Rivers  Set to Create a New City

Blessing Ibunge in Port Harcourt

The Rivers State Governor, Mr. Siminalayi Fubara, has disclosed that every arrangement has been put in place to achieve the development of new cities in the state that would help to decongest Port Harcourt and Obio/Akpor cities.

Fubara said that the new cities would end the one city status of Rivers State and attract more investors into the state.

The governor stated this yesterday when he inspected the Greater Port Harcourt City Development Authority’s (GPHCDA) office and project sites in Ikwerre Local Government Area of the state. Fubara said that his administration is determined to do more by adding to what it has inherited in order to establish more cities in Rivers State.

“I can assure you that in our time, we might not achieve the dream of that big city in four years, but we will add a few things that would also help us in getting at that target.

“This is because, we are thinking of decongesting the present one city state that we have, which is Port Harcourt and Obio Akpor. We are thinking of developing other parts of the state and our coming here is to see what the agency has been doing, what you have done already and what we can also do to make us achieve more new cities in our state.”

Fubara noted that despite the challenges the agency has been facing, there would be remarkable difference in what it would achieve within his tenure if the agency’s development ideals are aligned with those of the state government. 

He, however, charged the agency to be self-sustaining by attracting investors as outlined by its establishment law.

Speaking, the Sole Administrator of GPHCDA, Mr. Desmond Akawor, said that since its establishment in 2009 by the Greater Port Harcourt Law, the agency has been slowed down in creating more cities because of its operational structure and the nature of the Public-Private Partnership it adopted.

Akawor, who is the Rivers State Chairman of the Peoples’ Democratic Party (PDP), explained that a new legal framework has been fine-tuned by the last GPHDA board, which the current management would present to the governor. 

He said: “I am sure that with your directives, we will be able to reschedule some of the projects so that we can move forward with all of our partners, especially in the area of reforming or strengthening the public private partnership arrangements.”