Niger Delta Women Integrity Vanguard (NDWIV) has called on President Muhammadu Buhari to as a matter of urgency sack Dr Cairo Ojougboh, Executive Director, Projects, of the Interim Management Committee of Niger Delta Development Commission (NDDC), saying that he is unqualified to hold such a position.

The women group in a press statement signed by its National Coordinator, Mrs Grace Nene Iworiso, declared that the appointment of Dr Ojougboh as ED, Projects by President Buhari is a gross violation of the NDDC Act.

The statement reads in part: “We have watched the goings-on at the Niger Delta Development Commission (NDDC) with some interest for a while believing that the actions of the Minister for Niger Delta Godswill Akpabio and indeed the federal government were altruistic. But recent events convince us that Chief Akpabio is on an agenda that can only lead to the ruin of the NDDC and more crises among the people of the region. We are compelled, therefore, to raise some pertinent matters for the attention of President Muhammadu Buhari and Nigerians as a whole in the hope that the president will do the needful and bring sanity to the NDDC.

“One of these issues that bother us is the membership of the interim management committee, which we believe is packed with unqualified people recruited to further Akpabio's own selfish agenda and which only value is acting as yes-men. One of such unqualified members is Dr Cairo Ojougboh who is currently acting as ED Projects. By virtue of the NDDC Act, Cairo Ojugboh is not qualified to be a member of the management of NDDC whether on Interim or Substantive basis because he is not an indigene of any Oil Producing Local Government Area in Delta State or any State in Nigeria. His appointment as Acting Executive Director, Projects, in this Interim Management Committee set up by President Buhari is in gross violation of the NDDC Act.

“Appointing Dr Cairo Ojugboh in the first instance was an embarrassing error President Buhari was apparently misled to make. This further confirms our fears that those who President Buhari wholly and confidently trusts to advise him aright on national issues and appointments are sadly betraying and failing him.

“Dr Cairo Ojougboh is from Ika South Local Government Area of Delta State which is not an Oil Producing Local Government Area at all. How then did he get this appointment in the first place? He also does not have the requisite skill for the position he holds, which is Executive Director Projects, which has always been held by qualified engineers since the establishment of the Commission. Ojugboh is a medical doctor and only a warped mind could have recommended him for the job of Executive Director Projects. By his conduct at the commission so far it is clear that he is Akpabio’s Man-Friday for whatever personal agenda.

“We therefore call on President Buhari to immediately sack him from the management of NDDC the same way he sacked Dr Joi Nunieh for the lesser offence of not having her National Youth Service discharge certificate as required by the Laws of Nigeria. We are aware of the schemes of Ojugboh which led to the unfortunate sack of Joy Nunieh, a qualified woman who hails from oil-rich Ogoniland.

“It will be wrong and unconstitutional to keep Dr Cairo Ojougboh for an extra day in NDDC having not been qualified to be a member of the management of the NDDC in the first place, otherwise we will have no option but to accuse President Buhari of protecting male appointees and easily sacking more qualified female appointees who commit far lesser infractions.

“The sack of Finance Minister Mrs Kemi Adeosun for presenting false NYSC Discharge Certificate is still fresh in our minds at a time other male officials with similar infractions were let go.

“We are putting the federal government on notice that we will not sit idly by and watch the desecration of the NDDC management requirements as laid out in the Act setting up the development agency, which Akpabio and his cohorts have bastardised, as it concerns Dr Cairo Ojugboh, whose appointment is totally offensive to us and the people of the Niger Delta.