By Sunny Ikhioya

ON Friday, April 9, 2019, the Senate confirmed the appointment of retired Major General Paul Tarfa and other members nominated for the board of the North East Development Commission, NEDC.

It is neither the constitution of the commission nor the appointment of board members that is the issue here; the issue is whether this project will not become another drain pipe where rent seekers and carpetbaggers will have a field day. That is, an avenue for political settlements and an appeasement for family members, friends and other cronies of those in Abuja.

Senate

We have seen it in OMPADEC (Oil Mineral Producing Areas Development Commission), NDDC (Niger Delta Development Commission) and other state controlled commissions that deal with resources allocations. We have seen the urge for individuals to grab and the opportunity for the big guys at Abuja – they control these agencies – to allocate jobs and contracts to their very own and in the process subverting the purpose for which these commissions are set up.

This fear is not misplaced. The Babachir Lawal case is still fresh in our memory. The Deputy Senate President, Ike Eweremadu, expressed this sentiment when he said: “The NDDC is steeped in a lot of protocol and bureaucracy, so this commission (NEDC) should learn from this”.

What he failed to mention was the shenanigans going on underground, outside the official norms, where invoices are tendered and paid for without substantive proof. What reigns in the commissions that we have seen so far are the manifestations of new sets of the super rich enabled by their privileged appointments and unlimited access to government money, while the conditions in the areas for which these commissions are set up continue to deteriorate.

https://newlive.vanguardngr.com/2019/03/pandef-ndelta-women-ask-fg-to-probe-polls-infringement-by-military-politicians-2/

You will also discover that the administrative costs of running these commissions will soon outstrip costs of envisaged projects; that is our way. The NEDC was specifically set up to “coordinate the rebuilding of the insurgency- ravaged North-East region of Nigeria”. Already, N10 billion, out of the N55 billion allocated for the first year, has been earmarked for administrative and other bureaucratic functions.

If you ask me, this appears to be a huge chunk of the budget given the situation in the country presently. One would expect that things will be done in a very austere manner, with the purpose of meeting the needs of the people and in the event turn them away from acts of insurgency and sabotage against government. The idea of creating the NEDC is a good one, but looking at the way we are going about it, it is destined to end up a sham like its predecessors.

I came to this conclusion because we have not properly addressed the insurgency issue. You cannot build on nothing; there is nothing on ground to show that we have established peace in the region. Up till last week, we were still witnessing Boko Haram attacks in towns and villages in Borno and Adamawa states, villages beING over run and people displaced from their ancestral lands.

Our armed forces are yet to find a permanent solution to the killings and displacement of people in the region. How can you build in an atmosphere of crises? I believe we are putting the cart before the horse. We should not be in a hurry to take wrong decisions because we want to please our people. If the purpose for this project is not met, then the whole thing will become another drain pipe to the nation which is in need of funds to execute vital projects across the land.

The NEDC, as it is today in the North-East, will not work unless peace is restored to the region. You remember the late Umaru Yar’Adua and his amnesty policy which paved the way for militants of the Niger Delta to surrender their arms? That brought about peace in the Niger Delta area which has remained till date. You want to build for the Boko Haram to destroy? What then is the purpose for building? Our priority for now should be on how we can properly equip our armed forces to cope with the ravaging Boko Haram insurgents, killer herdsmen and kidnappers in the land; until peace is achieved, reconstruction will be difficult to achieve.

We must beat the Boko Haram to submission, to the point where they will never rear their head again; and when that is achieved, then we can begin to rebuild. The Marshall Plan to reconstruct Germany and other war-ravaged regions of the world did not take effect until victory was achieved after the Second World War; until the opposition was properly brought to submission.

They capitulated and conceded defeat and were ready for the transformation that was to take place in their lives. So, what the North East zone of Nigeria needs for now is a lot of sensitisation of the populace. This government has a lot to do in this regard, with the Minister for Information, Alhaji Lai Mohammed, leading the way.

The people in the zone must be made to realise that they are destroying their entire history, culture and future if they continue in this manner. The ones that have demonstrated good prospect for change should be properly rehabilitated. The liberation of the North-East must start with education and reorientation; the same people who are giving Boko Haram information will turn their back on them if they are properly reoriented.

Let there be peace in the land; let the people be properly rehabilitated back to their lands; then we can start the rebuilding and reconstruction processes.

Another thing is, how can we separate the foreigners from the true Nigerians? It is clear, from the way these people operate, that a large percentage of them are foreigners. So, destroying properties, killing and looting in the land means nothing to them since they have no filial connection to the land. You cannot standby or partake in the destruction of your ancestral land unless you are a bastard.

At the moment, a video is trending in the social media showing how Nigerians are being tortured by fellow Africans in Angola. Same thing happening in South Africa, a country that we helped to liberate. Same with Ghana. Nigerians are serially attacked and forced to return to their country.

Why is it only in Nigeria that foreigners are holding the whole country to ransom and nothing is being done about it? We used to play the big brother role to all, but see how they have paid us back. I don’t know how we can go about it, but we must, by all means, start identifying ourselves, beginning from the North-East region.

The conspiracy of our northern brothers with the immigrants from Chad, Mali, Niger and the rest is not doing this country any good. Again, if peace is not achieved, all that have been recommended here will not work, so we go back to where we started from; declare a proper military solution to the problem of the north east, using the military boys from the area. As long as we continue to send soldiers from the south to the northeast frontline, we will continue to chase the boko haram in vain because the language and terrain are not theirs. The north east development commission must be wary in the manner it goes about carrying out its mission, without peace there cannot be development in the land.

Vanguard