ADB To Partner Rivers On New City Initiative

The African Development Bank (ADB) says it will offer technical information to the Rivers Government in its bid to develop a new city.

The News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) reports that the state government is building a “Greater Port Harcourt City” to decongest the old city.

The West African Regional Director of ADB, Mr. John Litse, told newsmen in Port Harcourt on Tuesday that the bank’s assistance would be in the area of capacity building and technical assistance.

“The new city will definitely improve the living standards of Rivers people, hence our support to the government in capacity building and technical assistance,” he said.

The bank, however, advised the government to prepare a transactional guide as well as Preliminary Evaluation Note, including its projection for the next five years.

He added that such data would pave way for a grant of $1 million under its African Private Sector Assistance programme.

The Administrator of the Greater Port Harcourt City Development Authority, Mrs. Aleruchi Cookey-Gam, thanked the bank for its support.

“Amidst other landmark achievements, Rivers government has not incurred any external debt toward the development of infrastructure in the State,” she said.

The administrator said the state government would be disposed to applying for low interest loans, noting that it had three windows of opportunity to borrow from the ADB.

She said the loans available to them were the ADB concessional and non-concessional loans, the Nigerian Transfer Fund and the ADF concessional window with a provision of $350 million.