PRESS STATEMENT
Former Presidential Adviser on Niger Delta Affairs and ex Chairman of the Presidential Amnesty Programme, Hon. Kingsley Kemebradigha Kuku, has praised President Bola Ahmed Tinubu for pursuing the Lagos Calabar Coastal Highway. He also insisted that the Ijaw Nation and the wider Niger Delta deserve development that matches their contribution to the country’s wealth.
In a public statement on the project, Kuku said, “President Bola Ahmed Tinubu deserves recognition for pursuing an ambitious national infrastructure agenda.”
He added, “Leadership sometimes requires the courage to contemplate projects that previous administrations discussed but did not bring to fruition.”
Kuku also set out where he stands politically. “Let me make it clear that I am not a PDP boy. I served my country under President Goodluck Jonathan, and I am proud of that service, but my loyalty has always been to the Ijaw Nation, the Niger Delta and Nigeria, not to any political party. Today, I support President Bola Ahmed Tinubu because I see in him a leader willing to take on the kind of bold projects our region has waited decades for.”
He continued, “Supporting the President does not mean I will stop asking hard questions. It means I believe this government can deliver for the Niger Delta, and I intend to hold it to that promise.”
The lawyer and former legislator argued that the region’s claim to infrastructure is about fairness, not favour. “The Niger Delta does not deserve development as an act of charity. It deserves development as a matter of equity, responsibility and national justice,” he said.
He pointed to decades of oil spills, gas flaring and damaged fishing grounds. He noted that communities whose land and waters have sustained the national economy still struggle with poor roads and weak infrastructure. “The region should not have to plead for attention each time a major national project is conceived,” he stated.
On Bayelsa’s swampy terrain, Kuku said wetlands and creeks were no excuse for leaving the state behind. He cited road projects under successive administrations, including that of Governor Douye Diri. “Technical difficulties should inform the solution, not predetermine the exclusion of communities that have legitimate development claims,” he said.
In a rare admission, Kuku conceded that the Goodluck Jonathan administration he served did not deliver every part of the development agenda that followed the 2009 amnesty. “Public service is not served by pretending that every promise was fulfilled,” he said. He urged later governments not to use past failures as an excuse to abandon unfinished commitments.
Although he backs the highway, Kuku called on the Federal Government to make the project’s route, costs, financing, procurement and environmental assessments open to the public. He also warned that concerns about the route should not be brushed aside as disloyalty to the President. “Public scrutiny is not opposition to development,” he said.
He maintained that the highway must not replace the roads, bridges, waterways, healthcare, environmental cleanup and jobs that the Niger Delta still urgently needs. Instead, he said, it should form part of a long term national plan that outlives any single government.