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From Fred Itua, Abuja
niger Delta leaders, under the leadership of Edwin Clark, have asked President Muhammadu Buhari to reverse appointments made at the Nigeria National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC).
Addressing newsmen yesterday at his Asokoro residence in Abuja, yesterday, Clark, who referred to the appointments and redeployments as lopsided, urged the president to immediately reverse them in the best interest of fairness and justice.
He added that the Niger Delta, which produces the oil, was neglected in the appointment, an action which violates the Local Content Act.
The elder statesman, who noted that the local content law was no longer functioning, warned those he described as ‘cabal’ around the president to allow him perform properly and added that the president should not see himself as the president of a particular group, but for the entire country.
The South South leader said the federal government’s refusal to correct alleged lopsidedness in the appointments has promoted increased agitations for restructuring but ruled out the option of a resort to violence over the matter.
“We cannot continue like this. The country belongs to all of us.
“This is why everybody is now calling for restructuring. There is no other option but to restructure. I don’t want our boys to go violent. We have worked for peace and peace has returned. So, we cannot go to fight, let us us restructure so that everyone controls what is produced in his area.”
Reading the list of those who benefitted from the appointments, Clark said: “The list shows that the whole of the South has 19 positions, out of the 55 positions and the North, a non-oil producing zone, has 36 positions, which include senior positions. We challenge the NNPC or whoever has a list that ‘adequately’ distributes these positions to all the zones, to make such list available to the public.
“Top management positions in other subsidiaries, such as the Petroleum Product Marketing Company (PPMC), Petroleum Trust Development Fund (PTDF), Petroleum Equalisation Fund and the Department of Petroleum Resources, one of the departments in the Ministry of Petroleum, are also majorly held by northerners.
“The people of the Niger Delta stand by our earlier position that the recent appointments/redeployments made in respect of the NNPC board and its subsidiaries, by Mr. President, is lopsided in favour of the North.
“If the NNPC and some others are making counter-claims, they should also make public the ‘correct’ list. “Otherwise, we, in the South South (Niger Delta) stand by our earlier position that the appointments/redeployments be reversed and an equitable one made in the spirit of fairness, equity and justice.”
Clark stressed that the people of the Niger Delta/South South are still contending with the vexed issue of the composition of the board of the NNPC, where, out of nine members of the board, only one person is from the South South, in the person of Dr. Thomas John, apart from the Minister of State for Petroleum, Dr. Ibe Kachikwu, who is delegated by the minister (the pressident holds the portfolio, in this case), and one person from the South West.
“The other members, including the Chief of Staff to the President are all from the North. The South East, an oil-producing zone, does not have a representation on that board.
“When I first convened a press conference on it, NNPC refuted it and others commented without looking at the justification of what has been done. I thought it was time for me to bring it out, again, to the notice of the whole country, that appointments made in NNPC, DPR, and other NNPC subsidiaries are lopsided, they excluded us. When we bear the brunt of suffering, marginalisation in everything that is happening in the oil industry, we are not appointed. Does it mean that we have no graduates, no people trained in the oil industry, when almost all of them are shown their way out?”
He charged Buhari to bring every part of the country together.
