• Dickson takes campaign to OAU
Emmanuel Addeh in Yenagoa
The Ijaw Youth Council (IYC) has called of the federal government to commence the process of implementing the core recommendations of the ruling All Progressives Congress (APC) Committee’s report on Restructuring, Power Devolution and True Federalism.
Secretary General of the IYC, Worldwide, Mr. Alfred Kemepado, said in a statement yesterday that only the implementation of the report of the Committee led by the Governor of Kaduna State, Mr. Nasir el-Rufai, before the 2019 elections would show seriousness on the part of the government.
Kemepado said the curious silence, which has followed the recommendations of the el-Rufai Committee, seemed to suggest that the recommendations were inspired by a motive to deceive the people once again for the purpose of elections.
He stressed that the APC and the Federal Government had a moral burden to prove their sincerity to Nigerians on the recommendations by the el Rufai Committee.
The el-Rufai Committee, which made recommendations on power devolution and true federalism also proposed to put onshore mineral resources, including oil and gas under the control of the states of the federation.
Kemepado said the recommendations reinforced the spirit of the letters of the Kaiama Declaration, which captured the demand of the Ijaw people for resource control within the Nigerian Federation.
Kemepado said the position of Governor Henry Seriake Dickson on the issue of restructuring represented the collective view not only of the Ijaw people but also the entire Niger Delta.
The IYC Scribe called on Ijaw youth across the higher institutions of the South-west to mobilise to the Obafemi Awolowo University, Ile Ife, where Governor Dickson is billed to deliver a crucial lecture on the subject.
He linked the herdsmen and farmers crisis, and the killings across the country to the tendency to control resources to the deprivation of the stakeholders.
According to him, the current situation of insecurity being experienced by some parts of the country had been a major aspect of the Niger Delta peoples’ struggle for resource control and fairness in resource allocation over the years.
Meanwhile, Dickson is set to take the ongoing debate on restructuring to the Obafemi Awolowo University, Ile Ife.
The state Commissioner for Information, Mr. Daniel Iworiso-Markson, said in a statement on yesterday that the governor would deliver a major lecture on restructuring at the prestigious university on July 12.
He said the governor was invited by the Vice-Chancellor of the university, Prof . Eyitope Ogunbodede, to deliver a lecture on the topic, “Restructuring and the Search for a Productive Nigeriaâ€.
