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Make NDDC Accountable To Niger Delta People – INC Boss

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Alabotubo Charles Harry is the President of the Ijaw National Congress (INC) worldwide. During a live Radio programme in Port Harcourt last Monday, he stated the position of the Ijaw apex organisation on the forensic audit of the NDDC ordered by President Muhammadu Buhari, insisting that the Interim Management Board of the commission led by Dr. Joy Nunieh should not be tampered with. He also spoke on the just concluded Governorship election in Bayelsa State. The Tide correspondent, Dennis Naku who monitored the programme presents this report. Excerpts.
Would you say happenings in Ijaw land in the last couple of months have been a good tiding for the people?
Elections are for the people to decide for themselves where they want to go whether we like where they have gone or not is not the issue here. What is an issue here is that the will of the people have taken place in Bayelsa and Bayelsa State cannot and will not be ruled through surrogates or God-fathers. For me I think where the people want to be is good tidings. A lot of people have few constraints here and there about what they feel about the elected or the Governor-elect. But I think that is not an issue.
What is the view of the INC on the forensic audit of the NDDC ordered by President Muhammadu Buhari?
I think it is a welcome development. I mean the Ijaw nation considering the 13 per cent derivation, the NDDC, the Amnesty Programme and the Ministry for the Niger Delta should have done much way better than it is doing. It is doing really poorly and I think an audit into the NDDC in particular, which is an interventionist agency to take care of certain developmental aspect of the Ijaw nation and the Niger Delta in general is a core place to begin.
Many Ijaw sons have held sway at NDDC, yet nothing seems to be coming to the Ijaw nation?
The real problem with the NDDC is the constitutional arrangement put in place. The NDDC act is set to fail. It is created in such a way that it puts a lot of power and puts the helmsmen in the NDDC under too much strain from extraneous quarters where they must kow tow to the dictates of the people who beat the drum, the senators, members of the House of Representatives, people in the executive. And you laden it up also with extraneous bodies like directors from the North East, North Central, North West, South West etcetera. All these things were time bombs that are now playing themselves out. I think the essence of this audit on the affairs of the NDDC is necessary because we need to find out why so much money has been pumped into the NDDC and it is not working. And the problem we are facing today, the fight against the Interim Management Board is because the same powers that be do not want that audit to succeed. Because if it does, maybe, we will get to a position where the NDDC Act will be amended to remove the overbearing influences that curtail its abilities to achieve its set aims.
The region has NDDC and Ministry of Niger Delta, one may be tempted to ask how come you are complaining of underdevelopment or do you think it is an orchestration to blackmail the region?
I will want to say that a lot of the faults belong to us at home here (Niger Delta). We must take the bull by the horns and accept responsibility for a great number of the things that have gone wrong. We have members representing us at the National Assembly who should have asked for an amendment of the laws blackmail, yes it is because if the Niger Delta Ministry cannot build the East West Road in over, it is close to 10 years since that Ministry was created and one major artery that takes the bulk of the products because the industrial hub of Nigeria sits here into the developed quarters of Lagos and the Ports cannot be fixed, then something is deliberately wrong. I believe and I am not in any way controverted to say that there is more to it than meets the eye.
You said one of the biggest challenge is the NDDC Act itself though you support the forensic audit. Do you think the rot might not go away unless the NDDC Act is changed?
Correctly so. The truth of the matter is that I even see the process of amending the NDDC Act being truncated because we saw the hurry with which the National Assembly went on to confirm a list that in itself is an abrogation of the principles and practices of the NDDC Act itself. People were put there surreptitiously and now an Interim Management Board was put in for one purpose. Not to issue contract, but to go and try to find out what is the problem going on there. The Interim Management Board as led by Dr. Joy Nunieh is supposed to just go in there and create an enabling environment for internationally reputed companies to do a forensic audit and see why trillions of Naira has been put into this place (NDDC) and it is not working.
It is not working because the budget of the NDDC is approved by the National Assembly. The two Houses and their oversight bodies always scream of and do not carry out the contracts.
Don’t you think people that the Niger Delta should also share the blame for the underdevelopment of the region rather than trading blames?
I have agreed that there is need for the forensic audit. But what I am insisting on is that the Interim Management Board must not be tampered with because the source of the problem is the oversight function that has been given through the Act to certain people. The Interim Management Board does not owe its loyalty to the National Assembly. Its job is clear and distinct, go clear the rot. But I am saying that after the rot is cleared, let us also clear the debilitating factors. Let us deal with what is causing this problem ab initio and not the causative reactions. The problem if you remember under the Onene, I believe the first Managing Director of the NDDC, the problem was not much, but now every NDDC leadership owes all its life to some people in the National Assembly. That is unacceptable.
The NDDC was established and put under the presidency for a reason. It wanted to address the issue of underdevelopment and agitations in the region so that we can have a seamless way of producing oil and selling our oil. We in the Niger Delta are complaining of degradation, of dehumanization. That is what NDDC should take care of. What has happened to the master plan that came out from Timi Alaibe? It’s been dumped. All they do in NDDC is issue contracts without milestones. Knowing what have we achieved, where are we going and what should be done? Joy Nunieh’s board is not to take us forward. It is to look behind because the truth remains, and it is incontrovertible that until and unless the foundation on which we build the superstructure called NDDC is sustainably corrected, that is why I go to the Act, nothing good can be put on it. That is my position.
What will you want changed in the present NDDC Act?
First and foremost the NDDC Act must make the NDDC accountable to the Niger Delta itself. Once you make it accountable to the National Assembly, then it cannot carry what it is set up to achieve. Check the North East Development Commission today, the Act setting it up is quite different from the NDDC Act, why is that? There are no extraneous bodies in that commission. But for today, all I am interested in is that let a forensic audit be carried out and let those fat cows sitting at the National Assembly be put to the knife so that we can see whether they were doing their job of oversight or becoming cake sharers and developers of their own pecuniary interest rather than the interest of the Niger Delta. The Niger Delta is at fault. We have been slovenly, we have been very lazy in our intellectual and idiosyncratical attitude towards the NDDC. We only ask for crumbs to come to us rather than to ask where is that trillion? Where is that development? And challenge to know who are the contractors, what are the timelines and why is it not delivered? That is the crux of the matter!
That is the way to go because we have what it takes. We have the will to do it. So I am saying we will call a coalition of intellectual thinkers together that can think out a way through to solve this problem because we cannot continue to play the ostrich and sit down and watch what is going on go wrong. All we want from the Federal Government for now is that the Interim Management Board should not be hampered and that Dr. Joy Nunieh who I know personally as an amazon with a great heart can do this job without fear or favour. She will unearth the rot.

