May 22, 2009:

Gender Coalition Against Genocide Sends Letter to the ICC

(GAG)
International Criminal Court
Office of the Prosecutor
The Hague
The Netherlands

Dear Mr. Moremo Ocampo

PROSECUTION OF THE JOINT MILITARY TASK FORCE AND THE NIGERIAN GOVERNMENT FOR GENOCIDE IN THE NIGER DELTA

The Gender Coalition Against Genocide (GAG) hereby draw your attention to and protest the murderous actions of the Joint Task Force of Nigeria against the Niger Delta people of Gbaramatu kingdom in Delta State. We request that the office of the Prosecutor open an immediate investigation into the murderous action going on now in the Niger Delta. The action of the government through the JTF is a campaign of genocide against hapless women, children and innocent indigenes of the Niger Delta region.

On Wednesday, May 13, 2009 the Nigerian Joint Military task Force began an aerial bombardment of the communities that make up Gbaramatu kingdom of Delta state including Kurutie, Kunukunuma, Kokodiagbene, Oporoza, Okerenkoko, Azama, Benikrukru and Ubefan with the excuse that they are attacking militant camps. Meanwhile the only militants camps the JTF has reported taking so far are  Camp 5 and Iroko Camp,  whereas 8 communities have been under  land, water and aerial attack with Okerenkoko, kurutie and Oporoza completey burnt down.

Residents of Gbaramatu kingdom and their guests were celebrating the installation of their regent when the bombings started, and they all had to flee into hiding in the swamps and mangrove forests and have been there for 10 days now without food, water, shelter and medical care. The JTF has prevented humanitarian and human rights groups from going into the area.

It is reported that thousands of innocent civilians, especially women, children pregnant women and the aged are dead already. Several others numbering over 30,000 are trapped in the bush, swamps and mangrove forest where they are hiding. The only way they can leave Gbaramatu, the scene of terror is by boat and all the water ways are blockaded by the JTF.

It will interest you to note that the Niger Delta has suffered similar military attacks in the years past such as:

• the killings in Umuechem 1n 1990
• the massacre of Ogoni people and the rapes of Ogoni women in the 1990s led by Major General Paul Okutinmo.
• the 1999 genocide in Odi and the rapes of Odi women led Col Agbiaka.
• The massacre in Iko community in 1997.
• the razing down of Odioma in 2005.
• the razing down of Agge community in 2008.

The perpetrators of these previous massacres have neither been investigated nor prosecuted. We therefore call for the prosecution of those responsible for this inhuman action against the people in the Niger Delta region including

Brigadier General Sariki Bello, Col. Rabe Abubakar, Air Vice Marshal Paul Dike, Major General Paul Okutinmo, Col. Agbabiaka, President Umar Musa Yar Adua, former President Olusegun Obasanjo, Speaker Dimeji Bankole, who said the JTF action is a peace keeping operation, Bala Ibn Na’Allah who called for the extermination of 20million Niger Delta to enable 120million Nigerians to steal the natural resources in the Niger Delta.

The leadership of Nigeria and the military must know that they cannot act with impunity. We sincerely request your attention and interest in this case as lives and existence of peoples of the oil producing communities of the Niger Delta of Nigeria are presently being threatened. The immediate commencements of investigation will save the Niger Delta people from extinction.

Signed:

Annkio Briggs         -           Agape Birthrights

Emem J. Okon         -           Kebetkache Women Development & Resource Centre

Hilda Dokubo          -           Centre for Creative Education (CCAE)

Ifie Lott                     -           Women Light Foundation

Ibiba Don Pedro     -           Centre for Development Communication

Lilian George          -           Niger Delta for Justice

Evangelist Charity -          Mothers for Peace

Unity Ototo             -           Man & Water Survival Foundation

IJeoma Wokocha  -            Kebetkache -  Delta

Constance Meju    -           Amazonna Women Leadership Initiative

National Network for Women in Niger Delta Security and Peace Building

Niger Delta Women for Development Energy & Security

Villages Razed Statement by Ijaw Elders and Leaders

May 19, 2009

STATEMENT ISSUED BY IJAW ELDERS AND LEADERS AFTER THE UNPROVOKED MILITARY ATTACK ON IJAW COMMUNITIES IN WARRI SOUTH WEST LOCAL GOVERNMENT AREA OF DELTA STATE

