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Wike suspends all events at Abuja International Conference Centre
The Minister of the Federal Capital Territory (FCT), Nyesom Wike, has suspended all events at the International Conference Centre, Abuja.
The minister announced the suspension after he inspected the centre on Monday in Abuja.
He said the suspension was to enable Julius Berger to carry out holistic rehabilitation of the centre.
Wike had earlier terminated the contract of Messrs Integrated Facility Management Services Limited, assigned to manage the centre.
The minister, who announced the development in a statement issued on April 4 by his Director of Press, Mr Anthony Ogunleye, said that Julius Berger had been contracted for the immediate renovation of the centre.
On Monday, after Wike went around the facility, he described it as a mere conference centre.
He said: “There is nothing international about the centre.
“When we came here for the ECOWAS inauguration sometime last week with President Bola Tinubu, no right-thinking human being would see the state of this facility and be happy.
“In fact, during the inauguration, Tinubu drew my attention to the rot. Even the lighting system was so poor.
“This is unacceptable. There is no way we can accept this as an International Conference Centre.
“You can call it a conference centre but not international because there is no standard compared to any international conference centre”.
He added that the FCT Administration would not continue to be embarrassed by the poor state of the centre.
“So, we are sorry to announce this; every booking made here is cancelled.
“We will start immediate rehabilitation of the centre to meet up with international standards,” the minister stated.