Local news: "Only Buhari can chair Dialogue with the Niger deltans" - Niger delta avengers

• Avengers attack Shell crude line
• Communities threaten showdown with SPDC

Failure to revive the now-comatose platform of the holistic 2009 amnesty dynamics that President Umar Yaradua deployed may continue to fuel armed agitation in the Niger Delta.Towards this end, President Muhammadu Buhari has, once again, been implored to adopt the amnesty template.

The advice is contained in a terse statement released by United Niger Delta Energy Development Security Strategy (UNDEDSS), the region’s coalition of ethnic nationalities and civil society.

This is coming as the Niger Delta Avengers early yesterday at about 22:05 am blew up a crude oil trunkline belonging to the Shell Petroleum Development Company of Nigeria in Batan, Warri South West Council, Delta State.The spot is close to a military camp and hidden deep inside the mangrove. Reports said the location is inaccessible with speed boat except by canoe which explained why it took a while to locate.

Also, two communities of Kolokuma/Opokuma and Asaingbene in Bayelsa State have threatened showdown with Shell Petroleum Development Company (SPDC) over a breach of the Global Memorandum of Understanding they signed with it in 2014.

The communities also frowned at what they described as the insensitivity of Daewoo E & C and Morpol Jihad, Shell’s servicing companies in the areas.Efforts to get the reaction of Shell were unsuccessful as calls to mobile phone of its Media Relations Manager, Mr. Precious Okolobo, indicated it was unavailable.

In the Statement, signed by UNDEDSS Secretary General, Mr. Tony Iprinye Uranta, the Federal Government is urged to adopt the successful Yar’Adua template of 2009, by appointing a credible Special Adviser on the region and re-establishing the Niger Delta Committee/Council that operated five sub-Committees to holistically and sustainably address the challenges identified in the region.

“UNDEDSS and other leading stakeholders in the region have tirelessly interfaced with very senior members of this administration and given them a detailed template the President should deploy now to resolve this growing insecurity in the region, which is negatively impacting all of Nigeria”, says Uranta.

“In the light of the conflicting statements being made by too many putative representatives of both the region and the Federal Government, it is necessary, however, to state that the Niger Delta is not going to know sustainable peace via the coterie of so-called contact groups or committees. And, that there cannot be any reliable dialogue, between the FGN and the region, without a commitment to Justice and equity by President Buhari himself.”

Whilst reiterating that all the government needs to do is adopt what the 2008 Niger Delta Technical Committee’s Report advises, UNDEDSS listed immediate actions the Federal Government can commence, towards reassuring the Niger Delta of its sincere commitment to Justice and Equity. These include: “the release of ten secondary school children and others detained as prisoners-of-war for many weeks since the military’s invasion of Gbaramatu Kingdom.”

The return of Symbols of Gbaramatu traditional worship; and, most importantly, President Buhari addressing the nation to announce that he would personally lead the revival of the 2009 template premised on a Niger Delta Development Committee under his direct supervision, plus grant free passage to all stakeholders he is ready to directly dialogue with.”

In a communiqué released after their meeting at the palace of King Okpoitari Diongoli, monarch of Opokuma Kingdom in Kolokuma /Opokuma Local Government Area of the state, they alleged that Shell had failed to remit N50m annual development fund contained in the pact.According to them, the oil company also reneged on the payment of N768 million top-up fund being two per cent of the total project it was carrying out in the areas.

They said, “No member of the cluster is an employee of the SPDC either as a management staff, middle manpower or even at the lowest category.“SPDC, from every indication, is not alive to its corporate social responsibility to our cluster.”

The cluster communities complained that the name “Koroama spuu 1” as given to the Akaranbiri community in Opokuma clan manifold is of serious concern and controversial.They said Koroama is a community in Gbaran clan of Yenagoa Local Government Area while Akaranbiri is a community in Opokuma Kingdom in Kolokuma/Opokuma LGA.