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Job Osazuwa
Ogun State Niger Delta Progressive Front (NDPF), yesterday, expressed its displeasure over planned inauguration of the Advisory Committee of the Niger Delta Development Commission (NDDC) by President Muhammadu Buhari to be carried out today.
The group National Coordinator, Johnson Ebelo, in a statement, described the proposed inauguration as a clear distortion of the NDDC Act, which he alleged the Minister of Niger Delta Affairs, Godswill Akpabio, has perfected of late.
“This is coming on the heels of the inauguration, two weeks ago, of a monitoring committee for the same commission. Yet, there is no substantive board in place, which both committees are supposed to work with as stated in the NDDC Act.
“For the avoidance of doubt, the NDDC Act makes provision for a board nominated by the president and confirmed by the Senate to manage the affairs of the commission. This has not been done, yet committees whose work is predicated on the activities of the board are being inaugurated.
“The government has found it convenient to ignore the NDDC Act in respect of the inauguration of a substantive board but has conveniently latched onto the Act to inaugurate the monitoring and advisory committees as provided for in the Act. We find this dubious and intended to give an impression that it is following the law when it is selectively applying it.
“This travesty is even more complicated when the Act states clearly that the two committees are meant to monitor and advise the board. In this instance, what we have in place is an illegal interim management committee, not a substantive board,” he said in the statement.
