|
BNW |
|
B N W: Biafra Nigeria World News |
|
|
|
|
||||
|
|
|
|||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
|
Bayelsa opposes President's plan to amend NDDC Act
MOVES by President Olusegun Obasanjo to get the Niger-Delta Development Commission (NDDC) Act 2000 amended was yesterday opposed by the Bayelsa State government. The state government rather suggested an improvement to the existing Act.
The state governor, Chief Diepreye Alamieyeseigha, who presented the position of the state, in an address he read at the public hearing on the NDDC Act 2000 Amendment Bill, held by the Senate Committee on Niger-Delta in Yenagoa put forward an 11-point demand.
He said: "We believe that the proposed amendment to the NDDC Act is premature. It is in the interest of democracy that the existing law be allowed to play itself out before far-reaching amendments are suggested."
"The 10 per cent contribution from the member-`states to the funding of the NDDC being canvassed by the Federal Government is unacceptable to us. The NDDC is a Federal Government body established specifically to develop the Niger-Delta area. By the same token, the state governments have their own commitments to the development of their individual states. It is unfair, therefore, to ask the states to bear the burden of funding a body over which they do not exercise control," he said.
According to him, one of the "major causes of agitation in the oil producing states of the Niger-Delta is the inadequacy of the Federal Allocation to address development in our difficult terrain. To seek direct assistance from an already disgruntled state," he added, the government is not helping matters.
"For the sake of peace and unity, therefore, the Federal Government should take its responsibility seriously," he stressed.
The governor added that the "cardinal point in the amendment bill is that the Federal Government's contribution to the NDDC should be reduced from 15 per cent to 10 per cent.
"Again, we find this repellent. We insist that the government at the centre should not contribute anything less than 15 per cent to the funding of the commission. In like manner, the quota for oil companies should be increased to five per cent from the existing three per cent rather than being reduced to two per cent as being requested."
He added that "if the NDDC was well-funded and management achieves an evident focus in developing infrastructure in the region, the growing incidence of protest for which the people of the region have come to be known will be drastically contained." He said that the amendments being sought could only serve to further ignite the restiveness we have struggled to put at bay in the recent past.
He added: "We are of the strong opinion that state governors should appoint their own state representatives in order to cultivate harmony in the region. In like manner, the Senate should undertake the screening of all such appointees as provided for in the existing law."
Alamieyeseigha stressed that the commission should sufficiently consult the NDDC states and local councils in order to promote co-ordinated development and avoid duplication of projects.
"By the same token, I would urge the Federal Government to refrain from intervention in the day-to-day running of the commission, as was the case with the defunct Oil Minerals Producing and Development Commission (OMPADEC), where contractors were recommended from places outside the OMPADEC states, a phenomenon that inevitably led to the commission's programme failure. To check this, we request that the state representatives should operate from their home states in order to effectively co-ordinate affairs concerning their constituencies."
The governor also faulted the provision in the existing law, which demands that 50 per cent for the Ecological Funds due the states be remitted to the NDDC, adding that the law was obnoxious and should be outrightly expunged.
"The NDDC, rather than the Federal Government, should benefit from the 50 per cent tax regime paid by oil companies and oil servicing companies operating in the region from withholding tax and taxes other than Pay As You Earn (PAYE) tax."
He added: "50 cents per barrel remittance on oil sales from the region to the NDDC would go a long way to improve the fortunes of the commission for development purposes.
The governor however used the opportunity to remind the Senators that the Niger-Delta region holds the ace in a delicate balance of power and therefore hold the key to the stability of the nation. This, he said, "is why the sustainable development of the region is non-negotiable.
To achieve this vision, he said, well-articulated and co-ordinated strategic planning for the development of the Niger-Delta should be pursued with vigour
A cross section of Bayelsa State indigenes who also spoke at the pubic hearing, described the proposed amendment as provocative even as the region is at the height of crisis.
One of the groups, the South-South Peoples Conference (SSOPEC), pointed out that the proposed amendment is viewed by the people of the region as the calculated attempt to undermine the people of the Niger-Delta region.
|
|
||||||||||||
