White paper on NDDC Forensic Audit will be out soon – FG

THE Federal Government, on Wednesday, said its White Paper on the forensic audit of the operation of Niger-Delta Development Commission, NDDC, from 2001 to 2019, in response to the allegations of widespread corruption in the agency, will soon be released.

Minister of Niger-Delta Affairs, Chief Umana Umana, who disclosed this while presenting the scorecard of President Muhammadu Buhari Administration (2015-2023) in the region in Abuja on Wednesday, said over 4000 projects have been identified for termination as part of the implementation of the Forensic Audit Report.

2023 polls and spread of fake news

Umana spoke as his counterpart in the Federal Ministry of Information and Culture, Lai Mohammed, expressed satisfaction with the efforts of Meta, owners of Facebook, Instagram and WhatsApp, to check the spread of fake news on its platforms ahead of Nigeria’s 2023 elections; urging other social networking sites to take similar steps to address disinformation and make political advertisements more transparent.

Mohammed said, “During one of our earlier sessions here, I spoke about the dangers posed to the 2023 elections by fake news and disinformation. I said the increasing resort to fake news and disinformation by some political actors and a section of the media constitutes a clear and present danger to the success of the elections, just like violence, insecurity, vote buying, attack on INEC facilities, etc.

“In this regard, I want to acknowledge the announcement by Meta, the owners of Facebook, Instagram and Whatsapp, that it will take clearly-outlined steps to protect the integrity of the forthcoming elections. Specifically, Meta detailed the actions it plans to take to combat disinformation and to make political advertising more transparent. The company committed to these actions before, during and after the elections.

“This is commendable and it is in line with what we have always said, that the platform owners have a big role to play in checking the spread of fake news, disinformation and hate speech via their platforms. Meta has demonstrated a great sense of responsibility and we hope the company will live up to its promise.

“We also urge other platform owners like Google (owners of YouTube and others), ByteDance (owners of TikTok), Twitter and the Telegram Group Inc. (owners of Telegram messenger) to emulate Meta by taking positive steps to prevent the spread of fake news, disinformation and hate speech via their platforms ahead, during and after the 2023 elections.”

NDDC Forensic Audit

Meanwhile, in reeling out the achievements of the Buhari administration in the Niger-Delta, Chief Umana explained that the process of harmonising the Ministry’s ‘Niger Delta Action Plan’ and NDDC’s ‘Regional Development Master Plan’ as well as other plans in the Region into a single developmental blueprint is ongoing and would be concluded by First Quarter 2023.

He said, “We have submitted a single Forensic Audit Report on NDDC to the President. He has directed the cancellation of some contracts illegally awarded by the Commission. Out of over 4000 projects directed for termination, a total of 1,250 have been so far terminated as part of the implementation of the report.

“Mr President has also directed the refund of money by some contractors on projects not executed and contract sum inflated. Indeed, some funds have been returned by contractors due to non-performance and other reasons. The recovered funds are in custody of the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission, EFCC. The White Paper on the exercise is being awaited. It will be released soon.”

Though Umana refused to disclose the exact amount of money so far recovered, the Minister of Niger-Delta Affairs said President Buhari directed that the funds be released by the EFCC to the Ministry for use in funding specific critical projects and programmes in the region before he leaves office on May 29, 2023.

NDDC Board and Budget

The Minister insisted that the composition of the new management team and governing board of NDDC was in line with Section 2(1) of the NDDC Acts and had been concluded, adding that the screening process of board members by the National Assembly will commence on Thursday.

He explained that there were a lot of legal issues around the board members cleared and confirmed by the Senate in October 2019 which made the President to keep their inauguration in abeyance, despite calls on him by the legislature to proceed with the ceremony.

“Government formally disbanded that board even though it never took off. So, we’ve gone beyond that. We have nominees now submitted to the Senate, the screening process is on and once that is concluded the board will be inaugurated. I understand from the updates I got yesterday. The nominees have been invited for screening tomorrow (Thursday) by the Senate Committee,” Umana said.

He also disclosed that the NDDC pending Budgets for 2021 and 2022 have been transmitted to the Senate for Legislative approval.

Statutory Allocations, Projects and Programmes

On the issue of statutory allocations to the Ministry of Niger-Delta Affairs since 2015 vis-a-vis the projects and programmes executed during the period under review, Umana said that the total sum of N220.5bn had been appropriated, but only N147.5bn was released and a shortfall of N73bn recorded. According to him, these figures indicate a 66.8 percent of actual release to appropriation.

Nevertheless, he said Niger-Delta Affairs received the sums of N11bn and N19bn as special intervention funds for the years 2019 and 2020 respectively, bringing the grand total release to the Ministry to N178bn between 2015 and 2022.

Against that backdrop, Umana said the Ministry has completed 553 Projects and Programmes between 2015-2022 while some others are ongoing at different completion stages in the nine states of the Niger Delta region.

He described the East-West Road project as a dual carriageway and a priority project that spans a total length of 338km with well over 41 Nos. bridges. It runs from Warri through Port Harcourt to Oron, with a proposed extension to Calabar.

According to him, “291km out of the 338km dual carriageway were completed and all the 41 bridges also completed (with two deck-on-pile bridges substantially completed) by the Ministry before the road project was transferred to the Federal Ministry of Works and Housing in 2021. The Ministry is also constructing Inter-state and other road projects in the region to increase the number of road infrastructures in the Niger Delta region and added to the national road network.

“Within the period under review, a total of 102.55km and five bridges have been completed. 102 road projects are ongoing in the region at different completion levels.”

Other areas of interventions, the Minister said the Buhari administration has made in the region include; Agriculture and Empowerment (163 projects), Education (66), Environment (115), Health (29), Housing (66), Orientation and Information (21), Water (31), and Works (62).

(Vanguard)