NDDC: Group tasks Umana on ongoing illegality, demands board inauguration

 
Following President Buhari’s restatement of his commitment to end the ongoing illegal sole administratorship at the NDDC and inaugurate the Board of the Commission in compliance with the law, Niger Delta United Congress (NDUC) has urged Obong Umana Okon Umana, Minister of Niger Delta Affairs, to “urgently implement the inauguration of the board and management of the Commission to ensure that the nine constituent states of the region will have fair and equitable representation in the Commission.”

The group further stated that their demands are also in tandem with unending calls by authentic stakeholders who have consistently demanded that the NDDC Act should be complied with in the governance of the Commission because it is “illegal to have contraptions of interim management committees/sole administrator to administer the NDDC and arbitrarily utilise the monthly sums due to the Commission.”
 
NDUC also quoted renowned constitutional lawyer and human rights activist, Mr Femi Falana, a Senior Advocate of Nigeria (SAN), who warned that if the Federal Government “does not put an end to the impunity, it is undoubtedly clear that the appointment of the Interim Administrators and the actions taken by them including the award of contracts are liable to be set aside by the Federal High Court, sooner or later.” Falana also noted that the continued administration of NDDC by a Sole Administrator “constitutes a violent violation of the valid and subsisting order of the Bayelsa Judicial Division of the Federal High Court which has restrained President Buhari from further appointing Interim Administrators to manage the NDDC.”