Nigerians need to encourage Jonathan - Sen Brambaifa

Tribune

8 September 2011

Nigerians need to encourage Jonathan - Sen Brambaifa

Written by Olawale Rasheed and Daniel Kolawole,

John Brambaifa

President Goodluck  Jonathan has spent 100 days in office, how will you review the state of the nation so far? Well, 100 days in the life of a man is not much to talk about. I think he is trying to put a lot of things in order. You know this country was almost on the brink of collapse, nothing was working, nothing had worked. And so, if a good leader comes in, he must study the situation, improve on it and build the institutions. I believe in institutional building because institutions make things work. But for some reasons in Nigeria, institutions never worked.

So, a new person, who has love for this country, should try and put the institutions right. That is what he is trying to do. He had set up the economic team with members who have local and external experience in economic matters. I will say Mr President is on the right course and path.

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The NDDC is statutorily empowered to develop the Niger Delta, now you have another ministry, Ministry of Niger Delta, don’t you think it is a bit of duplication of duty? And secondly, NDDC is in crisis; the in-fighting at the commission. Are all these in the interest of the zone?

Certainly not! It couldn’t have been in the interest of the development of the zone for an agency that is supposed to develop the zone to be engrossed in in-fighting. It will certainly produce negative result and that is what we are saying. All these developmental agencies are deliberately created to develop the forsaken region that produces the golden egg. It is a deliberate thing by the government, but the operational method is faulty.

I agree with you that there are conflicts of interest that exist between one agency and the other, because if local governments in that particular state is supposed to provide chairs, why should NDDC provide such? If the state government is to create link roads between one senatorial district to the other, why should NDDC take it on its own? Why don’t they collaborate? Why can’t the NDDC bring part of the fund, the state government brings another part and then you now do it? You have more money to handle a major project and the result is the people affected.

But I think that, even if we have not seen that in the past, we must make deliberate effort to see it this way. I think the problem with these developmental agencies is that in most cases, it is the wrong people that get to be at the helms of affairs. They don’t even seek advice; there is no leader that knows it all. A good leader must tap into the knowledge of people. How many of these people who are at the helms of affairs do consult? They don’t and that is why we are having these problems.