-By Gideon Osaka
Agitations over perceived marginalisation of the South-South region in the distribution of national oil wealth and resources was freshly reignited recently when a group from the region issued strong condemnation over supposed lopsidedness in the appointments into top management positions at the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC) and its subsidiaries and departments.
The Pan Niger Delta Forum (PANDEF), a non-political organisation of the Niger Delta people, warned that it would not hesitate to drag the government of President Muhammadu Buhari to the International Court of Justice (ICJ) and the United Nations (UN) over what it described as “an affront to national character.”
The Forum threatened to carry out the action after it said it had exhausted all known democratic avenues to extract a commitment from the federal government to consider the wellbeing of the Niger Delta region which produces about 96 per cent of crude that is the nation’s economic mainstay.
According to the National Publicity Secretary of PANDEF, Ken Robinson, in a media interview, the Forum has since 2016 been making entreaties to the Buhari government to consider the Niger Delta an important region in terms of its huge economic contribution, but to no avail.
The main displeasure of the group is the perceived injustice in the appointments into the top management positions of the NNPC, in which according to them, only one slot out of nine was allotted to the Niger Delta region.
“Top management positions of the NNPC and its subsidiaries, departments, and ventures are held by people from the north, a region that does not produce an ounce of oil,” he said.
Further analysis of the situation by Valuechain reveal that the threat to approach the ICJ by the PANDEF came a week, after the leadership of the group wrote another open letter to President Buhari, listing the lopsided appointments in the NNPC and its subsidiaries to the chagrin of the ‘Niger Delta people’.
PANDEF, in the letter signed by Robinson, said the region’s marginalisation at the national oil corporation became even more pronounced in the March 2020 promotions and reorganisation, which further isolated the Niger Delta from its mainstream management structure.
PANDEF stated, that “virtually all top management positions of NNPC and its subsidiaries, departments, and ventures are held by persons from the northern zones of the country that do not produce an ounce of oil, to the exclusion of indigenes of oil-producing communities of Niger Delta region.
Going further, the group said the uncouth discriminative bias against the Niger Delta region is even being perpetuated in the current efforts to stem the spread of COVID-19 in the country, and in the dispensation of palliatives to vulnerable citizens by Ministries, Departments, and Agencies of the federal government.
The group claimed that of the $311 million Abacha loot recently returned from the United States which the Buhari administration said has been allocated to projects; including the second Niger Bridge, Lagos-Ibadan and Abuja-Kaduna-Kano expressways, as well as the Mambilla Power Project in North-East zone; no project in the South-South zone is listed.
“These situations further bolster the Niger Delta peoples’ demand for not only adequate participation in the management, administration, and dispensation of the resources nature has richly endowed our lands but also for the restructuring of the country.”
PANDEF concluded that rather than addressing the genuine demands of the region as encapsulated in the 16-Point Demand that was presented to the president on 1st November 2016, “what we see is further alienation and distancing by the Federal Government and its agencies.”
Further findings show that since the advent of the current administration allegations of lopsided appointments in the NNPC board and its subsidiaries by individuals or groups from Niger Delta has not been persistent.
In 2017, leader of PANDEF, Chief Edwin Clark, had asked President Buhari to, in the interest of peace, reverse all the appointments made at the NNPC describing the appointments and redeployments made by the president at that time as lopsided and favouring a particular part of the country and detrimental to the people of the South-South, whose areas host oil exploration activities.
Reading a list of those who according to him benefited from the appointments, Clark said: “The list shows that the whole of the South has 19 positions out the 55 positions and the North, a non-oil producing zone, has 36 positions, which include the very senior positions.
“Top management positions in other subsidiaries such as the PPMC, PTDF, PEF, and the DPR, one of the Departments in the Ministry of Petroleum, are also majorly held by Northerners.”
At that time, an avalanche of condemnations from the Niger Delta/South-South greeted the vexatious composition of the NNPC Board where out of the 9 members of the Board only one person was from the South-South in the person of Dr. Thomas M. A. John from Cross River State, apart from the Minister of State, Petroleum, and one person from the South-West.
According to the group, the rest were all from the Northern zones of the country and “the lopsided NNPC Management later effected a re-organization in September 2017 that left the Region more estranged,”
Are Agitations Justified?
Reactions from stakeholders that have trailed PANDEF’s outburst over the alleged marginalisation against the region, have been mixed as most describe the group’s leaders’ threats as handiwork of mischief makers who want to further polarise Nigerians to achieve their political goals.
According to them only a few names and positions out of a long list are being presented as the whole. Some are of the opinion that if time is taken to examine the staff list of the NNPC, one will see that every part of the country is adequately represented at all levels, be it management or down the ladder.
