IJAW leader, Chief Edwin Kiagbodo Clark ,was literally belching fire, last Wednesday, when he played host to Sunday Vanguard at his Kiagbodo country home in Delta State. “It�s because it’s you (Vanguard) that I am opening up in this way. You people have a special way of doing things”, he said. Beyond doubt, he called a spade a spade. Puzzle from the Ijaw leader: “Military people, not our youths are the oil bunkerers and I have told the President, Chief Olusegun Obasanjo; so, soldiers took over the job of our youths as boat pilots and that is one of the reasons they are fighting; the whole of Ijaw people are behind the Movement for Emancipation of the Niger-Delta (MEND); and any Ijaw elder that betrays the cause of MEND will be killed like the Ogoni vultures”.
If you have not understood why the Ijaw people are up in arms before now or you do not know what next after the release of the last three hostages by the MEND, then, unwind with the elderly stormy petrel of Ijaw land in this down-to-earth interview.
IJAW is behind MEND
Even though hostage taking is against international laws and we condemn taking of human beings as hostages, the crisis was not without a reason. The Ijaw youths have been fighting over the years for their rights to be recognized as part of Nigeria. A situation whereby an oil producing community is the poorest in this country cannot be tolerated. It is unacceptable. Nobody can accept it. Everywhere in the world, whether in America, Britain or Russia, Middle East or Canada, areas which produce oil, are the wealthiest but the reverse is the case in Nigeria. There is no federal presence in the area of education – not one tertiary institution. Even in Delta State, the government established three polytechnics in one day, but there is not a single one in the Ijaw area.
And these are the people who need education more than any other people in this country if they are to live side by side with other Nigerians. But a situation where a man sits on top of water, sleeps on top of water, yet he has no water to drink shows clearly that something is wrong somewhere. These boys are not criminals; they are not just fighting for fighting sake. We have been dubbed as vandals, pirates, bunkerers. Enough is enough. The boys are not fighting for nothing. The whole of Ijaw nation is behind them and we thank Mr. President for his maturity this time in not fighting. The situation would have been worse for the whole nation. So, now that Mr. President said there should be dialogue, violence should be ruled out, hostage-taking should be ruled out because the innocent expatriates are not stakeholders. That is why we condemn this hostage taking.
How FG can solve the problem
As was said by a former ruler of this country, these people who produce the wealth of this nation have a peculiar case. They were to have been enjoying 50 per cent derivation as other states did before and after independence, but was cancelled due to the civil war and being restored piece meal from one and half per cent to three per cent, and later, the late Sani Abacha raised it to 13 per cent. And with the establishment of OMPADEC, nothing also happened and OMPADEC was scrapped and replaced by NDDC. What happened? Areas, which were not part of Niger-Delta, have to become Niger-Delta by law. Naturally, they are not Niger-Delta. This is the problem. As the former ruler said, OMPADEC has failed, NDDC is also failing because the laws establishing NDDC are not properly observed and where it is said that development should be based on oil and gas production quota, it is not observed. What is presently happening? Areas which do not produce oil now get more attention from the NDDC than the areas that produce oil. The 13 per cent, which is being paid by the Federal Government to the state government, is not used properly for the Ijaw people. And so, the Ijaw people have a good case.
So, as the former head of state said, now that the NDDC is also failing, there should be a direct intervention by the Federal Government like the Marshal Plan in Europe after the Second World War. And this is what we should now be discussing – direct intervention, crash programme for the Ijaw people – to show to the youths that they are not being neglected and that they are not being deceived or intimidated again. So, we appealed to the youths, drop your arms, release the hostages and adopt dialogue. And that is what they are going to do. Dialogue will solve the problem.
Soldiers took over the job of the boys
In 1998, there was the Kaiama Declaration giving the oil companies 30 days to move out of the Ijaw area, from the Niger-Delta. I was one of the elders who tried to intervene to negotiate with the Federal Government but government was not ready, it prepared for war, attacked Ijaw youths, killed them and vandalized places like Kaiama and so on and so forth.
Now, what followed? Nothing happened to the resource control matter, which was the heart of the Kaiama Declaration. What the boys are now saying is that all that we fought for during the Kaiama Declaration has not been met and that they need employment. And these are some of the things that have been listed out. Take note that Asari-Dokubo was part of Kaiama Declaration. He has been fighting and these boys found in him the leadership quality of someone fighting for them.
