THE U – TURN ON CONFIRMATION OF CHIEF BARRISTER OKOI OBONO-OBLA’S NOMINATION AS A MEMBER OF BOARD, NIGERIAN COMMUNICATIONS COMMISSION
Press Releases January 5, 2017 admin
ALL PROGRESSIVES CONGRESS
NATIONAL VICE CHAIRMAN (SOUTH SOUTH)
November 29th 2016
OPEN LETTER TO THE SENATE PRESIDENT:
THE U – TURN ON CONFIRMATION OF CHIEF BARRISTER OKOI OBONO-OBLA’S NOMINATION AS A MEMBER OF BOARD, NIGERIAN COMMUNICATIONS COMMISSION (NCC)—OUR DEMAND.
The Senate President Sir,
I have the courtesy and privilege of writing to you on behalf of the All Progressives Congress (APC) and the good people of the South-South zone on this high profile and disturbing issue of the alleged reversal by the Red chamber of the confirmation of the nomination by the President of the Federal Republic, of one of our own, Chief (Barrister) Okoi Obono – Obla, into the Board of the Nigerian Communications Commission [NCC] as a Non – Executive member representing the south-south zone. As you may be aware, Chief Barrister Obono – Obla from Yakurr Local Government Area of Cross River State, is an illustrious son of the south- south.
He is a successful Lawyer and Human Rights Advocate.He is aTraditional Ruler and also a Politician of the progressive bent. He is a committed member of the All Progressives Congress (APC).
He was duly nominated by Mr. President recently as a Non – Executive member representing the south-south in the Board of the NCC and by legislative procedure he was only to assume full responsibility of that office, after due confirmation by the senate.
Having passed through the said screening as available records/ reports emanating from the Red Chamber have shown, Chief Obono – Obla’s name was one of those listed by the Chairman, Senate Committee on Communications, Senator Enyinnaya Abaribe and submitted to your office, as having been duly confirmed.In fact it was this indication that saw the rejection of two other nominees by the Committee for certain reasons. Barrister Obono – Obla’s name was not among the rejected ones.
However, in the course of the letter you wrote to Mr.President detailing the duly confirmed nominees, Chief Obono – Obla’s name was left out for no reason whatsoever.
Mr. Senate President, I want to say with every sense of responsibility that this latest rejection of Chief Obono – Obla’s name after due confirmation has so assumed a disturbing dimension among the people of the south-south zone, that what is left is for the senate to do the needful to clear itself of the many insinuations held against it by the people of the zone.
Unfortunately, there has been initial suspicion that the Red Chamber has in the sixteen years of the Peoples Democratic Party leadership developed a gargantuan appetite for legislative rascality and has during this period always attempted to plunge our democracy into the valley of anarchy especially in its relationship with other arms of government and with the people of Nigeria. Mr.Senate President , you will agree with me that the whole essence of our change mantra was to ensure a paradigm shift in the way government affairs are conducted including the idea of legislative practice which must agree with international best practices. Whether therefore this change-era Senate can discharge itself creditably in the face of the challenging insinuations is left to be seen.
In the light of the plethora of violent agitations and conflicts that have tended to bedevil the south south, the people of the zone have developed a psyche that has united them as a people with a common destiny and a common course whereby they seek the help and prop of every government apparatchik to bless them. They have come hard against any poignant picture of marginalization and rejection in taking a substantial place in corporate Nigeria.
To be therefore confronted with yet another poignant picture of rejection like the Ken Saro-Wiwa episode, speaks expressly of a near pogrom wish of the Red Chamber for a people who have refused to be pliant to acts of political misdeeds and machinations as this.
What the Senate must understand about the south south in this change era is that for the over sixteen years of oil exploration activities with the attendant lack of commensurate development to assuage for the degradation of their land, government at all levels must lay a plumb on the psyche of the people of the region, appreciate and exude goodwill for them just as President Muhammadu Buhari has done severally, and not the option of tinkering with the nomination and confirmation of their son for public office without any cogent reason.
Equally, it would be against democratic prudence especially with the doctrine of separation of powers and of the rule of law as the hallmarks, to attempt to unconstitutionally shortchange the Executive Arm of government, by rejecting without any justifiable reason, the nomination of the President. In fact, beyond the political bias alleged against its decision to reject the President’s nomination, the idea of turning a blind eye on the recommendations of the Senate Committee on Communications which endorsed Barrister Obono-Obla’s nomination calls to question the Senate’s regards for its own decisions and the decisions of others.
Against the backdrop of the above, the APC and the good people of the south-south geopolitical zone have placed a direct demand that the Senate of the Federal Republic should show leadership and prove critics wrongs that it is anti-people, by resorting to initial confirmation of Chief Barrister Okoi Obono-Obla as contained in Articles 889—891 of the Report and Proceedings of the Senate Committee on Communications. We still hold strongly as a party that the leadership of the Red Chamber will exude that goodwill and respect that the people of the south-south see in them by confirming Chief Obono-Obla as recommended.
However, anything in the contrary will be unacceptable to the south south people and will be resisted with every sense of vigour.
SIGNED: NTUFAM HILLIARD ETAGBO ETA
National Vice Chairman [South South]
All Progressives Congress.
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