An independent evaluation by Valuechain of the composition of the NNPC Board show that the Board of the NNPC, which is the highest decision making arm of the corporation aside the President, is headed by a former NNPC GMD, Dr. Thomas M. A. John from Cross River State (South-South/Niger Delta State) as Acting Alternate Chairman. He maintains a dual role as a Board Member also. This is in addition to the fact that the Minister of State for Petroleum Resources Chief Timipre Sylva from Bayelsa State (Niger Delta region) oversees the NNPC on behalf his principal the President and Minister of Petroleum. The headship of the Board of the corporation had been enjoyed previously by Ibe Kachikwu (Delta State) formerly as GMD NNPC and Minister of State, Petroleum.
The Facts vs. Fiction
Further investigation into the Executive Management of the NNPC group headed by the Group Managing Director, shows that the corporation’s executive management comprises of the Corporate Headquarters, five Autonomous Business Units (ABUs) and two Directorates.
The five ABUs and the Corporate Services Directorate are all headed by Chief Operating Officers (COOs); while the Finance and Accounts Directorate is headed by the Chief Finance Officer. The positions of the COO are distributed in such a way that each geo-political zone is represented including the South-South.
The representative of the South-South is in the person of Mr. Roland Ewubare the erstwhile Chief Operating Officer (COO), Upstream who was made a sort of ‘Super COO’ by giving him more responsibility to oversee at the newly formed NNPC Ventures and Business Development Directorate as COO. His elevation topped the list of the changes.
Under the arrangement, Ewubare, in the new order got an additional responsibility of business development, besides managing the group’s ventures. He is expected to bring his competence to bear in the onerous task of laying the groundwork for the corporation to take up new business opportunities and challenges thrown up by the COVID-19 impasse, and the new position would also see Ewubare traversing downstream, midstream and upstream sectors to develop new ventures.
Clarifying the recent appointments in the corporation, NNPC’s spokesman Dr. Kennie Obateru further explained that the principle of federal character was a factor in the progression of the new appointees.
Throwing more light, Obateru stated that many top management officers of the corporation were moved to new positions while some were promoted based on their verifiable track records of performance, saying some COOs, Group General Managers and Managing Directors of subsidiaries were affected in what some industry analysts described as the most objective placement exercise in the recent history of the National Oil Company.
Obateru stated that the exercise kept in place Mr. Adokiye Tombomieye, from the South-South, as Group General Manager, Crude Oil Marketing, a highly strategic position in the corporation which current GMD held before his appointment.
The NNPC spokesperson explained that the beauty of the new wave of appointments in NNPC depicted a leadership of the corporation determined and bent on ensuring placement of square pegs in square holes, while not losing sight of geographical spread, in respect of staffing.
In terms of distribution of appointive positions in the parastatals under the Ministry of Petroleum Resources, available data shows that two out of the six parastatals (excluding NNPC) are manned by competent indigenes of the Niger Delta region of South-South: Simbi Wabote (Bayelsa state) for the Nigeria Content Development and Monitoring Board (NCDMB) and Prof. Sunny Iyuke (Delta state) of the Petroleum Training Institute (PTI).
Some achievements according to the presidency of the Buhari government for the Niger Delta region include the Ogoni cleanup which commenced in January 2019, with 16 contractors moving to 21 sites across 4 Local Government Areas in Ogoniland- Eleme, Tai, Khana and Gokana LGAs after a handover by the Hydrocarbon Pollution Remediation Project (HYPREP).
The Maritime University in Delta State which took off in 2018, is now on full steam with over 1,000 students spread across 13 undergraduate courses in three faculties.
Peaceful resolution of the OML-25 dispute between Shell Petroleum Development Company (SPDC) and its Host Communities by the GMD of NNPC at the instance of the Federal Government which paved way for Belemaoil to be responsible for Operation and Maintenance of the Asset. Belemaoil is now in charge of employment of personnel in the entire field, a development that will create opportunities for all sons and daughters of Belema, Offoin-Ama Communities, and the entire Kula Kingdom.
The government’s Presidential Amnesty Programme (PAP) continues to engage ex-militants and youths in the Niger Delta informal education, vocational skills acquisition, and empowerment schemes while creating jobs for beneficiaries.
The government’s efforts in infrastructure also includes the 34km Bonny-Bodo road and bridges project, the Itakpe-Warri standard gauge rail line project and refineries.
So far, six modular refineries are currently at different stages of completion in the Niger Delta region. The refineries are located in six states in the Niger Delta: Rivers, Delta, Akwa Ibom, Imo, Bayelsa and Cross River.
The refineries include the Niger Delta Petroleum Resources Refinery (NDPR), in Ogbele, Rivers State, which was refining at 1,000 barrels per day (BPD), and was recently upgraded to 6,000 BPD.
