WARNING: This is Version 1 of my old archive, so Photos will NOT work and many links will NOT work. But you can find articles by searching on the Titles. There is a lot of information in this archive. Use the SEARCH BAR at the top right. Prior to December 2012; I was a pro-Christian type of Conservative. I was unaware of the mass of Jewish lies in history, especially the lies regarding WW2 and Hitler. So in here you will find pro-Jewish and pro-Israel material. I was definitely WRONG about the Boeremag and Janusz Walus. They were for real.
Original Post Date: 2010-11-30 Time: 02:00:04 Posted By: News Poster
By Emeka Nwosu
It was widely believed that the amnesty programme instituted by the late President Umar Musa Yar’Adua in 2008 in which all former militant leaders and their army of supporters in the Niger Delta were granted free pardon would bring lasting peace and stability to the region. With the recent turn of events in the area today, the expressed optimism appears to have been misplaced.
Rather than the crises abating, tension is gradually building up again following the ill-advised decision of some of the ex-militants and some budding warlords to spurn the amnesty programme and return to the creeks.
Hostilities, of late have resumed in the volatile region after some long spell of calm and quiet that were the immediate spin-off of the amnesty programme in which the militants surrendered their deadly weapons in exchange for rehabilitation and empowerment by the Federal Government.
Intelligence reports indicate that the unrepentant militants have started setting up camps in some of the communities in Niger Delta particularly Bayelsa, Delta and Akwa Ibom States from where they set out to take oil workers hostage and inflict damages to oil and gas installations.
As at press time, the eight oil workers abducted from Exxon Mobil facilities at Ibeno in Akwa Ibom including some Americans were yet to be released by the militants operating in the name of Movement for the Emancipation of the Niger Delta (MEND). One of the criminal elements who goes by the name “General Togo” is said to be the brain behind the current wave of criminality in the region.
In Bayelsa too about 19 foreign oil workers including some Nigerians were similarly abducted and held in custody for over a week by some of the criminal gangs operating along the creeks and water ways. Following the international outrage that greeted the events, the Joint Military Taskforce in the Niger Delta had to launch massive rescue efforts which resulted in the successful release of the hostages.
It was also in the same Bayelsa that the home of Chief Timi Alaibe, the presidential coordinator of the amnesty programme was recently bombed by suspected militants. In that unconscionable attack, one of the security guards of Alaibe was killed.
How did we get to this faux pass? What really went wrong? The country was already counting her gains in the increased oil revenue she was now earning following the cessation of hostilities in the troubled region which ensured uninterrupted pumping of crude oil.
With the recent turn of events in the area, the question is what has really gone amiss with the amnesty programme? If we relate the current crisis with the Independence Day twin-bombings in Abuja which MEND claimed responsibility, it may be rightly concluded that the amnesty programme has broken down or the implementation is faltering.
Whatever interpretation that may be offered, the truth of the matter is that we have a national emergency on our hands. The Federal Government must rise quickly to the occasion. If the amnesty requires some fine tuning or adjustment to accommodate some disgruntled or grumbling militants that may have been inadvertently excluded, that should be done with a sense of urgency.
When this happens, the so-called militants who presently constitute a big nuisance along the creeks and water ways should be isolated and treated as common criminals; for that is what they are. They cannot continue to deceive the people, claiming to be freedom fighters when they are in actual fact armed marauders and economic saboteurs.
The amnesty programme was well conceived by the late President Yar’Adua who as a humanist was genuinely concerned about the deep-seated poverty and degraded environmental conditions of the Niger Delta. The programme which is in stages has the ultimate goal of transforming the Niger Delta from a zone of crises and conflicts to a region of sustainable peace and development.
It is in keeping with this vision that the government, right from Yar’Adua’s presidency, proposed the Petroleum Industry Bill (PIB) which is to confer on host oil producing communities fuller participation in the management of the oil industry. The allocation of ten percent equity stakes in oil production to the host communities was intended to assist development in those communities and mitigate the incidents of restiveness.
This milestone, even if it has not meaningfully addressed the agitations for resource control, it is definitely a huge step forward in the economic emancipation of the Niger Delta region.
All well meaning Nigerians and particularly those residing in the Niger Delta are worried on this latest resurgence of violence and instability in the area more than two years after the widely acclaimed amnesty programme had come into force.
The security agencies in Nigeria particularly the JTF operating in the Niger Delta must begin to articulate effective strategies on how to rid the area of all the loafers, pirates, oil thieves, rapists and kidnappers who parade themselves as militants. They must be made to realize that the period of militancy was over with the declaration of the amnesty.
These criminal elements who do not want to give peace a chance must be fished out and made to face the full wrath of the law. Since they have decided, out of selfish economic reasons, to hold the nation hostage, there should be no hiding place for these destructive agents. An all-out war must be declared against them in order to give the law-abiding people of the Niger Delta an opportunity to live in peace and harmony.
Government must also make strenuous efforts, using its vast intelligence networks, to identify and fish out the sponsors of the criminal activities in the region, particularly the ‘big men’ who are behind the illegal oil bunkering in the area and similarly bring them to justice.
Government must demonstrate the resolve to make an example out of these highly placed people who are benefitting from the chaos and instability in the region. With that, a strong signal would have been sent that it can no longer be business as usual. This has to be done in order to bring sanity into the place and secure the fragile peace which the amnesty programme has succeeded in enthroning before the current relapse.
It is against this background that the decision of the Nigerian Navy and other security agencies to launch a holistic operation to flush out all criminal elements from their hideouts in the creeks must be applauded.
The Chief of Training and Operations, Naval Headquarters, Rear Admiral Ben Acholonu had told news men in Abuja after a brain storming session by the Naval authorities that the nation’s armed forces have concluded plans for a joint military exercise code named ‘Operation Nemo’ to curb kidnapping and other criminal activities in the Niger Delta.
Although he was tactical with the use of language when he stated the objectives of the military exercise, it was, however, imperative that the armed forces have declared war against the criminal gangs in the area. He said the objectives “are to assess the operational state of the naval ships, air access and the logistics support the navy could give to its ships in sustained operations at sea”.
The operations must be sustained until the region is rid of the menace of all the criminals that have made peace impossible in the Niger Delta.
Original Source: 
Original date published: 29 November 2010
Source: http://allafrica.com/stories/201011300117.html?viewall=1