Ebonyi state chapter of the All Progressives Congress (APC) on Wednesday called on Governor David Umahi to tighten the border closure across the state until the coronavirus pandemic was over.
Umahi had immediately closed all the borders across the state to prevent the spread of the coronavirus to the state on hearing that the disease has entered Nigeria.
The state APC said it was supporting the Governor’s action which according to it has worked very well and saved the state from contracting the disease.
The party Chairmen, Pastor Eze Nwachukwu Eze stated this in Abakaliki, the Ebonyi State Capital.
He said the party was totally in support of the closure of all borders in the state and recommended that it should be tightened.
Mr Nwachukwu urges the governor to reconsider the ban on motorcycles in the state.
He said that the ban has brought untold hardship to the people and commercial riders who depend on the okada business for survival.
Eze said “we want to commend the state government on the closure of the borders in Ebonyi state. This has really worked very well and we are in support of it. We encourage them to close the borders even tighter until the convid era is over.
“We want to call on the Governor to kindly consider the suffering and the plight of the Ebonyians and relax the ban on motorcycle in Ebonyi state, let it be limited to the border areas.
“The reason is obvious; Ebonyi state is an agrarian state, we are all farmers and good number of us in Ebonyi here are poor people. Good number of Ebonyians here are poor and the only means of transportation here predominantly is the use of motorcycles.
“So, it is difficult now for people to convey their farm inputs to the farms. The implication is that if these local people who have been doing great work to farm in Ebonyi state don’t have the means of convey both the humans and materials to the farms, we are afraid that the post Convid effect will be devastating.
“In the light of the above, whosoever may have advised him to put this total ban, we suggest he reverse this and relax it a little. We are not against the ban, but we are saying it should be relax.”
The Chairman raised the alarm that APC members in the state were being excluded in the compilation of names in the state for federal government conditional cash transfer scheme and called for the immediate inclusion of the members.