Niger Delta Crisis: Amnesty or Travesty?

Amnesty or Travesty?


I have decided not to approve the so called Amnesty the Federal Government has given to the so called militants in the Niger Delta region, because the celebrated Nigerian Nobel Laureate in Literature, Prof. Wole Soyinka already spoken my mind in his critical analysis of the anomie in Between Amnesty and Amnesia.

The recourse to Amnesty after the punitive campaign of the Joint Task Force (JTF) failed woefully is begging the question of the Niger Delta crisis and not a solution. The solution to the Niger Delta crisis is not a Herculean task if the ruling People’s Democratic Party (PDP) wants to be truly honest and transparent.

The bloody battle in the Niger Delta over resource control is actually a power struggle between mercenaries of the oligarchy in Nigeria fighting over illegal oil bunkering in the oil rich states of the Niger Delta. Both the serving and retired top military officers are actively engaged in the criminal operation of illegal oil bunkering and the Nigerian Navy cannot deny this fact, because the tankers and barges used for illegal oil bunkering are not invisible in the territorial waters of the Federal Republic of Nigeria. They are ruthless in their greed for political power and money that they have usurped the rights of the host communities and took over the reins of power in government to control the Nigerian Armed Forces and ruling party to plunder the mineral resources in the country.
They have shared the oil blocks and are now engaged in a do or die battle in illegal oil bunkering that fetches over $20 million daily.

President Umaru Yar’Adua knows the truth and the sooner he says the truth the better.
The most ridiculous is amount of N50 billion being projected for the conflict resolution as proposed in the presidential Amnesty. Before our very eyes, that N50 billion would be embezzled by the same mercenaries of the oligarchy in power in Nigeria and the devastated host communities would be left with the crumbs.
This so called Amnesty is a travesty of justice.
Who is fooling whom?