PATRICK ABANG, Calabar –
Former Senate Leader, Senator Victor Ndoma Egba has expressed satisfaction with President Mohammadu Buhari over the signing of the controversial Petroleum Industry Bill (PIB) into law, which was recently passed by the National Assembly.
Senator Egba also commended the move by the Federal Government to commercialised The Nigeria National Petroleum Cooperation (NNPC) in the next six months.
Senator Egba, spoke with newsmen in an interview recently after the president gave his assent to the controversial bill amid criticism from the people of Niger Delta.
He debunked fears in some quarters saying that the act would bring positive development to the country’s economy.
“Have always believe that business is for the private sector and government should restrict itself to government and provide the necessary environment for business to thrive. I have never believe that government has anything to do in business”
On why the host communities are not happy with the president’s assent on Petroleum Industrial Act (PIA), he said: “For me, the issue is what should be our final destination in our federalism and that is fiscal federalism in which every state should be in position to control her resources. That should be our ultimate decision” .
“But before we get there, we are looking at incremental improvement in our situation. Have heard the arguments, some say it should have been three, five or 10 percent may be. I am saying that if the host communities actually wanted a figure higher than three percent, there should have been some stakeholders engagement prior to the passage of the bill between stakeholders of the region and their legislators in the National Assembly”.
“If the stakeholders are dissatisfied with the 3% that has been provided for in the bill, then it is a clear evidence of the failure of politics in the region because for a sensitive issue like that there usually ought to have been a high level stakeholders engagement were the governors, the National Assembly members, the traditional rulers, the major players in the region, the experts from that region on how to proceed. I saw no evidence of that kind of engagement, so it is just the question of the failure of politics. The people of the region are crying after spilled milk. Steps ought have been taken long before now to engage one another to ensure that their interest were protected but I did not see such engagement”.
On the blame placed on the lawmakers from South South who did not represent the interests of the region, he said: “You can’t just make scapegoat of the National Assembly, every leader of the region should share the blame. In an example during my stay in the senate when the NDDC bill was passed, the then President Olusegun Obasanjo withheld his assent to the bill but the National Assembly over rode the president and passed it into law but that could happen because the lawmakers engaged stakeholders from every part of the country and that is how politics is played. The governors then were involved but I did not see that kind of serious engagement by stakeholders of the region this time around”.
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