By Ayodele Oni
Bayelsa State Government has urged the Inter-Agency Technical Committee set up by the Revenue Mobilization and Fiscal Allocation Commission (RMFAC) not to take side in the dispute between the state and Rivers state.
Deputy Governor of the state, Lawrence Ewhrudjakpo, made the call during a presentation of the state government’s position on disputed oil and gas wells at Government House, Yenagoa, on Thursday.
Ewhrudjakpo, in a statement his Senior Special Assistant on Media, Doubara Atasi, described the Committee’s assignment as critical, and stressed the need for it to be objective, fair and truthful to promote justice and peaceful coexistence between Bayelsa and its neighbours.
He commended the Chairman and the entire Management of the Revenue Mobilization and Fiscal Allocation Commission for setting up the Committee and expressed optimism that their findings will serve as a veritable guide to the commission in its decision-making.
He maintained that while Bayelsa would never go out of its way to claim what does not rightly belong to it, the state would do everything within its powers to defend her God-given resources.
On the disputed Soku Oilfield, Ewhrudjakpo who described RMFAC as an agency with institutional memory, expressed hope that the Commission would be guided by its previous decisions and statements about the brotherly disagreement between Bayelsa and Rivers states.
His words: “On behalf of the Governor, we thank the Chairman of RMFAC for setting up this Inter-Agency Technical Committee to carry ou this exercise. I think the last time this exercise was conducted either in 2004 or 2005.
“We’ve been expecting this for a long time. So we are happy to have you in our state. You will go to see all the areas where we have disputes with our neighbours.
“In Bayelsa, we believe in the spirit of complementation, and give and take. So be very objective in your assessment. We want you to be our guide. Whatever you look at (in your opinion) that is not legal, justiceable and not ours, we will happily relinquish.
“But we will not also allow anybody take what we strongly believe is ours. We will protect our land and resources. So, you really have to look at everything objectively.”
Making a presentation of the state government’s position to the Committee, the Secretary to the State Government, Prof. Nimibofa Ayawei, said Bayelsa currently has 49 onshore and 14 offshore oilfields.
According to the SSG, there are about 13 unplotted oil wells, 12 non-producing fields for joint verification and several disputed fields, including the famous Soku Oilfield, the Biseni Oilfield, Obiafu, Ubie and the Nda-Okwori OML 126 oilfields.
Giving a legal and historical perspectives to the state government’s position, Prof. Ayawei, urged the committee to go through the plethora of evidence at its disposal and plot the newly identified unplotted oilwells in favour of Bayelsa.
Speaking earlier, the Chairperson of the Inter-Agency Technical Committee, Dr Khadija Suleiman-Bello, explained that the Committee was set up early this year with members drawn from the National Boundary Commission, Office of the Secretary to the Government of the Federation and the Nigerian Upstream Petroleum Regulatory Commission.
Dr Suleiman-Bello, who is the Director of Crude Oil at the Revenue Mobilization and Fiscal Allocation Commission, assured that the committee would carry out its assignment in a dispassionate manner in the interest of justice, fairness and peace.
The Team was accompanied to Government House for the presentation by 16 members including Dr Samiu Ayinde of the Office of the Secretary to the Government of the Federation and a representative of the Nigerian Upstream Petroleum Regulatory Commission, Aisha Musa.
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