Stop Black Mailing Jonathan, PDP Tells Adeosun On Airport Terminals Funding

The Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) has accused the Minister of Finance, Mrs. Kemi Adeosun, of blackmailing the previous government with her claim that Nigeria has not paid the airport terminal counterpart funding of $100 million. Adeosun was said to have made the claim in a television programme.
The party described such statement like her previous ones as false, misleading, malicious and was deliberately made with the intention of blackmailing previous PDP administrations in the country.
In a statement yesterday by its National Publicity Secretary, Prince Dayo Adeyeye, the PDP said it was pained that the All Progressives Congress (APC) under President Muhammadu Buhari was bent on sacrificing the nation’s hard earned democracy on the altar of falsehood by consistently disregarding and denying its achievements in the 16 years.
The PDP said the contract for the remodeling and building of the airport terminal in the nation’s airports in Lagos, Abuja, Port Harcourt, Kano and Enugu, which was awarded in 2014, was on Built, Operate and Transfer (BOT) basis. According to the party, the contracts were financed by the Chinese EXIM Bank with counterpart funds from Nigeria. “The contract total sum was $500 million with counterpart funding of $100 million from Nigeria.
“The fact of the matter is that, Nigeria paid her $100 million on January 29, 2014 through the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) at the beginning of the projects,” the statement revealed. It added that the Permanent Secretary, Federal Ministry of Aviation, Hajiya Binta Bello, corroborated this in an interview with a national newspaper on September 14 last year.
PDP quoted Bello to have said that; “Finance was not an impediment, and that Nigeria’s counterpart funding of $100 million has been paid at the commencement of the projects,” while adding that the project would be completed and delivered at the first quarter of 2016.
It wondered why the minister “is not only standing the truth on its head, but depicting the habitual lies and deceit that the All Progressives Congress (APC) is known for.