Enemies of progress

hardball

Ironically, the governors of Nigeria’s oil-producing states, who should be working for their development, may well be responsible for their underdevelopment. The country’s oil-producing states are: Akwa Ibom, Delta, Rivers, Bayelsa, Cross River, Ondo, Edo, Imo and Abia.

Deputy President of the Senate Ovie Omo-Agege accused the governors of diverting 13 percent oil derivation funds meant for developing their oil-producing states.

Omo-Agege’s spokesman Yomi Odunuga highlighted the accusation made when the senator hosted a delegation of Oil and Gas Host Communities of Nigeria (HOSCON), led by the Amayanabo of Twon-Brass in the Brass Kingdom and Chairman, Bayelsa State Traditional Rulers Council, Chief Alfred Diete-Spiff.

Omo-Agege was quoted as saying “the 13 percent derivation is meant to ameliorate the conditions of the people who are most impacted by oil exploration and exploitation…These funds are not meant for the state governments. The state governments are meant to be purveyors to host communities.”

The senator alleged: “Even in states that have development commissions, they only earmark 50 percent of the funds to the commission to manage on behalf of the host communities. So what happens to the other 50 percent?” He emphasised that “100 percent of the funds is meant for the development of host communities because it is not every area that suffers from oil exploration and degradation.”

The first commercial oil discovery in the country happened in Oloibiri in present-day Bayelsa State in 1956; and the first oil field began production in 1958. More than six decades later, the story of underdevelopment in the oil-producing states is a continuing story.

Nigeria is said to have “a maximum crude oil production capacity of 2.5 million barrels per day.” The country “ranks as Africa’s largest producer of oil and the sixth largest oil producing country in the world.”  So it is inexcusable that many host communities in the country’s oil-producing states present pictures of poor development.

For example, President Muhammadu Buhari, represented by his Special Adviser on Niger Delta Affairs, Senator Ita Enang, in October 2019, had said during the reopening of Oil Mining Lease (OML)-25 facility in coastal Belema in Kula Kingdom, Akuku-Toru Local Government Area of Rivers State:  ”We have been to the communities (in Kula Kingdom). I felt touched that the people were asking for schools, hospitals and potable water in 2019, after 40 years of oil and gas being taken from their soils. I scooped water from the pond that the people drink. It was smeared with crude oil.”

The governors accused of diverting derivation funds need to prove that the accusation is untrue. There is strong evidence of underdevelopment in many host communities in the oil-producing states. The governors should not be enemies of progress.