Barely a week after President Olusegun Obasanjo held a meeting with stakeholders in the Niger Delta region, the Movement for the Emancipation of the peoples of the Niger Delta, (MEND) has given fresh ultimatum to the foreigners in the region. The militants warned them to leave immediately, threatening that they were ready ready to resume their �operation black mamba strike.�
In a statement signed by Brutus Ebipade, the group stated that it was �dismayed at the politicization of the Niger Delta struggle by President Obasanjo.� The group said it voluntarily released the hostages but wondered why the government swiftly orchestrated a �political jamboree in the name of Niger Delta stakeholders forum.� A development it said �is unacceptable to our struggle.�
While noting that the Federal Government had not acceded to its demands, it urged all foreigners in the Niger Delta region to leave the Niger Delta area with immediate effect. Part of the statement reads, �MEND wishes to state that the people of the West, namely Buckingham capitalist collaborators and Washington hawks, have failed once again in prevailing over Abuja as agreed before the release of the last three hostages.
As such, MEND views their nationals in the Niger Delta as machineries working in tandem with political jobbers of this fourth republic to continually subjugate the Niger Delta child.�
It said those who met in Abuja had no mandate to represent the people of Niger Delta. The militants then added in the statement that it took exception to the reference of �the Niger Delta as communities devoid of ethos and communal life by Mr. President.�
It argued in the two page statement that �the survival of the Niger Delta people up to this moment is as a result of the strong communal life, brotherhood, values, ethos and spirit of the oppressed peoples of the Niger Delta.�
It declared those who attended the Abuja meeting �as enemies of emancipation of the Niger Delta,� stating that �any attempt at subscribing to the proposed Committee of Socio-economic Development of the Coastal States shall be met with the anger of the gods of our rebellion.�
Sunday Punch, April 09, 2006,