Isoko youths urge Buhari to disband NDDC’s interim committee

The Isoko Nation Youth Congress (INYC) has urged President Muhammadu Buhari to disband the Interim Management Committee (IMC) of the NDDC and direct the inauguration of a substantive board for the commission.

It said that the delay in installing the new management team for the intervention agency was a contravention of the Act establishing the commission, urging the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) to investigate alleged corrupt practices in the agency.

In a statement issued by its Publicity Secretary, Lawson Abanum, the group stated that over six months after the IMC was set up, the NDDC had gone from one scandal to another, hence the need to disband the committee.

Besides, President of the group, God’stime Akokotu, who also expressed his view on the issue, said: “There has been consistent calls on the Presidency to revert itself by doing the right thing, which is obeying the Act establishing the commission.

“A bad precedent is being enshrined into the Niger Delta interventionist agency by flouting and abusing the spirit and the letters in the Act establishing the commission.”

“This injustice to the Niger Delta people has now nosedived into suppression of the will of the people, with the presidency’s lethargy in taking action despite allegations of corruption leveled against the IMC as orchestrated by Minister of Niger Delta Affairs, God’swill Akpabio,” he said.

On his part, Secretary-General IYNC, Paul Tutu Erero, urged immediate dissolution of the IMC due to inefficient and corrupt practices leveled against it from inception, adding that the interim committee from inception had been in the middle of one controversy, corruption or the other and that there was no confidence reposed on its members.

The group, therefore, passed a vote of no confidence on the IMC and called on the Presidency, National Assembly and the anti–corruption agencies to investigate activities of the commission under the leadership of Akpabio and the IMC.

“It is also common knowledge that Akpabio is scheming to extend the six-months time frame for the IMC. We find this objectionable and demand that the substantive board nominated by President Buhari and cleared by the Senate should take charge of the commission and restore the confidence of stakeholders and the Niger Delta people,” he added.