Pastor Usani Uguru Usani is the Minister of Niger Delta Affairs. He spoke with some reporters in Calabar recently. NICHOLAS KALU was there.
What did you meet on ground and what your priority as you took over the ministry?
Putting things in proper perspective became our first responsibility, which so far is beginning to shape. It was just a situation before where people thought that, the Ministry of Niger Delta Affairs was a platform for collecting and sharing and then insistent agitations that would suggest further sharing. There can be no better way to describe that and that was why we had more 420 billion disbursed in the Ministry and the rate of project completion was just 12 per cent. So much of waste.
It was just nothing other than the conception that we had ascribed to ourselves of violent agitations or settlement at the detriment of the intentions of the setting up of the ministry. This is what I met. What we are trying to do is to reward contractors who have been diligent. Those who have shown due diligence in execution to be encouraged by being mobilized further to return to site. And those who are in liability against their resource mobilization to be requested or advised to return to site until they get to the levels of project execution that is commensurate with what they have gained financially.
What is the situation of the East-West Road?
Maybe you also need a good understanding of the history of the East West Road. It was first awarded in 2006. So today it is one decade of a project that is not complete yet has so much social and economic importance to the region. It is awarded in sections 1, 2, 3, 4 and 5. All the other sections are in progress of work except section 5, being the one linking Akwa Ibom from Oron to Calabar in Cross River State. Several segments of the East West Road are at various stages of execution. But obviously not at the same level. But section 5 has not started at all. But one thing I know is that the Section 5 which is till in my view at the level of award has been encumbered with certain procedural considerations. When the contract was awarded, it was awarded in US Dollars. Also the earlier design made suggested that of the complex bridge to link Oron and Calabar, the award carried only first phase of the contract with a partial commencement of the second phase and that means if it had started or even if it had been completed, you will never know when the second phase would awarded as to having a complete project.
Besides, one discovers that the nature of the design was going to affect the social conditions of the two communities, Calabar and Oron because the end route in Calabar was going to empty at the roundabout at Watt Market. So if you imagine traffic to the state from the road to empty in the city centre, it means some days people would not even move from one point for hours and it was a great defect. Consider even the fact of having to pass through Egerton, where you begin to negotiate compensation, which could take one or two years before some people will agree to quit their locations and so on. So we held a confab inviting Akwa Ibom and Cross River State Government and community leaders in both states, and former technical consultants who designed the road and other consultants to run commentaries on their designs. At the end of it, we put together all our ministry engineers and engineers from the ministry of works in both states to go and work out alterative which they did and eventually all of them agreed. By the new agreed design, the road is coming out at Adiabo and it would pass through some communities in Odukpani including Creek Town, which is longer in distance, but lesser in cost. But to suggest that we would go ahead and implement that contract denominated in US Dollars would mean that at the unstable exchange rate, the contract would be open-ended. So at any given time, Nigerians would not know the naira equivalent spent on the contract which is why I felt we must do a thorough thing once and for all, because as it were, if they started or even if they were going to start on that condition, it would mean that until the end of the contract, nobody would ever know how much worth it would mean. Thank God we have got alternative designs. We have also got the contractor who signed in to do the job. We invited him to come and see the reality, quote according to what this component design entails. That is the state at which we are. We invited them because, we do not want anybody to insinuate that it is because we want to change contractors for ulterior motives that is why we are disagreeing with the first things they did. But if they fail to do that, we must be more interested in the welfare of our people and the economy of our country than patronizing people just on the basis of being contractors. So we hope that we get the response very soon. We are having the president also to give his view on that. Once that is done, we would go ahead to the next phase of signing a proper contract. For me there has been no contract on that matter because I don’t see how a sovereign nation with its own monetary and fiscal policies will be denominating its contract awards in foreign currency when all the components are locally sourced including labour. For me that is fraud.
What would you say you have achieved since took over?
Our achievement in the ministry is trying to shape the ministry and giving a new value orientation to the people is quite important. When we said we were going to carry out a technical audit of all the projects it was vehemently resisted by all those you can guess to be concerned. But with determination we did and it has shown that we have been unfair to ourselves in terms of the resource application vis-à-vis the outcomes. In a region that cries for development, because of the peculiar circumstances we find that the average period for completion of a particular project is 5 years inspite of the nature of the project and yet we have only 12 per cent project completion rate and 8 per cent impact. Of course all these analyses we applied standard global performance indices and you see that the only projects that have been completed have been by us within the one year. Whereas in the past there has been a façade of attempts to commission projects that were not completed at all.
To Nigerians it may look meaningless, but without a good foundation there cannot be an established structure. Like I said the other works that are physical are continuing. We are applying our funds to them. But we have within period done something. The action plan of the ministry is being revisited and reviewed. We have also in collaboration with the UNDP done a baseline survey and we have got their report which was presented for ratification. When it is ratified it therefore means it will be ready for submission at any level for to secure assistance. Again, the process of our procurement or anything to be done in the ministry is getting a new lease and of course, you will expect that with all we are trying to initiate, our administration would remain unpopular as long as we are doing what we are trying to do. The reason is because they are those who don’t see anything good in what we are doing. But I believe that by the time we finish they will be happier.
How about the issue of insecurity and violence in the region?
To address the issue of insecurity and violence in the region, one needs to ask the first question, what is their reason? I have always been a crusader of the fact that the rate of disuse of the environment in the region demands specific, peculiar, special attention. However beyond that point, I am also aware that not much attention since the time of oil exploitation has been given to the region. But we thank God within the last one decade government started to look in that direction. In which case our rational action should have been to wait and see how government progresses with us, not just this administration. But instead to find unprovoked violence is what evoked curiosity in our minds to ask why. And our findings in these questions suggest more sinister motives than just lack of development in the region.
So I think what is happening in our region in this violence perspective is a hurt to ourselves and we may not survive it beyond a certain time.
There are people who feel the president has not been fair to the Niger Delta?
Even those who are saying the president is not doing well enough in their hearts know that they are not telling the truth. Because inspite of the UNEP report of Ogoni clean up, who has ever initiated action if not this president? And inspite of the fact that the amnesty programme was supposed to terminate in December 2015, did this administration not extend it? It is one of the major programmes the president has even attempted to give express approval for money to be drawn from special accounts to fund. So by what means should anyone suggest that the administration of the president in particular is not fair to the Niger Delta region. By my special access to what is going on, a lot of what goes on is about 2019. They are determined that this administration must fail. According to such persons, these administration must not be allowed to have money, to function so that they will be voted out in 2019. And the sponsors are big. If they hear this they will want to crucify me, but I own it up because I know. I am not speculating.
