Senate to NDDC contractors: Do your work or refund the money

The senate committee on the Niger Delta has warned contractors executing projects for the Niger Delta Development Commission (NDDC) to be prepared to work or refund the money paid to them.

Peter Nwaoboshi, chairman of the senate committee on Niger Delta, gave the order on Wednesday during a courtesy visit of members of his committee to the NDDC headquarters in Port Harcourt.

He said that those who run away with monies meant for the development of the Niger Delta would be held accountable, adding that his committee is determined to help the NDDC recover all its statutorily funds.

“In discharging its oversight functions, my committee will ensure that every contributor to NDDC pays what they owe the commission, because we cannot afford to toy with the development of that very important region. It’s important that NDDC gets all that is due it from the Ecological Fund, for instance,” he said, pledging to do everything necessary to resolve the impasse over the non-payment by gas processing companies to the NDDC fund.

Nwaoboshi said that his committee had obtained the supreme court ruling which the Nigeria LNG Limited was relying upon to renege on its funding obligations to the NDDC.

The case was not decided on merit and we have, therefore, advised the commission to follow up on the legal issues.

He added that even the budget of the oil companies, which the NDDC could not get before now, had been obtained by the committee.

“We have obtained all their budgets from the year 2000. That will enable the NDDC to appropriately calculate its own 3 per cent share of the budget and correctly determine whether they have been paying the correct percentage or shortchanging the commission,” he said.

Ibim Semenitari, the acting managing director of the NDDC, said that the commission had received just over N500 billion since inception, while it was being owed N800 billion.

“That is why we need the strong voice of members of the senate to tell our story,” she said.

“We have good stories to tell like the Ogbia-Nembe Road, in Bayelsa state, which the commission is executing with Shell Petroleum Development Company, SPDC, the orthopaedic and cardiovascular hospitals in the 9 states and the proto-type hostels for universities and polytechnics.”

The committee also paid a courtesy call to the Nyesom Wike, governor of Rivers state, at his official residence.

Wike said inputs from states in the region would reduce the incidents of the duplication of projects by the states and the NDDC, adding that “it is important for states to make inputs, so that necessary projects are executed by the NDDC”.

He expressed regrets over the many abandoned projects under the NDDC, and urged the committee to take steps to end the era of abandoned projects.