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The stage is set as the Senate armed with all the required arsenals move to probe how N40billion was lavished within ninety days by Senator Akpabio’s handpicked Interim Management Committee.
The Senate apparently disturbed by the manner N40bn grew wings from the coffers of the Niger Delta Development Commission, NDDC last week Tuesday constituted an adhoc investigative panel to unearth what actually transpired.
Senator George Sekibo in a motion had unearthed the massive fraud allegedly perpetuated by the IMC which paved way for the probe.
While making his submission the Rivers State Lawmaker emptied his points rounding up that the Senate should dig deeper into the matter to bring those involved in the looting of Niger Deltans Commonwealth to book.
Sekibo had in the motion entitled : ” Urgent Need to Investigate Alleged Financial Recklessness in the Niger Delta Development Commission ( NDDC) alleged reports from the Commission , indicate State of financial Recklessness that must be investigated and stopped .
According to him, while President Muhamnadu Buhari set up the IMC to coordinate forensic auditing of financial transactions carried out by the now dissolved Board of the commission , reports emanating from IMC, indicate financial Recklessness on it’s part too.
He added that aside financial Recklessness being carried out by the IMC, is also indulging in alleged arbitrary sack of the management staff of the Commission .
He said : ” While President Buhari ‘s action of setting up an IMC and the forensic audit may have been conceived to forestall the financial Recklessness of the commission and reposition it for fast tracking of the development of the region , the IMC has been more bedevilled with the same financial misuse , misapplication , misappropriation or outright fraud in the management of the funds of the commission .
” Within the last three months, the commission has spent over N40billion of the commission ‘s fund without recourse to established processes of funds disbursements , which has open up further suspicion among stakeholders of the Niger Delta Region .
” IMC is also alleged to be arbitrarily using executive power for wrongful sacking of management staff of the commission without recourse to established civil service rules and practices .
” Consequently, the IMC has lost credibility and seen as a financial conduit pipe based on opinions of stakeholders in the region , which therefore urgently calls for an intervention by the Senate of the Federal Republic of Nigeria to install confidence in the people for whom the commission was primarily established .
” In particular, Section 88 of the constitution ( as amended), has conferred on the National Assembly and in this case the Senate, to ascertain whether the sum of N40billion so appropriated and in the coffers of the commission , has been properly applied judiciously and appropriately to programmes meant for “.
Senator Akpabio who oversees the Niger Delta Ministry and by extension the IMC has described the Senate move as an empty threat as his IMC has lived above board.
But Niger Deltans are not particularly happy the way NDDC their Commonwealth is being managed.
Many had expressed their anger via many communicative channels but the one that really touched the heartbeat of the matter is that of Barrister Jesutega Onokpasa calling on the National Assembly to conduct a stainless probe.
Read him:
News that the Senate of the Federal Republic had resolved to investigate the Interim Management Committee, IMC, of the Niger Delta Development Commission, NDDC, brought a great sigh of relief to stakeholders across the Niger Deltan region who have been dazed by the humongous degree of corruption and irregularities that have reigned over the commission ever since the illegal contraption championed by the Niger Delta Affairs Minister, Senator Godswill Akpabio, took over the interventionist agency. Hitherto, it had been a most perplexing mystery to many of us how come our national legislature and more especially its upper chamber had seemingly gone to sleep with respect to a crucial agency of government charged with the development of a potentially explosive region which also doubles as the goose that lays the golden eggs for the entire nation. Indeed, ever since Akpabio executed his extra-ministerial coup of scuttling the institution of the commission’s lawfully envisaged board that had been duly screened and confirmed by the Upper House, and instead installed his handpicked illegal IMC of wholly incredible characters, it appeared he had been afforded license to personalise the collective property of the Niger Deltan people and handed a blank cheque to deplete its resources for the benefit of himself and those through whom he keeps getting all manner of highly infuriating extra-constitutional approvals from the seat of power in far away Abuja.
I can at this moment project that Akpabio, lacking any regard for law, due process or even for his former colleagues in the Senate, will proceed to attempt to intimidate the Senators into making a mess of the process by resorting to his broken record of very poorly-packaged recriminations that they are opposed to the much touted but never occuring forensic audit of the commission, hence they are investigating his minions! Indeed, day in, day out, his laughable IMC spares no opportunity to label anyone calling for probity and transparency in the NDDC as a contractor or corrupt individual afraid of what is already turning out to be a complete joke of a forensic audit!
The irony pertaining to the entire circus is the fact that no serious minded Niger Deltan takes Akpabio or his cabalistic IMC seriously at all. None of its members has ever been known to be an anti-corruption crusader or champion of good governance and in fact, one of its very vocal, loquacious and most unwarrantedly bellicose members used to be a board member at NEXIM Bank where he is said to have awarded to himself a huge loan of over N750 million that has neither been serviced nor repaid till date!
The Senate Adhoc Committee charged with the probe, which will be led by the senator representing Ekiti North, Olubunmi Adetunbi, with Senators Jika Dauda Haliru, Mohammed Tanko Almakura, Abdulfatai Buhari, Chukwuka Utazi, Ibrahim Hadeijia and Degi – Eremienyo Biobarakuma Wangaha as members, is quite credible, in my humble view. Indeed, from Senator Thompson George Sekibo, who moved the motion that led to the institution of the investigation, the leadership of the Senate and the membership of the adhoc committee, many stakeholders are hopeful of a thorough, sincere, fact-based, unsparing and untainted inquiry emanating from this particular oversight effort.