At the aftermath of the unprovoked attack on Ijaw communities in Gbaramatu kingdom of Warri South West Local Government Area of Delta State the Ijaw nation wishes to state with emphatic unequivocation the following:

a) That the deployment of highly supplicated military weaponry and arsenal to engage hapless villages and towns in aerial and amphibious bombardment in a scale never ever witnessed in even the Nigerian civil war is callous, inhuman, dastardly, barbaric and insensitive. We condemn this unprovoked attack in the strongest term possible.

b) The burning, destruction, complete razing of Okerenkoko, Oporoza, Kunukunuma, Peretorukorigbene, Kurutie and many other communities and the killing and maiming of innocent people including women and children amount to systemic annihilation of an ethnic race and this is simply genocide. It therefore deserves international condemnation.

c) Nigeria, in the comity of nations, is a highly respected country in International Peace Keeping operations where its proficiency even in the most challenging circumstances restrained it from the deployment of such supplicated weaponry in the weight and scale as was deployed to attack the Ijaw communities. It is therefore a travesty of justice and totally incomprehensible that the Joint Military Task Force (JTF) which primary task is to restore hope and bring peace to the troubled Niger Delta region decided to employ such highly sophisticated weaponry to kill and maim innocent fellow citizens. This, in our estimation is a clearly premeditated attack, conceived, planned and executed with the light of speed not even enforced in normal war situation.

d) The Ijaw ethnic nation contributes more than 70% of Nigeria’s wealth. We appear to be a people who have become victims of our own wealth by the use of sophisticated military hardware bought with our own petro-naira to kill our people.

e) It is indeed criminal, unjustified, inconsiderate and callous to declare full military operations on communities in the guise of undertaking a search and rescue mission for hostages and missing personnel whereas it is common knowledge that hostages and hijacked vessels are secured within the precinct of militant camps and not villages inhabited by innocent people. This is nothing but a deeply contemplated systemic killing of the Ijaw people in furtherance of the age-long crave by sections of this country to either forcefully relocate us or make the Ijaw identity extinct in the Nigerian map with a view to taking over full possession of our natural resources.

f) The Ijaw ethnic nation appeals to the United Nations Organisation to set up a Commission of Inquiry to investigate the circumstances surrounding this latest assault and killing of hapless and innocent people since we do not foresee the possibility of justice from a Nigerian government commissioned inquiry.
g) The Ijaw ethnic nation demands that those found responsible by the Inquiry should be tried at the International Court of Justice for acts of genocide.

h) The Ijaw ethnic nation in tandem with our earlier stand wish to call for the immediate withdrawal of the Joint Military Task Force and its personnel from the Ijaw land. The JTF has become more of an occupation force in our land and not advancing the course of peace.

i) The Ijaw ethnic nation calls on the Federal Government to take full responsibility for the rebuilding of all destroyed towns and communities and the immediate resettlement of all displaced people.

j) The Ijaw ethnic nation calls on the Federal Government to immediately order its troops to stop chasing and harassing innocent Ijaw sons and daughters in their own land for no reason.

k) Whereas as an ethnic nationality we have suffered decades of deprivation and neglect in the hands of Nigeria’s ruling tripod, the Ijaw elders have continually maintained that no arms combat can earn the Ijaw struggle its desired outcome. It is futile and counter-productive to continue the arms struggle as a strategy to emancipate the Ijaw nation from the present economic strangulation and neglect. We therefore call on our youth to take advantage of the amnesty pledged by Mr. President to surrender their arms.

l) The Ijaw ethnic nation appeals to all youths to sheath their sword and avoid further escalation of military combat since there is no better alternative to dialogue in conflict resolution. We want peace to seek the course of international arbitration and justice as the most plausible way to resolving the intractable crises in Ijaw land. Therefore we call on our combating children to exercise maximum restraint and cease further hostilities forthwith.

