Jaw-jaw always better than war-war. But all sides should show good faith
Just as well the Federal Government has met with the Edwin Clark-chaired Pan Niger Delta Forum (PANDEF), after PANDEF’s August 1 “ultimatum” to the federal authorities to parley or expect the worst.
In that “ultimatum”, Chief Clark urged the Federal Government to follow up on its November 1, 2016 vice-presidential visit; and show practical demonstration that it was not just buying time, and taking the people over there for granted. He cited the slow work on the Maritime University, Okerenkoko, Delta State, which Acting President YemiOsinbajo had then promised would soon take off.
He also, and rightly too, complained about the promised but yet to take off Ogoni clean-up programme. Since the federal authorities launched the “clean-up” very early in the Muhammadu Buhari Presidency, not much has happened in terms of the actual clean-up.
Although the federal authorities admitted that nothing on the surface appeared to be going on at the Ogoni environmental front, a lot indeed was happening, given that the various technical committees needed to do the clean-up were already in place. That could well be, for a foundation for a giant building often takes time, before the actual erection of blocks.
Still, given the hope the Ogoni clean-up project triggered, and the political and environmental health capital it could have given the Buhari administration, losing that momentum was something close to a tragedy, particularly with the restiveness in the area. That is why the Federal Government should use this PANDEF alert as re-starting point, and begin to do the needful on that front.
But then, after all the legitimate complaints, the PANDEF chair then launched into what sounded like a veiled threat: that the so-called “youths” were getting restless; and that many of them had inundated him with telephone calls, threatening to re-embrace violence, after the Niger Delta Avengers’ bombing campaigns of 2015/2016.
Inasmuch as the Clark alert might serve as accurate gauge to describe the near-peril of the deteriorating situation, throwing an ogre of violence, in the face of the government, is manifest bad faith on the path of PANDEF.
The reason is simple: if violence could solve the problem, why did the initial violence not lead to a solution, but instead a fresh opportunity to dialogue? In other words, what did the so-called “youths” that rushed into violence achieve, except to secure an agreement to discuss the problems with the authorities? And if violence didn’t entirely work then, how can it work now?
No matter the level of provocation or perceived insincerity, Niger Delta elders must always impress it upon the rash “youth” to always develop a deep sense of introspection; and not to permit themselves the illusion that violence can solve any problem. It can’t. Besides, the elders should be able to manage them, without having to throw the threat of violence in the face of the dialoguing party.
Apart from that, Niger Delta elders should be wary of romanticising violence, through fawning, inexact terms that lend dubious credibility — if not legitimacy — to brazen crime. Law-abiding “youths” don’t embark on destroying common facilities, built with tax payers’ money. Only criminals do — and criminals should be called what they are, and not by any other fanciful names.
Besides, the last bombing campaign by the Niger Delta Avengers had made the area a worse environmental nightmare than it was before the bombing. It therefore appears a lose-lose situation that should be avoided by all right-thinking persons.
Having said that, however, it is absolutely scandalous that the Federal Government had to jerk awake from its seeming slumber, just because of a threat to resume violence. Such negligence, for whatever pressing reasons, is intolerable and unbefitting of any government worth its name.
Besides, a part challenging the might of a whole government, with its theoretical monopoly of lawful force, could indeed be a suicidal trip. Still, government is not just about raw force. Indeed, what propels the force is legitimacy, which gifts it its moral fibre. An illegitimate government theoretically becomes a bully, which overthrow could be justified. That is why every government must do its duty by the people to retain legitimacy at all times.
Which is why the Federal Government must do its duty to the Niger Delta, and indeed, every part of Nigeria it swore, by the Constitution, to care for. Of course, not a few could scoff at the urgency PANDEF now feigns, given that the situation was pretty much the same when its own son, Goodluck Jonathan, was president.
True. But as government is a continuum, and the Buhari administration has a pact with Nigerians who voted it in, the sanctity of the Niger Delta space, and the welfare of its people, should be top priority for any sitting government. That a son of the soil didn’t do his duty should not excuse any subsequent government to abandon its own bounden duty.
But it is heart-warming that both sides are talking again. Niger Delta, the proverbial goose that lays the golden egg, is to parrot Nobel Laureate, Prof. Wole Soyinka, the open sore of the nation. The sore must be sorted fast.
