■ 4,800 Nigerian families in pain, subjected to inhuman treatment
■ Cameroonian gendarmes harass, arrest, jail those in IDPs camps
Judex Okoro, Calabar
After the ceding of Bakassi Peninsula 16 years ago to the Republic of Cameroon, it has been tales of woes from the displaced natives. They have not only been subjected to all sorts of neglect and inhuman treatment, but have also been dogged by resettlement and leadership tussles among the elite.
The present plight of the Bakassi people began in 2008, when the oil-rich peninsula was finally handed over to the government of Cameroon under the supervision the former Nigeria’s Minister of Justice, Michael Aondoakaa, following the judgment given by the International Court of Justice (ICJ) on October 10, 2002.
READ ALSO: Kalu demands Obasanjo’s probe over Bakassi peninsula
It would be recalled that by 2012, the option to appeal the ICJ judgment was due, but was forfeited by the Nigerian government.
The travail of the Bakassi people has been like a recurring decimal, almost decades after, despite series of promises, discussions and dialogues.
The Bakassi people are, indeed, in dire need just as their situation is pathetic; they feel shortchanged as the Nigerian government has not performed its obligations to ensure that the inhabitants of the peninsula who opted to resettle in Nigeria realized their dream.
The people of Bakassi are, therefore, asking for some care from their country, especially on the crucial issues and questions relating to orderly transition and economic empowerment and resettlement.
The people of Bakassi are, therefore, asking for some care from their country, especially on the crucial issues and questions relating to orderly transition and economic empowerment and resettlement.
Investigations by Sunday Sun revealed that different resettlement committees were set up by successive administrations in Cross River State, right from the time of Donald Duke to Liyel Imoke and the Presidential Committee constituted by former President Goodluck Jonathan, yet nothing positive came out from the reports.
The Presidential Committee on the Plight of the Displaced Bakassi People in its report submitted on May 23, 2013, recommended the establishment of a N100 billion Special Fund for Bakassi Development and the sum of N250,000 to be paid directly to established beneficiaries based on estimated 2013 population of 38,907.
The committee on page 6 of the report further recommended that “the present headquarters should remain at Ikang because of centrality” just as “additional state constituency should be created so that the settlers and indigenes have a state constituency each to serve their interest.”
The committee’s recommendation of Ikang being retained as local government headquarters ended the in-fighting among various groups over whether the natives will relocate to Dayspring Island I and II or remain at Ikang.
Sunday Sun further discovered that so far the Federal Government may have thrown the report into the trash can and refused to implement it. Rather, the government released about N35 billion to the state government for the resettlement of the displaced Bakassi people. The big question is: what happened to the money?
On the international front, foreign donors have neither committed cash nor materials to the Bakassi IDPs at Ikang as expected. Rather the people have been left to their fate.
READ ALSO: INEC in Cross River takes steps to register IDPs in Bakassi
Lamentations at IDP camp
When Sunday Sun visited the Obutong camp in Bakassi, it was observed that the residents live
in abject poverty and squalor as the camp had neither electricity nor potable water. Some of the residents regretted returning to Nigeria, saying that they would have remained on the peninsula to do their business.
The ‘health centre’ is itself very sick and in desperate need of a ‘doctor’ to cure it. It is in a deplorable condition. It is ill-equipped and has no health workers attached to it. There has been no electricity for about four years as power supply was cut off in 2014.
Some of the residents revealed that medical personnel only come around whenever they learnt that a dignitary would visit the facility or if there are emergencies.
More troublesome for the displaced Bakassi people is the incessant harassment by Cameroonian gendarmes and the diversion of relief materials given to them by notable non-governmental organisations.
Even the conditional cash transfer programme began by the Governor Liyel Imoke administration, through which a monthly stipend of N5,000 was paid to the beneficiaries to cushion the hardship faced by the returnees, was abruptly stopped by the same administration in 2012 without explanation to the beneficiaries, thereby subjecting them to more hardship. This development led to series of protests.
Sunday Sun gathered that the Ministry of Social Welfare and Sustainable Development, which is in charge of the cash transfer programme, had written official memos and letters to the governor on the need to look into the plight of the Bakassi people, but got no response so far.
