HOW SOLDIERS INVADED IJAW COMMUNITY

BY SHOLA O’NEIL...THE NATION NEWSPAPERS

LAWRENCE OSIEGBU…

Agge Community in Ekeremor Local Government Area of Bayelsa State was in ashes, literally, when our correspondent visited on Wednesday, August 13, 2008. The entire community, unfurled at the confluence where River Ramos meets the Bight of Benin , had been pulverised – reduced to ashes in a rehash of the infamous Odi killings by Nigerian Army troops in 1999. The only stark contrast apart from that Agge was invaded nearly nine years after Odi was that nobody was shot by soldiers in the Black August 13 but more material damages were visited on the Ijaw community.

Row after rows of houses in the ancient community was reduced to ruins, allegedly by troops of the Joint Task Force in the Niger Delta region, which is ironically christened ‘Operation Restore Hope’. But if the accounts of hundreds of Agge indigenes are to be believed, then the task force, contrary to its code-name, has killed the hope of thousands of the riverside dwellers.

The destruction of Agge, pristine fishing settlement with a population about 5,000 persons comprising nearly 1,000 household was carried out in the early hours of Monday, August 4.

For 21-year old Anita Akpobolokeni, the day started like a bad dream, from which she was yet to wake up: “As I am talking to you now (Wednesday), I still don’t know what happened. We were sleeping in our house when my niece ran in and started shouting, ‘people are running, shooting all over the town’.

“I woke up with a start and started running along with members of my family – I had no underwear, just a piece of wrapper tied round my waist. We tried to run away from the sound of the gunfire but as we were running, bullets were whistling past overhead from different direction.

“That was how we ran into the bush, but after a while, we decided that the bush where we were hiding was too close to the town because the sound kept coming closer and closer to the place where we were. We then started moving again, this time, we ran towards a nearby village across the river,” she told our correspondent.

Anita and her sibling were lucky. They found a boat on the shores of the river and set off without paddle, their only aim was to drift away from the scene of madness into which they were woken.

But several others, according to our investigation, were not so lucky because at the time they got to the river shore, all the boats had left. But determined to put a good distance between them and what used to be their community, they jumped into the River Ramos and swam a length of over 500 metres into a neighbouring community on the other side of the river.

The leaders of the communities, including Chief Austin Korus and Williams Isiayei, Chairman and Secretary respectively, were the only members of the community who had a few minutes fore knowledge of the destruction coming.

Narrating their ordeal, in a telephone chat with this reporter shortly after the incident, Korus said they had boarded a speedboat for Warri at the Jetty, when they saw the armada coming towards their community.

“They drove past us in about 10 gunboats, went into a creek at the back of the community and started shooting sporadically for several hours. We did not know what it was about, so we drifted into a community on the other side of the river.”

Unknown to the community Chairman, what they saw was a military strategy to encircle the community and drive fears into the mind of residents.

After firing into the air for a while (some residents said it was up to an hour) the gunshots died down and the troops moved out of the creek, which is hemispherical round the community.

“When the gunshots died down, we waited for a long time and then start returning to the town from the bushes. We started coming out gradually – a few at a time until we were assured that there was no more danger,” one of the embattled residents revealed.

But unknown to them, the troops were engaging them in a cat and mouse game of scaring them off and them luring them back: obviously it was for a reason. For no sooner had a few of the residents returned did the troop sprung the trap and ambush them.

“They took my brother (Youmo Mietuade), who had been sick. They took him at the jetty and asked him to show them the house of the chiefs of the community. But he told them that he was a stranger and knew very little about the community.

“He was given a severe beating for claiming not to know the homes of the king and other chiefs of the community. After they tortured him for a very long time, they dumped him on the ground in front of the waterside and asked him to beat it,” recalled Smith Mietuade.

Youmo, in spite of his illness ran away from the invading troops immediately he was asked to leave. He ran for a long time until he got to a neighbouring community, where he immediately went collapsed. He went to a deep sleep, from which he never woke up.

The 37-year old fisherman became the only casualty of the JTF operation in Agge. He was, however, not shot, several sources, including Williams Isiayei, affirmed.

