Obaseki’s consultants tried to shutdown EdoGIS database – Ikpasaja

The managing director of the Edo State Geographic Data Service, EdoGIS, Dr Tony Ikpasaja, has disclosed that his administration inherited over 7,500 functions for certificates of occupancy allegedly deserted by consultants engaged by the instant previous administration of Governor Godwin Obaseki to handle the company.

DAILY POST stories that Dr Ikpasaja made the allegation throughout an viewers with the manager of the Correspondents’ Chapel of the Edo State Council of the Nigeria Union of Journalists, NUJ, in Benin Metropolis.

In response to him, greater than 7,500 recordsdata had been uploaded however left untreated—functions from people looking for to have their land registered and captured within the EdoGIS database.

“It was like they simply left the recordsdata idle there. About 7,500 whole recordsdata of candidates had been all left and never attended to. Residents would pay for registration, and they might simply depart the recordsdata there unattended. Possibly they had been solely attending to these in whom they’d an curiosity.

“For the 7,500 functions, we’re processing them and virtually finished with it. They’re the backlog that we inherited from the previous authorities.

“So, within the strategy of attempting to deliver again the system, we now have to return to the backlog of issues. We had been rebuilding step by step. In the intervening time, I can let you know that now we have reached a really comfy level,” he stated.

Dr Ikpasaja acknowledged that in lower than two months in workplace, his administration had registered and captured over 9,000 certificates of occupancy, which at the moment are prepared for assortment.

He assured the 7,500 candidates that their certificates would quickly be prepared, noting that the company was engaged on the pending functions alongside the 9,000 already processed.

He added that the brand new software program lately deployed by the administration had enabled the company to register over 9,000 certificates inside two months—far exceeding the 1,000 recorded by the earlier authorities between 2023 and February 2025.

The EdoGIS boss recounted how, upon assuming workplace, the consultants beforehand overseeing operations shut down all the system, ensuing within the lack of candidates’ contact data, amongst different knowledge.

“Below this current administration, we acquired new gear lately, and decommissioned the outdated ones as a result of they don’t seem to be helpful for at the moment’s work. We acquired new gear that’s of a better degree to enhance productiveness. Our workers are absolutely on floor, extremely engaged, and they’re very completely satisfied.

“I need to use this chance to tell you and the folks of the state that now we have been issuing certificates of occupancy and likewise producing extra.

“Those who have utilized and haven’t but obtained their certificates—we attraction to them to train slightly persistence. We guarantee them that they may get their certificates. We’re processing them as folks apply.

“When these consultants left and shut down our system, we misplaced the contacts of candidates. We couldn’t attain them, nor may they attain us. However now, that has been rectified. We now have lively telephone strains, and now we have began speaking with folks. We’ll quickly make the strains out there to the general public.

“When it comes to expertise, the construction of the info that we met on floor was not what we anticipated and was not professionally finished, so we needed to do a variety of restructuring to handle the info and use it to construct the brand new system.

“They tried to delete as a lot knowledge as they may to make sure that we couldn’t survive on our personal with out calling them again. By the grace of God, we recovered all that knowledge and had been capable of restore it into the system.

“We proceed from precisely the place we had been. So, folks shouldn’t be afraid—their data was not misplaced, and we guarantee them that they may all obtain their certificates. All who’ve utilized—we’re processing them, and in no distant time, we can get them out,” he stated.

DAILY POST recollects that the Dr Ernest Afolabi Umakhihe-led Property Verification Committee had alleged that the instant previous administration of Godwin Obaseki awarded 22 ICT contracts value N22 billion.

Umakhihe additionally alleged that non-state actors had been in command of Edo’s e-government platforms.

The committee additional alleged that disengaged consultants employed by the Obaseki administration had been being paid N5.7 billion to subscribe to the e-government platform.