The House of Representatives yesterday expressed displeasure at the budget performance of the Ministry of Niger Delta Affairs, even as it stated that the ministry has so far not been able to justify the reasons why it was created.

The members of the Committee on Niger Delta, who made this known during the annual budget appraisal exercise of the Ministry of Niger Delta Affairs in the House, described the performance of the budget as a fraud because the only projects executed were consultancy services which ran into billions of naira.

Speaking at the session, Hon Igo Aguma, Chairman of the House Committee on Gas and member of the committee, stressed that the ministers have failed woefully in the implementation of the 2009 budget, adding that the Minister, Ufot Ekaette and the Minister of State, Godsday Orubebe, are unpatriotic people who do not have the interest of the people of Niger Delta at heart.

He said, "Just yesterday, we approved supplementary budget for this ministry and if indeed as a minister you have the cause of developing Niger Delta at the back of your mind, we would have seen it in your plans”.

He continued, "You have introduced new projects and have done consultancy design and construction to the tune of N22 billion instead of asking for funds to complete the ongoing ones".

"Let's stop deceiving the Niger Delta people. Unfortunately, we have people from that region at the helm of affairs and yet they are performing like this. The ministry has performed woefully".

Another lawmaker, Hon Halims Agoda, pointed out that even though the year has come to an end, there are no indications that the ministry has been able to implement any of the capital projects in the 2009 budget.

"It does appear like money allocated for consultancy is even higher than that of the actual project. I am disturbed that at the end of the year, what we are going to have to show is consultancy", Agoda lamented.

In his contribution, the Chairman of the House Committee on Rules and Business, Hon Ita Enang, said "during the 2009 budget presentation by the president, I said in my contribution that the ministry is a diplomatic deceit of the government to the people of the Niger Delta and I cannot say today that I have been proved wrong".

Chairman of the Committee, Hon Olaka Nwogu, however, directed the minister and his team to go back with the documents they came with and prepare a more detailed budget performance sheet that would contain names of consultants, services offered and progress made so far, amount received and released by the ministry etc and return on Tuesday.

He disclosed that after the meeting on Tuesday, the committee would decide if to go and have a meeting with the president if need be to address ways through which resources earmarked for the region can be utilised to bring development to Niger Delta.

 "There is no indication that these projects will be done. We are considering a meeting with President Yar’Adua after the Tuesday meeting to see how to move the ministry forward", he said.

Earlier, the Minister of Niger Delta Affairs, Ufot Ekaette, had informed the committee that the ministry had problems implementing new projects for which they received N19.57bn in the 2009 budget, because "after removing money earmarked after design and costing, we couldn't pay 15  percent mobilisation fees for any of the projects".