The first ordeal of residents later paled into insignificance against the seconding coming of the troops, as they reportedly unleashed a wanton destruction of property and an orgy of arson on residents.

During the visit on Wednesday, our correspondent counted no fewer than 150 houses that were razed to the ground. Properties that could be worth close to whopping quarter of a billion naira or more were either looted or burnt to the ground.

In its first official reaction to the invasion, the Coordinator, JTF Joint Media Campaign Centre, Lt. Col. Rabe Abubakar, described the operation as a routine cordon and search. The JTF image maker said it was part of an orchestrated strategy to rid the region of militants and illegal bunkering.

Abubakar’s reaction, which came on the heels of an extensive report on the incident by The Nation of Tuesday, August 5, said the task force believed that the community was being used criminals to attack its troops.

A few hours before the Agge invasion on Friday, August 1, a number of gunmen invaded the Logistics Base of the special military outfit deployed to the Niger Delta in 2003. Two soldiers were killed in the ‘battle’ at far away Bomadi, in Delta State .

The attack on the JTF base was followed by a similar sortie against the task force’s Fast Attack Crafts by suspected militants. The armed attackers overpowered the troops and commandeered two of the vessels after seizing a number of weapons from the soldiers of the Nigerian Army.

There was also a development before the attack on the two military targets.

The JTF, under its new Commander, Brig. Gen. Wuyep Rimtip, had launched a running battle against illegal bunkering operations in his areas of responsibility. The renew ‘war’ against illegal bunkering yielded some spectacular results. So much so that he started receiving death threats from the warlords and ringleaders, who threatened to deal with him if he did not relent.

Still unrelenting, the task force raided Tuomo Community in Bomadi Local Government Area of Delta State, where a stunning 111 illegal refineries were destroyed by its troops. The illegal refineries where purportedly owned by militant groups who resulted to crude refining of stolen crude oil because of their inability to evacuate oil stolen from pipelines in the creeks of the volatile region.

Before that JTF soldiers arrested fourteen Filipinos for alleged illegal bunkering off the shores of Bayelsa State . The foreigners are currently standing trial in the oil city of Warri , Delta State .

Col. Abubakar said the operators of the illegal refineries and oil barons whose activities were affected by the operation of the task force carried out the attacks on its formations.

He said the task force believed that the hoodlums who attack troops were from Agge, which he also claimed harboured criminals and illegal bunkerers operating in the areas. He further claimed that a number of arms and ammunition were recovered during the operation.

Its troops, he said, did not burn down any dwelling in the course of the operation, rather, he said the houses must have caught fire during the exchange of gunfire between ‘own troops’ and the militants.

Independent investigations carried out by our correspondent in the community during Wednesday visit, showed Lt. Abubakar’s version of the burning to be rather woolly as there were only a handful of plastic drums usually found in such riverside communities and residents said they could hardly had cause the wanton burning observed.

Although he did not quite say that they were found in the community, the JTF mouthpiece also claimed that anti-aircraft missiles were recovered as a result of the JTF exercise during the period.

But for retired Director of Personnel, State Primary Education Board (SPEB), Delta State , Mr. Augustin Isiayei, the JTF are desperate to cover up their atrocities by giving the community a bad name.

Contrary to Abubakar’s justification, he said the troops that invaded Agge that morning came “to plunder, vandalise and loot the resources of the people of the community.

“We were woken up by gunfire near our greatest shrine that has been there since time immemorial. It is at the shrine where we settled certain quarrels among our members. We started running when the shooting started. I was on this side of the community and our king was on the other side (pointing to the far end a river). My house was vandalised. They came here to plunder and vandalise.”

He flayed the task force for stooping so low to tell such fallacious stories and wondered “where is the honour of the soldier that we used to hear about, that an officer’s word is his bond?

“They didn’t see any gun, that I can tell you because if it was otherwise, they would have displayed it for all to see. I would not be surprise if they come up with some guns and say it was recovered here, we will insist that they prove it with finger prints because we have grown used to such lies by the police and military men.

“That claim (of weapons), I can tell you without fear of contradiction, I am a retired civivl servant, I am over 60 years old and I put in 35 years of service, I am telling you this to let you know that I can never stoop to their level of lying, they did not see anything here it is just military propaganda..

