N/Delta militants: We are frustrated

Written by Daily Trust Friday, 26 March 2010

ShareAhead of today’s scheduled meeting between Acting President Goodluck Jonathan and stakeholders from the restive Niger Delta region, leaders of the militant groups said they are gradually losing patience over unkept amnesty promises, placing the deal at risk of coming off track.

Ailing President Umaru Yar’Adua last year granted thousands of “militants” an unconditional pardon. By October, some 20,000 had laid down their arms amid pomp and promises for training, jobs and cash. Five months on, some of the former fighters claim the programme has lost steam.

“They promised a lot... employment, good living,” Gospel Tamouno aka JP, a former commander of a unit of the Movement for the Emancipation of the Niger Delta (MEND), the most outspoken of all armed groups, told AFP. “Nobody is happy, but the youths are still waiting and hoping”.

He however added, “Some have patience but some might not have. The impatient ones are the ones forming the revolution,” said Tamouna in reference to a new armed group, the Joint Revolutionary Council (JRC), which has recently laid claim to a wave of attacks on oil pipelines.

Yar’Adua’s absence due to ill health is widely cited as the reason for stalling the exercise.

“I was surprised. I have never seen a Nigerian president with such ideas. He (Yar’adua) has done the greatest thing of granting a presidential amnesty for the Niger Delta youths,” Tamouno said.

He said hundreds of militant groups operating in the delta had embraced the amnesty, not a mean feat. “It’s not easy to bring people from the creeks. Some of them had never seen a car, but today they are happy, they can walk freely on the streets even if still in poverty,” said a clean-shaven Tamouno, dressed in a dark suit and sitting in a hotel lobby in the oil city of Warri.

Newspapers reported this week that a training exercise for 20,192 former fighters at three rehabilitation centres in Rivers and Delta States have been placed on hold until a new government is in place.

Just before the cabinet dissolution, a minister said Acting President Jonathan had set aside eight billion naira (around 53 million dollars) for the post amnesty programme.

The disarmed militants get a monthly stipend equivalent to around 400 dollars, but some complain that have been left out of the payouts list.

On Tuesday, hundreds of militants staged street protests at nonpayment of promised payouts in Edo State.

“The danger is that people can come (up) with other names and ...as leaders (we) cannot control them,” Tamouno said. “They are people ... who have been neglected under the amnesty”.

He said if the militants submitted 10,000 rifles under the amnesty, it is possible there are 30,000 others out there which could be turned to use “if they (government) don’t follow the original plans”.

“There is no sea or stream in Abuja, but they build bridges all over the place. We need such bridges all over the Niger Delta”.

Acting President Jonathan is expected to meet militant leaders in Abuja today.