Leaders and representatives of former militants drawn from all seven states of the Niger Delta, in alliance with a new think-tank of oil producing ethnic nationality of the region have thrown their weight behind the ticket of the Labour Party’s(LP) presidential candidate, Mr. Peter Obi and his running mate Sen. Yusuf Datti Baba-Ahmed.
The former agitators declared their stand in Port Harcourt under the umbrella name, Conference of Ex-militants for Niger Delta Industrial Rebirth (CENDIR). They made the declaration in alliance with a new body of Niger Delta elders, leaders and stakeholders which go by the name Oil Producing Ethnic Nationalities for Good Governance (OPEN-GG) after what both bodies described as six months of painstaking and inclusive consultations since mid-September last year across the seven Niger Delta states.
Under a common theme set by both groups titled “One State, One Refinery We Plead” one of the frontline co-conveners of CENDIR, Lord Marshall George Ansa-Duke, who is also the Director Forward Operations of CENDIR said: “We have a vision of a new Niger Delta region and government of its member states no longer run by guns but by brains. A Niger Delta not run by politicians but by statesmen and nation builders.
“We have a vision of a new Niger Delta governed by a breed of leaders who are forward looking and think into the future for their people and posterity. A region whose youths are not fed with scraps, guns and bullets to rig elections for selfish unscrupulous politicians in every election year.”
Lord Marshall George continued, “We desire a new Niger Delta whose citizens are not fed seasonal crumbs and handouts from our region’s vast oil resources by heartless, shortsighted, selfish and corrupt federal government captors, state governors and local government chairmen. We desire an economically thriving region whose indigenes excel through multi-mineral derivative industrialization and employment, quality education, health, environmental remediation, modern scientific agricultural intervention to rejuvenate our polluted lands much like Israel turned its arid, stony desert soil to fertile agricultural paradise.
“We want a new Niger Delta with purified waters and efficient power infrastructure that are at par with those which serve the residential quarters of expatriates of the IOCs (International Oil Companies) who explore the oil and gas resources of our land while our people live in stone age darkness, abject poverty, squalor and disease side by side their paradise. Is such life upgrade, among other provisions and possibilities of modern civilization, too much to ask for the people of the Niger Delta?”
Taking it from there, Ijaw elder statesman, Elder Timi Kaiser-Wilhelm Ogoriba, who is a co-founder of the new regional think-tank, OPEN-GG, rejoined, “All of the ideals described by George are perfectly possible. But only through good governance by genuine public spirited citizens who are competent, creative, wealth generating, empathic, compassionate and accountable to Nigerians in general and the people of the Niger Delta in particular.”
TK, as Elder Ogoriba is popularly known across the region, who signed the communique of the conference on behalf of OPEN-GG, went on, “Having these criteria in view, we put the presidential candidates of the four frontline political parties, APC’s Bola Ahmed Tinubu, PDP’s Abubakar Atiku, NNPP’s Rabiu Kwankwaso and the LP’s Peter Obi under the microscope of keen and sincere scrutiny. This was since September last year.
“Having objectively monitored their campaigns and utterances since then, the verdict is unambiguous, crystal plain and beyond debate that the man the cap fits, indeed planets apart the other candidates as a potential iconic president of Nigeria in this dispensation, is Mr. Peter Obi of the LP. Let’s be clear. All of us in this multi-lateral conference belong to one or the other of the four leading political parties of Nigeria, APC, PDP, NNPP and LP.
“However, without apologies to any quarters and without prejudice to the political parties which conveners of this meeting individually belong, for the sake of Nigeria and our Niger Delta region in particular, the consensus we have reached today with our progressive young ex-agitators of CENDIR and our own body as elders and leaders of our region is clear.
