Semenitari Takes Over As NDDC Boss

President Muhammadu Buhari, yesterday, sacked the Niger Delta Development Commission (NDDC) management and removed the managing director, Mr. Bassey Dan-Abia, and the two executive directors for Finance and Projects respectively.

In a statement by the office of the Secretary to the Government of the Federation (SGF), the president also announced the appointment of the immediate past Rivers State Commissioner for Information Mrs. Ibim Semenitari, as acting managing director, pending the appointment of a substantive board.

LEADERSHIP gathered that Semenitari would assume office today in Port Harcourt.

LEADERSHIP recalls that the agency had been accused of contract-splitting, and spending of huge public funds on irrelevant and non-existing projects and substandard jobs.




The commission was also on the spot for not responding to an audit query issued to its management by the Auditor-General of the Federation over the commission’s inability to account for N183.7 billion which passed through it between 2008 and 2012.

The choice of Abia was believed to have enjoyed the backing of former Akwa Ibom State governor, Godswill Akpabio, who was then the chairman of the governors’ forum of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP).

In reaction to a petition sent to the presidency, Abia said: “Those writing petitions against me should be bold enough to state clearly what they claim I did wrong while serving on the NDDC board or shut up forever. “My records are very clear and I am ready to defend them at any point in time.”

Before he was chosen to lead the commission, he served two terms as the representative of Akwa Ibom in the commission.

Different corruption allegations have been levelled against the NDDC, a body created as a response to the demands of the people of Niger Delta.