m) The Ijaw people are peace loving, law abiding and loyal citizens of the Federal Republic of Nigeria who, like people from other parts of this country, abhor criminality. The generalisation and characterization of the youths’ militant actions as inherent characteristic peculiar to the Ijaws is therefore unkind, unfair, discriminating, and unacceptable. As a people we condemn the nefarious criminal activities like hostage taking and hijacking indulged in by some of the youth which has negatively impacted on the development strides of the various governments on our land and demand that those involved should be arrested and prosecuted in accordance with the laws of the country.

Signed for and On behalf of the Ijaw Nation:
Dr. A. W. Obianime
President, Ijaw National Congress (INC)

Chief (Dr.) Edwin K. Clark, OFR, CON
Ijaw National Leader

Re-Branding Genocide, statement of Gender Coalition Against Genocide

May 19, 2009

GENDER COALITION AGAINST GENOCIDE (GAG)

PRESS STATEMENT

RE-BRANDING GENOCIDE

Yar adua in his maiden speech stated clearly that the ‘Niger Delta’ will be a priority in his seven point reform agenda, but two years down the line what activities has he carried out to show this interest in the region that feeds the rest of the nation. what strategy has he employed to rekindle peace, justice and development in the oil rich but neglected and poverty ridden Niger Delta?.
We recall with pains and disappointment how he has shown no ability, will power or commitment to implement his over advertised and pointless 7 point agenda. Watching the clip of his administrations efforts in the Niger Delta triggers off disgust in the average citizen who finds lies offensive. In two years against our disapproval of any kind of summit, talks, conferences, or seminars as a means of solving the Niger Delta equation. We knew that, it was a planned diversionary strategy by the government to waste our money, energy and time. Yet, he set up a technical committee, who worked tenaciously against all odds, and have since submitted a report/recommendation which like the Uwais electoral reform white paper will have another committee to review their recommendations based on reviews. What a reviewing administration? He has set up a Ministry of Niger Delta and provided it with 50billion Naira same amount allocated for the revamping of Arewa Textile Mill. 50billion Naira with clear instructions on how to spend N39b, leaving the minister with the horrible task of spliting 11b amongst the needs of nine states, same underfunding strategy used in incapacitating the NDDC. The systematic removal of all ministerial powers from “on the paper” minister of state for petroleum, Odein Ajumogobia and simply using his name as a pacifier.
To further proof this priority commitment Yar dua has sacked Agge community in Bayelsa State, hometown of Patrick Azazi, and now five communities in Gbaramatu kingdom of Delta State; Okerenkoko, Oporoaza, Kunukunuma, kurutie, kokodiagbene under the guise of getting rid of militants, militant groups and camps and avenging 12 dead JTF officers and releasing kidnapped oil workers(oil thieves).
There have been series of crises in Jos, Plateau State, the home state of Brigadier General Wuyep Rimtip, the Assistant Commandant of the JTF who has been instrumental to the genocide being carried out in the Gbaramatu kingdom of Delta state. Over three hundred persons killed with thousands more feared death in Jos, yet there has been no signal to send in any arm of the military to Jos. Is this because there is no oil in the state? Or that no soldier has been killed? Or that the dead are not militants?
As women of the region we have watched quietly this deceit and injustice of killing our sons and husbands, the raping and debasing of our young daughters and the abuses of our culture and very being by the JTF and Federal Government. We have prayed, fasted and hoped that someday peace, justice and development will come to us however, the Nigerian state presents us no option but to like the American leader Patrick Henry demand “Give me liberty or give me death”
We have read the various lies in the papers and are alarmed by the lies being traded and call on all well meaning Nigerians to join our cry in saving our communities from these gruesome murderers, Oporoza is our home not a militant camp, so is Kunukunuma, Ekerenkoko, Kokodiagbene, Kurutie we are Gbaramatu people. JTF is killing innocent people, women and children and branding them militants. SAVE US NOW! This is a repeat of the Obasanjo’s 1999 ODI destruction! THIS IS GENOCIDE

