President of Committee for the Defense of Human Rights, Comrade Prince Kehinde Taiga, has alleged that all the projects being showcased by the Delta State Oil Producing Areas Development Commission (DESOPADEC) are shadow projects that do not add value to the lives of people in the communities they are meant to serve.
Taiga told Emerald News on Tuesday that there is no tangible project executed by the commission in most of the communities it was established to serve. He listed some communities which are some of the recognized oil producing areas but have no presence of DESOPADEC projects in them.
He listed Otu-Jeremi, Otor-Udu, Iwhreka, and Isoko as some of the oil-producing communities but lack presence of DESOPADEC projects. Taiga, who was specifically unhappy over the poor performance of the agency amidst billions of Naira it receives from the state government, said the commission was not designed only to run poor skills acquisition programmes but to build, develop and transform host communities across the state.
He noted: “Even the skills acquisition the commission is displaying, how many people can boldly come out and say DESOPADEC trained them and they are doing well in the state? Even we at OML34 do not have funds up to one tenth of DESOPADEC, we are doing skills acquisition, developing communities, building town halls, providing electricity extensions, furnishing town hall and other development initiatives for communities.
“So, if the state government cannot scrap DESOPADEC, in order to see effectiveness in the agency, it should be restructured. All communities that are captured in the agency’s catchment areas should be grouped into clusters. Where I am as the PRO of OML34, we have 28 communities from Udu through Ughelli South and Ughelli North.
“Every community should have a representative in the commission’s cluster. This is to take development down to the communities and ensure no community is left out. With the money it has received so far, it has not performed up 40 percent of expectations. Rather they are spending the money on unnecessary things that do not have bearing on the lives of the people it is meant to serve.
“DESOPADEC would have been a very good interventionist agency created by the state government. It was established with a very good intention. But the purpose of its creation has been long defeated. It is now a shadow of itself. It stopped working after the days of Andy Osawota and Wellington Okrika. That is why we are saying either the government scraps it or restructure it to perform and meet needs of the communities.
“People want to see what the money being deployed in the agency is doing. In our OML34 cluster, when we receive our N250m, there are percentages meant for skills acquisition and development. DESOPADEC should be restructured in a way that money is assigned to building of schools, health centres and others.
“In OML34, we renovate schools, we build security houses for the schools, we fence schools and paint them. We have furnished a principal’s office. We completed town hall and furnished it. We have over 200 chairs donated to a school. This is from what accrued to my community and that is just N7m. If we can do this with just N7m, why should the agency that receives billions of Naira not do better and greater?
“Executives of the commission cannot boldly come out and say this community town hall was built by DESOPADEC. This primary or secondary school was built by DESOPADEC. They cannot. They can’t account for any good school they have built. So, what are they doing with the billions they are collecting?
“The leadership of DESOPADEC has failed Deltans. DESOPADEC led by Chief John Nani as chairman has disappointed Delta state. He should resign from office. He was one time executive directive of finance, now he is returned as chairman. What is he looking for in the agency? What quantum of oil is Idjhere producing that they gave him the chairman of the agency?
“He is close to one year as chairman but he has not executed any project. The communities I mentioned are major oil producing but no projects in them. Where the highest gas flow station is built, there is no project there. It is so sad. Go to the riverine areas, they have no good water to drink. A sachet of water there goes for between N100 and N150. This is where they are supposed to establish water for them to use.
“People are suffering in those places. Go to their schools. The reason why teachers do not want to go to the riverine areas is because there is no accommodation for them. These are things the agency is supposed to be doing for these places. It is supposed to build staff quarters in those places to enable the teachers to go there, stay and teach our children.
“I am challenging John Nani to show us his projects for the past year. Let us see. Whatever money that is accrued to that board, the money meant for skills acquisition is different from the money for projects. The leaders of DESOPADEC should publish what they have done within this one year they have been in office in various communities. There should be transparency in our dealings. We can’t be producing oil and suffering.
“They are not even developing their communities. They are doing things that do not add value to the lives of the people and their communities. They have turned away from the people they were appointed to serve and develop. In those days DESOPADEC used to construct roads, build schools, and make life good for oil-producing communities. They build schools, maintain schools, and provide desks for schools. But those days are now gone. DESOPADEC is now a shadow of itself. We need to change that narrative.”
