Some Niger Delta stakeholders emerged from their meeting with President Muhammadu Buhari Tuesday looking disappointment over their perceived unpreparedness of the Federal Government to commence dialogue on matters that could quell militancy in the region.
Despite claims that the dialogue between the President and the Niger Delta stakeholders may have gone on smoothly, most of the stakeholders looked disappointed as they stood in groups complaining about the proceedings of the dialogue.
A lawyer, Niger Delta minority rights activist and secretary of the Pan Niger Delta Forum, Ledum Mitee, a in a discussion with some journalists at the Aso Rock, said their disappointment stemmed from the President’s response after the group presented their requests.
According to Mitee, it gave off the impression that the government was still not ready to fully adopt dialogue as an option.
“We presented an address calling for dialogue. In fact, specifically asking that the Federal Government constitutes a team so that we can meet and dialogue on some identified dialogue issues, about 16 of those items, which were contained in the address.
“The President’s response was ‘he’s awaiting what he asked his security people to give him a report on; who are the militants, how many of them, where are their locations, who had influence where, etc. That it is when he gets that, together with our report that he will be able to respond.
“My personal view is that there is still need for better understanding between us and the government on the need for dialogue as the preferred option because for me, it is the dialogue that can solve the problems and I’m not sure that we have gotten close to achieving that yet,” Mitee said.
The long awaited meeting had raised the hopes of stakeholders in the region that this will bring an end to the agitation in the region or open doors for proper dialogue between those agitated in the region and the Federal Government.
The dialogue came on the heels of the oil and gas roadmap unveiled by the Federal Government last week, targeting to raise oil production to the country’s maximum capacity of 3.5 million barrels per day through a restoration of peace in the Niger Delta region.
Nigeria’s oil minister, Ibe Kachikwu, who had unveiled the seven big wins, said government was targeting zero militancy in the oil rich region by the middle of next year.
However, Mitee, giving insight into what transpired behind closed doors, said at the meeting stakeholders had put forward quick wins and other issues they thought could restore peace in the area and expected to come out of the meeting with some specifics.
“We have a responsibility also to get the grassroots buy-in to what we are doing, and at the same time we are not oblivious of the state of the economy. So, most of what we thought the dialogue will achieve was to look at things that: a) will be able to be achievable within the economy, b) can buy us a halt to the militancy and military action in the area, and thirdly, the things that you can make meaningful progress on within a short term of within three to six months. Because you’re dealing with an area that have been tired and sceptical about all these sort of submissions and reports and dialogue that does not bring out anything.
“So, we needed the dialogue to produce this time around some of the quick wins that will show some dramatic action that will show that this time around there is a change of attitude,” he said.
President of the Ijaw Youth Council, Udengs Eradiri, also expressed disappointment with the lack of specifics at the meeting, saying he was hoping that the President would take time to study the document presented by the PAN Niger Delta Forum at the meeting.
Eradiri said: “The discontent you see on the faces of those who came out is the same discontent you on my face. Personally, I am not satisfied because there were no specifics to say specifically this was done or the steps that we are going to take.
“But like the president said, he’s going to study the report that was presented so let us keep our finger crossed and hope that when he comes back with government position there will be things to pick out from. Our people did the presentation properly and all the issues were captured. So, we just hope, like I said.”
