2007 Polls: The NIIA Alarm On Mercenaries In Niger Delta

By

Senior Fyneface

senior_fyneface@yahoo.com

 

 

Recently, the Director General of the Nigerian Institute of International Affairs (NIIA), Prof Joy Ogwu raised two very serious alarms that bother on national security while delivering a paper at a seminar on Media Agenda and 2007 Election, organized by the Centre for Political Leadership and Communications Research.

 

The first alarm was very correct, that the Niger Delta militants resorted to hostage taking to get attention from Nigerians.

 

However, the second alarm over the influx of dangerous foreign mercenaries from Yugoslavia into the Niger Delta region was very wrong and a clever attempt (not by Prof Ogwu) to turn the genuine agitation of the Niger Delta people for resource right and correction of decades of neglect, into partisan politics.

 

The NIIA boss who was represented by Dr Daniel Omowhe, a director at the institute interestingly raised the two alarms at a seminar on Media Agenda and 2007 Election. What a coincident.

 

Prof Ogwu was very correct when she explained that “the understanding of the present issue of hostage taking lies in the heart of the struggle for resource right. They are doing this now to stop further exploration of oil in there area, the degradation of their environment and the actualization of resource control demands”.

 

But the Professor’s allegation that the new dimension of hostage taking introduced into the Niger Delta agitation late last year was to provide the needed funds to pay the mercenaries, was a carefully crafted mischief. She must have made the declaration with a clear intention unaware that she was playing into the hands some crafty political office seekers in the area.

 

Her words: “The alarming dimension about it is that mercenaries that operated during the Yugoslavian war are now involved in the Niger Delta crisis. If you see the way they operate you will agree with me that they are well trained. I think we need to address the issue quickly”.

 

The question is: which of the issues? The international relations guru raised two issues- resource right and rejection of presidential candidates that does not have the blessing of the neglected people of the Niger Delta.

 

Did Prof Ogwu, as reported on the “Red Alert Story” by a national daily soft sell newspaper, actually urged the people of the Niger Delta not to vote for any presidential candidate that does not have the resolution of the region’s problems as cardinal programme. If she did, then she actually betrayed the confidentiality of her sponsorship.

 

Which of the past President of this country has ever had the feelings of the people in his heart? Does the incumbent president have the interest of the Niger Delta in his heart? Which of the aspirants including those governors from the region, has or will have the feelings of the real people of the Niger Delta at heart? Are the genuine rights fighters (militants) of the Niger Delta actually interested in who is running for the presidency of the Nigerian state? Are they in the real sense of their struggle interested in the present Nigerian structure?

 

For the NIIA boss to say that “the militants are sustaining the mercenaries through the money they collect from government when hostages are seized” was an outright insult on course the rights activists (militants) have committed their lives to fight. The aggrieved advocates of resource right in the region do not need any mercenary to help them when they have the “Egbesu Bond”.

 

By the way, which government in the Niger Delta has paid money to free any hostage? They “honestly” made Nigerians believe that they never gave money in exchange for hostages. Do they want us now to believe otherwise?

 

An expository article on the “Politics of Hostage Taking in Niger Delta” published by Gamji and Amana, had earlier alerted Nigerians of the new dimension to the 3T Agenda where politicians mostly from the Niger Delta are fueling the renewed spate of violence and hostage taking to coerce other sections of the country to allow them access to the Presidency.

 

The report disclosed that “As soon as the apostles of the third term agenda with all their shameless arguments for the mammoth achievement of “Mr President” to better the life of the Niger Delta people, discovered that the project has flopped, they quickly dusted the amber of violence and insecurity which they nurtured, equipped and maintained since 2003 general elections in well-known parts of the region with a view to coercing the different party hierarchy and the Presidency to cede to their political selfishness.

 

“The mischievous and selfish plans are wide open to all informed analysts and political watchers of the Niger Delta. The security agencies, through their intelligence outfits should (if they are working) know of the marshal plans to create crisis to attract the international community in helping them actualize their wish, instead of the wish of the Niger Delta people, which has remained the religious agitation for resource control or sustainable revenue derivation allocation”.

 

Except the NIIA boss was indicting the security agencies over gross failure or rather inability to gather and analyse intelligence data.

 

Even the Petroleum and Natural Gas Senior Staff Association of Nigeria (PENGASSAN) was able to capture and expose the true picture of the situation in parts of Niger Delta. In a statement issued in Lagos, Wednesday June 7, 2006 and signed by Lumumba Okugbawa, the Secretary General, PENGASSAN urged the authourities to “look closely to the self-acclaimed political”.

 

In a matter of fact statement, the association declared that “The increased number of these incidents has brought to fore the need to investigate the activities of government officials and politicians in the area where hostage taking have held sway”.

 

It should interest the NIIA boss that since the renewed violence and hostage taking in parts of the Niger Delta, some state Government agents have perfected the act of negotiating the release of hostages, and in all the recorded cases, the amount of money spent on such exercise and people negotiating on behalf of the captors was usually kept secret therefore making this business suspiciously lucrative.

For the information of Prof Ogwu, when two Italians and an Indian staff of Saipem, a Port Harcourt-based Italian oil service company were abducted in May this year, it was the quick intervention of Government officials that secured the immediate release of the expatriates as “the kidnappers agreed to free them without collecting any ransom from government”.

 

The five oil workers kidnapped from a Shell oil facility between Delta and Bayelsa in near-shore area were released after “Government officials” in conjunction with some trusted Ijaw elders negotiated with the aggrieved youths. “No monetary compensation was paid to these aggrieved youths”.

 

The release of the two Filipinos kidnapped in the Buguma area of Rivers state was negotiated and secured by Government officials “without paying any ransom”.

 

My dear Prof Ogwu is it not interesting that just within the last few months, Government officials in some of these areas, “after several interventions in hostage taking matters” have now perfected the tactics for engaging, negotiating and releasing hostages from “aggrieved youths without payment of monetary compensations to the kidnappers”.

 

The NIIA boss should be careful not to be dragged into partisan politics or being used mischievously to achieve cheap political goal.