One of the things they are asking for is the immediate release of Asari-Dokubo because they believe that he had done nothing against the Federal Government. Nigerians have seen that. What did he do, that he was trying to overthrow Obasanjo�s government? With whom did he conspire in Benin City? So, these boys see this as an injustice. They also want immediate development of the area; they also want the Federal Government to direct the oil companies so that the oil producing communities would be involved in the oil exploration, marketing and other things. These are some of the things they are fighting for. A situation whereby in oil producing communities like Escravos, Okerenkoko and so on, there is nothing that one will be proud of is very bad.
And even the projects earmarked by the NDDC have not taken off. They wanted to build a foreshore wall in Okerenkoko, up till now; they have not started nearly one year after. If those projects have been done in those areas, most of these boys would be employed. Soldiers today have displaced Ijaw boys and men in the host communities who were security officers to the oil companies.
The firms employ soldiers to guard them. There is an organization called the Association of Seafarers or something like that – pilots, commercial pilots of Ijaw origin. Their fathers did it; their grandfather did it, that is escorting boats to Warri port and other seaports in the Niger Delta but today what has happened, these people, the maritime people now engage soldiers to go to the sea, to escort the boats, and so, all these commercial pilots have been displaced. These are some of the things the boys are fighting for. So immediate action has to be taken. It does not require long dialoguing because everybody knows the problem of the Ijaw people. They are the most neglected people in this country, they are the marginalized race and they can no longer tolerate this nonsense. They are part of this country; they have no other place to go to.
Our youths are not oil bunkerers
That is calling a dog a bad name with a view to killing it. I told you about the Kaiama Declaration. These are the same boys that were at Kaiama. They are educated boys who have left school for eight years without jobs. But people come from the West and East to take these jobs. The Igbo and Yoruba are the owners of the oil companies, the Ijaw are mere onlookers. So, when they come back after their National Youth Service Corps and find nowhere to work, they become restive.
For instance, during the Kaiama Declaration, what did we find? A boy like Oronto Douglas was a fighter and one of the youths who went for the Kaiama meeting. Mr. Nelson, unfortunately, he is dead now, was the commissioner for information in Bayelsa State during Alamieyeseigha tenure and also commissioner for information in Dr. Jonathan�s administration. These are some of the boys who fought during the Kaiama Declaration, today, the situation has not changed. They are people who feel that this is a battle they must fight.
Military men�re the bunkerers
So, the idea that Ijaw people are bunkerers, and any attempt to fight them, they will fight back is a lie. In fact, these boys have now stated and they have given it as a condition that they are prepared to supervise their area as security men against bunkering and we shall see who will suffer. The military people are bunkerers – past military officers are bunkerers, senior government officials are bunkerers. The recent case of the Russian ship, was it brought by the Ijaw people? How did it end? Ijaw people are ready and they are challenging the Federal Government and it is again one of the points they want to dialogue on with the Federal Government – give us the authority to supervise the riverine areas to prevent bunkering and they will send away all these sophisticated bunkerers and we shall see who will suffer. Ijaw people will not do bunkering. If they are doing bunkering, it is domestic bunkering. We are being employed by people to do bunkering.
I reported to Obasanjo
I have told Mr. President at a meeting in Aso Villa when we the Ijaw, Itsekiri and Urhobo went there during the crisis in Warri that it is the military, past military officers that are responsible, and that his security officers sitting with us at that meeting knew what was going on. Mr. President called General T.Y. Danjuma at that meeting, “you hear what Chief Clark is saying, could you investigate it” I want you (Sunday Vanguard) to ask General Danjuma what were his findings, am not going to tell you.
The night we freed the hostages
You know before the release of the six hostages, Delta State government together with Ijaw leaders, formed a committee, headed by one Chief Ari from Gbaramatu and the committee worked for sometime. And later, the FNDIC, headed by Dr. Bello Oboko, George Timinimi joined the committee and the negotiation continued. Now, six were freed unconditionally. The remaining three were kept because the boys were still afraid that the government might not grant them amnesty. That is the armed forces will still come to attack, so they kept the three as human shields waiting for government to keep to their words. It was at this juncture that the Ijaw leadership met at Yenagoa and took a decision, directing and appealing to the boys to release the hostages and the communiqu�� was very direct to that point. Bayelsa State governor, National Assembly men, state legislators, and representatives of Ijaw people from the six states of the Niger-Delta attended under my chairmanship.
