VANGUARD NEWS

The Rivers State Commissioner for Information and Communications, Paulinus Nsirim, has reiterated that Rivers State is safe for business.

Nsirim made the declaration, yesterday, when the newly elected executive body of the Port Harcourt Chamber of Commerce, Industry, Mines and Agriculture, PHCCIMA, paid him a courtesy visit in his office in Port Harcourt.

The commissioner charged PHCCIMA to articulate strategies that will project the state to the outside world as a place that is safe for business.

He said: “We want PHCCIMA to have a voice. The voice of the chamber needs to be louder because we must articulate strategies that will begin to project Rivers state to the outside world.

“I don’t think there is any state that has integrated and comprehensive security architecture like what Governor Nyesom Wike has put in place in Rivers State. We have the conventional police force, the Operation Sting, the C4i and the Neighbourhood Watch.”

Nsirim said Wike has done his part by providing the right leadership, building the right infrastructure and making the state safe for businesses to thrive, adding that what is needed is for the voice of PHCCIMA to be heard louder about the business opportunities that abound in the State.

“Governor Wike has done his part. He has also properly streamlined the tax regime to ensure that businesses do not suffer multiple taxation. We need to begin to develop the synergy that will begin to build on what he has done for Rivers State.

“We cannot quantify in monetary terms how much this administration has impacted  on businesses. That is why Governor Wike was quick to set up the Ease of Doing Business Council strategically designed to build a framework for the expansion of businesses.

“So we need to make our voice to come out strong. The world must hear it loud and clear that Rivers State is open for business.

“Qatar airlines will be flying Port Harcourt from March 3, while Turkish airlines have been flying Port Harcourt. Airlines like that won’t come to a State that is not safe. And those are the kind of things the Chamber needs to leverage on to tell the world that Rivers State is safe, he said.

The Commissioner noted that in the midst of perceived insecurity in the Niger Delta, oil companies carry out their exploration and exploitation activities unhindered adding that the design by detractors to demarket the State is to make capital flight possible for them while the goose that lays the golden eggs suffered.

“We must work together to make people understand that we have come to understand the political economy of the kind of thing they do to us as a people,” he said.

Nsirim congratulated the President and members of the new executive of PHCCIMA and expressed confidence in the ability of the new leadership to change the narrative.