From AIDOGHIE PAULINUS, Abuja
The Coordinator of the Pan Niger Delta Forum (PANDEF) Youth Wing, Famous Daunemigha, has asked President Muhammadu Buhari to immediately suspend the Group Managing Director of the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC), Maikanti Baru. The former Bayelsa gubernatorial candidate of the defunct Congress for Progressives Change (CPC) said if the government was not at home with the peace enjoyed in the region, the Niger Delta youths could revoke it. The call by PANDEF is sequel to the ongoing feud between the Minister of State, Petroleum Resources, Ibe Kachikwu, and Baru over insubordination and contract scam to the tune of $25 billion. Daunemigha who spoke with Daily Sun further called on President Buhari to relinquish his position as Minister of Petroleum Resources. He said it was absurd that a president struggling to meet the challenges of his office would occupy the petroleum resources portfolio. “I think it is an aberration in the sense that Baru’s action is a slap on the South South region. Ibe Kachikwu, if the government is sincere with itself, the roles he played, we were the ones that secured the ceasefire for the Federal Government, working with Ibe Kachikwu, with the PANDEF leadership. “This man has brought the needed peace that Baru is enjoying and awarding contracts more than the Nigerian budget, almost close to eight trillion naira without making recourse to the minister. “So, we see it as insult, we see it as something that the Buhari administration is doing by always appointing our people without giving them the required authority to act. It is a slap. All these amount to the fact that they are not enjoying the peace that we gave to them. And if they don’t want, then the peace that we brought, the peace must go back to where it came from. “The way out of the crisis is that Baru must be suspended. It is a question of Buhari’s integrity. I have worked with Buhari all my life from ANPP and CPC where I was a gubernatorial candidate in Bayelsa state. It is his integrity that is at stake. We are fighting corruption and they see people before him corrupt?