Niger Delta stakeholders, especially the Ogoni Ethnic Nationality, have berated the Minister of Works, Dave Umahi, for defending the commissioning of the uncompleted phase one of the Eleme-Onne axis of the East-West Road.

The stakeholders said that it was a mark of “dishonour” for the minister to “lie openly” and defend the commissioning of a road that has not been completed.

Following public outcry that trailed the controversial commissioning of the road on May 31, 2025, The Guardian, on June 9, 2025, carried out an on-ground fact-checking and it was verified that the commissioned phase one of the road, which is one carriageway of the dual carriageway, has not been completed, as work is still ongoing by the Reynold Construction Company (RCC) while the second carriageway was is to commence.

President Bola Tinubu had, in a statement issued on May 31, 2025, by his Special Adviser on Information and Strategy, Bayo Onanuga, announced the commissioning of several roads across the country, including the dualisation of the East-West road section II (sun section I) from Eleme-Junction, in Port Harcourt, to Ahoada.

However, after criticism that trailed the commissioning of the road, on June 12, the minister, during an inspection on the site, told journalists (not The Guardian) that the project is in phases, explaining that what was commissioned is phase one which is one carriageway.

Umahi said: “Phase one is one carriageway and phase two is the second carriageway, the bridges and the flyover. So, we are done with phase one and that’s what we have commissioned”.

Piqued by the minister’s claim and insistence that the road was almost 80 per cent completed, former President of the Movement for the Survival of Ogoni People (MOSOP), Pygbara Legborsi, called for the sack of the minister, saying that his alleged claim and deceit on the road is a “continuation of a genocide against the Ogoni people.”

Legborsi lamented that many people have been killed on the same road, adding that the minister’s claim that an uncompleted road was good enough for commissioning means he wants further death on the road.