Controversy has continued to trail the demolition of markets and motor parks by the Enugu State Government with the latest facts revealing that the company which has been awarded the contract to convert the demolished Ogige market at Nsukka to a motor park has only 10,000 units of shares.

There has been outrage across Enugu State since May 22, 2024, when agents of the state government commenced the demolition of major markets, motor parks, and buildings ahead of plans to build standard motor parks.

In Enugu, government bulldozers brought down portions of property belonging to the Nigerian Railway Corporation, including a section leased for a private polytechnic belonging to a charismatic Catholic priest, Rev. Fr. Emmanuel Edeh.

In Nsukka, the demolition, which commenced on Sunday, brought to rubble, the Ogige Market that has existed for nearly 70 years.

Findings indicate that the Enugu State Government has concessioned the building of the motor part to a company, Clan Development Company Limited, registered as a private limited liability company on January 12, 2004.

Search results obtained from the Corporate Affairs Commission (CAC) indicate that Clan Development Company Limited, is has a total of four shareholders, including, Onunkwo D. Chukwunenye, Nnenna B. Declan Onunkwo, Olisaemeka D. Onunkwo, and Ifunanya D. Onunkwo.

The company, whose registered address is at 43B, Ndiuche Street, Aba, Abia State, according to CAC documents, has 10,000 units of shares, although there was no indication of the value of each of those shares.

A Google search on the name and person of Chukwunenye Onunkwo yielded only a LinkedIn account which has no display picture nor any connections and posts, indicating it was recently opened.

Clan Development Company Limited is the second company on record that will be awarded a multibillion-business by the Enugu State Government with no known pedigree in the business.

Earlier in May, it was discovered that Pragmatic Palms Limited a company partnering with the state to revive the state-owned palm processing company had no track record in the agro-processing industry. It was also discovered, from data gathered from the Corporate Affairs Commission, that Pragmatic Palms was also registered in January 2024.

Although the government defended the controversial company by saying that Pragmatic Palms is a special-purpose vehicle, the coincidence concerning the time the two companies were registered raises some questions.

Speaking on the issue, the Chairman of Labour Party in Enugu State, Comrade Casmir Agbo lamented the demolition exercise take place in parts of Enugu State, saying that the opaque nature of the contract has vindicated his party’s position that the government was not sincere about the reasons for the demolition of properties across the state.

Agbo wondered the reason for the award of such a project to an unknown company with only 10,000 shares, wondering how the project would be financed.

“We have done our checks and the date from the CAC cannot lie, It clearly states hat this contractor that will handle the Nsukka Motor Park project has only 10,000 shares. As a lawyer, assuming that these shares is divided into fifty kobo units, what it means is that this company is worth only N5,000. Even if it is in units of N1 for each share, then the value of this company cannot be higher than N10,000. This means the company is not worth more than a kiosk that sells biscuits. How will is raise the money for this project, Comrade Agbo asked.

Also lending his voice to the matter, an Abuja-based lawyer, Osita Okoro, questioned the integrity of the transaction between Clan Development Company Limited and the Enugu State Government, wondering why the government should award such a contract to such a company of low credit-worthiness.

“What the Enugu State Government is doing with most of its projects is creating a lot of doubts in the minds of people. We were still struggling to understand why a market that has been in existence for more than 60 years would be demolished after giving the traders only a 72-hour notice to quit when we began to learn that the company that would handle the project has only 10,000 shares. We also heard initially that the project was going to be a public-private partnership between this company and the state government, but we also need to know why this same company was listed as a contractor on the signboard announcing the project. If this latest information is correct, when was the tender for the job done and how was the selection process done,” Okoro queried.

He also wondered why the government has refused to disclose the cost of the project to the people of the state.

“Whatever the government is doing, there should be no missing the fact that it is the tax-payers money that they are spending on these projects. As a result, simple expectations of transparency should make the government to disclose precisely how much the motor parks in Nsukka and Enugu are costing the people of the state,” Okoro said.

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