The Director-General of the newly established Delta Local Content Agency, Dr. Morris Idiovwa, said the state government decided to establish the agency to enhance the industrialization drive of the Dr. Ifeanyi Okowa-led administration.
Idiovwa, made this clarification on Monday June 28th 2021, during a press briefing held at the Government House, Annex, Warri, Delta State.
According to Idiovwa, “the Agency was created on the 15 day of September, 2020 pursuant to the DELTA STATE LOCAL CONTENT AGENCY LAW, 2020.”
He said functions of the agency includes, aiding local indigenous companies to exploit local opportunities while staying competitive and also organizing specialized programs and training for entrepreneurship development, including start-up, establishment and economic empowerment of community contractors and workers.
Other functions of the agency according to Idiovwa are; “To coordinate and embark on programs to increase indigenous Local Content in the operation of companies in Delta State
“To facilitate the provision of local content jobs and project partnership through a network of local, national and international organizations and agencies, as well as private sector bodies, community-based and civil society organizations in the State
“To monitor and ensure compliance with the terms of any Memorandum of Understanding, General Memorandum of Understanding and Agreements executed between Companies and host and impacted communities within the State.”
Idiovwa also noted that the establishment of the agency became imperative due to the coastal nature of the state which plays host to several extractive industries.
While fielding questions from journalists, Dr Idiovwa assured local contractors in the state that the agency will partner with them to ensure that they were not shortchanged in anyway.
“The purpose why the Delta State Government domesticated the local Content act is to manage the operations and employment of not just the IOCs but also the rural communities in the state,” Idiovwa said.
He said the agency has designed a plethora of activities that they will soon begin to roll out and which will be beneficial to both the IOCs and the local communities.
On the relocation of headquarters of IOCs to the Niger Delta region, Idiovwa noted that the region has to first of all put it’s house in order before the IOCs will think of relocating.
“We must be ready to effect the changes that we want. We need to stabilize the region in terms of security. No company will want to do business where there is no security. We should fix security issues before we ask the IOCs to relocate their headquarters to the Niger Delta region,” Idiovwa said.