The Gender Coalition Against Genocide (GAG) is made up of female human rights activists in the Niger Delta.

signed:
Irene Tuoyo – Delta state
Ekaete Eyo – Cross Rivers state
Emem Okon – Akwa Ibom State
Unity Ototo – Bayelsa State
Hilda Dokubo – Rivers State
Imaguero Idahosa – Edo State
Annkio Briggs – Ijaw
Uroma Amaechi – Ikwerre
Azuka Ezekwem – Aniocha
Inyene Sylva – NGO
Victory Igho – Urhobo
Carol Usen- Ibeno
Enyinna Blessing – Iko
Eunice Okpor – Isoko
Dora Aju Ukku – Itsekiri
Regina Akhimien – Ishan

Niger Delta Women Call for an End to Genocide

May 19, 2009

NIGER DELTA WOMEN FOR DEVELOPMENT ENERGY AND SECURITY

PRESS STATEMENT – May19, 2009
STOP THE GENOCIDE IN DELTA STATE: THE CRY OF NIGER DELTA WOMEN

We, the women of the Niger Delta have noted with dismay the horrifying act of genocide meted out to innocent indigenes and inhabitants of Gbaramatu kingdom in Delta State by operatives of the Joint Task Force. This is happening despite repeated declaration by the Yar’adua government of its good intentions to address the issues and the neglect of the Niger Delta people. By this action, it has been revealed that the President feigned his sympathy for the Niger Delta problems with his much acclaimed 7-point agenda, the setting up of the Technical Committee on the Niger Delta as well as the establishment of the Ministry for the Niger Delta. But the President and Commander-In-Chief of the Federal Republic of Nigeria, Umar Musa Yar’dua could not pretend for long too. Perhaps, he could have been labeled a rebel to deviate from the path towed by previous administrations, especially the Obasanjo administration that ordered the razing down of Odi, a Niger Delta community, in 1999.
Thus, the Yar’adua administration has manufactured its own excuse for a greater massacre of Niger Delta women and children under the guise of fishing out militants. Beginning Wednesday, May 13, 2009 the Joint Task Force has been bombing Kurutie, Kokodiagbene, Kunukunuma, Oporoaza and Okerenkoko communities in Gbaramatu kingdom of Delta State, killing innocent persons, majority of them, women and children. Many more persons are rendered homeless; the Punch of Monday, May 18, 2009 reported that about 20,000 people are trapped in these riverine communities because the waterways are blocked by the JTF.
The displaced persons who took refuge in the Ogbe-Ijoh General Hospital were further made to flee the camp due to the invasion by soldiers from the Joint Task Force. As at Tuesday, May 19, 2009, the soldiers proceeded to carry out a house to house gruesome burning of persons and properties Okerenkoko community. The implication is that the re-branding Nigeria project has succeeded in rebranding everyone in the Niger Delta militants, including women, children, governors, aged, kings, chiefs, physically challenged et al.
Thousands of harmless women and children have been killed while some are displaced. Schooling has been disrupted for a great majority of children in the Gbaramatu kingdom of Niger Delta; having access to food and shelter has suddenly become a luxury; safety & security is far from the people; development has become a mockery; access to sanitary facilities for the women is out of the question. Many are scrambling to safety but no thoroughfare. The cries of the Niger Delta women have re-echoed. The Federal government is the killer of women and children. Instead of giving them food, education, health and security; the women and children of the Niger Delta are given bullets, blood, grief and poverty. WHERE DO WE GO FROM HERE?

PEACE HAS BEEN SLAUGHTERED! WOMEN HAVE BEEN VIOLATED! It seems like another Odi, which was destroyed by the Obasanjo’s government. Must the Federal government always turn the nozzle of the gun against the vulnerable people it is expected to protect?
We strongly condemn this act of violence against harmless women and children in the Gbaramatu kingdom. We are calling on the Federal Government of Nigeria to stop this callous and merciless action against the communities of the Niger Delta.
We appeal to all human rights groups, women rights advocates in Nigeria and the international community to call on the Federal Government of Nigeria to withdraw all military forces from the communities of the Niger Delta.

