Few weeks ago, the presidential probe committee on the activities of the Niger Delta Development Commission (NDDC) submitted its report to the Secretary to Government of the Federation, Senator Pius Anyim. The committee, which is chaired by former Head of Service of the Federation, Mr. Steve Oronsaye uncovered mind- boggling fraud perpetrated by the commission and recommends the dissolution of the board. This led to the sack of the board and management by President Goodluck Ebele Jonathan. FRANCIS OTTAH AGBO and Anayo Onukwugha examine the issues at state.
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Yesterday, President Goodluck Ebele Jonathan bowed to public opinion with the dissolution of the Niger Delta Development Commission (NDDC).
In a statement signed by the Secretary to the Government of the Federation (SGF), Senator Anyim Pius Anyim, the president said the sack was predicated on the recommendation of the presidential committee set up to investigate the spiral of allegations against the commission.
The committee was headed by the immediate past Head of Service of the Federation, Mr. Steven Orosanye. Anyim also instructed the Managing Director (MD), Mr. Chibuzor Ugwuoha and other executive directors to handover the commission’s items in their custody to the Director of Administration and Human Resources, Mrs Osato Areyenka.
The NDDC was established in 2002 by the then president, Chief Olusegun Obasanjo to serve as a catalyst for the development of the Niger Delta region, whose environment had been adversely polluted as a result of oil exploration and exploitation.
Unfortunately, since its inception, the interventionist agency has not met the expectations of the people of the nine states that make up the Niger Delta region especially in the areas of infrastructure and human capital development.
In all instances the management and the board had connived to salt away the resources that should have been used to develop the region.
But that honey moon seemed to have ended with the feud between the NDDC board headed by former Air Vice Marshal Larry Koinyan and the MD.
The NDDC board had in November, 2010 written a petition to the federal government accusing the MD of opening a foreign account with First Bank Plc, United Kingdom and transferring mind-boggling amounts into same account without authorisation of the board and the office of the Accountant General of the Federation (AGF).
This and many other allegations necessitated the setting up of a committee headed by Oronsaye.
The committee which was inaugurated on July 27 this year was mandated to investigate all the allegations levelled against the management and make recommendations on the way forward.
Radical lawyer, Mr. Bamidele Aturu, Mr. B. O. N. Otti, a representative of the Bureau for Public Procurement, and Senator Bassey Ewa- Henshaw are members.
Other members are, Mr. Ishaq Yahaya. Alhaji Mohammed Ibrahim, Mr. Raymond Brown and Dr. Timiebi Koripamo- Agary.
The committee report reads in parts: ‘‘that the MD proceeded to open a new account with First Bank Plc, in the United Kingdom without the approval from the board and with fictitious board resolution…’’ Ugwuoha claimed that he took the solo decision because NDDC bank in the UK ( Union Bank) was weak.
He said he opened a foreign account and transferred the monies into same because he wanted to be proactive so that the commission would not lose funds if the bank eventually crumbles the way Societe Generale Bank went.
But the committee is of the view that the MD had sufficient time to seek approval from the board before opening the account.
LEADERSHIP learnt that Oronsaye and his team were also shocked that in spite of the controversy generated by the foreign account, the MD still went ahead to transfer $37million out of Union Bank, Uk into the notorious account.
In fact the MD opened the account without the approval of the AGF. According to the report, the MD, having realized that he ran foul of the law got approval for the transaction from the AGF office in December 2010 for the offshore account that was actually opened in September of same year.
The committee position is that the purported approval given by the AGF was illegal, null and void having contravened Section 701 of the Federal Government Financial Regulations.
The panel discovered that while $20 million was withdrawn from the ailing Union Bank, a sum of $58 million was left in the same sinking Union Bank.
The report revealed that no interest has been credited to the NDDC from September 2010, when the account was opened to date.
Besides, the panel it was learnt established that the transfer of another $37 million to the contentious First Bank UK offshore account bringing the total funds in the account to $57 million.
Furthermore, our sources in the Presidency stated that infraction of the Public Procurement Act (PPA) was established in the award of over 500 contracts worth over N120 billion, without budgetary provision.
The panel also discovered the award of consultancy service contract of about N27 billion, out of which N4.7 billion has been released to the contractor.
Also two executive directors were indicted over a transaction that amounted to $80 million.
The embattled Ugwuoha seemed unrepentant in his reaction to the report of the committee.
He said people are calling for his head because he sanitised NDDC.
‘‘Everybody wants business as usual. Once you deviate from what is known, even if it will bring the very best result, people will attack you first,’’ the MD argued. Ugwuoha who was speaking to journalists in Abuja this week after bagging the ‘‘Service Delivery Index Award for Most Outstanding Public Institutions’’ said instead of been praised for moving NDDC funds from a ‘‘failing bank to a strong bank,’’ the committee wanted the world to believe that his act was fraudulent.
He explained that for transferring the money from Union Bank to First Bank, the latter has joined NDDC foreign scheme and will contribute $1.2million annually for a period of five years to the Niger Delta region.
The controversial MD was however silent on the criminality of single-handedly opening the account and the presentation of fictitious board resolutions that enabled him to open the infamous account.
Meanwhile Anyim on receipt of the interim report from Orosanye reviewed the committee’s recommendation and urged the president to sack the current leadership in his executive summary to the presidency.
