Category: South East

The Federal Road Safety Corps (FRSC) in Anambra State said yesterday that it would begin road audit ahead of the opening of the second Niger Bridge in Onitsha in October.

The Zonal Commanding Officer, Mr. Andrew Kumapayi, made this known in Awka during his first quarter monitoring and inspection visit to Anambra Sector Command, to assess its performance in 2021 and ways of improving on their operations in 2022.

The Federal Government had announced that the second Niger Bridge would be completed and opened in October.

He said the road audit is part of strategies to cope with expected increase in traffic when the second Niger Bridge and International Passenger and Cargo Airport begin full operation.

“We are discussing with the sector commanders in the zone on plans to commence road audit to ascertain how to deploy personnel, patrol vehicles and work out partnership with other security agencies on the bridges.

“This time, we are not going to allow breakdown of vehicles on the new bridge, to ensure free flow of traffic. Same applies to the old bridge,” Kumapayi said.

He condemned increasing cases of extortion among certain officers on highways in the zone, saying such act would not be condoned.

He said such act was tarnishing the image of the corps, urging the media and the public to report such officers to the command so they could be punished.

The state Sector Commander, Adeoye Irelewuyi, said the command stepped up enforcement by starting ‘Operation Jiliya Nwayoo’, with focus on speed limit device.

Pensioners, who retired from Edo State civil service and the 18 local government councils, yesterday protested their unpaid pensions and gratuities, as well as the absence of harmonisation over the years.

The retirees, in their hundreds and armed with placards bearing inscriptions, took over the popular Ring Road, causing gridlock, with motorists opting for adjoining streets.

The Public Relations Officer (PRO) of Nigerian Union of Pensioners (NUP), Edo chapter, Claudette Ehanire, said: “We are here to let the world know of the sufferings of pensioners in Edo State. I am from the local government, I retired in 2010 and till now I am yet to get my gratuity. Those who retired before me, in 2008 and 2009, have not been paid their gratuities, let alone those who are just retiring.

“I retired on Level 15 (8), I am on N73,000, my juniors that are retiring now are on over N100,000 to N200,000, this is because there is no harmonisation. We have written many times. Governor Godwin Obaseki earmarked some money that they should use it to pay local government pension arrears, they started paying from 1982, and group us into batches, but not a single batch was cleared, and some they did not pay at all.”

Obaseki, who was represented by his deputy, Philip Shaibu, while addressing the protesters, assured that modalities were being put in place to pay the arrears of their gratuities, as done with their pensions.

He pleaded with the pensioners to give the government time to resolve the issues once and for all.

Edo State Secretary of the All Progressives Congress (APC), Lawrence Okah, has said the 14 lawmakers-elect of the party, who won the House of Assembly seats during the 2019 general election, but yet to be inaugurated, will get automatic tickets to re-contest next year, except they opt out.

He spoke yesterday in Benin at the declaration of interest by Osaro Obazee to vie for the party’s ticket to represent Oredo Federal Constituency.

Okah said: “The 14 lawmakers from our party (APC) have the right of first refusal, because of the way they were treated by the administration of Governor Godwin Obaseki. Despite all they have passed through, they have remained with the APC.

“Osaro Obazee has done well; he has been the mayor of the city. This is for people to learn that patriotism is very important. We know what he did when he was the chairman of Oredo Local Government.”

Obazee said he decided to vie, because the constituents needed better representation.

He said: “I will win the election, if I get APC’s ticket. I am a consultant on political affairs in my local government (Oredo).

“I am not trying to praise myself, but I am coming from the grassroots. I am not afraid that if I get the ticket of APC, I will be contesting against a ruling government.”

The House of Representatives’ aspirant said most members of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) in Edo State, especially in Oredo Local Government, were not happy with Obaseki’s leadership style, coupled with the deepening crisis in the PDP, thereby making it much easier for him to record landslide victory.

A coalition of women organisations, Nwanyi Bu Ife Advocacy Group, yesterday decried increasing low participation of women in politics and governance in Anambra State.

They urged the legislative arm of the government to accord women their rightful position with maximum security through legislation.