Now, these boys, as they told you, have respected us as elders and, therefore, decided to release them. Before this happened, I had appealed to the governor of Bayelsa State to join the governor of Delta State to see that there was immediate solution to the problem and Governor Goodluck Jonathan sent his secretary to the state government, Dr. Igali, to join in facilitating the release of the hostages. On the part of the elders, we were in contact with the boys at all times. Even though we did not know their location, we were in contact with them, appealing to them to release the hostages, dialogue will follow, the Ijaw leadership is behind them but it is not proper to hold human beings in Nigeria. We told them that hostage taking is inimical and something that the society abhors. So it was at this juncture…it may interest you to know that the Bayelsa SSG had to go to the creeks to negotiate with the boys.
The Delta SSG was also doing his bit, negotiating with them, talking to the boys at the waterside. So, that night, we insisted that the hostages should be released, they should not wait another day. They had told us again – half way – they said they would come. The governor of Delta State was away to Abuja and was on his way back. We said no, the governor would arrive, release them this night, we waited till about 12.30 am in my house including the Bayelsa State delegates, led by the SSG. We left my house for our hotel because I had to stay in an hotel. There at Enerhen junction, I saw the governor of Delta State with his entourage coming to the Governor�s lodge, and we got to our hotel at about 1.00 am. At 2.30 am, we received a telephone call that the youths had complied with our directive and that the people were being released that night. We did not know that George Timinimi and others had gone there that night to release them with the assistance of the Bayelsa State people. Now, when the Delta SSG called me, I told him to bring the hostages to my house. He complied, respectfully brought them.
I received them and thereafter, we went to hand them over to the governor. You can, therefore, see how tedious it was. We did not sleep that night. We finished at about 6.00 am. We are very grateful to the boys for respecting their elders on this matter. So, we do not want to go to that area of hostage taking once again. It was a very bad experience, it was something that could damage the image of Nigeria and portray the Ijaw people in bad light. But the boys, according to them, have not done anything, they were attacked by the military unprovoked on a Wednesday, Thursday and Friday, and when they knew that they could not resist the Federal Government, they decided to go to Forcados Terminal and kidnap these nine expatriates and use them as human shields. That�s what happened, they had no alternative; you can see that they did not demand for any ransom. All they are now saying is, develop our area, pay attention to us, employ us, and regard us as oil producing communities. That�s all.
We could be killed if…
We are in a very difficult position. I won�t tell you a lie. We have a duty. We can never be on the side of the government. The boys are fighting for the Ijaw people and we realize that if we do that, that is sell them out to government, we will become the Ogoni vultures. We will be killed. Some of us have made sacrifices, refused to receive patronage from the Federal Government simply because we believe that the Ijaw nation should be developed, not developing just a few individuals. That is what we have been sacrificing for. So we have promised these boys that we would negotiate with the Federal Government. Therefore, the dialogue must start now and we are happy to note that the Federal Government set up an ad-hoc committee with the chief of defence staff, Lt. General Alexander Ogomudia, the minister of state for petroleum, Dr.Edmund Dakouru, Senator Diffa, former Ijaw National Congress president, Chief Fumuodoh and some others as members and they have made up some points for discussions.
Obasanjo shocked the Ijaw
I am really surprised, really surprised and shocked that Mr. President is now thinking of another jamboree meeting after the Bayelsa meeting that took place after the four hostages were released.
What we are saying is that the Ijaw people have a peculiar problem. Any person outside Ijaw area can never understand the case of Ijaw people. This has been proved by the Willink Commission in 1958, which said that Ijaw problem can never be understood by the man who lives on land and that is what has been happening. We have been called all sorts of names and for us to say again, let us meet like it happened during the Abdulasalam Abubakar period, it was actually a jamboree, everybody would talk.
If you say go and put a water borehole in Ijaw land, the man from Ogoja will say what of himself? The man from Auchi will say the same thing and the Owerri man will say same thing and so, the real thing, the real reason Ijaw people are fighting will be lost. And there will be no focus. So as far as we are concerned, we will be marginalized again. The Ijaw can never be part of the jamboree they are arranging in the name of stakeholders� conference in Abuja. Let the Federal Government discuss with us – the Ijaw. We fought and we know what we are fighting for. We know where it is paining us.