Niger-delta-620x350

Related News

President Muhammadu Buhari last week met with some leaders of the Niger Delta in the bid to find lasting peace in the region. At the end of the meeting, the leaders presented Buhari with a 16-point agenda that they believe will halt the restiveness in the oil-rich region.
The demands ranged from bread and butter issues such as the Amnesty Programme through regional economic development scheme to environmental remediation and the highly charged issue of resource control.
The Forum is demanding that it is not enough to train the former armed militants, it is imperative to provide them jobs after their training so that the nation and the individuals can fully benefit from the investments in the amnesty programme.  The Forum is pushing for a general economic development of the region and is asking for the revival of previously planned specific investments like the Brass LNG and fertilizer project including the NLNG Train 7 scheduled for Bonny.  It is also asking for a review of the national gas master plan to integrate economic interests and the industrialization of the Niger Delta.
The Pan-Niger Delta Forum also demands that critical infrastructure projects in the region be fast-tracked including the East-West Highway, which seems to have been in limbo for years. It also called for the full implementation of the rail project to run through the Niger Delta to Lagos.  The Forum insists that there must be a prompt take-off of the contentious Maritime University and that contract for the security surveillance and protection of oil and gas installations should be handled by communities and not individuals. It also called for the restructuring and enhanced funding for the Niger Delta Development Corporation (NDDC) and the Niger Delta Ministry.
On power supply, the Forum demanded that there must be a link between gas supply and electricity supply to the area to ensure everyone has a stake in the safety of gas supply lines.  The Forum asked that the Niger Delta be included in the participation in the oil industry by including people of the region in the allocation of oil blocs.  The Forum asked that the issue of military presence in the region should be reassessed to avoid the invasion and displacement of communities which often involved harassment and other forms of human rights abuses.
The Minister of State for Petroleum Resources, Dr. Ibe Kachikwu’s note that Nigeria’s oil production has soared to 2.1 million bpd is probably the greatest testimony that peace in the Niger Delta is a win-win situation for the nation. Three months ago before the détente, we were down to less than 1.2 million bpd. We believe that the meeting is a good beginning, the demands by the Niger Delta sound reasonable; after all, these are opening demands and would need to be negotiated.
That the Niger Delta has to remind the allocators of oil blocs to include Niger Deltans in the allocations attests to the colonial mentality that had dominated the exercise.  It is an extreme case of injustice which should be a national embarrassment and must be corrected by affirmative action.  Indeed, the allocation of the oil blocs to individuals turning them into billionaires while the rest die in penury should be re-examined.  Why should the oil blocs not be communally owned?
The cleanup of Ogoniland has been a matter of great concern for years now.  Again, as the Forum said, there should be a cleanup of all communities which have experienced oil spills.  The reality of the environmental degradation of the Niger Delta has been there for years. This includes devastation of rivers, farmlands on which nothing can grow, gas flaring, night and day, with persistent danger of leukemia and other health hazards.  These are prices that the Niger Delta has had to pay and is paying daily which must be reversed.
We urge the Federal Government to end the bribing of individuals and concentrate its efforts in economic development of the region and communal participation in the protection of oil and gas installations.  There is a master plan for the development of the Niger Delta which should be dusted and made the focus of the development of the Niger Delta region.  We urge the President to quickly constitute his negotiating team and get to work for a final and lasting peace in the Niger Delta.