Ijaw Youths decries marginalization in NNPC employment exercise, want shortlisted candidates published

Ijaw Youths decries marginalization in NNPC employment exercise, want shortlisted candidates published

The Ijaw Youth Council (IYC) has decried what it described as marginalization of the Ijaw nation in the ongoing employment exercise in the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC), demanding that names and states of origin of candidates shortlisted for interview must be published in national dailies.

IYC President, Pereotubo R. Oweilaemi, who made this call in a release issued on Sunday, said that not more than ten persons from Bayelsa, Delta and Rivers States put together were shortlisted, while states in the Northern and Western parts of the Country got more than twenty slots each.

He said; "We have been reliably informed by competent sources within the NNPC that the Parastatal has shortlisted candidates for its ongoing employment exercise. 

"However, to our chagrin, not more than ten persons from Bayelsa, Delta and Rivers States put together are featured in the list, while states in the Northern and Western parts of the Country got more than twenty slots each.

"Meanwhile, only one state alone in the North has been shortlisted with not less than twenty persons. Is this the one Nigeria they're preaching?

"IYC rejects this discriminatory and nepotistic employments. The Ijaw nation that is feeding this Country with the mineral deposits found in her lands barely have five slots in the whole list.

"NNPC should immediately publish the list of shortlisted candidates in the dailies for the world to see the truth. 

"We have it on good authority that the Agency refuses to publish the list because of the disparities associated in the process.

"To perfect its divisive and apartheid employment process, the NNPC has resolved to surreptitiously call the shortlisted candidates for interview in order to cover up its fraudulent and nepotistic agenda just like what other agencies have been doing under this Buhari's regime."

He warned that the NNPC Group Managing Director (GMD), Dr. Maikanti Baru and the cabals in the presidency should be held responsible for any crisis in the oil sector, insisting that the NNPC must publish the list of shortlisted candidates for the world to see its sincerity.

"The goose that lays the golden egg can no longer be an onlooker in the sharing of the dividends from the black gold which has being taking from our lands at the detriment of the people's lives.

"Enough is enough. If there is any disparity in the process then we call on the GMD to immediately correct it before publishes the shortlisted list. Doing that will in no doubt guarantee peace in the oil sector.

"The oil producing states cannot take less. Rather, special consideration should be given to these environmentally devastated and economically pauperised oil bearing states. That is the only panacea to address this injustice," the IYC President said.