In the Senate, he was called Senator and SAN. He was the only Senator thus far to be crowned a Senior Advocate of Nigeria while serving in the Senate. As he would say then, he wanted to be ‘condemned’ to the Senate in his state but his former friend and ally, former Governor Liyel Imoke, decided to stop him at all cost in 2015 after Imoke disagreed with his friend and predecessor in office Donald Duke. Senator Victor Ndoma-Egba then became the fall guy. He was rendered completely irrelevant in the Peoples Democratic Party in the state and had to move to the All Progressives Congress.
President Muhammadu Buhari was spot on during the week with the nomination of Ndoma-Egba for appointment as Chairman of the Niger Delta Development Commission. That nomination is remarkable in two ways. One, coming from Cross Rivers, which has almost been wiped off as an oil producing state because most of her oil wells have been taken over by Cameroon and Akwa Ibom State, President Buhari seems to be affirming Cross River’s status as an oil-producing state with Ndoma-Egba’s appointment. The other point is the widely-acknowledged outstanding qualities of the former Senate Leader, which will be brought to bear on that interventionist agency that is NDDC in the development of the restive Niger Delta. Ndoma-Egba has experience in diverse areas and he is also a bundle of integrity.
He obtained his LL.B degree from the University of Lagos, LLM degree from the University of Calabar and was called to the Nigerian Bar in 1978. He was elevated to the rank of SAN in 2004. He has been Chairman of the Nigerian Bar Association, Calabar Branch, and President of the Calabar Chamber of Commerce. He has also been Director of the Cross River Basin and Rural Development Authority, and Commissioner for Works & Transport. He served three terms in the Senate from 2003 to 2011, during which time he distinguished himself. It was in recognition of the leadership qualities in him that he was elected the Senate Leader in the immediate-past Senate, the 7th Senate.
The President also nominated Mr. Nsima Ekere as the Managing Director of the commission to take over from Mrs. Ibim Semenitari, who is currently acting as MD of the commission. Ndoma-Egba’s nomination and that of Mr. Nsima Ekere as NDDC MD were contained in a letter by President Buhari to Senate President Bukola Saraki on Wednesday. I do not have any doubt in my mind that the Senate would ratify his appointment given his qualities and again because he had been one of them.
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