DIALOGUE WITH BOKO HARAM OR NATIONAL DIALOGUE?

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It is a common knowledge that the Niger Delta peoples are living under the harrowing yoke of political and economic domination led by the Fulani hegemony with the support of their local and international collaborators. This is otherwise referred to as internal colonialism. Ceasing control of the Nigerian State they have hijacked all segment of its bureaucracy – the Judiciary, Police, Military, Intelligence, Civil Service, Customs, etc – and with this, ensure the occupation of our land and exploitation of our natural resources; promote the political alienation and economic subjugation of our peoples. These have left dire consequences for our people, such as, tragic ecological collapse, aggressive environmental degradation, inestimable damage to our pastoral economy and means of livelihood, mass unemployment, poverty, psychological violence, molestation, genocide, massive electoral fraud, de-industrialisation and even deprivation of Nigerian citizenship. Today, we are considered as second class citizens. Wherever, in the Nigerian Public Service that we want to work, we are consider only after those from the dominating nation have been taken and even if we get that job, our promotions are be slower than theirs and the fatter paying jobs with a lot of opportunities for personal advancements are reserved for them.

The political elites from Niger Delta are not excluded from this regime of apartheid. Oil blocks are allocated majorly to elites of the Fulani hegemony and sometimes, their Hausa servants. In the presidential power equation, they are considered unfit and less than deserving. This was manifested recently when the incapacitation and subsequent death of Late Alhaji Umaru Musa Yar’Adua in 2010, created a vacuum in the Nigerian Presidency which going by their “1999 Constitution” was ordinarily supposed to be filled by the then Vice President, Dr Goodluck Ebelle Azikiwe Jonathan from Niger Delta. Not only was Goodluck Jonathan reminded of his second class citizenship and Niger Delta background, he was also threatened not to run for the Presidency of Nigeria in 2011. They promised to make Nigeria ungovernable for him should he run for the Presidency in 2011 Election. They battled so hard and left so many fractures in the process that betrayed the false impression of unity that was touted before then.

Before then, our organisation had never shown any interest in who governs Nigeria. The power struggle of 2010 – 2011 opened up the hitherto hidden contradiction of national oppression against the Niger Delta at a level that cannot be denied by even the intellectually lame. The Presidency and the contest for it became the new turf for national struggle and the ‘national question’ was thrown up on a scale that could never be ignored. As students of social history, we interpreted the development correctly and decided to intervene in a manner that will expose the hypocrisy of the One-Nigeria mantra and thereby show that Nigeria as presently constituted is a fraud that is been preserved because it is the conduit for the continuous bleeding of the oil and gas of Niger Delta by a dangerous hegemony.

Consequently, we decided to impress on President Goodluck Jonathan to contest for the Nigerian Presidency in 2011 and let us see how they make good their threat of making the country ungovernable. Now we have seen their worst which includes: post-electoral violence; terrorism; trying to make a political gain of the nihilistic activities of ‘Boko Haram’; and painting the President as weak. They claim that they are strong, what have they done with that strength rather than deprive people of their freedom of expression, insubordinate other nations in Nigeria to their own nation which has given their miseducated underprivileged people the impression that we are beneath them and the effrontery to snuff the life out of our people, especially Igbos living in the North, with ease.

Furthermore, we want to make it abundantly clear that the terrorist activities of ‘Boko Haram’ do not represent an Islamic Jihad. The reasons are not farfetched: firstly, the conditions for a Jihad as spelt out by the Holy Prophet Muhammad do not exist in Nigeria or the North; and secondly, there are rules and guidelines to follow in carrying out a Jihad and they are being grossly violated by these people. The motives behind their activities are at best national domination, ethnic chauvinism and political arrogance.

Sadly, the terrorist activities of Boko Haram, their sponsors and sympathisers has led to the loss of so many innocent civilian lives mostly that of Igbos. We wish to state categorically our call on Mr President to act more firmly to preserve the lives people who are targets of ‘Boko Haram’. We can no longer sit down and watch while our people are being slaughtered with impunity like chicken and our people mourn daily in black.

However, some people especially those from the Northern part of Nigeria insist that dialogue with the Boko Haram group is the only way to prevent further slaughters. We disagree! No amount of dialogue with Boko Haram will bring back the thousands of our people whose lives were cut short by these barbaric activities or heal the emotional and psychological wounds caused. Our take on this is that a dialogue with Boko Haram will not provide any guarantee that these senseless killings of our people will never be repeated.

Consequently, we demand that any dialogue with Boko Haram, their sponsors and sympathisers should not end without assuming a national dimension of a Sovereign National Conference (SNC) to resolve this recurring ‘national question’. We can no longer continue to live in denial and choose the quick-fix option whenever we are fiercely confronted with the ‘national question’. Ours is a struggle for self determination and the elimination of all forms of national domination of our peoples and land. Our right to self determination is guaranteed by the African Charter on Human and Peoples Right. Even as recent as September 2007, the United Nations General Assembly passed a resolution, known as the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples. That UN declaration recognised our right to self determination and stated amongst other things that we have a right to determine which state we want to be part of; how we want to be governed; control over our land and resources; protection of our cultural and spiritual life and the protection of our environment.

In pursuant to these internationally recognised rights and aspirations and having resolved to commit ourselves all the more to cause of our peoples, we hereby demand and insist more than ever before that the Government of Nigeria under President Goodluck Jonathan should as a matter of national emergency, to before October 1st, begin steps that will lead to the convocation of a national dialogue (instead of just dialoguing with the terrorists) in the form of a Sovereign National Conference (SNC) which we have shown to be possible in the PRONACO organised Peoples National Conference (PNC) in which we played a pivotal role; failings which we shall use all means available in this world to assert our right to self determination.


Written By Comrade Mark Olise

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