President Muhammadu Buhari said on Thursday the Ajaokuta Steel Complex would generate $ 1.6 billion annually and provide 500,000 jobs for Nigerian youths.
The president, according to a statement issued by his Senior Special Assistant on Media and Publicity, Garba Shehu, stated this at the Palace of the Ohinoyi of Ebiraland.
Buhari, who was in Kogi on a one-day visit, commissioned the Agassa-Ogboboro Road and the Ohinoyi of Ebiraland Palace.
He also commissioned the 300-bed Reference Hospital in Okene, and later inspected the medical facility that houses the Sigma-Prime Magnetic Resonance Imaging Machine, CT Scan, and other world-class medical equipment.
The president reaffirmed his administration’s readiness to position Kogi as an industrial hub as well as a solid mineral power base.
He explained how the Federal Government resolved all legal entanglements that had bogged down the progress of the Ajaokuta Steel Complex.
Buhari said: “No other single project holds the key to unlocking this vast potential as much as the Ajaokuta Steel Complex which we inherited as a long moribund complex strangulating under a tangle of local and international commercial disputes.
“I am glad to report that as we begin to round off in the office, we can genuinely say that our administration has rescued Ajaokuta from all legal disabilities.
”It is now ready for concessioning to a private investor with the right profiles to put it to work for Nigeria in general and Kogi in particular.
”The process has cost this Federal Government over $400million so far, but I consider it money well spent as we move closer to achieving our objective of transforming Kogi State into Nigeria’s iron and steel powerhouse.
“The benefits of getting Ajaokuta Steel Complex working again are numerous. It would provide over 500,000 estimated jobs and more than $1.6 billion in annual income to the Nigerian economy.
“Nigerians can rest assured that I remain committed to seeing this process to a logical conclusion before the end of my tenure in office.”
He insisted that the All Progressives Congress (APC) had delivered on its promises to Nigerians at all levels.
He said Governor Yahaya Bello had performed creditably in his two terms as governor of the state.
“We are an administration that prides ourselves in the fulfillment of our electoral promises to the Nigerian people, at both national and sub-national levels.
”This is why I am glad that we have an impressive array of legacy projects through your own state government as proof of our stewardship of Kogi.
“The APC Administration has indelible footprints in Kogi,” he added.