“They unjustly destroyed our town, innocent people are being victimised, we want justice. If they said we are militants, let them show the world how the ‘militants’ resisted them, they should show us their casualties and bring out the people they subdued here. If we had resisted them our people would have been killed. The only person that died suffered from cardiac arrest,” he maintained.

If the retired civil servant was angry, Monday Lugbeinwei, a member of the Redeemed Christian Church of God (RCCG), was despondent when our correspondent met him front of what used to be his house.

He was on his way to the Redemption Camp, bear Lagos State, that Monday when reports reached him that his house and all he has had been razed by fire set to his house by the soldiers.

“We were on the way to Lagos , I and my wife. In fact we were already at Benin , when my telephone rang and somebody from the town told me that soldiers had invaded the community and set everything on fire. They said my house was among the scores of houses razed by the rampaging soldiers,” he said.

At that point, Lugbeinwei, a marine transporter, said he was faced with a hard choice of running back to ascertain the extent of damage to his entire property and his faith and commitment to God. “But I decided that my loss can wait, I must go and serve my Lord with other members of my faith.”

But his faith did not undo, physically, the havoc the soldiers had wreaked on him: three outboard engines, worth over N1.5 million, household items, wares, fishing equipment, his wife’s items of trade.

“My entire life savings, what I spent the whole of my youth working to acquire are all gone. The only things left were the things we were taking to the camp for the programme. But we are giving thanks to God, because that is what he wants from us in everything.

“I lost the entire house built on a stretch of 100x50 land. You are asking me the extent of my loss, can you quantify the sweat of a life time; can you undo what the soldiers have done? I can tell you that I have lost over N7 million in this inferno. I came back here to see the extent for my self, I couldn’t bring my wife with me, she is at Aladja (in Udu Local Government Area of Delta State),” he stressed.

Perhaps the man that suffered the most material lose was Chief Samuel Alla, a famous deep sea fisherman, who lost seven houses – one of his, one each of his three wives, three for his children.

Alla, a chief of Kou Clan, was still dazed, ten days after the incident. He said, “As I stand before you, this is all there is to me, I have no other cloth, no other hat and no other shoe. You are seeing the whole of me.

“They came , destroyed shot at engine boats they saw on the waterside, I am a fisherman, that is why if you see one of the outboard engines they burnt it is 40hp Yamaha, what does a bunkerer need a 40hp engine for? It is fishermen who use them. Who do you think can console me; do you think that even if the government comes here and say they want to compensate us I can get my life back on track with the cost of what I lost? If we had arms we would have resisted this destruction,” he lamented.

But our correspondent gathered that a man did resist the soldiers. His name is Alfred Omonifegha, who resisted, not with guns, but his will. “When they came, I ran initially, but later when I saw people’s houses going up in flames, I returned.

When they got here they said they were going to burn down my house and I should leave, but I told them they have to burn me with the house, I cannot rebuild another one if they burn it any way. So that started beating me, flocked me, but I insisted that they burn me along in the house. Later, they saw some government books inside the house. The books belong to the primary school, I offered to keep it for the teachers because they have no space for them. So when the soldiers saw the books, they said, ‘this house must be government house, lets leave it’, he said even as he showed our correspondent the marks of his torture.

The list of victims is endless: Tom Selegha, a 29-year-old okada rider, married with two wives ad two children. The carcasses of his three motorcycles were lying forlornly beside his burnt house, during our visit.

“Please tell the government that they should remember me and send me even one okada so that I can feed my wife and children. Life must go on, you see me now, I am trying to rebuild my house,” he said. And, he was. He had, with the help of his wife, retrieved dozens of burnt roofing zincs and was cobbling them together when our reporter met him.

“I have to get something to cover up the place because we now sleep in the open but some nights when it rains, like it did last night, it is terrible. We have to stay awake until rain stops. Even at that time it is no longer possible to sleep because the ground would be soggy,” Selegha said in Pidgin English.

Apart from the widespread burning of property, the soldiers also allegedly raided various homes and stole money, GSM handset and portable electronic devices from the victims of the raid.

