By Jimitota Onoyume

Arewa leader in the south Alhaji Musa Saidu has urged the federal government to adequately fund the Niger Delta Basin Development Authority, NDBDA, stressing that it would assist immensely in addressing issues of underdevelopment across communities in the Niger Delta region.

Saidu said the Niger Delta Development Commission, NDDC, was yet to make a significant impact on matters of infrastructural development in several communities in the region several years after it’s establishment.

He said it was sad that decades after agitations led by Chief Harold Dappa Biriye and several other leaders of the region for a better Niger Delta the level of poverty and neglect in the area were still very visible.

He said the agitations of Chief Biriye ,Chief Edwin Clark, Ambassador Mathew Mbu, Prof Sotonye Amachree, Dr Tari Sekibo, Comrade Ekpo from Akwa Ibom, Prof Ambily Etekpe. Barr Ayo Young Tamuno, Joseph kariboro, and many more led to the creation of the NDDC.

He said the NDDC should do more for the region in the area of road construction , equipping schools for learning and so on.

“The Niger Delta Development Commission should give more attention to development issues .

” I worked with Chief Harold Dappa Biriye as his Special Adviser , SA. The NDDC was set up from our struggles and that of many other Niger Deltans to address problems of underdevelopment in the region.

“Communities across the region are still facing challenges of poverty , neglect , the NDDC should be seen in these places.

“The Pan Niger Delta Development Forum , PANDEF, should be pushing the government to keep its promises to the region. The effort of Chief Harold Biriye and others should not be in vain. So much poverty in the area.

“Niger Delta basin authority should be funded. Chief Edwin Clark , Ambassador Mathew Mbu , Prof Sotonye Amachree, lDr Tari Sekibo, Comrade Ekpo from Akwa Ibom, Prof Ambily Etekpe. Barr Ayo Young Tamuno. Joseph kariboro and many others were among those at the forefront of the fight for a better Niger Delta region .”