Published On: Wed, Apr 29th, 2015

Delta Oil Communities Protest Move to Scrap DESOPADEC

DESOPADEC LOGO
LAGOS APRIL 29TH (URHOBOTODAY)-Nigeria’s oil and gas communi¬ties in Delta State have taken a swipe at Governor Emmanuel Ud¬uaghan over an executive bill to the House of As-sembly, calling for decen¬tralisation of Delta State Oil Producing Areas De¬velopment Commission, DESOPADEC.
Protesting yesterday at the complex of Delta State House of Assembly, national coordinator of host communities, Prince Maikpobi Okareme, who led the protesters, said the bill was ill-conceived, a cover up, punitive, un¬popular and anti-commu¬nities and as such must be thrown out.

According to the leader, leadership of the state’s oil and gas producing communities met with leadership of the five eth¬nic nationalities of oil and gas producing com¬munities in the state and resolved inter-alia: “That the entire oil producing communities in Delta State for which purpose DESOPADEC was set up, totally reject the scrap¬ping of the commission.
“The funds being appro¬priated to DESOPADEC as commission belong to the oil producing commu¬nities and not Delta State Government, hence it cannot be scrapped with¬out their consent.
“The present action of the state government could be likened to some¬one that wants to shave another person’s hair in his absence.
“That the communities will vehemently resist any attempt to scrap the commission with a view to cover up the ills in the commission for the past eight years of its existence. The current staff of the commission will be thrown into the labour market at a time govern¬ment ought to be looking for avenues to address un¬employment in the state.
“As we talk, N230 bil¬lion outstanding be¬tween 2008 and 2013 is yet to be remitted to the commission. The 2014 budget was only released to the commission early March 2015 valued at N39 billion and the money, as we talk, cannot be found in any bank account and contractors are been owed millions of naira. DESOPADEC 2015 budget of N42 billion was only ap¬proved just last week,” Okareme alleged.

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