NDDC SAGA AND THE REST OF US

In the last few weeks, the media space, traditional and the new media platforms have been bombarded with all sorts of gory and despicable stories about looting and relooting of the Niger Delta Development Commission (NDDC) fund. 

Many people have opened their mouths in disbelief, but I'm the last person to be taken aback, considering the information I had at my disposal during my NYSC year. 

Let me state here quickly before I forget, that the Buhari's government has failed and is failing on so many fronts, and surprisingly too is the opaque failure in the anticorruption crusade which many believe is his selling point. The regime is fast losing it, if it had not completely lost its cloak and mantra of integrity. 

Back to my story. In 2009, I was posted to Delta State to serve. At the orientation camp of Batch A, I was one of the conspicuous names at the camp due to a number of activities I engaged in from Social Committee PRO to emerging as the Overall Best MDGs Trainee of the set, you will just noticed me except you are an indoor person. I remembered reciting a poem on one of the morning assemblies ground. 

I've just come out of the university with burning desires to make impact. With all I gave, I should have been posted to Asaba and or Warri but my excellent performance at MDGs took me to Bomadi, a town which shared boarders with Bayelsa and also serve as the local government of Bomadi Local Government Council. As at that time, the part of the town where the local government Secretariat was situated was without electricity as at 2010. No pipe borne water. Their boreholes water was always fulk of oil. I became used to drinking 'pure water' since that time as I could not drink their river water which was the same water they drink, use in cooking, defecate and wash in. Not even our save water drink campaign could disuade the residents of the community. To them, 'it no fit do them harm'. 

On the day of posting, let me confessed here that I was bitterly disappointed for my posting, so throughout my journey to the town, I literally kept mute. Some of my fellow corps members sympathized with me that I don't deserve it considering the fact that other members of our social committee were either posted in Asaba or Warri. 

What Asaba is to the state capital with seat of power is like what Abuja is to Nigeria, Wari is like what Lagos is to Nigeria. If you've been to Wari, you will know 'Wari no dey carry last' true true. It's in Wari or Asaba that things are truly happenings. 

Our journey to Bomadi was straneous and stressfull. It took us several hours. On getting to our base, the Local government had booked some hotel rooms for us, but while others were struggling to choose juicy ones, I was yet to accept my fate such that I could not get room in that particular hotel. The next hotel I was taken to was 'sarewa hotel', if you understand what it means. The building was uninviting, the facilities were nothing to write home about, and the environment was unbefitting but I've no choice again. I slept without food unlike my colleagues who were given sumptuous meals.

In curiousity,I sat down outside and talked with the manager of the hotel. I was interested in knowing what was responsible for the backwardness of the region. My host narrated so many stories, but the summary of them all is that he blamed it on the Federal Government and the Oil companies like Shell BP, Chevron and co. 

While I quite agreed with him, i however had other narratives to sell to him based on my recent findings from my thesis on Anticorruption Crusade in Nigeria: An Appraisal of EFCC, which coincided with the days of Mallam Ribadu in office. However, my guest would not have it. He praised the politicians from their regions for fighting for their course, and to him, James Ibori was their saviour that deserved to be praised and worshiped. He was the man who built the bridge that connected one part of the town to the other, otherwise, we would have been taken to our base on boats.

This was the same James Ibori that stole billion of naira and dollars from the Delta State Government who disguised out of Nigeria as a woman before he was arrested in London. When I persisted he was a criminal, I saw rage in my host eyes, in fear, I've to relunctantly agreed with him while mechanically and subtley passing my message to him. 

In my one year in the region, I saw backwardness and underdevelopment at first glance. On the faces of people were poverty such that #50 naira and a parcel of 'eba' is all you need to get their beautiful ladies to bed. The corps members were seen as rich people and an extension of the Federal Government such that goods were sold at exhorbitant prices to us. 

Across the towns were series of NDDC abandoned projects with several billions expended but with nothing to show for it. A serving Senator was said to collect over 80 million to build a public toilet without any toilet to show for it as that time. So are other projects. The chairman and the councilors together with other excos don't stay in the office, they only come when allocation entered and after sharing, they go back to Wari or Asaba. Same is with the civil servants who resumed office only during the end of the month. 

At a time, I had an encountered which almost cost me my life except for inside information I got from the SSS brother who happened to come from my State. I've been at daggered head with the chairman and the Head of Department of the local government for failing to make provision for accommodation for corps members which were directly posted to the local council despite yearly budget for it. As a Corps Liasion Officer, and having been a victim, I wanted to correct it, so I started series of letters and ambushed of the stakeholders concerned. When my 'whala' was getting out of hand, they started discussing how to eliminate me. This information the officer from the Secrete Service heard, such that he has to sneak into our apartment in depht of the night to relay it to me. According to him, the same guys we played with it in day time, are the same guys who operate in the middle of the night as militants, so he encouraged me to be more discreet about what I say and where I go.

I've to thank him profusely even though I was still hell-bent to do something about the accommodation, though not as aggressive as I was before the information. The rest is history, the accommodation was not fully furnished before I left but the process was kick-started.

The problem of Niger Delta people are like problem of Nigerians, they are the problem of themselves. Their elites are the one milking the region dried. Otherwise, the region should be adored in gold and ornaments considering the amount of money that have been sunked into the region, and until, the people hold their leaders accountable, majority of them will continue to wallow in poverty.