WE SAY NO TO THE JOINT TASK FORCE!
WE SAY NO TO THE GRUESOME MURDER OF WOMEN AND CHILDREN IN THE NIGER DELTA!!
WE SAY NO TO MILITARY INVASION OF THE NIGER DELTA!!!
Signed:
Annkio Briggs – Agape Birthrights
Emem J. Okon – Kebetkache Women Development & Resource Centre
Hilda Dokubo – Centre for Creative Education (CCAE)
Ifie Lott – Women Light Foundation
Ibiba Don Pedro – Centre for Development Communication
Lilian George – Niger Delta for Justice
Constance Meju – Amazonna Women Leadership Initiative
National Network for Women in Niger Delta Security and Peace Building

Social Action follow up Statement on Delta Clashes

FOLLOW-UP STATEMENT ON DELTA CLASHES

19 May 2009

As the military actions by the Joint Task Force (JTF) in Warri South Local Government Area, Delta State escalates, we are calling on the military to stop invading Ijaw communities in the guise of searching for the militants. Since the aerial and land pounding of Ijaw communities by the JTF started last Wednesday, available reports indicate that the death toll of innocent citizens had risen to 200, as at the last count.

About six communities including Ubanfa, Okerenkoko, Oporoza, Kuruntie, Kunukununama and Kuruje, had been invaded and their people displaced with scores of women, children and the elderly still unaccounted for in the swamps of Gbaramatu. The attack on a community library, the palace of the traditional ruler of Gbaramatu clan, whose coronation the defenceless community people were celebrating when they were bombed, smacks of an agenda of total annihilation. Some of the displaced community members escaped and are now waiting for relief at Ogbeh-Ijo hospital.

We recall that from Umuechem to Ogoni, Odi to Odioma and Agge to Gbaramatu, it has been a coordinated pattern by the military to murder the innocent, sack communities and plunge women, children and the aged into hunger.

We call on the Federal Government and militants to ceasefire to end the humanitarian crisis that has been occasioned by the onslaughts on Ijaw communities.

We demand that the Federal Government, through the National Emergency Management Agency (NEMA) convey immediate relief materials and medication to all displaced persons.

“The claims by the JTF that it is doing a good job in dislodging militant camps can never justify the huge loss of innocent lives and mindless destruction of property. This is not the panacea to Niger Delta crisis”, said Asume Osuoka of Social Action and the Gulf of Guinea Citizens Network.

According to Osuoka, “the crises in the Niger Delta have been created by failed leadership, mismanagement of oil revenues by all tiers of government, loss of legitimate livelihoods in communities due to the recklessness of transnational oil corporations operating under military cover, inability of community members to elect genuine representatives into political offices due to rigged elections, collusion of the Nigerian military, armed gangs and top government and oil industry officials in crude oil theft.”

“It is our view that sustainable peace in the region can only be achieved with transparent and participatory processes aimed at addressing the underlying problems of state failures and abuses that generate insecurity in the region”, said Patrick Naagbanton of the Centre for Environment, Human Rights and Development.

For information, contact Ken Henshaw, Social Action (08034053707 henshaw@saction.org; drndi10@yahoo.com)

Ijaw in Diaaspora petition UN on genocide in Gbaramatu Kingdom

May 18

Ijaw in Diaspora petition UN

A group of Ijaw living abroad have petitioned the Secretary-General of the United Nations (UN), Ban Ki-Moon over alleged genocide and ethnic cleansing in the Gbaramatu Kingdom of Delta State.

A copy of the petition, which was made available to The Nation yesterday in Warri, accused President Umaru Yar’Adua of sending Nigerian troops on Ijaw communities to silence their demands for a fair deal from the Federal Government.