“It is good that the people have come out to protest, maybe the governor would now listen to them,” source said, in a voice with obvious pain on the plight of the abandoned Bakassi people.
Expressing dismay at the turn of events, one of the leaders at the camp, Mr Linus Asuquo Essien, said that they had on several times protested against their poor living condition and diversion of materials meant for the deprived people of the area.
Essien said: “The IDP camp for the displaced persons is in Obutong Town in the riverive area and not in Akpabuyo. About 4,800 family heads have been documented by the UN, Immigration and some other government agencies and there is need to factor them into government’s programmes and activities.
“Often times the relief materials given to the IDPs have been diverted by some officials. The IDP camp is in Bakassi and not in Akpabuyo. The Cross River State government’s N5,000 monthly stipend under the Conditional Cash Transfer Programme has been stopped since 2012 and we have been left with nothing.
“We want to tell the governor about our poor condition and notify him of our people who are in Cameroonian prisons for no just cause and nothing is being done by the government at any level to secure their release. The Cameroon gendarmes beat up our people who could not cope with the harsh conditions in Obutong Town and had to sneak out.
“We have health centre that is not functioning. People are dying in the camp due to lack of medical attention; the medical staff only come when they have programmes or screening just to show their faces and go back.”
Blessing Eyo, a mother of seven, said the non-payment of the monthly stipend of N5, 000 for six years impacted negatively on their lives just as the people of the area do not feel any impact of governance at all levels.
She called for the re-instatement of the monthly stipends to ameliorate the suffering of the women and also help send their kids back to school.
“I am here because I am a returnee from Cameroon since 2009. Our life has been very difficult because there is no money, no food for our children and the N5,000 which was given to us has not come since 2012 and nothing is working in Obutong Town in Bakassi.
“We have not had any benefit and feel completely excluded from governance at all levels. So, we want government to come and settle us and help pay us our money, the money which was stopped in 2012 so that our children can go back to school,” she pleaded.
Another leader in the camp, Mr Daniel Asuquo, appealed for more support by organizations and individuals, especially in the area of electricity as there has been no electricity in the camp since 2014.
Equally lamenting their ordeal, Mr Nse Edet Okon, from Akpankanya in Abana, said: “We have been writing letters calling our people for help, but yet nothing has been done. But we have been hearing in the news that they have been doing so much for Bakassi IDPs.
“All those stories are fake; all those things do not come to us the rightful beneficiaries. The people here are suffering. It is very painful. Whatever the Nigerian government would do it should come directly to the people who are suffering.
“The worst is that the Cameroonian gendarmes restrain Nigerians in Bakassi to have access to the sea for their fishing among other ill treatments. The issue of a proper resettlement for Bakassi is yet to be addressed.”
The village head of Ifiang Oyong, Effiom Okokon Edem, said: “We are happy that the governor is constructing a housing estate for us. But the problem we have here is that there are no security as gendarmes threaten us a lot. So, we want the government to assist us. We need to be empowered to carry out our fishing business.
“Again, we don’t have any Nigerian telephone network here and, therefore, no means of communicating with our brothers and sisters or children living in the town. We use Cameroon MTN network and they charge us at international call rates.”
Reps member wants Bakassi Development Commission
Bemoaning the plight of the Bakassi returnees, the member representing Bakassi/Akpabuyo/ Calabar South Federal Constituency in the National Assembly, Hon. Essien Ayi, said that after several efforts to achieve proper resettlement for the people of Bakassi failed, the last option is for the Federal Government to create Bakassi Development Commission.
READ ALSO: Who can rescue Bakassi from AEDC?
Ayi explained that the proposed Bakassi Development Commission has a definite life span of 10 years and within that time frame the government should be able to rebuild Bakassi and resettle the people properly.
He said: “The motion for the stopping of ceding of Bakassi, the motion for the proper resettlement of Bakassi people, motion for the review of the ICJ judgment was moved by me and at the end when everything had failed, I moved a motion for a referendum for the people of Bakassi to decide where they want to belong and if they say they want to belong to Cameroon so be it or if they say they want to be in Nigeria so be it.
“All those motions passed through, but none was implemented by the Federal Government and now we are saying it is the Bakassi Development Commission.”
