The Federal government has been urged to dismiss the idea to scrap the Presidential Amnesty Programme (PAP), designed to integrate ex-agitators back into the society in the Niger-Delta region.
The Deputy President of the Senate Senator, Ovie Omo-Agege described the move as premature and ill-timed and was capable of truncating the fragile peace in the region.
Omo-Agege who made the call to the Executive also charged people in the region to protect the institution by demanding for accountability from her leaders especially those placed to supervise over the affairs of special intervention agencies in the region.
Senator Omo-Agege said people of the region must evolve a new and workable narrative to hold leaders accountable to the people and the Federal government over releases made to the various agencies meant to improve the security of the area and the quality of lives of the people.
Senator Omo-Agege said this in Abuja at the weekend when he played host to a socio-political organization, New Era Forum, Yomi Odunuga, Special Adviser, Media and Publicity, to the Deputy President of the Senate quoted him in a release he signed.
He said this has become necessary as leaders in the region have failed, having been unable to judiciously utilise funds released for the development of the region.
In recent times there has been a debate for either the scrapping or retention of the Presidential Amnesty Programme, introduced by late President Umaru Musa Yar’Adua in 2009 for Niger Delta militants who had engaged in the armed struggle for a better deal in the oil-rich region.
According to Omo-Agege: “I don’t think that the timing is right for the Amnesty Programme to be scrapped. We have challenges right now in the North East, the ravages of Boko Haram, banditry in North West and North Central.
“Those are enough challenges already in this country. I don’t believe that this is the time to reawaken the agitations of militancy in the Niger Delta region.
“It is my hope and expectation that the policymakers who are around Mr President will convey this to Mr President that to the extent that there is any such plan at this time, it is premature and ill-timed. That is not to say that this programme must stay in perpetuity. But we don’t believe that the goals set have been completely achieved”.
“I have been privy to all of the budgetary estimates that were passed both in the Eighth Assembly and in the Ninth Assembly. And all that we are entitled to as a region has been given to us. But we have failed Mr President because we have not been able to hold to account those to whom these resources have been entrusted.
You don’t expect Mr President moving from community to community to ensure that the fundings made available to us have been judiciously utilised.
“It is up to us as the people of the region who cried out to insist that interventionist agencies like NDDC be created for us and properly funded and as a result of the youth agitation in the region that the Amnesty Programme be set up, it is left for us to ask questions that to the extent that the fundings have been released to us how have these been utilised?
“It is left for us to ensure we identify the projects that we believe will best meet the needs of our people.
“It is not in Mr President’s place to come to my community to tell me what project should be sited in my community to alleviate the challenges we face as a result of environmental degradation and oil exploration.
“It is in the place of my community to come to Mr President through these agencies to say this is our priority. And having provided those funds, it is left for us to get back to Mr President either through the National Assembly or the security agencies to say these are the projects that were provided in our communities but not implemented.
“So Mr President has done his part, we are the ones that have failed our people”, he stated.
Earlier, Leader of the group, Sunday Onyewonsa, called for a security summit that will fashion out solutions to challenges facing the region, even as he stressed the need to declare a state of emergency on Niger Delta roads.
Onyewonsa called on the Deputy President of the Senate to prevail on the Federal Government to drop the planned scrapping of the Amnesty Programme, adding that it should be overhauled to run through to the end of the present administration.
YOU SHOULD NOT MISS THESE HEADLINES FROM NIGERIAN TRIBUNE
North May Back Atiku In 2023 — Yakassai •Says APC should pick Southerner as presidential candidate •‘Tinubu better than Buhari who has no plan’
IF former vice president, Atiku Abubakar, contests for the presidency in the next general election in 2023, the majority of the votes from the North will go to him, elder statesman and politician, Alhaji Tanko Yakassai, has said. Yakassai, a former Liaison Officer to former President Shehu Shagari, described both Abubakar and former Lagos State governor, Senator Bola Tinubu, as potential 2023 presidential contenders…Omo-Agege urges FG Omo-Agege urges FG
Buhari Suspends Babalakin As UNILAG Pro-Chancellor, Sacks Acting Vice-Chancellor
President Muhammadu Buhari has suspended the Pro-Chancellor and Chairman of Governing Council of University of Lagos (UNILAG), Dr Wale Babalakin, SAN and the Vice-Chancellor, Professor Oluwatoyin Ogundipe, over the lingering crisis…Omo-Agege urges FG Omo-Agege urges FG
‘I Lived As A Beggar. I Begged To Eat, I Begged To Wear Clothes, I Even Begged To Put My Head Under A Roof’
EMMANUELLA Udeh had just finished peeling melon inside the one-storey building she lives in when Saturday Tribune called. Surrounded by a calm environment in Emene, Enugu East Local Government Area of Enugu State, the 39-year-old paraplegic recounted her experience since she was disengaged as a beneficiary of N-Power, a scheme set up by the Federal Government to address the issues of youth unemployment and…Omo-Agege urges FG Omo-Agege urges FG
and then