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Reps Constitution Review Committee Holds Zonal Hearing For Rivers, C’River, Akwa Ibom In Calabar

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In a renewed effort to deepen Nigeria’s constitutional democracy, the House of Representatives Committee on the Review of the 1999 Constitution has announced the commencement of its Zonal and National Public Hearings across the country.

A press statement issued by the Chief Press Secretary to the Cross River State Governor, Mr Linus Obogo, disclosed that the Calabar Centre — designated as Centre B — will host representatives and stakeholders from Cross River, Rivers, and Akwa Ibom States.

The public hearing is scheduled to take place on Saturday, July 19, 2025, at 10:00 a.m. at the Transcorp (Metropolitan) Hotel, Calabar.

The initiative, according to the statement, is designed to promote inclusive dialogue and capture the aspirations of Nigerians from all regions.

It aims to serve as a platform for citizens to contribute meaningfully to the ongoing national efforts to refine and strengthen the country’s legal and institutional frameworks.

“Citizens, civil society groups, professional bodies, traditional rulers, and other interest blocs are invited to participate in this landmark engagement aimed at advancing a more just, equitable, and responsive Nigerian Constitution,” the statement read.

The hearing forms part of the broader review process of the 1999 Constitution (as amended), and is seen as a strategic move toward fostering national unity and addressing structural legal issues within the federation.

 

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Tinubu’s Contribution To Buhari’s Presidency Marginal – Ex-SGF

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Former Secretary to the Government of the Federation (SGF), Mr Boss Mustapha, has stirred fresh political controversy by dismissing claims that President Bola Tinubu was highly instrumental to former President Muhammadu Buhari’s emergence in 2015 after the merger of political parties that formed the All Progressives Congress (APC).

For the first time since 2022, when then-presidential aspirant Alhaji Bola Tinubu declared he made former President Buhari Nigeria’s President in 2015, Mr Mustapha dismissed the claims, stressing that the merger only contributed about three million votes in addition to Buhari’s existing 12 million votes in the North.

He insisted that former President Buhari’s integrity, national stature, and disciplined messaging were central to the breakthrough, not the three million votes from the merging parties, which he described as insignificant.

Speaking on the role of the merging parties, particularly President Tinubu, the leader of the Action Congress of Nigeria (ACN), Mr Mustapha, who was the keynote speaker at the launch of the book ‘According to the President: Lessons from a Presidential Spokesman’s Experience’ authored by Mallam Garba Shehu, described the impact of the votes from other merging parties as very insignificant.

