The House of Representatives, on Tuesday, warned all parties involved in the crisis rocking the Niger Delta Development Commission (NDDC) to stop further media attacks on the National Assembly to allow a proper investigation into the matter for a peaceful resolution.
The Chairman of the House Committee on NDDC, Him Olubunmi Tunji-Ojo gave the warning at the opening session of the investigative hearing on the need to stop illegality in the Commission held in Abuja.
Recall that the House of Representatives, on 13th November 2019, deliberated on a motion on the need to stop the illegality in the Niger Delta Development Commission which was moved by Hon Ossai Nicholas Ossai and consequently referred same to the Committee to investigate.
Hon Tunji-Ojo said, “may I also use this opportunity to sound a note of warning that media attacks on the Legislature should stop henceforth.
“The National Assembly is one. An attack on the Senate is an attack on the House of Representatives and we will consider it as a declaration of war on the Institution. We will not allow anybody or agency to bring the Institution to disrepute.
” If there are contending issues to be resolved here, such can be done in camera, we are going to do just that now, we should work as a team and as a member of the same family.
” We are committed to dealing with the issues dispassionately and enjoin all the stakeholders to give the Committee maximum cooperation as the 9th National Assembly is determined to have a new and functional NDDC that will take the people of the region to the next level in line with the promise of President Muhammadu Buhari administration to the nation.”
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The Speaker of the House, Femi Gbajabiamila, while speaking at the occasion lamented that Ecological damage was still a clear and present danger to the people of the region, depriving them of opportunities for economic sustenance and sustainable living.
According to the Speaker who was represented by the Acting Leader of the House, Hon Peter Akpatason, ” the available transportation, healthcare and education infrastructure are still insufficient to meet the present needs of the people.
“And after these many years, the people of the region and indeed all of Nigeria are rightly beginning to wonder if the establishment of the Niger Delta Development Commission (NDDC) has served any real purpose, or made any measurable positive impact on the lives of the people in the region.
“Unfortunately, the available evidence suggests that these significant allocations have not achieved the objectives for which they were intended.
“It is for these reasons that the House of Representatives resolved to investigate the operations of the Niger Delta Development Commission (NDDC) to identify the issues that have mitigated against the full achievement of the Commission’s goals. Everything is on the table.
“Where corruption or mismanagement is the issue, we will uncover them and take necessary corrective action, and we will do so without political consideration or preference for any predetermined outcomes.
“Where funding or the lack thereof has been an issue, we will also take action to remedy the situation. Our objective is to ensure that the Commission is properly positioned to carry out its mandate effectively and meet the obligations it owes to the Niger Delta and to the country,” he added.
Speaking with newsmen after he appeared before the Committee, the Minister of the Ministry of Niger Delta Affairs, Senator Godwin Akpabio lamented that the Commission had not been living to expectations but expressed optimism that things would soon change for better.
On his encounter with the Committee, he said, “the investigation went well; it was all about legality, the result is not out yet but we have explained everything to them and gave them the necessary documents that backed up our activities.
“The forensic audit is on course. The intention is that if anybody has committed misappropriation or otherwise, it is a window of opportunity for them to go back to site for monies they collected and complete the projects, or the forensic audit if it does unearth those things, people have a right to refund or face the law.
” The essence of it may not necessarily be to unearth fraud, it is to find out why the failure of the agency in 18 years because we cannot say it has been a success story.
“Why has it not lived up to its expectations and why do we have so much poverty in the Niger-Delta.
“Nobody seems to own all those projects of the Niger-Delta especially misplacement of priorities. You have no single primary school but you can buy up to one million desks and pile them till they get spoiled.
“We also have to talk of the responsibilities of the not just the IOCs but the oil companies operating in the region. Why have they not been remitting their statutory percentage to the commission? How come many of them remitted those monies to wrong accounts and they are still owing the commission.
“The forensic audit is all-encompassing; it is about management, the projects even when the projects come in it may not be useful to some of those communities because of duplication as a result of lack of synergy with the states. For instance, when a state government is doing a particular road and the NDDC contractor will put his signboard and collects money and the state government eventually pays for the road. Those things are going to be unearthed.
“You also have to talk about the quality of deliveries; how come roads of the NDDC cannot last five years. Is it just cut and paste or a function of politically motivated infrastructure which is just meant to syphon money? The region is totally polluted. The oil spills, illegal refineries have destroyed a lot of the soil in the region. What can we do to ensure remediation?
“At the end of the audit, I will expect that the governance structure will have been well set; I will expect that we will now have the total number of projects and the total number of people who collected money without doing those projects.”
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