Retired primary school teacher, Chief Lawrence Orukemezougha, wondered who N80,000 disappeared from his wife’s house that was partially burnt, wondering, “The boxes where also not burnt yet the money disappeared, who took them, the soldiers of course.

‘True’, chipped in Mrs. Eunice Eddy who claimed she lost over N750,000:00 both in cash and valuables to the invaders. “I had just returned from Onitsha where I went to stock my shop the previous night when they came, by the time I returned from the bush, my money and other valuable were stolen and burnt down by the soldiers, god will punish them,” she vowed amidst tears.

Meanwhile, the community members were trying to pick up the bits and pieces of their lives again. Those who able to savage half-burnt zincs and other roofing materials are cobbling them together for protection against the elements.

HOW SOLDIERS INVADED IJAW COMMUNITY

BY SHOLA O’NEIL...THE NATION NEWSPAPERS

Agge Community in Ekeremor Local Government Area of Bayelsa State was in ashes, literally, when our correspondent visited on Wednesday, August 13, 2008. The entire community, unfurled at the confluence where River Ramos meets the Bight of Benin , had been pulverised – reduced to ashes in a rehash of the infamous Odi killings by Nigerian Army troops in 1999. The only stark contrast apart from that Agge was invaded nearly nine years after Odi was that nobody was shot by soldiers in the Black August 13 but more material damages were visited on the Ijaw community.

Row after rows of houses in the ancient community was reduced to ruins, allegedly by troops of the Joint Task Force in the Niger Delta region, which is ironically christened ‘Operation Restore Hope’. But if the accounts of hundreds of Agge indigenes are to be believed, then the task force, contrary to its code-name, has killed the hope of thousands of the riverside dwellers.

The destruction of Agge, pristine fishing settlement with a population about 5,000 persons comprising nearly 1,000 household was carried out in the early hours of Monday, August 4.

For 21-year old Anita Akpobolokeni, the day started like a bad dream, from which she was yet to wake up: “As I am talking to you now (Wednesday), I still don’t know what happened. We were sleeping in our house when my niece ran in and started shouting, ‘people are running, shooting all over the town’.

“I woke up with a start and started running along with members of my family – I had no underwear, just a piece of wrapper tied round my waist. We tried to run away from the sound of the gunfire but as we were running, bullets were whistling past overhead from different direction.

“That was how we ran into the bush, but after a while, we decided that the bush where we were hiding was too close to the town because the sound kept coming closer and closer to the place where we were. We then started moving again, this time, we ran towards a nearby village across the river,” she told our correspondent.

Anita and her sibling were lucky. They found a boat on the shores of the river and set off without paddle, their only aim was to drift away from the scene of madness into which they were woken.

But several others, according to our investigation, were not so lucky because at the time they got to the river shore, all the boats had left. But determined to put a good distance between them and what used to be their community, they jumped into the River Ramos and swam a length of over 500 metres into a neighbouring community on the other side of the river.

The leaders of the communities, including Chief Austin Korus and Williams Isiayei, Chairman and Secretary respectively, were the only members of the community who had a few minutes fore knowledge of the destruction coming.

Narrating their ordeal, in a telephone chat with this reporter shortly after the incident, Korus said they had boarded a speedboat for Warri at the Jetty, when they saw the armada coming towards their community.

“They drove past us in about 10 gunboats, went into a creek at the back of the community and started shooting sporadically for several hours. We did not know what it was about, so we drifted into a community on the other side of the river.”

Unknown to the community Chairman, what they saw was a military strategy to encircle the community and drive fears into the mind of residents.

After firing into the air for a while (some residents said it was up to an hour) the gunshots died down and the troops moved out of the creek, which is hemispherical round the community.

“When the gunshots died down, we waited for a long time and then start returning to the town from the bushes. We started coming out gradually – a few at a time until we were assured that there was no more danger,” one of the embattled residents revealed.

But unknown to them, the troops were engaging them in a cat and mouse game of scaring them off and them luring them back: obviously it was for a reason. For no sooner had a few of the residents returned did the troop sprung the trap and ambush them.

“They took my brother (Youmo Mietuade), who had been sick. They took him at the jetty and asked him to show them the house of the chiefs of the community. But he told them that he was a stranger and knew very little about the community.

