Adibe Emenyonu in Benin City
The controversy surrounding the planned siting of an airport in Uzairue Kingdom in Etsako West local government area of Edo State being opposed by the people of the neighboring Okpella in Etsako East local government area continued yesterday as a group, Bullets of the Harmless Rabbit (BHR), have described the position of the Okpella people as an attempt to politicise the project.
A statement by the founder of the group, Lukeman Akemokue who is from Okpella, described the proposed airport as a project that would benefit members of the public while the airstrip being planned by an investors in Okpella was a private initiative.
He said there was no truth that the planned airstrip had been hijacked by the state government, stressing that neither did the government through the deputy governor, Comrade Philip Shaibu “clandestinely” moved an airport meant for Okpella to Uzairue as being insinuated.
He said: “First, what Dangote and BUA Cement companies are proposing in Okpella is airstrips for their private use, not airport for public use.
“Government cannot dictate to Dangote or BUA where to locate their private airstrips meant for their private use only. The insinuation that a private project is being hijacked and relocated from Okpella to Uzairue by the deputy governor is, therefore, mischievous and misplaced.”
On the issue that Okpella was mentioned by the Federal Ministry of Aviation as a community in Uzairue kingdom, Akemokhue said: “As for the use of names of two different communities-Okpella and Uzairue- as the location of the project, there is nothing clandestine about it.
“Preliminary Googlemap snap observations suggested two suitable lands between Uzairue and Okpella Communities, one by the left, and the other by the right, when going to Okpella form Uzairue.
“The deputy governor, in his usual show of fairness and wisdom, therefore instructed as follows: (a) if the project is situated wholly in Okpella Land, name it Okpella Airport; (b) if it is wholly Uzairue, name it Uzairue Airport; (c) but if it is situated in the lands belonging to the two communities, call it Okpella-Uzairue Airport. It was on the basis of this logical reasoning this dual-name was adopted by the inspectors, pending when the actual geographical coordinates will reveal the exact community(ies) the project is located.”
