FEATURE ARTICLE

Chigachi EkeMonday, June 21, 2010
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NIGER DELTA: FOCUS ON IMO OIL PRODUCING COMMUNITIES (2)

orking with the statistics of the Nigerian National Petroleum Company, NNPC, Imo State produces 2.5% of Nigerian crude. The wonder of it is that rather than respect this output earns the state open contempt before other Niger Delta states and non-littoral states alike. You are always apologetic if you come from Imo and had to introduce yourself in a seminar as Niger Deltan, for which reason wearing that iconic Niger Delta hat is tantamount to impersonation. Of this figure Oguta alone accounts for 60% of Imo oil production, Egbema produces 20%, Ohaji 5% and Izombe 15%. Any wonder why development projects meant for the Niger Delta have consistently eluded these oil communities?


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The NNPC statistics is not reliable. It is politicized and outdated, at best. I have bothered to do my own calculation based on identifiable oil wells. The truth is that Oguta town alone, not the whole of Oguta Local Government Area, has 78 oil wells. Since the Oguta communities of Ezi-Orsu, Umukpo Agwa, Mgbala Agwa and Umuofeke Agwa are now oil producing, it logically follows that Oguta alone accounts for 80% of Imo production and Imo more than 10% of the national output.

For a people whose resources qualify Imo as an oil producing state the question must be asked if Imo in turn privileges the people of Izombe, Oguta, Egbema and Ohaji for appointments into management positions in oil companies and parastatals. It is true that these communities have produced all the state commissioners of the Niger Delta Development Commission, NDDC: Chief Victor Kogah (Egbema, 2000-2004), Chief Emma Assor (Ohaji 2004-2008) and Mr. Ikechukwu Joseph Akeru (Oguta, 2009-); but that is as far as the gain goes. When you come to the management staff and directors of Shell, Agip, Chevron, Addax, Sterling and allied companies you don�t see many faces from these communities. The governments of Delta, Akwa Ibom, Bayelsa and Rivers are implementing 70 % local content, lack of political will is hindering progress in this direction in Imo. But kudos must be given to the former Speaker of Imo State House of Assembly, Honourable Kelechi Nwagwu, for taking drastic measures against �Korean-owned� Daewoo when that multinational short changed an oil producing community.

When it comes to development what readily comes to mind is the NDDC as vanguard of change. But Imo is one Niger Delta state poorly funded by the NDDC headquarters in Port Harcourt. Whereas Mega Projects (projects in excess of three billions) and Regional Projects (billion naira projects cutting across two Niger Delta states) are financed in other littoral states by the NDDC headquarters, such is not the case for Imo with its official 2.5% crude production. Faced with cash crunch over the years the Imo NDDC Liaison Office had to limit development to Petty (Small Thicket) Projects like classrooms, health centers, rural electrification, boreholes and transport schemes.

Paucity of funds often translates to uncompleted projects. The past NDDC management awarded LOTO INT�L W/A LTD the contract to build a block of six new classrooms for the Umuofeke Community School Agwa but the contractors executed only 20% of the project before abandoning it. Umuofeke villagers are today appealing to incumbent NDDC Commissioner Akeru to complete the six classrooms for the Agwa child to get quality education under humane condition. They are willing to also build their own secondary school with direct labour if the NDDC gives them building materials. For this 2010 fiscal year the Imo NDDC allocated 80% of the budget for the completion of hundreds of these Petty Projects like the Umuofeke Community School Agwa abandoned by past Commissioners. This means that new projects can only be initiated in 2011.

A strong case which Ndigbo have against the Nigerian establishment is the absence of industries in Igboland. Equally so, zoom in on Imo state and you begin to see noticeable lopsidedness in the citing of development projects skewed against these oil producing communities. Till date the biggest project at Oguta is the 39 million naira Water Reticulation Project abandoned for fifteen years. It took the bold intervention of present Senate President, Honourable David Mark, as the Minister of Communication to have telephone installations in Oguta.

