The Rivers State Government will no longer tolerate youths from other Niger Delta states who come to Port Harcourt, the state capital, to cause trouble in the guise of agitation.
Chief Nyesom Wike, the Rivers State Governor, warned that such attitude must stop, sounding a note of caution: “Nobody should take our tolerance for granted.”
Speaking while receiving the Interim Administrator of the Commission who paid him a courtesy visit at Government House, Port Harcourt, Governor Wike declared that the Niger Delta Development Commission does not belong to any ethnic group, but the entire Niger Delta region.
Governor Wike stated: “Those who are seeing themselves as the owners of NDDC are mistaken. They leave their states and come to Rivers State to block NDDC gates. NDDC belongs to the people of the Niger Delta. No particular group should arrogate powers to themselves.
“The commission is owned by all the states of the Niger Delta region. The talk about people not coming from the core Niger Delta is not tenable. We must have to stop that kind of thinking.”
Governor Wike added: “We should not allow ex-militants who come under the cover of amnesty to determine what happens in the Niger Delta region. We should not allow people to come to the region to intimidate us. They cannot be allowed to come from their states to block roads in Rivers State. It is somebody from Niger Delta that will be appointed to head NDDC and he can come from any of the states. It is not the birthright of certain states.”
