NAN-H-81
Cards
By Victor Adeoti
Osogbo, Feb. 8 2017 (NAN) The Osun House of Assembly on Wednesday said the delay in the execution of the state’s residence card contract by Messrs Cham Plc since 2012 was unacceptable.
Mr Tunde Olatunji, the House Committee Chairman on Industries, Commerce, Cooperatives and Empowerment, said this at a meeting with Messrs Cham Plc, the consultant handling the card project in Osogbo.
Olatunji said that it was worrisome that not a single card, also known as “ Card Omoluabi, ‘ had been produced since the award of the contract in 2012.
He said the assembly had received complaints from residents who had enrolled for the cards.
” This is not good enough. You have spent N272 million on the cards and yet you have not produced a single card since 2012.
“People are anxiously waiting for you to deliver,’’ he said.
But in his response, Mr Kayode Komolafe, the Chief Operating Officer of the company, said the inability of the company to access funds was responsible for the delay.
Komolafe, said the initial contact sum as at 2012 for biometric registration of residents was N467 million, adding that only N272 million had been paid since inception .
He said the biometric registration actually started in 2014 with public school pupils, adding that the company had enrolled 858,895 pupils and adults.
” We have enrolled 471,347 public school pupils and 387, 548 adults, making a total of 858, 895 persons registered,’’ he said.
Komolafe, however, said close to a million cards would be produced for the residents in the next eight weeks.
He said the target was to enrol two million residents under the initiative.
Komolafe said the database produced would help government in planning for all sectors of the state’s economy. (NAN)
VE/OJO
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(Edited by Mufutau Ojo)