The corporate world also does not believe in giving something back to these communities in terms of development. Agwa does not come across as a community of 56.7 million barrels per year. The roads are decrepit and I found the town without electricity. The Indians drilling in Agwa did not improve its infrastructures. Only one secondary school, Agwa Secondary School, still serves the five autonomous communities. Employment was limited to menial jobs with slave wage pegged at twenty-five thousand naira (N25, 000) by Sterling, before the crisis. With so much suffering in the midst of plenty you don�t have to look far for upheavals. The Agwa crisis was managed because it was stimulated by the state and multinational.

One challenge before the state government, NDDC and the Imo State Oil Producing Area Development Commission, ISOPADEC, is for them to properly define the relationship between town unions and Igbo monarchs, especially in oil producing communities. This will go a long way in easing intra-communal strife. Strike oil at Agbor, Akokwa or Obolo Afor and see the bloodletting surely to follow in the struggle for the miserable stipends handed down by oil privateers rapidly reducing Igboland to waste land. Central to this problem is the morality in town unions fronting as contractors to execute sub-standard contracts. �Homage� and �PRO� imposed on outside contractors are nothing but corrupt practices; forced to part with large sums these contractors are financially challenged and no sooner abandon the projects.

The state must spell out the rights/benefits of oil producing communities from non-oil producing ones. Of the 6 billion naira that came to Imo state from the amnesty programme, the people of Nde Oshimiri in Oguta 1 are groaning that "Igbos" from Orlu and other parts of Imo have swallowed everything leaving them more marginalised than before. Sadly enough, their complaint seems legitimate. Remind them that Governor Ikedi Ohakim used this money to dredge the Nworie River and you'll be hitting a sore spot indeed as none has deemed it fit to dredge the Oguta Lake. So we need a great deal of diplomacy here. The resentment of these oil producing communities must be looked into.

Finally, Imo needs a legal instrument compelling oil companies to pick their Community Liaison Officers, CLOs, directly from the host communities. In Agwa, Sterling imported its CLO from outside. The implication was that the CLO who is a non-indigene had to rely on local �middle men� to be seen and heard, a potentially dangerous thing as these go-betweens further expanded the chasm between Sterling and Agwa. No sooner does drilling start than these obnoxious �middle men� corner the palliatives meant for the host community, contents Bishop Udo Azogu. Sterling must pick its CLOs from Agwa to be properly embedded in the affairs of its host communities.

But just for a moment, is there a law under the heavens that prohibits Agwa from drilling, refining and exporting their own petroleum in partnership with the NNPC? Why are we mentally conditioned to play second fiddle after whites, Arabs and Asians? Ohakim goes to the end of the world looking for �investors� to develop Imo while doing nothing to develop Imo himself. Everyday in Owerri, Niger Delta, Nigeria and sub-Sahara Black Africa it is conference, conference and more conference. I will believe Ohakim and his New Face Organisation, whatever that means, if he can stop talking and assemble four Igbo civil, mechanical, electrical and petrochemical engineers to fabricate the crudest refinery capable of turning out ten liters of petroleum per day, doing so without help from Arabs and Indians who seem to be the new colonial masters in Igboland today. So why can�t we think Igbo investors, Igbo technology and Igbo consciousness?

When former President Olusegun Obasanjo removed Imo from the list of Niger Delta states, it was Chief Francis Arthur Nzeribe who responded to the distress call from the oil producing communities. He single handedly sponsored their representatives to Aso Rock and Imo was included in 2000, never mind if former Governor Achike Udenwa elbowed him out in the scramble for appointments into the NDDC. The truth is that these communities have no trust in the government of Imo State. At the root of the quest for Orashi State could be a moral revolt, take note. There could be a psychological dimension why these communities once more lined up behind Chief Nzeribe who finally got them the 4/1 votes in favour of Orashi State creation at the Senate Committee on Constitutional Amendment in December 2009.

My genuine fear hinges on the probability that an Orashi State might look South-South rather than embrace Ohaneze, meaning that the accumulated grudges of years of political perfidy will surely reverberate in times to come. The mindset of Ohaji, Egbema, Izombe and Oguta is not pro-Imo; it is not even pro-Ohaneze for the very reason that �others� understand their plights more intimately than those who take their allegiance for granted. The very insensitivity which other Niger Delta minorities decry in Igbo politics is more pronounced today in our dealings with our own oil producing minorities.

Ndigbo must negotiate.

Chigachi Eke is an Igbo Rights activist.

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