Chief Akene had in an unprecedented manner came out tough with widespread allegations of unlawful and unjust collection of loans by the immediate past Bayelsa Governor Henry Seriake
Dickson wrote and published that, Loans collection became the order of the day with the Dickson Administration which took loans from Nigerian banks and banks outside Nigeria, according to Chief Akene, amounting to billions of dollars with foreign banks and N100bn with Nigerian banks.
Surveyor Akene was appointed Commissioner in 2012, by the former Governor, Henry Seriake Dickson in his first tenure in office and assigned to the Ministry of Lands. But Surveyor Akene who did not see the appointment as what he should have wasted his time, resigned.
Lamenting the level of under-development and poverty in the State, while tracing the cause to loans collection by the State Government; especially during the eight years adminstration of the immediate past Governor, Seriake Dickson, Surveyor Akene who painstakingly gave blow-by-blow accounts of a visibly outrageous debt profile of the fledgling Oil and Gas rich, only all Ijaw State, in the Niger Delta Region South South Nigeria wrote an article he titled:
"ECHOES OF DEVELOPMENT IN BAYELSA STATE-EPISODE (12)..; where he graphically itemized the loans profile of the State, according to his findings based on a report by the Debt Management Office (DMO) as follows:
External debts:-
31st December 2008
$25, 788, 797.44
31st December 2011
$27, 447 ,347.48
30th June 2012
$27, 897, 951..97
31st December 2012
$28, 002, 261.72
31st December 2015
$37, 602, 856.36
31st December 2019
$59, 511, 021.22
Domestic debt in Nigerian Naira culled from DMO reports as at:-
31st December 2014
N91, 681, 863, 473 29
December 2015
N103, 374, 234, 640.82
30th September 2019
N129, 243, 132, 172.38
30th June 2020
N150, 057, 580, 348.08
"This implies that from 31st of January 2012 to 31st of December the State got an external debt of $32, 064, 672.74 (US dollars).
In the same vein from January 2012 to 30th of June 2020 the State got a domestic debt of N100bn."
Continuing, Chief Akene made it clear that:
"The figures show that the last four and half months of the.immediate past administration and the first four and half months of present administration, the State has collected a loan of N22.8bn.
Chief Akene used the medium to question the functionality of the State Parliament in these words:
"WHAT IS THE ROLE OF THE BAYELSA HOUSE OF ASSEMBLY IN ALL THESE LOANS?"
He accused the Executive and the State Assembly of complicity in the borrowing or loans collection business.
Surveyor Akene who posited that the Bayelsa State debt profile was N50bn before Henry Seriake Dickson came onboard, expressed disappointment over the way and manner the said loans were taken in connivance with the State Assembly to the tune of billions of dollars and N100bn in the face of other avenues of revenue which include:
"Bayelsa State own... Oil Company Limited that have a functional and producing Oil field, yet no revenue has been declared.
"Bayelsa Development and Investment Company BDIC have asset base worth over N200bn spread across Nigeria, South Africa, UK, and others, but over the years, no income has been declared by the so-called transparency briefing that has never been transparent.."
Chief Akene said.
The former Bayelsa State Commissioner for Lands who voluntarily resigned, Surveyor Furoebi Akene emphatically posited that:
"Despite all these sources of revenue, Yenagoa the State capital still remains as a glorified village slum...the Local Government headquarters.... streets in Yenagoa are deplorable to the extent that vehicles cannot pass through some of them."
He observed with concern that consequent upon the ugly trend, Bayelsa which receives higher financial allocation because of the 13% derivation funds is now the poorest and most underdeveloped amongst the six States that were created the same day with Bayelsa, October 1st 1996 namely:
"Ebony, Ekiti, Gombe, Yobe and Zamfara States.
Out of the six States with Bayelsa receiving higher monthly allocations with 13% derivation funds, Chief Akene said Bayelsa is the poorest and most underdeveloped which he attributed to penchance in loans collection to the detriment of Bayelsans by the former Governor of the State in connivance with the State Assembly as alleged.
Efforts to reach the former Governor to get his side of the story proved abortive as at Press time.
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