From Femi Folaranmi, Yenagoa

A transparency advocacy group, Young Professionals for Peace, Transparency and Development (YPPTD) has called on President Muhammadu Buhari and the Chairman of the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission, (EFCC), Abdulrasheed Bawa to launch an investigation into the alleged monumental corruption at the Niger Delta Development Commission (NDDC).

It is therefore seeking the probe of the immediate past Minister of Niger Delta Affairs, Godswill Akpabio and the interim administrator of the commission, Mr. Effiong Okon Akwa, to ascertain their role in the alleged corruption.

The group also called on the President Muhammadu Buhari to sack Mr. Effiong Okon Akwa as the Interim Administrator of the NDDC over the expiration of the three months tenure and lack of renewal and for the immediate setting up of a substantive Board for the Commission.

YPPTD in a petition to President Buhari and the EFCC boss, signed by its Director-General, Chief Selekumo Ndiaye, alleged that the N700billion fraud as revealed by the Ijaw Youth Council(IYC) was perpetuated under various systems and passed through conduit pipes including illegal payment of 20 Billion to ghost contractors for the fictitious contract of distilling purportedly awarded by the NDDC.

The group lamented that though the IYC provided alleged evidence of the sleazy process where the signatures of a former acting Managing Director of NDDC, Prof Nelson Brambiafa and former Executive Director (Projects) Samuel Ajugbe, were forged to pay the ghost contractors between N300 Million and 400 Million in the last three months, the anti-graft failed to probe the allegation.

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The group accused Akpabio of using the NDDC to get funds used in funding his presidential ambition on the platform of the All Progressive Congress

The group also called on President Muhammadu Buhari to take a second review of the Forensic audit ordered to review the account of the NDDC, alleging that the forensic audit has been tampered with and used as a negotiating wand to exonerate some members of the APC, National Assembly members and others to delay and sabotage the appointment of substantive NDDC board.

“There is a high level of suffering among the people of the Niger Delta due to lack of development despite the trillions of naira that has been deplored into the NDDC. We call on the commission to identify corrupt officials and punish them.

“The imposition of Mr Effiong Okon Akwa as Interim Administrator of the Niger Delta Development Commission is not only illegal but an affront to the Niger Delta people. The imposition is yet a further flagrant disobedience of the NDDC Act, which spells out the manner of appointing the Commission’s executive management.

” We call on Mr. President and his advisers not to take the patience of the Niger Delta people for granted with the continued flagrant disregard for the NDDC Act. They should reverse this illegal appointment and follow the guidelines on appointment of the executive management of the NDDC as spelt out in the law setting up the Commission”