Emma Amaize
3 November 2007
Worri — Controller of the Movement of the Emancipation of the Niger-Delta (MEND) in Bayelsa and Rivers states, Commander Ebi, yesterday, warned that militants would blow up the Shell Petroleum Development Company (SPDC)'s Bonga Oil Field in Ekeremor Local Government Area of Bayelsa state and other oil installations in the Niger-Delta region in the next few weeks if the Federal Government failed to swear-in ministerial nominee from the South-South, Mr. Godday Orubebe, who was left when others were inaugurated recently within a reasonable time.
Commander Ebi disclosed the planned onslaught while speaking with Saturday Vanguard on phone just as the national co-ordinator of the Movement for Peace and Sustainable Development for Niger-Delta Communities, Mr. Joseph Hitler called on the Federal Government to swear-in Orubebe to avert the plan by those he described as commercial militants to wreak fresh havoc in the region.
According to the MEND leader, "I am Commander Ebi, a militant controlling Bayelsa and Rivers states. Tell the Federal Government that they should swear in Orubebe who is from the Niger-Delta since President Umaru Yar'Adua have sworn-in others that were screened by the Senate, if not, we are going to make the Niger-Delta states to be ungovernable by destroying oil pipelines and oil installations. We will even go to the Bonga Field".
"Officials of the Presidency and Senators should also stop visiting the riverine areas until they are ready to develop the area, they should stop fooling us because they are the problem of the areas, they should stop using the money for development for retreat, if not, the Niger-Delta will never have peace. For long, we have been waiting for the promises made by the past and the present government. There is limit to human endurance, we going to cause more problems if the federal government does not swear-in Orubebe and confirm other appointees who are yet to be confirmed in the Niger-Delta so that they will join hands to develop the area", he asserted.
"They should create job opportunity for the youths in the region; the Niger-Delta Development Commission (NDDC) should start implementation of their development plan for the region with immediate effect while the federal government should release all the outstanding sums due to the commission so that they will not take that as an excuse for non-performance. What we did in Bayelsa recently is just a warning", he added.
Speaking on behalf of the Movement for Peace and Sustainable Development for Niger-Delta Communities, Mr. Hitler asserted, "The exclusion of God-day Orubebe during the recent inauguration of ministers is what some commercial militants now want to use to start another trouble in the region, the federal government should avert this looming danger by swearing him in".
His words, "Commercial militants want to start kidnapping expatriates in the name of the excluded ministerial nominee and I think Mr. President and his deputy, Dr. Goodluck Jonathan should not endanger the peace process in the Niger-Delta because of entrenched interest of some persons and party politics".
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