However, there seems to be sharp disagreement among groups in the Niger Delta region on the recommendations of the Oronsaye panel report, especially as it affects the call for the dissolution of the NDDC board as well as the sack of Ugwuoha. Such groups include, the South-South Youth Movement for Non-Violence (SSYMN) and the International Society for Social Justice and Human Rights (ISSJHR).
To the SSYMN, the recommendation was not the wish of the people of the Niger Delta.
The human rights group said the recommendation of the presidential committee was not in order as the current administration of the NDDC, under the MD had done well through its youth empowerment programme.
According to SSYMN President, Mr. Cliff Ndubisi; “The recommendation is not the wish of the people of the Niger Delta. We are witnesses to how the removal of Ambassador Sam Edem affected the NDDC.
The dissolution of the board and removal of the MD could negatively affect the growth of the commission and Niger Delta as a whole.”
But to the Chancellor of the ISSJHR, Chief Jackson Omenazu, the level of corruption in the commission had prevented the interventionist agency from achieving its objectives.
Omenazu was speaking during a one-day symposium, organized by the Correspondents’ Chapel of the Nigerian Union of Journalists (NUJ) in Rivers State to deliberate on the performance of the NDDC as it affects development in the oil and gas-rich region.
Speaking at the symposium, which had the theme; ‘NDDC: The Performance, Challenges, and Prospects’, the founding director of the Ijaw Council for Human Rights (ICHR), Patterson Ogon, who commended the Oronsaye probe panel for submitting its report to the federal government, recalled that the National Security Adviser, General Andrew Azazi was earlier mandated to investigate the brewing crisis in the NDDC but could not make any head way.
Read him: “I wish to commend the Steve Oransaye probe panel for submitting its report to the federal government.
Recall also that the National Security Adviser was earlier mandated to investigate the brewing crisis and report to the President.” Ogon, who spoke on the sub-theme;
Strengthening Revenue Management in the Niger Delta’ urged President Jonathan not to allow the report of the panel go the way of other reports in the country stressing that given the public perception about the reports of probe panels in this country, Mr. President’s positive rating may rise if he is able to quickly act on the recommendations of the reports.
Ogon, who flayed the in-fighting in the NDDC, called for the full publication of the report of the committee in view of fears that the report may be biased.
In his presentation, the deputy president, Niger Delta Integrity Group (NDIG), a lecturer with the Rivers State University of Science and Technology, Mr. Idumange John said the Managing Director of NDDC has consistently flouted violated parts of the Act establishing the Commission, saying that such violations include; the award of contracts without due process; non-implementation of the Board’s decisions.
He also accused Ugwuoha of undue interference with the statutory functions of State Representatives in creating a Due Process Unit a situation he exploited to perpetrate heinous financial crimes in the commission.
Idumange, who spoke on the sub-theme: “The Impact of NDDC in the Eyes of Ordinary Niger Deltans,” also accused the management of the commission of usurpation of the functions of the board of NDDC.
As one State Commissioner puts it ‘‘the MD kills every viable programme and policy initiatives by the board and stifles their implementation.
This ridicules the decisions of the board by permitting NDDC contract award letters to be flaunted outside the Commission and sold cheaply to contractors.
Idumagen stressed that the conditions for tendering and bidding for contracts are so harsh that not many Niger Delta people can meet them.
It therefore implies that NDDC contracts are indirectly meant for people outside the Region. One of the conditions is that contractors will not obtain mobilization and are expected to deliver on the first milestone.
He said his investigations show that these harsh conditions were unilaterally introduced by the present Management without the approval of the board.
Idumange called on the federal government to take urgent steps to review the Act of Parliament establishing the NDDC so as to remove the omnibus role of the commission.
Emphasizing that the responsibilities marked out in the NDDC Act 2000 was too bogus for the commission, the university don said the provision of the Act had made it impossible for the NDDC to fully implement its responsibilities for the people of the region.
While calling on the federal government to revisit the mission statement of the Federal Ministry of Niger Delta Affairs, he insisted that the ministry now sees the NDDC as a competitor in the development of the region.
To Mr. Anyaekwe Nsirimovu, executive director of the Port Harcourt-based Institute of Human Rights and Humanitarian Laws (IHRHL), the NDDC, which was established to achieve a people centred development, was now being used as an instrument to under develop people of the region.
Nsirimovu who described the NDDC as animal farm said it is being controlled by godfathers who in turn appoint board members by way of patronage, saying the commission was not meant to succeed. Nsirimovu, who presented a paper on the theme; ‘Niger Delta: Bad Animal Farm’, said; “People-centered development was the essence of establishing the NDDC, but unfortunately, those who established it did not want it to succeed.
“Just like the OMPADEC, the people who set up NDDC never wanted it to succeed. Can you believe that till today, the federal government still owes OMPADEC billions of naira.
The NDDC is only helping individuals to succeed and not the people of the region,” he stressed.
The human right activist called for intellectual militancy in the Niger Delta region, saying that it was the only way to redeem the region. He added that the problem of the Niger Delta region is not Abuja but the people of Niger Delta.
He believes as long as there is deficit democracy in the region, there will continue to be under development in the region.
With the sack of Ugwuoha and the board, Alhaji Abubakar Tsav, renowned anti-corruption crusader, has called on the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) to commence the investigation of the commission’s leadership for contravening section 14 of the NDDC Act.
Will the commission act?
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