DESOPADEC: Lori-Ogbebor insists on court action as Okowa visits Warri monarch

WARRI—A group of host communities in Delta South senatorial district, Delta State, led by Niger-Delta activist, Chief Rita Lori-Ogbebor, weekend,  rebuffed the move by Governor Ifeanyi Okowa, to stop its planned court action against new Delta State Oil Producing Areas Development Commission, DESOPADEC law.

Governor Okowa had visited the Warri monarch, Ogiamae Atutwase, recently, to prevail on Lori-Ogbebor and her group to withdraw their threat. A former state commissioner who is also from the area, Mr. Omolubi Newuwumi, told Vanguard, yesterday, “I guess you must have seen the response of the Olu of Warri in the newspapers, where he said Okowa should not take for granted the words said by Chief Lori-Ogbebor.”

He said that even the appointment of an Itsekiri son,  Godwin Ebosa, as chairman of DESOPADEC Governing Board would not prevent their court action. He said,  “We are proceeding with the court action because our position has never been who becomes the DESOPADEC chairman or whose ethnic nationality produces the chairman, but with the  recent bill signed into law by the present administration of Okowa, as it relates to the host communities.

“Our argument has been that the new law does not favour the host communities, especially the issues of constitution of the board and having equal representatives with other senatorial districts, which do not produce oil or are impacted with oil exploration as stated in the law. “The issue of whether an Itsekiri man or an Ijaw man becomes the chairman is not the issue because the board has a chairman, a Managing Director, three executive directors and nine representatives coming from the three senatorial districts that make up Delta State.

That to me is not being fair to the oil producing communities, the local governments or the senatorial districts that produce oil and gas. They bear the burden of oil exploration and exploitation. “For you to say you are sharing per senatorial amounts to marginalization of these ethnic nationalities and its people. I am against this as stated in page (2) paragraph (4) of the new law because it does not represent the true principle as stated in the constitution.”

“We are also going to ask the state government what they are doing with 50 per cent of the 13 per cent derivation fund because it is clear that the state budget is planned according to the revenue allocation from the Federal Government and its internal generated revenue.”