Minister of Niger Delta Affairs, Senator Godswill Akpabio, recently picked up the gauntlet thrown down by the National Assembly to name lawmakers who got contracts from the Niger Delta Development Commission (NDDC) but from the list, it was very obvious that he cleverly omitted some names.
The minister, in a document attached to his response to the threat by the House of Representatives to sue him over the allegations that federal lawmakers were the major contractors of NDDC, listed four senators as receiving 74 contracts from the commission between 2017 to date.
He also accused the Chairman of the House Committee on NDDC, Hon. Olubunmi Tunji-Ojo, of inserting 19 contracts worth N9 billion into 2019 NDDC budget.
House of Representatives Speaker, Hon. Femi Gbajabiamila, had last week given Akpabio a 48-hour ultimatum to identify lawmakers that are NDDC contractors as he alleged during his testimony before the House Committee on NDDC.
According to the list, the Chairman of the Senate Committee on NDDC, Senator Peter Nwaoboshi, allegedly executed 53 NDDC projects from 2017 to date.
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He also accused three other senators namely: Matthew Urhoghide, James Manager, and Sam Anyanwu of executing a total of 21 NDDC contracts during the period under review.
In the bulky document with a three-page covering letter entitled: “Some Niger Delta Development Commission (NDDC) Contracts Allegedly Given to some Members of the National Assembly – Senate and House of Representatives,” Akpabio also fingered the Chairman of the House Committee on NDDC in 19 contracts worth ₦9 billion inserted into the 2019 NDDC budget.
The contracts listed against Nwaoboshi’s name included Emergency Repairs of Asue Street, Owa Phase 2; Emergency Repairs of ldumuogbe Road via Ojemaye; Emergency Repairs of Otolokpo College Road, Otolokpo; and Emergency Repairs of Police lshu Ani Ukwu Road, Issele Uku in Delta State.
They also included Emergency Repairs of old Sapele Agbor Road, Obiaruku; Emergency Repairs of Ehwerhe Obada Road Agbarho Road; Emergency Repairs of Hon. Ifeanyi Eboigbe Street, Boji Boji Owa/Goodwill Street, Owa Alero; and Emergency Repairs of Ahiama Okwu to Obuocha Okwu among others, all in Delta State.
Other lawmakers that Akpabio listed projects against are, Senator Mathew Urhoghide (six projects), Senator James Manager (six projects); former Senator, Sam Anyanwu (19 projects), and others simply identified as Ondo and Edo representatives while the project cost was not supplied by the minister.
Akpabio also listed one Mutu’s name against 74 projects which included various emergency road projects in Delta, Akwa Ibom, Bayelsa, and Rivers States.
All in all, Senator Akpabio has succeeded in naming those who he deemed fit to face the music but in full glaring reality, it was noticed that no Northerner was in his list.
The only explainable reason for this is because he knows the consequences of releasing the real list containing the names of Fulani stakeholders in the Niger Delta Development Commission (NDDC). Nigeria is the only oil-producing country where oil wells are allocated to individuals. The Hausa-Fulani cabal control over 80% of the oil blocks and as such, they call the main shots in the Niger Delta Development Commission board.
Senator Godswill Akpabio being aware of this and also aware of the numerous mishaps that would befall him if he crossed them manipulated the list and wiped off names of those who have sworn allegiance to the Fulani cabal.
One might say he did this to save his own head because, like many other Government officials, the Fulani Cabal has stockpiled some damning information which they use to control and manipulate political stakeholders to keep them in check.
And Senator Godswill Akpabio himself is not a Saint in any form having been accused of fraudulent mismanagement of funds summing up to ₦120 billion, job racketeering and abuse of office at various levels. It was reported that on September 4, 2015, that the operatives of Department of State Security (DSS) uncovered a stockpile of arms and Ammunition, plus a whole room loaded with United States Dollars and British Pounds within the Presidential Lodge of the Akwa Ibom Government House complex. Akpabio still had the keys exclusively to the Presidential Lodge, even when he was already in the senate.
The catché of arms and ammunition plus bags of foreign currency were seized by the DSS. The then young Gov Emmanuel had protested to President Muhammadu Buhari on what was described as the invasion of the Akwa Ibom Government House. The president intervened, faulted the “invasion”, and as they say in Nigeria, that intervention “died” the matter. Till date, we do not know what happened to the hard currency and even the arms and ammunition. The case was closed.
It was this same Akpabio, two years earlier, on March 18, 2013, who went to Port Harcourt, for a South-south zonal reconciliation meeting of the PDP. And in a brazen show of impulsive spending zipped open his purse and doled out six million Naira, to the six state chairmen of the party for, “Mr Biggs refreshment”. It was only the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) that dared to peep into his books, and what they saw was damning enough to commence prosecution immediately he left office as governor of the state when his immunity expired.
But as many things in Nigeria go, the cases of fraud and corruption filed against him by the EFCC has long become hitched. The case is neither dead nor alive and this stagnancy is hitched on the fact that he is still a stooge to the Fulani Oligarchy and only a phone call or two can change that fact. Nobody talks about them anymore, especially when he decamped from the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) into the All Progressives Congress (APC).
Nobody is exactly surprised that immediately Akpabio bathed the APC waters and swore allegiance to the Fulani cabal, all his sins were washed away, and he became clean enough to join the cabinet of a government pitched high on anti-corruption war.
Didn’t Comrade Adams Oshiomhole, the former National Chairman of the APC once declare that as soon as any filthy politician joins the APC, all his sins are forgiven and so becomes as white as snow? Only in Nigeria!
As long as Senator Godswill Akpabio keeps playing to the rules of the Fulani Oligarchy, he is safe with them. If Nigeria was really what it was supposed to be, that list should have been hotly contested. But this is politics of the Fulanis, for the Fulanis, by the Fulanis.
AFRICA TODAY NEWS, NEW YORK