Former Chairman of the Governing Board of Niger Delta Development Commission (NDDC), Senator Victor Ndoma-Egba, has advised the current Chairman, Lauretta Onochie, to be guided by provisions of the Act that established the Commission.
Ndoma-Egba, who spoke in an interview, stated that the law establishing the NDDC provides for powers of the board and that of management. He noted that although the overall powers of managing the Commission reside with the board in providing policy direction, the management has the responsibility for implementation of policies.
He said: “Ordinarily, there shouldn’t be a problem, because the powers are clearly defined. But the problem is on the issue of control of funds. The various laws, Fiscal Responsibility Act, and the NDDC Act, make the Chief Executive Officer (CEO) the accounting officer, and, in some cases, liability for infractions of those laws are personal to the CEO.”
Ndoma-Egba noted that the CEO could not spend outside the budget, which must be approved by the board.
He added: “So, all you need do is to exercise the powers that have been given to you in a creative way that will check the board without necessarily impeding the running of the Commission.”
He further noted that the chairman is not an executive chairman, and cannot take decisions without the approval of the board.
He, however, explained that what is causing the confusion in the Commission is misunderstanding of the law establishing the NDDC.
Ndoma-Egba said: “The law does not have powers attributed to the chairman. Powers of the chairman are the powers of the board, and when we started, the first thing the board did was to donate their powers to me as chairman, to act in urgent cases. But you will always come back to the board to ratify what you had done.
“So, as chairman, you don’t have any special powers. The powers of the chairman are coterminous with the powers of the board. It is the Managing Director (MD) that, for instance, is named as the chief accounting officer, and, by virtue of the extant laws, he is personally liable for the infraction of those laws.”
The former NDDC Chairman regretted that the Commission had not been allowed to grow, thus denying it of an established tradition.
