Group Blasts NDDC, Hails PIB for Niger Delta

Group Blasts NDDC, Hails PIB for Niger Delta

THE Niger Delta Development Commission (NDDC) budget for this fiscal year has come under some harsh criticism even as the Petroleum Industry Bill (PIB) received thumps up for coming up with new provisions for the oil and gas region.

Stakeholder Democracy Network (SDN), a civil society group which took a swipe on the NDDC budget however, said the PIB which has been a seeming endless saga that has primarily been noted for battles between government and industry interests over various commercial provisions.

Spokesperson of the group, Mr. Inemo Semiama, told AkanimoReports in an interview on Wednesday that receiving less attention has been the scope for the bill to either address or institutionalize further a swathe of impacts on communities in the Niger Delta.

According to the group, ''existing law, and crucially the way it is enforced, has led to a tolerance for a level of oil spills that would not be accepted in any other part of the world. There are some provisions in the bill - such as a mandatory clean up reserve fund - that at least partly acknowledge this problem.

''However the bill seems to continue the overlapping interests that stand in contrast with the need for a strong independent agency capable of bringing discipline to a 'wild west' operating environment''.

Continuing, the SDN said, ''one provision that has been injected late into the bill demands closer attention. A 10 percent 'share' in operations has been updated as a dividend payable to communities 'impacted by oil operations'.

''Earlier versions of this proposal contained inexplicable contradictions. The present version has some improvements - such as the proviso that funds must go to elected community co-operatives- but there are many questions still to be answered. These range from the seemingly arbitrary way that community 'dividends' are valued (bearing a curious resemblance to the derided Land Use Act) through to the professed goal of the dividend being to reduce pipeline vandalism''.

They are claiming that the 10 per cent provision still estimates a transfer of $600 million to communities - potentially a bigger impact than the trickle down impacts of NDDC projects but still easy to fritter away in a large region besieged by corruption.

''As the passage of the PIB is unlikely to wait much longer there is an urgent need for effective public hearings that will address both the 10 percent provision and the role of the PIB in reducing the devastating environmental impacts of oil operations'', the group said.

On the $1.6 billion NDDC 2010 budget, the SDN said the budget was only passed at the end of July by the National Assembly, claiming that it was passed without any meaningful breakdown of its main activity - capital projects - other than a single line for the expenditure that it will make in each state.

''Its annual budget appears never to have been released publicly, leaving it less transparent than even the most opaque of states. In the next couple of months the NDDC will rush to contract out its 2010 budget before the end of the year, with a very high risk that patronage priorities will trump development needs.

''Contracts will actually be executed in 2011 and meanwhile NDDC will produce its 2011 budget before Christmas. The contract process will have nominal procurement procedures but these are trivialized by an almost complete absence of public record on what will be done with these funds and how much will be spent'', SDN said.

''One example of how good development ideas go bad'', they went on, ''can be found in the NDDC's solar water projects. A recent short survey by a local Non-Governmental Organisation (NGO) found that 80 per cent of the sites visited contained failed projects - with the basic design in most cases being at fault regardless of whether the contractor had completed the job.

''With price tags at over $250,000(40 Million Naira) each for dozens of water projects and more planned in the 2010 budget there is a clear risk of the NDDC setting glaring new precedents in how not to undertake sustainable development.

''All actors with an interest in development in the region need to press the NDDC to release its 2009 and 2010 detailed budgets with a record of what has been done and what is committed. The process could prove transformative - good concepts within the budget will attract deserved attention and issues such as solar water shortcomings stand a chance of effective remedial action''.

They said the NDDC can help overcome its appalling reputation as a patronage contracting machine by ''demonstrating that a high degree of public transparency will help protect its enlarged budget from the abuse that has been a persistent characteristic over the past nine years''. ENDS

ENDS

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