Contrary to the widespread reports of his arrest over an alleged coup plot, the Managing Director of the Niger Delta Development Commission (NDDC), Dr. Samuel Ogbuku, on Thursday, addressed agricultural stakeholders at an ongoing two-day strategic meeting in preparation for an upcoming agricultural summit in Port Harcourt, Rivers State.
Speaking at the meeting, which began in Port Harcourt on Thursday, Dr. Ogbuku tasked the South-South region to look beyond the oil and develop agriculture, which he said, was capable of transforming the region.
The meeting had in attendance, Commissioners of Agriculture in all the Niger Delta States and their Permanent Secretaries.
Also, speaking with journalists on the reported arrest of Ogbuku earlier, a close ally of the NDDC boss and a chieftain of the All Progressives Congress (APC), Hon. Yekini Nabena, dismissed the reports of the alleged arrest, tagging it a fabrication of the political enemies.
According to Nabena, Dr. Sam Ogbuku is one of the trusted and reliable hands in the Renewed Hope Government, hence his political enemies were jittery and deliberately being mischievous.
The APC chieftain called on the general public to dismiss the report of arrest of the NDDC boss.
“We woke up yesterday to see some fabricated social media reports that Dr. Sam Ogbuku was arrested. And we asked, for what? Well, the ongoing agricultural summit in Port Harcourt, where the Managing Director spoke live this morning and it was carried live on two national Televisions. We hope that this will put the purveyors of fake news to shame.
“We ask the general public to disregard the fake news and see it as it is, Fake,” Nabena said.
The APC chieftain said Dr. Ogbuku was busy carrying out his mandate at the interventionist agency and did not have time to play dirty local politics as being practised by some individuals in the South-South region.