The women took their protest to the House of Assembly in Awka, carrying placards with inscriptions such as: “Nigerian women matter and their votes will count in 2023”, “Give women more voice”, “Nigeria cannot make progress without women”.

Other are: “Marriages render women stateless in Nigeria”, “Stop the subjugation of women” and  “Women are half the population, 35 per cent is not too much”, among others.

The group’s spokesperson, Dr. Ego Uzoezie, told reporters that they were at the Assembly to submit the Women Agenda for the lawmakers to appreciate the problems facing them in the state and make laws to alleviate their plight.

She said: “We planned strategic advocacies and came up with the Anambra Women Agenda to drive the progress and development of women in the state.

“The agenda will improve women’s participation in leadership, governance and elective politics in the state.”

The group’s secretary, Anekwe Eucharia, said: “We need the legislature to make laws to protect women’s rights, promote women inclusiveness in government, both in elected and appointed positions.

“We need legislation that will strengthen and uphold the values of equality and inclusivity that lie at the heart of democracy.”

Addressing the protesters, the lawmaker representing Onitsha South ll Constituency and member, House Committee on Gender, Mrs. Beverly Ikpeazu-Nkemdiche, lamented the outnumbering of women in legislative and executive arms of government, despite their population.

She said: “I’m the only woman in the House of Assembly, it is unfortunate. We need to change the narrative by ensuring more women participate and vie for elective positions in 2023.

“I promise to use my position to push for legislation that will empower and promote women inclusiveness in Anambra.”

Cross River State Governor Ben Ayade yesterday disclosed that a production line for the manufacture of military biscuits has been completed and will soon begin production.

He spoke at the inauguration of CSS Food Processing and Packaging Factory at Gora, near Abuja.

The governor, who has sent over 3,000 young people from Cross River for training at the CSS farms, advised the latest batch of 150 trainees to concentrate on learning the latest techniques in agricultural production.

He said: “I will send as many youths as possible here before my tenure ends. Over 3,000 have been trained already; more will still be trained because we are now expanding our value chain. So, we will need more raw materials.

“We have set up factories. We have a massive biscuit line and we don’t want to use wheat flour; we want to use fortified cassava flour to produce our biscuits. We will fortify our flour with special vitamin A and energy to have military biscuits. These call for backward integration, innovation and research. But this can only happen when you have the industrial platform to be able to work. “

“This is why ‘Cross Riverians’ will continue to come here, to gain advanced knowledge and skill in modern farming techniques, bring back the knowledge to the state, grow our cash crops and raw material dependence, and then ship into the factories that will process for export through the Bakassi Deep Seaport under the kinetics of the superhighway.”

Hailing Prof. John Kenedy Opara for leading the way in agro-industrialisation, agro-innovation and food security, Ayade said: “I think it is timely for Nigeria to realise that we can’t keep importing everything. It is time to embrace technology driven agriculture. It is time to begin to create jobs for our people, increase the foot falls in farms, reduce restiveness, banditry, armed robbery and kidnapping.

“The basis of the insecurity we find in Nigeria is characterised by unemployment. Agriculture actually speaks to the subject. This is why it is imperative for me to keep sending young men and women from Cross River to CSS farms to learn modern techniques and skills in farming, to enable them earn a living through agriculture and its value chains.”

Ijaw and Ndokwa youths, under the aegis of Ndokwa East Ijaw Nation Movement (NEINM), have protested the degradation caused by oil exploration by Sterling Exploration and Energy Production Company Limited (SEEPCO), on the coast of the River Niger.

The youth, who yesterday stormed the company’s premises in Ndokwa East Local Government of Delta State, said the activities of the company left the people of the coastal communities “hungry all year round.”

They bore placards with inscriptions such as: “We demand payment of tenement rates to Ekeremor, Burutu, Bomadi, Patani and Ndokwa East councils”, “Sterling and her subsidiaries, please embark on a JIV with your host communities”, among others.

The demonstrators said the protest would continue until the company listened to their demands, “as failure to so do will be critical to the parties involved.”

Led by Samuel Ebolo and Okwuwa Ezechi, chairman and secretary, the youth, who were drawn from Ndokwa East, Patani, Bomadi and Burutu local governments in Delta State, as well as Ekeremor Council in Bayelsa State, said they embarked on the peaceful protest after a 14-day ultimatum to the company to address their demands elapsed.

