Youths from Niger Delta region have demanded that Vice President, Dr. Goodluck Jonathan be sworn in immediately to steer the ship of state following the long absence of President Umaru Musa Yar’Adua occasioned by ill health.
Acting under the aegis of Niger Delta Youths Council (NDYC), the group threatened to unleash mayhem on the country should the federal government continue to dilly-dally to swear in Jonathan as the nation’s acting president.
Speaking in Port Harcourt at the weekend on the state of the nation, NDYC President, Chief Mike Amakiri, said delay in swearing in Jonathan is a clear indication of the age-long marginalisation of the Niger Delta people by the Nigerian state.
Amakiri who spoke through his vice president, Comrade Chinwendu Ordunwa, argued that the region can no longer fold its arms and watch the government make it irrelevant, but would rise and possess what rightly belongs to it.
“The shoulder automatically becomes the burden-bearer in the absence of the head, and so why is the shoulder not being allowed to do its job in this case? In case of any external aggression, who will have the constitutional right to command the armed forces?” He queried.
The youth leader also explained that at this critical point in the country’s history of being branded a terrorist nation, it was pertinent to do the right things in the eyes of the comity of nations, urging the federal lawmakers to peruse the constitution and invoke a suitable section and swear-in Jonathan, as acting president.
He used the opportunity to commend the South-South caucus in National Assembly for their doggedness, adding that “they are the true representatives of the Niger Delta people.”
The South-South caucus had recently called for the swearing in of Jonathan, as the acting president following Yar’Adua’s protracted absence in office, due to his lingering health challenges.