Follow Us on Google
Femi Folaranmi. Yenagoa
The Niger Delta Self Determination Movement (NDSDM) has written to the Chairman, South-South Governors Forum and Governor of Delta State, Dr Ifeanyi Okowa, over threat to the security of South-South states.
NDSDM, in a letter by its convener, Annikio Briggs, said it has “watched with trepidation deteriorating situation across the country and with special emphasis as to how that impacts our dear Niger Delta.”
According to her reports are rife over killer herdsmen attacking peaceful communities and these attacks have continued unabated because security agents have looked the other way and sometimes overwhelmed by the attacks.
“The NDSDM in all sincerity can no longer trust the established security agencies to protect our people as they have shown a high level of complicity and sometimes outright connivance with killer herdsmen to attack, kill, kidnap, rape, molest and terrorise our people. What is true of Delta is true of all the South-South states. There is no absolutely no state in the South-South that is immune from rampaging and ravaging killer herdsmen and the security breach they bring with them” The letter stated.
Briggs made an appeal to Governor Okowa to use his office to convene a South-South Security Summit so that the people of the region can agree on the regional security network that would aid the “overstretched established security agencies in combating the unacceptable level of insecurity across the Niger Delta”
Bayelsa State Governor Douye Diri has affirmed his readiness and total commitment to the Ijaw cause and interest, saying he would defend the Ijaw ethnic nationality in the Nigerian federation.
Governor Diri vowed that the Ijaws, who are domiciled in Bayelsa, Rivers, Delta, Edo, Ondo and Akwa Ibom states, the fourth largest ethnic group in the country, would not play second fiddle to any tribe.
A press release by his Acting Chief Press Secretary, Mr Daniel Alabrah, quotes the governor as having made the statement during a meeting with the Ijaw Leaders Consultative Forum in Government House, Yenagoa.
Diri, who was the pioneer Organising Secretary of the Ijaw National Congress, INC, hinted that, as governor of the only homogeneous Ijaw state, he would not relent in spearheading and championing the Ijaw cause or interest.
The Governor also called for unity of purpose among all the Ijaw speaking people to ensure that the Ijaws in the Niger Delta are not relegated to the background.
“For us to continue to improve the lives of our people, we must have unity of purpose, we must be united as Ijaw people and shouldn’t be seen to be pulling down ourselves.”
He disclosed that the meeting was convened to enable him to interact with the group as they were part of the struggle that led to the creation of Bayelsa state by late General Sani Abacha in 1996.
