Ministerial list: Coalition, Itsekiri people appeal to Tinubu over marginalisation

The Nigeria Human Rights Community (NHRC) and leaders of Itsekiri in Delta State have appealed to President Bola Ahmed Tinubu to address the injustice and marginalisation being meted out to the Itsekiri people regarding appointments to key positions in the country such as ministers, heads, and members of government agencies and parastatals.

NHRC, an umbrella body of 121 Civil Society and community-based groups, and Itsekiri leaders, namely: Comrade Oritsetemeyin Edgar, Jolomi Penue and Tuoyo Urowayino, raised this concern at a joint press conference which took place on Thursday in Lagos.

Noting that it was imperative to draw the attention of the Nigerian people and their leaders to the striking case of exclusion of an ethnic community that contributed no fewer than 30 per cent of the country’s oil yet had been constantly and humiliatingly neglected by successive governments since Independence in 1960.

According to Comrade Edgar, who spoke on behalf of the people, it was clear that there has been the brazen exclusion of the Itsekiri from ministerial appointments by the Federal Government since 1999, even as he sadly recalled that the race produced the first Federal Minister of Finance in the person of Chief Festus Okotie-Eboh, who was killed during the military putsch of 1966, and it “was not until the administration of Chief Olusegun Obasanjo that an Itsekiri (Dr Roland Oritsejafor) had a stint with a ministerial position that lasted for less than two years.”

This was just as he noted sadly that the politics of exclusion and trampling underfoot of indigenous people, including the Itsekiri people, were largely responsible for instability in many Nigerian communities today.

“Clearly, there has been Itsekiri’s brazen exclusion from ministerial appointments by the Federal Government since 1999. Even though each state in Nigeria is expected to produce at least one minister, the Itsekiri have been continuously denied this opportunity either in Delta or in Edo State,” he said.

Edgar said the marginalisation was occurring despite the contributions of the Itsekiri to the nation, declaring that the Itsekiri had contributed a lot to the growth of Nigeria and, therefore, did not deserve the kind of treatment they were getting now.

Edgar described it as very painful that the Itsekiri had been at the receiving end of the stick “at the levels of political and economic structures,” just as he pointedly said that the people had always been in support of the progressive government since 1950, had always behaved themselves, and were never involved in an armed struggle like some other communities in the Niger Delta.

“In the last 2023 elections, many prominent leaders in Itsekiri fully supported the All Progressives Congress (APC). Though the Itsekiri produces some 30 per cent of Nigeria’s total oil output, the history of the people has been that of exclusion,” he lamented.

“This is why the Nigerian Human Rights Community, NHRC, hereby appeals to President Bola Tinubu to come to our aid and speak for the Itsekiri at the level of the presidency.

“We plead with all righteous voices to look at us with pity and deploy all possible political machinery to assist the Itsekiri, particularly to be appointed into such parastatals that can be deployed for the development of Itsekiri ancestral and, by extension, Ilaje land inclusive since both (Itsekiri and Ilaje) occupy the same geographical and ecological area,” he said.

Edgar, however, expressed the group’s trust and belief in President Tinubu, saying that he would demonstrate again his passion for justice by listening to the demands of the Itsekiri people, even as he commended him for the memorable recognition of the late Pa Alfred Rewani’s role in the democratic transformation of Nigeria, in which he paid the supreme price of death” by naming one of the longest streets in Lagos State after him.

“Given the background of President Bola Tinubu as a humanist and pro-democracy leader, we kindly call on him to assist in addressing these long-standing afflictions of a peace-loving people who are committed to a united, strong, and prosperous commonwealth where liberty and justice reign supreme,” he said.

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