Hon. Bassey Etienam is a lawmaker representing Urue Offong-Oruko State Constituency of Akwa Ibom State. A one time personal assistant to Governor Godswill Akpabio, he spoke to Vanguard in Uyo on grave national issues bordering on security, corruption and economy among others.

Bonny community in Rivers State is home to a Shell oil terminal and the Nigerian Liquefied Natural Gas, NLNG. Over the course of these corporate tenants’ business of tapping crude oil and gas deposits in the shores of this tiny island, there has been established, as in most oil host communities, a love-hate relationship in which the natives repeatedly feel compelled to sack the operating companies for perceived unsatisfactory returns to the landlords.

Against the back ground of collective result of stakeholders across the country to wage an unrelenting war against sundry graft, one of the agencies responsible for anti corruption crusade has taken its approach to combat the menace to another level. Instead of the traditional method of prosecuting offenders after the crime has been committed, the new initiative is preventive in nature.

As Nigeria finally forfeited its right to formally appeal against the controversial judgment of the International Court of Justice, ICJ, which in 2002, ceded the oil-rich Bakassi Peninsula to Cameroun, the Nigerian Bar Association, NBA, yesterday, distanced itself from the position of the Attorney General of the Federation and Minister of Justice, Mohammed Bello Adoke, SAN, on the matter.

Six oil-producing states have reiterated commitment to improving quality of education in their region, the Director-General of the BRACED Commission, Ambassador Joe Keshi, has said. He noted that BRACED, is an acronym for Bayelsa, Rivers, Akwa Ibom, Cross River, Edo and Delta states.