The Movement for the Survival of the Ogoni People (MOSOP) has condemned the sudden and undeserved removal of Dr. Joi Nunieh as the acting managing director of the Niger Delta Development Commission (NDDC), describing it as a disgrace and an affront on the Ogoni people.
In a statement circulated in Port Harcourt, capital of Rivers state on Friday, the foremost Ogoni umbrella body said that the continued marginalization of the Ogoni people in all spheres of the Nigerian society has been elevated to another level.
The statement dated February 20 and signed by MOSOP’s its Publicity Secretary, Naabulobari Naazigha-Lue, observed that the struggle of the Ogoni people led to the creation of the Niger Delta Basin Development Authority (NDBDA) and the Oil Mineral Producing Areas Development Commission (OMPADEC) which the Ogoni did not benefit from as a people.
“Our struggle without doubt also led to the creation of the NDDC in the year 2000. However, despite our enormous contributions to the Nigerian project, the Ogoni alone have not been found worthy among other Niger Delta tribes to head the NDDC.
“When the immediate past managing director of the NDDC was removed (before the present interim management committee), instead of elevating Derek Mene, the then director of finance and administration as the acting managing director, he was unceremoniously removed paving the way for the nominee of the current Minister of Transportation, Rotimi Ameachi.
“Now again, Dr. Joi Nunieh, just three months in office as the acting managing director has been singled out and removed from the three -member interim management committee, without any credible reason advanced for her removal other than her determination for a credible forensic audit against vested interests,” the statement alleged.
Naazigha-Lue in the statement further stated that several other discriminatory practices by both the state and federal governments against the Ogoni people, reinforces their belief that the Ogoni people are an unwanted ethnic group in Nigeria.
“This reinforces our demand for a truly federal or co-federal Nigeria. We cannot continue to be good only for the exploitation of our God given resources for the benefits and developments of other sections of the country to the exclusion of ourselves,” he stated.
MOSOP in the statement therefore, called for the immediate reinstatement of Dr. Nunieh or in the alternative, the appointment of another credible Ogoni person as the substantive managing director of the NDDC.
It urged the federal government to demonstrate more sincerity and commitment in the clean -up of the devastated Ogoni environment in strict compliance with the recommendation of the UNEP report.
MOSOSP stated that the unceremonious and unwarranted removal of the Nunieh will rub of negatively on the corruption fight of the federal government because “the disgraced acting managing director must have stepped on powerful toes in her mandate to carry out a forensic audit of the interventionist agency.”
