Stakeholder Wants NDDC To Tackle Security Challenges

Renowned administrator in Rivers State, Prof. Calistus Omejekwe, has charged the newly re-constituted Board of the Niger Delta Development Commission (NDDC) on positive service delivery and the curbing of security challenges in all the nine states of the region.
Speaking with The Tide yesterday in Rumuodamaya, Obio/Akpor Local Government Area, Omejekwe noted with sadness that the NDDC over the years has performed below expectation and relegated her established mandate which consequences has brought untold hardship on the people of the region, which lacked quality projects from the commission to the background.
According to him, “Past Chairmen and Managing Directors of the Commission has been accused of mis-management of funds and some indicted of corrupt practices through the embezzlement of funds, fraudulent award of contracts, sub-standard projects execution, hoarding of the commission’s budgets and absolute neglect of the region in delivering its mandate”.
In his words, “I deemed it necessary at this point, to call on the current chairman and former Deputy Governor of Edo State, Prof. Pius Odubu and the Managing Director, Mr Bennard Okumagba, respectively to live above the usual corrupt tendencies that have charracterised the commission since inception to restore the confidence reposed on the agency.
He expressed belief that if this was properly done, Niger Deltans and the entire country would witness huge relief ranging from militancy, restiveness, hostility and poverty now that the commission’s board was restructured for efficiency and greater productivity and urged the team to come up with better and result-oriented policies and programmes that would improve the well-being of the people in the region.
He added by stating that NDDC as an interventionist agency established by an Act in 2000 with the mandate to develop the Niger Delta region with the provision of good roads, potable drinking water, affordable health-care services, power generation, as well as, scholarships, empowerment, job creation, housing and urban development, among others, which he said, must be put in place for the benefit of the people in the region.
He, therefore, commended President Muhammadu Buhari for the re-constitution of the board and added they should see the appointment as a call to sanitise the commission, whose status had been relegated to the background due to lapses and corruption, misappropriation of funds and inefficiency in service delivery to the people.
He admonished the new board members to stand their ground by providing the needed incentives for the region, as well, operate an ‘open-door-policy’ that would attract development, security and enabling environment for investment in Nigeria.

Bethel Toby