UNDEDSS: Buhari Knows How to End  N’Delta Crisis

Chiemelie Ezeobi
The United Niger Delta Energy Development Security Strategy (UNDEDSS) yesterday said President Muhammadu Buhari knows exactly what to do to end the Niger Delta militancy crisis.

UNDEDSS Secretary, Mr. Tony Uranta, who made the disclosure, said they had drawn up proposals that captured the interests of all the parties involved in the agitation in the Niger Delta.

In a statement made available to THISDAY, the coalition said “President Buhari knows exactly what he needs to do to end the crisis today, if he so desires.

“He probably has not, because he has allowed his administration to be beset with too many petty rivalries, too many individuals jockeying for putative relevance, and too many party chieftains of Niger Delta origin who don’t have the interests of the region at heart.”

He said this is the position of UNDEDSS and other well meaning Niger Delta indigenes, who interface with patriotic members of the president’s inner cabinet and intelligence chieftains, have drawn up a proposal that should be ‘win-win’ for all parties concerned.
He further said: “This dynamically-tweaked proposal is before the president, the armed agitators in the creeks, the international community (including the UK and the USA) and other relevantly interested Nigerians like Nobel Laureate, Professor Wole Soyinka.

“The proposal is hinged on four vital prerequisites, viz., the affirmation by the president that there is no change in policy regarding the need to commence matriculation of students this year in the National Maritime University, Okerenkoko, Delta State; the rebirth of the Niger Delta Council (with its five relevant sub-committees!) of President Yaradua’s 2009 template.
“And the guarantee of safe passage for delegates to any dialogue locations, after all armed parties publicly agree to a 60-day Armistice to be proposed by the federal government and, the attendance of Foreign observers (including Diplomats from the EU, UK and USA), to be invited by the federal government to any such dialogue.

“This proposal has been presented to President Buhari over four weeks ago, after many meetings between the government (represented at different points by the chief of staff to the president, the DG DSS, the EFCC chairman, the DG NIA, the minister of state for petroleum…etc.) on the one hand, and credible Niger Deltans (including past special advisers to Nigerian Presidents on the Niger Delta, United Nations consultants and former apex ‘Creeks Generals’ of the three zones of the Niger Delta) as well as prominent members of the 2009 Aaron Team that negotiated with President Yaradua in 2009.

“Ultimately, UNDEDSS calls on President Buhari to exhibit the patriotic and objective decisiveness necessary to end the ongoing crisis in the Niger Delta, by announcing his adoption of the said proposal now.”