A FORMER Chairman of Senate Committee on Federal Capital Territory, Sen Smart Adeyemi has said that last Tuesday’s Memorandum of Understanding, MoU, between Kogi State government and Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation, NNPC, on ethanol fuel would make the state a model for economic development.
He particularly said that apart from providing jobs for more than two million people, the partnership which would result in the construction of a refinery in the state would make Kogi less dependent on federal allocation. The state government and NNPC signed the MoU in Abuja for the development of a biofuel processing plant that would produce 84 million litres of biofuel annually. Adeyemi in a chat with Vanguard, said more than five local government areas in the state are major producers of cassava needed for the biofuel refinery.
His words: “This agreement signifies a new chapter in the socio-economic history of Kogi State coming less than a month after the maiden edition of the economic summit. It also points to the fact that the state governor, Alhaji Yaya Bello is purpose driven. “The partnership will bring several individual and communal benefits to the confluence state. It will provide jobs for over two million people and also bring infrastructure development to the state which would make Kogi a model for economic development. This again has greatly re-echoed the New Direction Agenda of the government.
“I commend the governor for exploring latent but potent sectors aimed at diversifying the state economy and accelerating socio-economic development.
My political affiliation with the governor is such that gives me joy and convinces me that Kogi can work better with good governance.
‘’It is worthy of acknowledgment that with the implementation of the biofuel project, the government’s quest of having a maximally functioning government without necessarily looking forward to monthly allocation from the federal government would be greatly enhanced.’’
