By Sola LEBILE,Akure.

The new board of the Niger Delta Development Commission (NDDC) was erected on an unbalanced scale last November as it was inaugurated without representative from Ondo State,( as well as Abia and Imo states) and at the moment there is no signal(considering the fact that new list had not been forwarded to the Senate ) that these vacant seats will be filled soon. So we keep on waiting for when the Ondo state seat(and two others) will be occupied the commission’s board.
Recall that someone who is not from the oil producing areas in the state was nominated and forwarded to the Senate for confirmation against lay down procedures. The Senate however did not confirm the nomination following stiff protests from stakeholders and realizing that such nomination contravened the NDDC act on the subject. The representatives from the Abia,Imo states suffered the fate as their nominations were rejected on the similar grounds.
Why the delay in the substitution of names? One would have expected that the task of sending a fresh list for onward confirmation at the Senate should not pose serious challenge. In other words, replacing the earlier nomination shouldn’t have taken the authority a long time to perform given the array of qualified and capable individuals jostling for the seat from Ilaje local government which is the only oil producing area in the state.
But the reality is three months down the line , the seat is yet-to-be-filled which has further triggered the cry of deliberate marginalization from powerful quarters as well as unfair and unjust treatment of the sunshine state in the commission. One is inclined to reinforce the floating feeling that the big block is marginalizing the member oil producing states which has been on for years.
Incidentally, the representatives of state already pretty seated on the board and seems not bothered if the missing posts are occupied or not. The fact is that the top management positions, that is Managing Directors, Directors of projects and finance on the commission has been appropriated by this league of four BIG states of Akwa-Ibom, Delta and Rivers states while the other five, namely Ondo,Edo,Imo,Abia have not have their fair share in the commission as it relates to positions. Who cares?
Is it fair to go ahead and run the board without other states’ representatives? Can these states enjoy maximally their share in the commission in absence? How would the Commission(Government) stop violent agitation in the region with this arrangement? How long should those states with vacant seats wait?
One will not refrain from passing an adverse judgment on those wicked and satanic hands that shortlisted a wrong nomination from the presidency, those individual(s) who because of their selfish and dubious interest refused to do the right thing abini tio. Those who wanted to tear our society and relations with our neighbours by taken a big misstep of making wrong nomination. Sad enough, there were those who supported this aberration either out of ignorant or mischief.
Now the board is running without representatives of three states. In short, it is difficult for the state to contribute its quota on the board and might be greatly handicap in a large extent in getting its fair share in the commission which calls for t filling the position without further delay. We are patiently waiting and only hoped that would not wait till our people are upset before acting appropriately on the matter.
Again the appointment delay has thrown up the sore issue of long delay characterizing appointments into government’s establishments. We all remember vividly when it took the President a long waiting months to form his cabinet only for Nigerians to discover that the delay did not worth it after the appointment eventually came up.
It is interesting that the national Assembly is working on such to enact a law compelling president to appoint his cabinet within a time frame to avoid such. With the present scenario, won’t the Senate help us amend the law and include the full composition of NDDC to it?
This matter is a serious on and we will never allow anyone or group to treat the issue as though it is a pedestrian one. Indeed, the thrust of this government is not only to guarantee accountability, transparency, equity but also to make the citizens feel the impact of governance. We will not allow the cabal at the presidency to distort reality and rob us of what legitimately belong to our people.
Finally, we hope the authority will do the needful on this matter while on our part, we continue to remind them on the urgency of filling the vacant seat in the interest of fairness and justice. The Yoruba has a saying:ti ina o ba ton lori,eje kii tan lekan, meaning the hands would continue to have blood stains as long as lies remain on the head.Chai!