Umbrella body of Ijaw youths, Ijaw Youths Council (IYC) Worldwide, has renewed its call for the International Oil Companies (IOCs) to relocate their headquarters to the Niger Delta where their business activities are carried out, contrary to what is currently in place.
The call is contained in a statement yesterday by the spokesman for the IYC, Amb. Binebai Princewill.
He, therefore, urged the multinational oil companies operating in the region to begin to activate plans to relocate their headquarters to the region, noting that the Ijaw could not continue to accept that kind of injustice where ‘Peter is robbed to pay Paul’.
He argued that the IOCs could not milk oil from their soil and then be paying royalties to other states that don’t produce oil and gas, demanding that the people of the Niger Delta must be treated fairly and must be allowed to participate fully in the oil and gas sector.
“We must get our due benefits and not the usual crumbs. We must renegotiate the modus operandi of the oil companies with particular regards to the well-being of the Ijaw and Niger Delta people that are hosting these companies,” the IYC spokesman said.
Princewill also reiterated IYC’s call for fiscal federalism, recalling that 25 years after the formation of the Council through the Kaiama Declaration on December 11, 1998, fiscal federalism for all federating units in Nigeria to control resources in their region had always been part of the Ijaw struggle for self-determination and resource control.
He noted: “Ijaw people and ‘Niger Deltans’ cannot continue to be exploited politically and economically in the Nigerian state without justice. As Nigeria is talking about sustainable peace, we should be talking about sustainable justice.”
“Today, in Zamfara and other states, they are mining gold and the proceeds from gold are not being shared as the Federal Government has always kept mute over this grave injustice, while our oil and gas is made public.
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“These are some of the anomalies that need to be corrected if we are to really move forward as a country. If our oil and gas can be shared across the country, why can’t the gold be shared? It is only fiscal federalism that can lay to rest this economic and political imbalance.”
He equally harped on the implementation of the 2014 National Conference (Confab) Report, saying that Nigeria still has an unfinished business with the 2014 Confab where a lot of far-reaching positions on how to move the country forward were considered.
Princewill said: “Nigeria has been wobbling with a lot of challenges that at certain points even threaten our very survival as a nation. It is no longer news that Nigeria as a multi ethnic country needs to be renegotiated by all.
“A renegotiated Nigeria for which the plights of the minorities are taken into consideration and a constitution for all is what the 2014 National Conference (Confab) report stands for. Nigeria is not likely to make any reasonable progress if the Confab report is not implemented.
“A simple implementation of the 2014 Confab will lay to rest almost all the woes bedevilling Nigeria. It contains the master plan for Nigeria’s development.”
He promised that the IYC would continue to work closely with security agencies and other critical stakeholders in the region to foster peace and unity in the region and in Nigeria.
He, however, tasked the military and other security agencies to always be professional in dealing with the Niger Delta communities, as the people had witnessed too much bombardments of the defenceless communities in the region.