NDDC to end agitations for compensations over right of way

NIGER Delta Development Commission, NDDC, is to redress complaints of right of way compensation over its projects in the region. Managing Director of the Commission, Mr Nsima Ekere, gave the assurance at the commission’s headquarters in Port Harcourt, Rivers State, when the Nigerian Institution of Estate Surveyors and Valuers paid him a courtesy visit.

He said there had been
several complaints on right of way over some of its projects, adding
that they could not be resolved in the past because of paucity of funds.

Ekere said: “The fund is always a bit low so that by the time a
consultant finishes evaluation and brings a report, you find out that
what is in the contract is not adequate to pay compensation.”

He promised to clear outstanding claims to estate surveyors and valuers,
 saying they would be addressed holistically through a joint committee
of the NDDC and NIESV, to be headed by the Commission’s Executive
Director, Projects, EDP.

“The issues will be treated on a case by case basis. We are now doing
things differently by using the 4-R initiative to add value to the
process,” he added.

The Chairman, Rivers State Branch of Nigerian Institution of Estate
Surveyors and Valuers, Mr. Elliot Orupabo, urged the commission to set
up a valuation unit headed by a registered estate surveyor to help
resolve challenges of compensation because “the absence of this unit is a
 major lacuna which the engineers in the Project Management Department
have capitalized upon to vet and tamper with compensation valuation
reports prepared by registered estate surveyors and valuers without
recourse to the consultants.”