Ministry Of Niger Delta A Distraction To NDDC, Should Be Abolished – SSRG

The South-South Reawakening Group has called on President Bola Tinubu not to be distracted by blackmail in his earlier plans to abolish the Ministry of Niger Delta describing the ministry as a distraction to the Niger Delta Development Commission, NDDC.

The SSRG in a statement issued by its convener, Comrade Joseph Ambakederimo and made available to GWG.ng challenged supporters of the ministry to articulate the achievements of the ministry in the last 11 or so years of its existence.

“We need the Honourable Minister to bring forth verifiable list of projects undertaken by his Ministry for the past twelve years that the Ministry has existed either ongoing, completed or abandoned. We must verify these projects to corroborate our position that we have held, going further l will challenge the Honourable Minister of Niger Delta Development to a debate on National Television so that we can better appreciate the position we have held that the Ministry does not need to exist a day longer than necessary.

“We have also identified that the Ministry is a distraction on Niger Delta Development Commission (NDDC). The NDDC decline started about three years  after the Ministry was created and it became worse when the then Minister Senator Godswill Akpabio, now the President of the Senate took charge. The obsession that was brought to bear on the NDDC was suspect and of course our fears were confirmed.

“The maiden media interaction  the Honourable Minister had was basically all about the NDDC, nothing in the media interaction was said about the Ministry itself. The Minister did not mention one project undertaken by the Ministry or what is his action plan of the development of the region. It is disheartening to watch the tour of the Minister on Television without saying anything tangible or the government plan for the entire region that is replete with total collapse of infrastructures.

“Going by the recommendations put forward by the Steve Oronsaye committee that listed the Ministry of Niger Delta Development amongst others to be scrapped was the most ideal recommendations given by that committee. We support the position of the Steve Oronsaye committee and we hereby call on the President to do the needful as soon as practicable unless those calling for the retention of the Ministry of Niger Delta Development are beneficiaries of the diversion of the resources to line their pockets. If the Ministry must stay then it is there to line the pockets of a few, this is essentially what the Ministry has been used for. With all the agencies which are the Ministry, Amnesty office, NDDC, thirteen percent derivation, the states in the region are all in a competition to collect loans including the states statutory allocation, the the region is still crying for infrastructural attention, the resources that is allocated to all of these agencies including the states share of FACC is near one third of the annual national budget, this should tell us that something is not right. It is time to do the right thing and that right thing is streamlining of the MDA’s in the region that have anything to do with the development agenda of the oil producing areas.

Urging the president not to allow himself to be blackmailed from what it described as the reasonable thing to do, the group said:

“The President must not allow himself to be blackmailed, the appointment of Hon. Abubakar Momoh is in itself an aberration and should be reversed immediately. Here is a man that comes from a very dry land and cannot feel and will never feel what my people from the wetlands feel.”

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