Ndoma-Egba and Ekere
Ndoma-Egba and Ekere

 

President Muhammadu Buhari has nominated erstwhile Senate Leader, Victor Ndoma-Egba as Chairman of the Niger Delta Development Commission. He has also nominated former Deputy Governor of Akwa Ibom State, Nsima Ekere as Managing Director of the commission.

The nominations are said to have been delivered to the Senate for screening and confirmation. If the nominations are confirmed, it would mean the old Cross River State (from which Akwa Ibom was created) would be lucky to have both Chairman and Managing Director of the powerful and important commission come from it.

The confirmation would obviously put a big smile on Ndoma-Egba’s face after he was frustrated out of the Peoples Democratic Party by the internal politics of the Cross River Central Senatorial District which he represented. As things turned out after the 2015 general elections, the highly erudite Senior Advocate of Nigeria who had done three terms at the Senate, had no elected position to show for his being a strong voice of the PDP even beyond Cross River State.

His followers decamped in droves into the All Progressives Congress which won the Presidency. They have consistently boasted that 2019 will be pay-back time for the PDP in Cross River. Ndoma-Egba himself decamped from the party on whose platform he was a senator for 12 years to join the APC in February this year.

Nsima Ekere, Buhari’s choice for the position of Managing Director, was a very successful Abuja businessman before he boarded the governorship ticket of Godswill Obot Akpabio in his home state of Akwa Ibom. Ekere became Deputy Governor following the success of that ticket in the 2011 elections.

He was however to make history later when after only 17 months and two days in office, he threw in the towel on October 31, 2012. Even so, virtually everyone in Akwa Ibom State knew the Deputy Governor was up for impeachment at the State House of Assembly.

Nsima Ekere, most analysts believed, fell from grace with Governor Akpabio essentially because he eyed the Akwa Ibom governorship in 2015. He was, according to close observers, thought to be too fast in seeking to become the governor.

Godswill Akpabio, since his governorship tenure ended in 2015, has moved on to become a distinguished senator of the Federal Republic. His candidate, Udom Emmanuel is the incumbent governor of Akwa Ibom State.

In the Senate, Akpabio has made history as the first newcomer to hold the key position of Minority Leader. That position makes him the number one legislator of the PDP at the National Assembly. That also makes him to be very relevant in the affairs of the Niger Delta region whose six states are controlled by the PDP.

People and Power could not confirm if Ekere may still have his eyes on the governorship or if he would run in 2019. It was also not clear if he may want to run as an APC candidate.