**Fmr NNDC Ag MD fumes over non-development of oil communities
**Says Competition for 5-Star hotels shameful
**History will judge governors harshly
A former Acting
Managing Director of the Niger Delta Development Commission, Pastor Power
Aginighan, has taken the six Niger Delta states governors to the cleaner over
the non-development of oil bearing communities in the region.
Aginighan, in a
statement on Valentines Day, particularly faulted what he termed
'cutthroat competition' among the governors to develop cities in their various states
at the detriment of the inaccessible communities of
their state where they
derive revenue.
He said the activities of the governors in the cities is to hoodwink visitors into believing that they are working and justifying the billions of naira they receive monthly from the 13% derivation fund from the Federation Account.
He said, "My
attention has been drawn to an on-going competition amongst the oil mineral
producing States in the Niger Delta in delivering development projects in the
respective States.
"In this
club of major oil producing States that have received hundreds of billions of
naira as 13% derivation from the Federation Account from 1999 to date are
Akwa-Ibom, Rivers, Bayelsa and Delta.
"The press
is awash with cut-throat competition amongst these states to build five-star
hotels, airports and flyovers to mention a few. Governors of these states have
argued that they are embarking on these grandiose projects to prepare for their
states beyond oil.
"My point
of departure from this chain of thought is that these development initiatives,
some of which should have been private sector-driven, have not taken cognisance
of environmental sustainability in the oil bearing communities in the
respective States that are mostly located in the coastal and riverside areas of
the States," he lamented.
Aginighan, who
was the foundation Secretary of the Ijaw National Congress (IYC), noted that
thousands of communities in the four core oil bearing states that have
benefited from the largess of oil windfall still wallow in abject poverty and
deprivation.
He said communities
such as Kula, Soku, Old Sagama, Ke, Bille, Krakrama, Obuideinde, Ekerekana,
Okujagu, Ofiomina-ama (Alakiri) and Orubiri in Rivers State; Egbema Angalabri,
Peretorugbene, Ekeni,Sangana, Brass, Ogbolomabiri and Bassambiri in Bayelsa
State; Ogulagha, Odimodi, Obotobo, Sokebulou, Kokodiagbene, Jakpa, Tisun,
Bateren, Ugborodo, Okerenkoko, Kokodiagbene, Ogidigben, Ojobo, Tsekelewu (Polobubo),
Alagbabri, Inyi, Obikwele, Afor, Olota, Ederie-Araya and Enhwe (Isoko) in Delta
State and Amadaka, Kampa, Alile and Amazaba , Atabrikang, Ntafre, Opolom,
Okorutip, Okposo 1 and 2 in Akwa-Ibom State, which account for over 70% of the
13% derivation funds received by these States remain inaccessible by road. 
"If this
state of affairs persists until the oil gets exhausted these communities cannot
be part of the dream post-oil economy which is expected to be driven by
mechanised agriculture and industrialisation; no tractor can move to any of
these communities.
"It is
therefore my counsel that oil rich States of the Niger Delta should compete,
not in building five star hotels in non-oil producing state capitals, but in
linking up the criminally alienated oil bearing communities in their states,
which have borne the excruciating pains of the destruction of their ecosystem
for so many years."
In his parting
shot, Aginighan warned that governors of the oil bearing states who fail to
heed the advice risk going down in the history book as those who laid the
foundation for the destruction of those communities.
