By Gift Chapi Odekina
The Niger-Delta caucus of the House of Representatives on Monday called on President Muhammadu Buhari to relieve the Minister of Humanitarian Affairs Sa’adiya Umar Farouk of her ministerial position if she failed to resigne haven made an alleged degenerating statement concerning the Niger Delta region.
According to the lawmakers, the statement made by the minister was degenerating.
The caucus at a press conference in Abuja carpeted the minister over her recent comment that Bayelsa State could not and should not be classified as one of the 10 most affected states by the flood which claimed thousands of lives, property, farmlands, to the causing injuries and displaced thousands others from their homesteads all over the country.
Caucus spokesman Rep Frederick Abedi questioned the veracity and motive behind the minister’s statement, adding that it smacked on insensitivity on the minister’s side and suggests a ploy to perpetually keep a section of the country marginalized.
According to the lawmaker, the statistics reeled out by the Minister of Humanitarian Affairs to the effect that the death toll of the devasting flood in the whole of Bayelsa was 81 while the number of injured and displaced person’s stood at 91 was no only neauseating but represents a collective insult on the psyche of Niger Deltans, especially Bayelsans.
“Nothing could be farther from the truth from the minister’s assertion because not only was 80% of Bayelsa’s total landmass submerged at the peak of flood’s devastation, the state was completely cutoff from the rest of the country by road on the Western part, approachable only by boats from the surrounding creeks and rivers leading to the high sea” Rep Abedi said.
According to the lawmaker, the level of devastation was so high that schools, including higher institutions in Bayelsa have to be shut down.
He described the minister’s comments as being at variance with that of the United Nations Resident and. Humanitarian coordinator Mr Mathias Schmak who declared Bayelsa a disaster zone.
“We wish to bring to the Minister’s attention that the entire Niger-Delta States of Rivers, Delta, Bayelsa, Akwa Ibom Ibom, Edo, Imo and Cross River are highly impacted by the flood.
During the question and answer session of the briefing Rep Abedi noted that a disaster of such a high magnitude was too serious a subject to be playing politics with. pointing out that the death of even one person in the flood disaster was enough to evoke empathy in anybody and not to start scheming how to downplay the effect of the flood in one part of the country.
