A coalition of the Niger Delta ex-agitators made up of Phases I, II and III ex-militants under the Presidential Amnesty Programme (PAP) has advised the Federal Government against scrapping the scheme until all components of the programme are fully implemented.
The ex-agitators gave the advice yesterday in a letter to President Muhammadu Buhari and the National Security Adviser, Gen. Babagana Monguno (rtd.), saying that the scrapping of the amnesty programme would not be accepted by the majority of the ex-freedom fighters.
The ex-agitators opposed the plan against the backdrop of the alleged directive by the Office of the National Security Adviser (NSA) that the Interim Administrator of the Amnesty Programme, Major General Barry Ndiomu (retd.), should commence the process of winding down the programme.
The coalition in the letter signed by the Secretary, Comrade Omoko John, noted that the fact that the government awarded multi-billion pipeline protection contracts to a former militant leader, Chief Government Ekpemupolo, aka Tompolo, was not a tenable reason to end the programme.
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The ex-agitators reasoned that the pipeline surveillance job was only awarded to a company, a corporate body and did not cover the spread of the ex-militants and PAP beneficiaries.
The coalition said before PAP was established by late President Umaru Yar’Adua in 2009 as part of the government’s measures to reduce militancy in the oil-rich Niger Delta, Yar’Adua carefully studied the security situations of the Niger region vis-à-vis the destruction of oil installations, decline of oil production and kidnapping of foreign oil workers triggered by the region’s neglect by multinational oil firms and the Federal Government.
They said the programme enrolled only 30,000 ex-militants out of over one million youths that were actually involved in the militancy, noting that out of the 30,000 ex-militants, less than 45 per cent had been reintegrated without empowerment packages for them to fully equip themselves to compete with their contemporaries in the society.
The coalition advised President Buhari and Monguno that scrapping of the programme was counter-productive, saying that such action would definitely spark another rounds of agitations in the region which would inevitably lead to the disruption of the success the action intended to achieve in the ongoing pipeline security, fight against oil theft and bunkering in the region.