He said the bill for the commission came out of a research and is going through the first reading, adding that what is happening in Bakassi today is not as a result of the making of the people of Bakassi but as a result of the poor handling by the government and their team of lawyers at the International Court of Justice (ICJ).
“I sincerely believe that the issue was not handled properly. People were more interested in how much they could make. Over $600 million was spent on pursing the Bakassi issue in the time of President Obasanjo, which we lost.
“What annoys me most is that the country is very busy trying to rebuild the North-East. The devastation of the North-East has been the product of the so-called Boko Haram, who are Nigerians. And after Nigerians had destroyed Nigeria, the government is bent on rebuilding that area to the extent of setting up a North-East Development Commission. But the Bakassi that was ceded, not because of the making of the people of Bakassi, the government is not doing anything about it.
“The people of Bakassi have been clamouring for proper resettlement in line with the Green Tree Agreement involving the UN and the Nigerian government, but no concerted effort has been seen in that direction except one or two committees which funding was not spelt out and appropriation of funds has also been questionable,” Ayi said.
On his part, former Chairman of Bakassi Local Government Area, Hon Ani Essien, said: “I think it is high time the government focused on the real settlement of Bakassi people rather than playing politics with it.”
Ani, who doubles as the Director-General, Cross River State Water Ways, further said: “I can tell you that we have not in any way witnessed any intervention from any foreign country or donor agencies as seen in North-East. It could be because since the signing of Green Tree Agreement, which the superpowers witnessed and must have believed that Nigeria government has the capacity to take up the responsibilities of resettling us.
“It would be surprising for you to know that the Cameroonian government has developed all those former Nigerian villages, including Abana and Archibong Town, which are now in their territory.
“If you have ever been there during the regime of Nigeria, before you go to Abana you have to pull up your pair of trousers to cross, but now there are quality access roads all over the place with modern jetties built around the beaches.
“Right now I can tell you, because I go there often, that cars now drive in Archibong Town unlike before. That is how far Cameroon has gone and we are still here groping with resettlement matter after nearly 20 years. I think the Nigerian government should study the template Cameroon adopted in developing the peninsula.”
Ani further said that besides resettling the people, there is urgent need for the Nigerian government to look into the challenge of environmental degradation and citizenship beyond the pockets of housing units, calling on the state government to do more for the Bakassi natives.
During one of the official visits to the Bakassi IDP camp, the Director General, Cross River State Primary Health Care Development Agency (CRSPHCDA), Dr Betta Edu, wondered why the people should be subjected to this kind of human deprivations.
Her words: “After they had taken their land, their oil, their source of livelihood (fishing), their identity, and their pride, there was a Green Tree Agreement and those who made the agreement and got the billions sleep in beautiful houses while these young men, women and children continue to die. Given that the least we can do is to show solidarity with the Bakassi people, we appeal to the Federal Government to cater for their needs and ensure that the people are properly resettled.”
Expressing sympathy to the natives of Bakassi at a town hall meeting in Calabar, organized
in continuation of the series of engagements with leaders in the Niger Delta Region early in June 2017, Prof Osinbajo, then Acting President, said: “The ceding of Bakassi as a result of the judgment of the ICJ is a development that we all consider a loss.
“But President Muhammadu Buhari strongly believes that while we ruminate over the legal issues we must not allow Nigerian citizens in Ikang and elsewhere to suffer. The Federal Government will certainly do more and engage more with the displaced in Bakassi. This is our duty and our commitment.”
The Chief Press Secretary and Senior Special Assistant to Governor Ben Ayade, Mr Christian Ita, said: “The stipend was stopped before this present administration came into power. But even at that the administration has embarked on some social schemes to alleviate the plight of the Bakassi people.
“The government is constructing a housing scheme, which is 90 per cent completed; there is also the Deep Sea Port at Bakassi. So, we have not forgotten them. Rather this government has been at the forefront of the survival of Bakassi natives.”
Ita, however, denied that the state government had collected about N35 billion from the Federal Government for the development of Bakassi, adding that the N500 million the government received from the Federal Government was for the loss of oil blocks.
He added that the Akwa Ibom State government is demanding for the refund of the money.