I wonder if the man who is mainly the subject of today’s essay, Barr. Chiedu Ebie, has realized how profound this moment is for us, the people of the Niger Delta, who have been relegated to the “other side” by those who seized political power at the centre since 1999 and patterned the Niger Delta Development Commission (NDDC) in their own image and like­ness.

Here, I should call on an elder soul sister, from the other side of the Atlan­tic, Alice Walker, the African- Ameri­can whose poem, For My People, was converted into the Festac ’77 anthem, to help me. So, I’ll borrow from her open letter to Barack Obama when he was first elected President of the United States of America. She wrote: “You think you know, because you are thoughtful, and you have studied our history. But seeing you deliver the torch so many others before you carried, year after year, decade after decade, century after century, only to be struck down before igniting the flame of justice and of law, is almost more than the heart can bear. And yet, this observation is not intended to burden you, for you are of a different time, and, indeed, because of all the relay runners before you, North America is a different place. It is really only to say: Well done. We knew, through all the generations, that you were with us, in us, the best of the spirit of Africa and of the Americas. Knowing this, that you would actual­ly appear, someday, was part of our strength. Seeing you take your right­ful place, based solely on your wisdom, stamina and character, is a balm for the weary warriors of hope, previously only sung about.”

Sometimes, a single person could carry the dreams of billions of others as Barack Obama or the immortal Dr. Nelson Mandela did for the black race. Now, Niger Deltans look up to Chiedu Ebie. So, it is terribly easy to downplay the implications of what took place on Thursday, 16th November 2023, for the NDDC and Niger Delta when President Bola Ahmed Tinubu inaugurated the NDDC Board with Mr. Chiedu Ebie as chairman. To view that earth-shatter­ing act as just another appointment, similar to the others he, as President, has been making, is to miss the whole point.

Mr. Ebie’s appointment is a radical departure from the subsisting trend since year 2,000 (23 years ago) when Presidents Olusegun Obasanjo, Good­luck Jonathan and Mohammadu Bu­hari, appointed their lackeys as Chair­men. Mr. Ebie’s appointment is akin to a recalibration of the NDDC, taking it back to what it should have been if it had not been taken hostage by even those who hated it. Those people were deceitful from the start.

The result, since 2023, has been a di­saster foretold. For an interventionist agency that is supposed to help right the over half a century of wrongs Ni­geria has visited on the goose that lays her golden eggs, the management of the NDD has always fallen short of the South-South region’s expectation. Yet, interrogate that sordid result in any way and you would find that it could never have been different; those who made the appointments were not those who fought for the establishment of the NDDC. And so, those they appointed to head the Commission were their boys (and a madam) who owed allegiance to the Presidents who appointed them and no allegiance to the ideals behind the agitation that gave birth to the Com­mission.

Hey, how many people still remem­ber that President Olusegun Obasanjo did not sign the NDDC Bill the National Assembly sent to him in 2000 but vetoed it? The presidency, in its curious and de­fective reasoning, or lack of reasoning even, had felt that the money provided for NDDC in that bill was too much for the job it had to do. I was there at the gallery of the House of Representatives the fateful day early June 2000 when it overrode Obasanjo’s veto. House Speak­er Ghali Umar N’Abba sat there, not just inscrutable but Buddha-like as the stage for that history-making event was being prepared; it was the first time a President’s veto was being over-ridden in the Fourth Republic. Obasanjo had lobbied and cajoled and threatened but all came to naught as he and his in­ner-circle hot=heads – Nduka Irabor, the late Yari Suru Gandhi, Chidi Duru, Chijoke Egoga, Sadiq Yar’Adua and others had their minds firmly made up. As the voice vote was ending, Hon. Ned Nwoko walked into the chambers and Na’Abba asked him how he would vote: he answered “yeah”. A final applause erupted; Obasanjo had been roundly defeated and his plot to rob Peter to pay the same Peter (instead of Paul) had backfired. Obasanjo wanted some mon­ies deducted from the NDDC member states to NDDC’s purse, yet those states will have no say in how the Commis­sion is run. Also, Obasanjo wanted a reduction in the amount of money to accrue to NDDC from the oil com­panies. All in all, Obasanjo wanted a much impoverished NDDC!

On 6th July, a week after the House of Reps overrode Obasanjo’s veto the Senate made it a fait accompli when, under that late Dr. Chuba Okadigbo’s Senate presidency, the Senate sum­moned a two-third majority vote to feed Obasanjo with a humblest pie.