The chairman said on February 22, letters were dispatched to the management of SEEPCO requesting a Joint Investigation Visit (JIV) of the stretch of the waterways to ascertain the level of pollution due to crude oil activities of the firm – with a view to compensating the affected communities.

Other demands are immediate clean-up of the waterways and restoration of the ecosystem to support fishing, carrying out Corporate Social Responsibility projects and shore protection for the coastal communities in the five councils.

“We hinted that their failure (to reach out and discuss within 14 days) will constrain us to do the needful. Self-help also an option,” Ebolo said.

He noted that SEEPCO had been “lifting and transporting crude oil” on the River Niger for more than a decade, leaving devastating economic impact on the livelihood of the people.

“More than 10 barges, heavily guarded, travel this route from Ndokwa East to Agae in Ekeremor Local Government of Bayelsa State before it is loaded on a mother vessel for the Atlantic Ocean.

“As these vessels make this journey, the pollution it leaves behind is unquantifiable.

“Our local communities on the banks of the River Niger from the aforementioned councils are either agrarian or fishing communities. Some are both.

“Spilled crude and industrial wastes leave their trail on the Niger. Marine life is gone, the economic mainstay of our people. When the floods arrive, our farmlands and communities are flooded. The moment the water recedes, it leaves patches of crude and industrial wastes in our communities and farmlands,” he said.

He added that efforts to get the intervention of the council authorities on the matter showed that “the management of SEEPCO pride themselves high and above the local government where they operate.”

Efforts to reach the company’s spokesman for comments proved futile at press time.

An email sent to the mail address, obtained from the company’s website, failed to deliver.

Ijaw communities under the auspices of the Movement for the Survival of Izon Ethnic Nationality in Niger Delta (MOSIEND) have urged the Minister of Niger Delta Affairs, Sen. Godswill Akpabio, to account for the N800billion that accrued to the Niger Delta Development Commission (NDDC), between 2020 and 2021.

MOSIEND, in a communiqué after its national executive meeting in Port Harcourt, Rivers State, lamented that there was nothing on ground in the Niger Delta to show that such money was received by the NDDC.

The communiqué, signed by MOSIEND’s spokesman, Charles Omusuku, accused Akpabio of manipulating the Presidency to have his ways in the region and the NDDC.

“It is on record that NDDC has received well over N799billion between 2020 and 2021 and nothing tangible can be seen in the region in the name of development,” the document said.

The group said the Federal Government should take responsibility for the increasing oil bunkering in the region because it reneged on its promise to liberalise the award of modular refineries, to encourage local participation and youth employment.

MOSIEND said: “In February 2017  during the Niger Delta Avengers attack on oil and gas facilities in the region, Vice-President Yemi Osinbajo, then acting President, promised that the Federal Government had resolved to liberalise the award of modular refineries to curtail illegal bunkering activities.

“That promise made many of our people, who were financially buoyant, to venture into the business, to enjoy waivers, as the thinking was that most of the perpetrators would be granted amnesty and considered for allotment. Unfortunately, the government awarded the modular refineries to themselves and their cronies.”

The group challenged the Federal Government to make public the list of those it awarded modular refineries since 2017.

It urged President Muhammadu Buhari to review the process of awarding the Nigerian National Petroleum Organisation (NNPC) surveillance security contracts and modular refineries, to restore hope in youths in the region.

MOSIEND hailed the NNPC for the rehabilitation of refineries, saying it would facilitate the full deregulation of the downstream sector.

A former National Auditor of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), Mr. Ray Nnaji, has promised to sue Enugu State chapter of the party if it fails to maintain the existing rotation of the governorship position and allows ex-Deputy Senate President Ike Ekweremadu or any other person outside Enugu East to pick its governorship ticket.

Nnaji, who expressed worry about the silence of the party leadership on the issue of the rotation of the governorship position, said by convention and practice, the seat should be zoned to Enugu East Senatorial District.