In attendance were former Head of State Yakubu Gowon, chair of the event; immediate past Vice President Yemi Osinbajo; SGF George Akume, who represented President Tinubu; PDP’s 2023 presidential candidate Atiku Abubakar; former Chief of Staff to Buhari Ibrahim Gambari; elder statesman Babagana Kingibe; former governors Nasir El-Rufai (Kaduna), Kayode Fayemi (Ekiti), Chris Ngige (Anambra), Rauf Aregbesola (Osun), Raji Babatunde Fashola (Lagos); former ministers Solomon Dalung and Sunday Dare; former Army Chief Tukur Buratai, and Bayo Onanuga, President Tinubu’s spokesman, among others.

According to Mr Mustapha, “I do not intend to stir up any controversy. The merger in 2013 was midwifed to create a Buhari presidency. Let us look at the statistics. In the 2003 election, it was the Obasanjo-Buhari presidential contest where Buhari recorded 12.7 million votes. In 2007, it came to 6.6 million, and it went back to 12.2 million in 2011.

“When we were conceptualising the merger, what would give us a headstart? Obviously, it was at the back of our consciousness that the merger with the Congress for Progressive Change (CPC), though it had only one state, the ACN had six states, ANPP three states, and when you sum up the total votes that we had as the presidency in 2015, the aggregate of the total votes was 15.4 million.

“So, basically, what we brought to the table after the merger outside the Buhari 12.5 million votes was three million. Before turning to that presidency, it is important to recognise the former President’s role in reshaping Nigeria’s political trajectory.

“In early 2013, as the leader of the CPC, Buhari formally requested and supported the creation of a CPC merger committee, part of a broader coalition-building process that brought together the ACN, ANPP, APGA faction, and elements of the ruling party through the breakaway ‘new PDP’ group. His endorsement and participation, along with other party leaders such as President Tinubu and Senator Ali Modu Sheriff, lent credibility and direction to the merger, helping to unify disparate party factions under the banner of the APC. That coalition-building paved the way for the first democratic defeat of an incumbent ruling party in Nigeria’s history.

“President Buhari’s integrity, national stature, and disciplined messaging were central to that breakthrough. No account of President Buhari’s tenure would be complete without acknowledging the extended periods he spent on medical leave. These moments, while politically delicate, were also telling of his leadership philosophy and personality,” he said.

In his remarks, President Tinubu promised to build on the legacies of former President Buhari, stressing that “nation-building is a relay. The efforts of one administration lay the foundation for the next.

“In this regard, I acknowledge the efforts of my predecessor, President Buhari, and assure all Nigerians that the reform-oriented path he initiated will be consolidated and strengthened under this administration. Our Renewed Hope Agenda is inspired by the desire to build a resilient, just, and inclusive Nigeria—a nation that delivers dividends of democracy to all its citizens”.

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Your Lies Chasing Investors From Nigeria, Omokri Slams Obi

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Former Presidential aide, Mr Reno Omokri, has accused Labour Party’s 2023 presidential candidate, Mr Peter Obi, of spreading false information about Nigeria’s debt profile, claiming it is deterring foreign investors from the country.

Speaking during an appearance on live television on Wednesday, Mr Omokri alleged that Mr Obi’s statements were misleading and damaging to the country’s economic prospects.

Mr Omokri said some investors currently operating in Nigeria were considering exiting the market due to Mr Obi’s remarks.

“That is not true. He doesn’t rile me up. I rile him up. The reason why I came here is because I’m a patriot. Peter Obi lied. You know, foreign direct investors are watching your programme, who are making investment decisions not to come to Nigeria. There are foreign investors in Nigeria that are making investment decisions to leave Nigeria because of the lie he told.

“One of the lies he told is that President Tinubu has borrowed more than the administrations of Yar’Adua, Jonathan, Buhari. That is a blatant lie”, Mr Omokri said.

To buttress his claims, Mr Omokri referenced figures from the Debt Management Office (DMO), maintaining that President Tinubu had actually reduced Nigeria’s external debt burden since assuming office.

“I have here with me data from the Debt Management Office, and Nigerians who are watching can go to DMO.com and search Debt Management Office, Nigeria State of Indebtedness 2015.

“As of 2015, Nigeria was owing a total of $63 billion. When Buhari was leaving office, Nigeria was owing $113 billion. Today, from the DMO, our debt has gone from $113 billion to $97 billion, meaning that Tinubu has reduced our debt by over $14 billion.

“We should be appreciating this man. Yet Peter Obi came here and lied to the Nigerian people. He took the debts and translated them into naira to make it look like the debts have increased”, he said.

 

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