The petition, signed by Mr. Eric Omare, a lawyer, said: “We wish to formally bring to your attention, the United Nations Security Council and General Assembly through the office of the Special Adviser on the Prevention of Genocide, the ongoing genocide and ethnic cleansing against the Ijaw people of Nigeria by the Federal Government of Nigeria on the instruction of President Umaru Yar’Adua.

“In the early hours of Friday, 15th May, 2009, the Federal Government of Nigeria deployed two (2) warships, fourteen (14) gunboats, four (4) jet fighters and 7,000 troops to attack defenceless civilians in the ijaw kingdom of Gbaramatu in southern part of Nigeria resulting in the death of more than 300 people, mainly women, children and elderly.

“The attack was repeated on Sunday 17th May, 2009 simultaneously on several Ijaws communities like Oporoza, Kunukunuma, Okerenkoko, Kurutie, Azakarama, Ajama through land and aerial bombardment. The number of death cannot be ascertained now as attack was still going on at the time of writing this petition.

“The reason for the attacks is because of the demand of the Ijaw people for fairness and environmental justice in the exploitation and exploration of oil resources from Ijaw land. More than four decades of oil exploration from Ijaw land by the Federal Government of Nigeria has resulted in massive environmental degradation and poverty in Ijawland. What the Ijaw are demanding for is sustainable development in the exploration of oil resources from their land.

“The intention of the Federal Government of Nigeria is to cleanse the Ijaw ethnic group whose land produces the majority of Nigerians oil so as to have unrestricted access to the exploration and exploitation of oil.”

The Ijaw urged Ki-moon to invoke the relevant charters of the UN to halt the purported genocide and prosecute officials of the Federal Government who overtly or covertly supported the action.

Demand access to Gbaramatu Kingdom in Niger Delta for NGO’s and Journalists

JOINT STATEMENT ON DELTA CLASHES

SUNDAY, MAY 17 2009

Human rights and development organisations active in the Niger Delta have called for restraint on the part of the Nigerian military to prevent killing of civilians in communities close to clashes between the military and militants. The groups have also asked the military and militants to allow access for humanitarian groups to visit the communities.

“We have had tragic experiences in the very recent past when military actions of this nature have resulted in the destruction of whole communities and killing of many innocent people, as was the case with Odi and Odioma. The Nigerian political leadership should ensure that its armed forces understand the need to protect innocent citizens in the communities of the Niger Delta,” said Asume Osuoka of Social Action.

“The use of helicopter gunships against targets in Okenkerenko, and by most accounts other villages, appears to be undisputable and has caused a mass evacuation of villagers in a creek environment where there are no safe options for refugees”, he said

There is no doubt that there are casualties from the current clashes who need urgent medical attention and there are thousands more who have fled their villages without adequate food or water.

We are calling on both the military and militants to allow free access for our local organisations and international groups such as the Red Cross, and Medicins Sans Frontiers without delay. This will ensure that aid is delivered where needed and end speculation over the level of casualties from the clashes over the past few days.

The military is claiming that it has acted responsibly and that civilians were not targeted in their operations. The best way for them to show the truth of this claim is to allow immediate access to Okekerenko, Oporoza and surrounding communities. We equally call on MEND to respect and support the need for villages to receive urgent assistance.

“There is need for immediate steps to reassure villagers that they can safely return to their communities before there are more deaths amongst the frail and young, who are the first casualties in such harsh conditions,” said Damka Pueba of Sustainable Peace Initiative

Signed

Asume Osuoka, Social Action (Chair, Gulf of Guinea Citizens Network) PH 0803 3099494

Patrick Naagbanton, Centre for Environment Human Rights and Development, Eleme, Rivers State

Damka Pueba, Sustainable Peace Initiative, PH

Press Statement from the Niger Delta Civil Society Coalition

Niger Delta Civil Society Coalition(NDCSC)
Secretariat: c/o 2B, Railway Close, D/Line, Port Harcourt.
Rivers State. Niger Delta Region. Nigeria.
Tel/Fax: 234- 84-231 – 716

