A Niger Delta based Non-Governmental Organization, Center for Peace and Environmental Justice (CEPEJ), has knocked Delta State Governor, Dr. Ifeanyi Okowa over what it described as out-sized State Executive Council.
The Center accused the governor of making well over 60 per cent secret appointments into his cabinet when he had already lamented that there are no funds to run his administration.
National Coordinator, CEPEJ, Comrade Sheriff Mulade, said the most painful aspect of the appointments is the ‘’recycling of the same crop of politicians who have not performed well in the past’’.
The Niger Delta activist reasoned that in this era of the nation’s dwindling economic fortunes, the governor should have only picked a ‘’concise and formidable team’’ to help him deliver on his policies and save the state the huge outlays of running the government.
While expressing dismay over the various appointments, which he said were lopsided and excluded the a segment of the state from key positions, he tasked the governor on running open door government by giving the much talked about dividends of democracy to the grassroots people.
He equally advised the governor to breathe fresh life into the various moribund companies and industries littered across the state to provide jobs for the large army of the unemployed persons.
‘’We are not happy with the various appointments, when he is complaining of paucity of fund to run his government, yet he has made well over 60 per cent secret appointments and only below 40 per cent were made public. Or he is doing that in anticipation of a rerun? He should give us a purposeful leadership and Deltans are ready to support him. But from what we have seen so far, he is short of giving us all-embracing governance we have been yearning for and which he espoused during his campaign’’, he said.
He added: ‘‘We observe with shock the one sided appointments already made with 60 per cent secretly done to satisfy his ethnic and political cohorts and even the ones he declared publicly, Warri Ijaws were deliberately disregarded and totally excluded for no just cause.
’’For instance, Warri Ijaws were not given prominent appointments. Going by tenet of fair play, Ijaw people in Warri are entitled to Commissioner Position, but he has only handpicked two persons as assistants. This is a grave injustice.’’