As Obasanjo must be Obasanjo, he must prove petulant; he then refused to inaugurate the Board for a good 12 months. Then he appointed Chief On­yema Ugochukwu as the first NDDC Chairman. Ugochukwu quickly set the standards; Obasanjo’s appointees into high NDDC positions fought strenuous­ly against independent-minded state governors. As Ugochukwu fought to push out Orji Uzor Kalu from Abia state Government House, so did Emma Ag­wariwodo oppose Chief James Onanefe Ibori in his bid to become Delta state Governor. Perhaps the most consequen­tial of such fights happened in Bayel­sa where Timi Alaibe fought against late D.S.P Alamieyeseighia, who was hounded until he died as he was denied the opportunity to get adequate medi­cal attention after a stomach surgery in Germany. In Bayelsa, Alaibe and Goodluck Jonathan, Alamieyeseighia’s Deputy-Governor, were a team.

Now, President Tinubu has handed over the baton of NDDC chairmanship to a man with a background which dif­fers from those of the others before him. He is not being sent by a radical­ized reactionary out to cut certain state governors to size. As journalists have always added when portraying him, he is in the James Ibori political family of Delta state. Every knowledgeable Nige­rian can attest that Ibori hazarded him­self the most among his 1999 – 2007 set of governors for the cause of true feder­alism in Nigeria. He led from the front every fight for the betterment of the Ni­ger Delta sub-region, supported openly by some former Governors; Dr. Victor Atah (Akwa-Ibom state) Orji Uzor Kalu (Abia), Lucky Igbinedion (Edo state) and the late Alamieyeseighia (Bayelsa state) the one who made the supreme sacrifice for his stance on matters con­cerning the Niger Delta area. Having been close to these gallant gladiators, who fought lustily for the betterment of the Niger Delta, the issues are not alien to Ebie and the problems can’t prove insurmountable, either.

Yesterday, Saturday, 18th of Novem­ber, another version of this write up appeared in the Saturday Vanguard. Among the phone calls that flowed in, one, from Mr. Linus Nwaozomudo, a highly decorated retired Commissioner of Police, stands out. Apart from the fact that I always count it an unmerited hon­our to even have the chance of learning words of wisdom that drip from his lips of this “Uncle” from Onicha-Ugbo, he called attention to one aspect of the character of the new Chairman of the Niger Delta Development Commission (NDDC) Barr. Chiedu Ebie. He said that once, he was at a hall in Benin for a par­ty in honour of the wife of Professor Chiedozie of the University of Benin. He had made it early to the hall, and no­ticed a nice young man, sharply dressed in a well-tailored safari suit busily re-ar­ranging the sitting arrangements.

Nwaozomudo called the young man who was re-dressing the hall, to praise the verified attention to great details he had espied in him. He had taken it for granted that the young man should be the boss of the event management agency that was in charge of the party. Then he asked for his name. That young man bowed respectfully and answered: “Sir, my name is Chiedu Ebie”. The retired Police officer wondered at the coincidence, adding that the Chiedu Ebie he knew about was the Secretary to the Delta State Government. The young man smiled and replied that he was the same person.

So, “Uncle” Nwaozomudo told me that Chiedu Ebie obviously has one character I failed to mention; his amaz­ing humility. This brings us to the other issue; Chiedu Ebie the man; he is com­ing into this job having been prepared by his experience as Secretary to the Delta State Government. And oh, he has the pedigree, too. He had not only been a Commissioner for Education before becoming SSG, his father was a full-fledged Professor of Psychiatry at the University of Benin and was also a Commissioner for Health by 1972 in the Samuel Ogbemudia regime. That was when Ogbemudia was struggling, with the aid of Prof John C. Ebie, Mike Okonjo (the SSG under Ogbe­mudia) to make Bendel a super state. I interviewed that good Prof in 1988 for THISWEEK magazine. He warned: “Some people say that Nigeria is only a distribution point for hard drugs and not a drug destination. They are mis­taken. if nothing is done to effectively stop hard drugs from coming in, soon, Nigeria will have a drug problem in her hands because not all the quantity that comes in will go out”. Today, Ni­geria has a hard drug problem on her hands…because we failed to take Prof Ebie’s warning seriously.

Chiedu Ebie should drive this whole­some dream of his father and Ogbemu­dia further to help turn the South-South into a super geo-political zone. He has all the ingredients for greatness. All he needs do is remember that he is the one the South-South has been waiting for since year 2000, someone who identified with the staunch agitators for a better South-South, a well-funded NDDC, true and fiscal federalism, unlike those be­fore him who were outsiders appoint­ed by outsiders to spite the agitators for the good of the South-South. Yes, he should remember that he is a core member of the group that fought for the genuine betterment of the South-South. He should also remember the son of whose father he is…and he will do well!

Dear Barr Chiedu Ebie, know that you are the one we have been waiting for even as “we are the ones we have been waiting for”… as Alice Walker wrote in her open letter to Barack Obama. You now symbolize the dreams of Niger Deltans. Yes, please note her plea to Obama: “I would further advise you not to take on other people’s ene­mies. Most damage that others do to us is out of fear, humiliation and pain.” Please rise above such. I wish you peace and joy…and uncommon success. Nige­ria is in search of heroes. Be one.