Nnaji, a two-term chairman of Nkanu West Local Government and former commissioner, was reacting to the issues raised by Ekweremadu last weekend during his consultation with the media on his intention to become the governor.

Ekweremadu had at that meeting said that there had never been zoning of the governorship position in the state and that those who had governed Enugu in the past never emerged through zoning.

But speaking with reporters in Enugu yesterday, Nnaji threatened to test in court, Section 7(3c) of the PDP Constitution regarding rotation of party and public offices.

He said: “I have to tell you, if the party fails to zone its governorship position to Enugu East, we will have to test the party constitution in court, whether it has a right to do so, based on the provisions of the party constitution.

“Ekweremadu should prepare if the party says it will listen to him and give him the ticket.

“I am saying that there’s no need for the party to throw the ticket open because of the existing convention and that the position has gone round. So, it has to start from the first zone, which is Enugu East.

“It is not as though if it is thrown open, somebody like Ekweremadu will take it from us. Mark my word. But what we are saying is that we will have to test the provision of the constitution if the ticket is thrown open. We will have to answer the question of where do we start after the position has gone round the three zones.”

Nnaji described Ekweremadu’s remarks about zoning as misinformation that should not be allowed to stand.

Said he: “The first section of the latest PDP Constitution (2017) makes it clear that everybody is subject to the provisions of the constitution, subject to the Constitution of the Federal Republic of Nigeria. That same Section One says the provision of the constitution is binding on everybody.

“Section 7(3c) states that rotation of public offices is compulsory. It says adhering to the policy of rotation and zoning of party and public elective offices in pursuance of the principles of equity, justice and fairness.

“Ekweremadu is aware of this provision because he cannot pretend not to be aware. If not for any other thing, he’s a lawyer.

“The party put this in the constitution to give room for fairness and equity.

“He also said if anybody is challenging him to the fact that zoning was discussed anywhere in the state, the person should speak up. I want to tell him that it is not true that zoning was never discussed anywhere in the state.

“It has been a convention that governorship position rotates among the three senatorial districts. It has come to stay, taking effect from 1999.

“The reference he was making about Jim Nwobodo, C. C. Onoh and Okwesilieze Nwodo having been governor of Enugu State. That was the period zoning and rotation were never in existence.

“The issue of zoning started in 1999. Although, Chimaraoke Nnamani is not a product of zoning, he started the issue of rotation. I knew quite well that at that time, he had the capacity to retain the governorship position in Nkanu (Enugu East) where he comes from in 2007. But for the issue of equity, justice and fairness, he decided that power should shift to another zone. The question then was between Enugu West and Enugu North, which would take governorship first.

“Myself, I had several discussions about that to the effect that I concluded that Enugu West should take it. And one day when I visited him, he told me that he had taken a decision that Enugu West should take the position. That was why power was shifted to the West and Sullivan Chime incidentally took the position.

“I was also meant to understand that there was a meeting Chimaraoke Nnamani called where the decision to shift the position to Enugu West was taken. Senator Collins Ndu, Ekweremadu and some others were at that meeting. It is not an issue that everybody must be at that meeting to take a decision.

“Now that it has gone round, the question is, are we going to allow it to be open or maintain the existing rotation? This thing is like a clock that must be allowed to continue to go clockwise.

“Enugu East that started the zoning has been out of power for 16 years and should take their turn immediately. Obviously after Enugu East, it will be the turn of Enugu West where Ekweremadu comes from.”

Nnaji added: “Ekweremadu’s argument on no zoning is because he believes that after eight years, he will not be politically relevant to contest the position anymore. This is why he wants to rock the boat by saying there’s no zoning principle.

“I will have to tell you that even if there is zoning, when the party comes out to announce where the position is going based on our constitution, it’s not going to foreclose other people who have interest. You can go and buy the form, enter the race. If you succeed, fine and good.

“I want to remind you that even when Sullivan was picked from the West, Chimaraoke’s deputy, Okechukwu Itanyi from the North, also contested but lost.

“So, we’re not saying Ekweremadu has no right to contest. But his chances of success will be reduced to the barest minimum if the party takes a position on where the ticket is going.”

He said Enugu East people are law-abiding and are interested in listening to the party and wanting it to take a position on the matter.