Today, during our plenary at the Senate, we debated various bills, including two on the amendments of the acts of the North West Development Commission (NWDC) and the South East Development Commission (SEDC), to enable us to correct omissions noticed in the laws.
I supported the amendments sought because, as human beings, we can never be perfect all the time; it’s only Almighty God who does everything perfectly. These were the mere omissions that we discovered after the bills were passed.
Unanimously, other senators who contributed to the debate, including Senator Abdulrahman Kawu Sumaila, threw their weight behind the amendments. While commending President Bola Ahmed Tinubu for approving the bill to establish the NWDC, Kawu Sumaila said irrespective of all differences, the commission means a lot “to all of us in the North West geopolitical zone”.
Similarly, while contributing to the debate on a bill for the establishment of the South-South Development Commission (SSDC), I drew the attention of my colleagues to the need to amend Niger Delta Development Commission (NDDC) to accommodate Bauchi, Gombe, Lagos and Ogun states that are now oil-producing.
I supported the bill for establishing the South-South Development Commission because what is good for the goose is also good for the gander. As we all know, NDDC was created to mitigate the problems oil-producing areas face, such as environmental degradation due to oil exploration in these areas.
So, NDDC was primarily created to take care of these environmental challenges and is not restricted to Niger Delta, as we have states in the South East and South West as beneficiaries.
With the creation of development commissions for other zones, like mine, North West, there is nothing wrong, if a similar commission is created in the South-South. After that, when the commission has been established, then we have to look at the NDDC Act again to change the name to Oil Producing Areas Commission so that it will include states like Gombe, Bauchi, Lagos, Kogi, Ogun that are now producing oil.
We will continue to work to address the developmental challenges in all parts of our country. Let’s do it together.
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