Civil Society Organisations, CSOs, have called for synergy among Host Community Development Trusts, HCDTs, in Akwa Ibom in the execution of projects in the communities to avoid duplicity of efforts and wastage of resources.
This was part of the resolutions reached at the end of a meeting between Frontier/Savannah Energy HCDT Trust and CSOs, as organized by Oxfam Nigeria in collaboration with the Civil Society Legislative Advocacy Centre (CISLAC) and Connected Development (CODE).
Harry Udoh, the Executive Director of Akwa Ibom Tax Justice and Governance Platform, said there was need for big trusts such as the Emoimee which is funded by Exxon Mobil to collaborate with smaller ones like Total/Savannah trust and other upcoming trusts in the implementation of the PIA.
According to him, if there is a collaboration in terms of infrastructure and project execution, there would be efficient use of resources so that they dont duplicate efforts which can lead to wastages of funds.
“Emoimee trust has the Exxon Mobil that is doing a lot more and their 3% OPEX is much bigger and we are thinking that there is a need for synergy, especially with those Small HCDTs so that there wont be duplication of efforts so that the little resources available with the smaller HCDTs would be maximized.
Udoh who said the essence of the meeting was to note the success recorded by the HCDTs in the implementation of the PIA, as well as their challenges observed that the 5% administrative fund for the running of the Trust was not sufficient.
Speaking, the Board of Trustee Chairman, Ekid Host Community Trust, Dr Macaulay Akpan said the administration fund was grossly inadequate as the money is meant to serve three tiers of the trust, made up of the BoT committee with seven members, management committee with nine members and advisory committee with five members.
He said the Ekid HCDT has so far received a sum of N170 million OPEX from both Frontier and Savannah Energy and had used about N98 million to execute projects ranging from grants, scholarships to skills acquisitions.
He also stated that the trust was planning to embark on capital projects either on health or education and prayed that the 20 percent reserved funds should be reviewed downwards to enable the trust have enough funds to execute such projects
Also speaking, the Program Manager/Accountable Governance, Oxfam, Henry Ushie harped on the need for accountability on the part of the HCDTs in the implementation of the PIA, as well as timely and correct remittance of three percent OPEX by the extractive industries in the communities.
“We want to see accountability, if the companies themselves are doing their remittances to the account and the members of the board are doing the right thing”, he said.
Ushie disclosed plans of the CSO to document all the processes of the HCDTs starting from the formative stage, expectations from the trust and how they implement projects, saying such would serve as reference materials for researchers, scholars and other upcoming oil companies that want to set up a trust.
“We want to document the process for them starting from when HCDT was formed, appointment of board members, accountability in the process of implementation of PIA, how inclusive is the process? What is the process of recruitment of the consultant? Who did the Needs assessment? The remittances by the settlers. These are the things we will document for future references”, he added.
