05 December 2012, Sweetcrude, Enugu – The Director-General, National Boundary Commission (NBC), Dr Mohammed Ahmed, has said that the rightful owners of the oil wells operated by Orient Petroleum would be determined in 6 months time.
Dr Ahmed announced this at a joint meeting of Anambra/Kogi interstate
boundary reconcilliatory meeting held in Lokoja, Möday.
The commission’s boss said the boundaries under dispute were last demarcated in 1954, noting that development, population and federalism, had
necessitated the need to carry out another demarcation. The demarcation, Mohammed stressed,would help resolve issues surrounding the boundaries
towards achieving peace.
According to him, “discoveries of natural resources had made determination of boundaries in the country very difficult”. He added that the current
exercise on the Anambra/Kogi boundary was a presidential directive, and
solicted the cooperation of the states involved.
Kogi State deputy governor and chairman of the state boundary committee, Mr Yomi Awoniyi, who received the presidential committee, said the state would do all it could towards having an amicable resolution, urging that
the exercise should be done in a manner which would enable the people to continue to live as brothers.
He, therefore, appealed to border communities to allow government carry out its work in determining the true boundaries without rancour, describing Kogi and Anambra people as brothers, and nxt door neighbours, who were united and showed empathy during the last flood that overtook several communities in the two states.
