24 Jul 2008 |
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Since the beginning of this millennium what started as citizens or sectional discontent in the Niger Delta region has rapidly spiralled into full-scale guerilla violence. The failure to act honestly and the adoption of “politics as usual” by successive governments have allowed what could have been resolved through sensible constitutional dialogue and compromise to turn into an albatross of an increasingly dangerous dimension likely to bring down our very nationhood. Time and again, individual statesmen, scholars, honest politicians, ordinary citizens as well as groups and organizations have appealed to our political leaders to take the Niger Delta situation seriously and respond with fairness and justice by addressing the unacceptable and unconscionable socio-economic conditions in that important region of the country. Unfortunately, those honest admonitions and the numerous objective suggestions and blueprints for resolving the Niger Delta problem have been set aside by successive administrations in favour of the mediocre, self-serving half-measures – a la OMPADEC, NDDC etc. - which have only served to enrich the elites from the Niger Delta and other parts of the country, while worsening the socio-economic conditions of the people of the Niger Delta region. While one could go on to dwell on the various debates about the rights and wrongs of the neglect of the Niger Delta region, or about who is to blame and who is not, the critical and urgent dimension of the Niger Delta situation would not permit such exercise. Indeed, numerous renowned and committed Nigerians (including my humble self) have carried that debate through countless publications and forums and proposed several blueprints towards honest, fair and permanent resolution of the Niger Delta problem. What Nigeria lacks is not solutions (I mean honest, fair and permanent solutions) to the Niger Delta problem, what we lack is vision, political will and leadership to move beyond parochial interests, to be bold, to be audacious, to do what is right and just in the interest of peace, progress and meaningful development for the people of the Niger Delta region and the entire country. Over the years we have not had leaders who are ready to take bold steps (unpalatable as they may seem), to do what is right to permanently resolve the problem in a manner that may actually lead to the awakening and renewal of prosperity in all nooks and crannies of the country. Instead our leaders (from all regions and of all creeds) have been afraid: they are afraid to loose their cushy federal allocations or their conduits of enrichment through derivation and other Niger Delta development schemes. They are afraid to think outside the box to evolve workable arrangements to explore and develop other numerous resources (apart from oil) that we are endowed with in very state and every region of our vast and beautiful country. In short, they are lazy and complacent in the comfort brought by oil dollars. So, regime after regime, government after government they have played politics of pacification and appeasement rather than heal the fracture (or cancer) in our constitutional arrangement.
How then do we deal with the Niger Delta problem? Ho do we avert the escalation of violence and the prospect of all-out guerilla war? There is no doubt that people close to the Presidency and all the political opportunists across the country will be whispering all sorts of ideas and solutions, especially about how to organize one grandiose conference or establish NDDC-type conduit or the other. Others may indeed be suggesting how to crush the Niger Delta gangs once and for all. With regards to the “crushing ideas”, while one acknowledges that there is a criminal dimension to the problem in the Niger Delta which rightly deserves the application of the security and law enforcement mechanisms of the state, one would still advise caution. It should be recognized and understood that the criminal dimension of the Niger Delta situation is only an opportunistic outgrowth of a fundamental socio-political discontent in the region. What one is saying is that, even if we are to crush the criminal gangs in the Niger Delta, the atmosphere of discontent will remain with a large majority of the people in the region, unless we also address and fix the political-constitutional issues at the root of the problem. What is more dangerous is that if we are to adopt the “crush them” advice, the process of dealing with these criminal gangs could itself lead to the escalation of the problem into full-scale guerrilla war. There are so many examples of such attempts to quash seemingly minor rebellions that have gone wrong in This brings me to the beef of this article: the recent pledge of military assistance to quash the Niger Delta gangs by the British Government. That pledge must be received with caution and tact and diplomatically put to bed. History has taught us that the western powers don’t always mean what they say, and importantly could be pursuing agendas of their own. The roles that have been played by such western powers in escalating conflicts through their so-called support in various parts of the world are well documented. Now that indications of that scenario seem to be coming out, one’s advice to Mr. President and all well-meaning Nigerians is to say thank you to the British and find a Nigerian solution to our problem. DO NOT INTERNATIONALIZE THE PROBLEM!!!. There is an adage that says that “family disputes often escalate when there is external advice or interference.” Apart from the fact that the military option will not and cannot resolve the problem is the Niger Delta,
July 20, 2008
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