Press Statement – Port Harcourt, May 16, 2009

STATE SPONSORED MASSACRE DEEPENS INSECURITY IN THE NIGER DELTA REGION.
The Niger Delta Civil Society Coalition(NDCSC) is shocked beyond believe learning of the latest massacre of people and razing to ground zero, communities of the Niger Delta by the President Yar’ Adua led regime in a ‘democracy’. The very sick, impotent and illegitimate government of President Ya’Adua, that have hardly moved Nigeria an inch forward in terms of any visible human development, have shown by its authorization of the latest massacre and orphaning of further thousands of children in the Gbaranmatu kingdom, of the region in the latest inferno, that there is a well written script and strategy for regimes in Nigeria, to go to any length – genocide inclusive, to expend the peoples of the region, wipe out their livelihood, to enable oil that fed their primitive accumulation of wealth, flow without let or hindrance.
The indiscriminate shelling and slaughtering of women, children and helpless seniors in the communities by federal soldiers of fortune, has no doubt put a lid on the mockery public relation exercise, flagged off recently by the President, in the name of amnesty and peaceful settlement in the region.
The cleansing strategy adopted in the wasting of Odi, Odioma, Agge, Umuechem has been repeated in the Gbaranmatu kingdom, all the time, the military making sure that the number of the raped, slaughtered, maimed and abused are never fully known in order not to horrify a conscious humane world. The level of human rights abuses in the region by the governments and military task forces has assumed a very high level proportion, that merits international attention for necessary action, by way of bringing pressure to bear on an unresponsive illiberal regime, to humanely deal with the legitimate and just demands of the peoples of the region.
The NDCSC maintains and very strongly too, that the conflict in the Niger Delta is about age long gross and attested violations of cultural, social, economic, political and environmental rights of the minority citizens, therefore, beyond the orchestration of criminality and oil bunkering that deflates from the fundamentality and community support for the genuine struggle for social justice. The orchestration of criminality and greed theory, leaving out friends and members of the regime who drive the arms proliferation and oil bunkering industrial complex for punishment, continue to make the federal government and oil multinationals look good internationally, in the face of human depradation in the region. Let it not be forgotten that structural violence of the State linked with inhuman standards of operations of oil multinationals, began the current cycle of violence. The criminal response of the State to what was a peaceful agitation by the Ogoni social movement , led by late Ken Saro-Wiwa, led to a change of strategy by peoples who now genuinely believe that an imposed government, holds no measure of security to their livelihood. This has inevitably led to the growing secondary forms of violence, such as hostage taking and destruction of oil facilities.
The NDCSC wishes to strongly draw the attention of the international community and sister democracy movements, to the fact human needs are continually being frustrated on a large scale by illegitimate federal and state regimes in the Niger Delta. Experience over the decades has shown that the more arbitrary law and order is enforced in the region to control helplessness and frustration, in the midst of abundance and evil governance, the more the helplessness and frustration. Our genuine fears and concern is that, rather than military massacre to put a lid on demand for just peace; from the humiliation and further loss, will spring some other forms of extreme agitation, to continue to emphasize and demonstrate to the world, that continue to tolerate competititve authoritarian regimes in Nigeria, that there are features of the regimes in the Niger Delta that are repugnant to justice and human dignity, that are unacceptable to the peoples, and are worth dying for.
The NDCSC therefore, wishes to renew the demand of the peoples of the region for just peace to mean: demand for sustainable development that has been deliberately kept away from them. They ask that the poor and vulnerable be at the centre of the development process in their communities – also the protection of the life opportunities of future generations and the natural systems on which all life depends.
The NDCSC once again calls on the global civilized nations and democracy movements to take their responsibility to protect human subjects anywhere in the world, including democratic principles seriously, by calling on the illiberal regimes in Nigeria, who are intent on destroying the enormous investment in democracy building by democracy defenders, to urgently respond to the just demands of the peoples of the Niger Delta, as forced peace will surely compound the avoidable catastrophe waiting to happen in that part of the world.
Signed:
Anyakwee Nsirimovu
Chair, NDCSC

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