Skip to main content

Quelling Militancy in Post Amnesty Niger Delta


The success of the amnesty programme of President Musa Yar Adua is not in question any more. What is in question however, is the fear of skeptics of the sincerity of the federal government in delivering its post amnesty pledges. It is also true that government largesses are not keeping quiet about government good intentions for the people of the Niger Delta.
The recent federal government pronouncement that ten percent of oil derivation will be given to oil producing communities was received with a lot of excitement by people from the South South region and by followers of the Niger Delta crisis. Causing even more excitement is the federal government intent to include this ten percent derivation policy to oil producing communities in the Petroleum Industry Bill currently in the National Assembly.

All hail President Yar Adua. “PDP – progress for the people.’ For once in more than twelve years since the party came into existence, have they been seen to be doing the right thing. Good as it may look, there are questions about this federal government pronouncement of relinquishing to the oil producing communities a whopping ten percent of oil revenue. The question is, which community falls under the classification of 'oil producing?

I was just wondering how the oil companies under the GMoU arrangement are able to categorise communities in the Niger Delta as oil and non-oil producing communities. If a particular community is given a development grant based on the premise that an oil company operates in their home land, what happens to the many other communities which suffers from oil spills, destruction of farmlands, aquatic and marine lives, and pollution of their source of clean drinking water?

I can not understand the logic whereby you give money to community A as oil producing, whereas community X, Y,Z gets nothing and yet suffers from the effects of oil producing activities in its neighborhood. A situation such as this is bound to spell doom.  Obviously, the so called ‘oil producing’ communities will be happy, the oil companies will enjoy relative sporadic peace from beneficiary communities, but other non-oil producing communities suffering from the effects of oil production activities which are not beneficiaries of such grants from oil companies and the federal government will be agitated.

A larger proportion of the restive youths in the Niger Delta who are now fighting in the creeks are actually from the so called ‘non-oil producing communities. Both the oil companies and the federal government should know that there is a big price to pay if this issue of ten percent derivation to oil producing communities is not well managed.  The situation may degenerate into intra-communal clashes leading to a retraction of militants to the creeks.

The success or failure of the post amnesty programme largely depends on how the oil companies and indeed the federal government is able to structure the distribution of the ten percent derivation to oil producing communities. 


Labels:

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Quote Me

"If you like ' Quote Me ', please show support by clicking 'Like'. "Success is a journey, you can reach your destination only when you know..." "Life is like a book and we are only but readers. We cannot change its content, but to live by it". "Life is an ongoing project, it is either you complete it or abandone it". "Success is like fruits hanging in the air, for some, they just wait for it to drop, and for others, they reach out and get it". "It is important to make new friends, but it is much more important to keep old ones". "Wherever you are now is a climp up or down the stairs of life. It is your will or lack of it that determines your direction". "Countries are not adjudged great by their resources, but by social stability and good governance". "The irony of life is that bad news makes the loudest noise thereby over-shadowing the good things that are happening". ...
Post a Comment
Read more

PULL DOWN THE WALL

Nigerians from all parts of the country, across sectoral, cultural, religious and political divides are strongly against any form of separation or division of the federation. The scares of the Odumegwu Ojukwu led Biafra civil war is still very fresh in our memory. Insinuations recently by Libyan leader Col. Muammar Gaddafi calling for a split of Nigerian into Christian south and Muslim north was largely seen as repulsive and condemnable. Federal government’s spontaneous reaction and recall of the Ambassador to Libya Alhaji Aliu Mohammed, was supported by both Christian and Muslim leaders. Obviously, Nigerians want to remain as one indivisible entity. However, there are calls for a sovereign national conference to bring about a truly federal constitution. Nigeria is regarded by a school of thought as a mere ‘geographical expression” of the British Colonial masters, brought about by the amalgamation of the north and south when leadership was conceded to the Muslim north under ...
Post a Comment
Read more

Let there be Peace in Bayelsa

It is a pity and indeed shameful that Bayelsans are busy fighting themselves while other States are pursing development with all vigour. The same thing happened during the Awolowo - cocoa era. While Awo was busy developing the West, other regions were busy engaging in political wrangling. Let us be wise and stop fighting. We should concentrate and seek ways of developing Bayelsa State. Presently, States like Lagos, Aqua Ibom, Cross Rivers, Enugu and some others are focused and are busy developing their towns and cities, and here we are busy fighting. The time will come again in future as it is now, when we have to give account of what we did with the resources available to us now. As usual with Nigerians, then, shall we again start putting the blame on the federal government? We have every opportunity now to move our people forward in the political, economical and fiscal arenas. I really pity us, because, I hear all kinds of degradating comments about how "we like en...
Post a Comment
Read more