Nigeria`s federal government Wednesday constituted a 50-member Council of Social and Economic Development of the Coastal States of the Niger Delta, in an effort to rapidly develop the poverty-ridden oil-producing Niger Delta region and end the violence which has cut oil production by 25 per cent.
The panel, which is expected to work out definitive programmes within two weeks and set time targets for their implementation, was set up following a stakeholders meeting convened by President Olusegun Obasanjo in Abuja.
President Obasanjo called the meeting shortly after three oil workers taken hostage by militants in the oil region were set free last week.
The Council, with President Obasanjo as chairman, is to list out the projects to be executed for accelerated development of the Niger Delta according to short term, medium term and long term bases.
It comprises representatives of the seven oil-producing states (Rivers, Bayelsa, Delta, Ondo, Akwa Ibom, Cross River and Edo) as well as the secretary to the federal government, group managing director of the state-run oil company NNPC as well as the Ministers of Works, Petroleum Resources and Power and Steel.
Obasanjo said he was convinced that even the militants were lovers of peace and lovers of Nigeria, adding: “But they are frustrated. We have to do something about them. We must not take the youths for granted. We should have a coordinated and consolidated approach.”
The meeting was boycotted by prominent Ijaw, the dominant group in the Niger Delta, and the militants of the Ijaw-led Movement for the Emancipation of the Niger Delta (MEND), who have waged a four-month battle against oil companies in the Niger Delta region to protest the neglect of the oil-rich region.
MEND is also demanding the release of two Ijaw leaders – militia leader Mujahid Asari Dokubo and former Bayelsa governor Diepreye Alamieyeseigha – who are being held on treason and corruption charges respectively.
Source : ANGOP