“He was given a severe beating for claiming not to know the homes of the king and other chiefs of the community. After they tortured him for a very long time, they dumped him on the ground in front of the waterside and asked him to beat it,” recalled Smith Mietuade.

Youmo, in spite of his illness ran away from the invading troops immediately he was asked to leave. He ran for a long time until he got to a neighbouring community, where he immediately went collapsed. He went to a deep sleep, from which he never woke up.

The 37-year old fisherman became the only casualty of the JTF operation in Agge. He was, however, not shot, several sources, including Williams Isiayei, affirmed.

The first ordeal of residents later paled into insignificance against the seconding coming of the troops, as they reportedly unleashed a wanton destruction of property and an orgy of arson on residents.

During the visit on Wednesday, our correspondent counted no fewer than 150 houses that were razed to the ground. Properties that could be worth close to whopping quarter of a billion naira or more were either looted or burnt to the ground.

In its first official reaction to the invasion, the Coordinator, JTF Joint Media Campaign Centre, Lt. Col. Rabe Abubakar, described the operation as a routine cordon and search. The JTF image maker said it was part of an orchestrated strategy to rid the region of militants and illegal bunkering.

Abubakar’s reaction, which came on the heels of an extensive report on the incident by The Nation of Tuesday, August 5, said the task force believed that the community was being used criminals to attack its troops.

A few hours before the Agge invasion on Friday, August 1, a number of gunmen invaded the Logistics Base of the special military outfit deployed to the Niger Delta in 2003. Two soldiers were killed in the ‘battle’ at far away Bomadi, in Delta State .

The attack on the JTF base was followed by a similar sortie against the task force’s Fast Attack Crafts by suspected militants. The armed attackers overpowered the troops and commandeered two of the vessels after seizing a number of weapons from the soldiers of the Nigerian Army.

There was also a development before the attack on the two military targets.

The JTF, under its new Commander, Brig. Gen. Wuyep Rimtip, had launched a running battle against illegal bunkering operations in his areas of responsibility. The renew ‘war’ against illegal bunkering yielded some spectacular results. So much so that he started receiving death threats from the warlords and ringleaders, who threatened to deal with him if he did not relent.

Still unrelenting, the task force raided Tuomo Community in Bomadi Local Government Area of Delta State, where a stunning 111 illegal refineries were destroyed by its troops. The illegal refineries where purportedly owned by militant groups who resulted to crude refining of stolen crude oil because of their inability to evacuate oil stolen from pipelines in the creeks of the volatile region.

Before that JTF soldiers arrested fourteen Filipinos for alleged illegal bunkering off the shores of Bayelsa State . The foreigners are currently standing trial in the oil city of Warri , Delta State .

Col. Abubakar said the operators of the illegal refineries and oil barons whose activities were affected by the operation of the task force carried out the attacks on its formations.

He said the task force believed that the hoodlums who attack troops were from Agge, which he also claimed harboured criminals and illegal bunkerers operating in the areas. He further claimed that a number of arms and ammunition were recovered during the operation.

Its troops, he said, did not burn down any dwelling in the course of the operation, rather, he said the houses must have caught fire during the exchange of gunfire between ‘own troops’ and the militants.

Independent investigations carried out by our correspondent in the community during Wednesday visit, showed Lt. Abubakar’s version of the burning to be rather woolly as there were only a handful of plastic drums usually found in such riverside communities and residents said they could hardly had cause the wanton burning observed.

Although he did not quite say that they were found in the community, the JTF mouthpiece also claimed that anti-aircraft missiles were recovered as a result of the JTF exercise during the period.

But for retired Director of Personnel, State Primary Education Board (SPEB), Delta State , Mr. Augustin Isiayei, the JTF are desperate to cover up their atrocities by giving the community a bad name.

Contrary to Abubakar’s justification, he said the troops that invaded Agge that morning came “to plunder, vandalise and loot the resources of the people of the community.

“We were woken up by gunfire near our greatest shrine that has been there since time immemorial. It is at the shrine where we settled certain quarrels among our members. We started running when the shooting started. I was on this side of the community and our king was on the other side (pointing to the far end a river). My house was vandalised. They came here to plunder and vandalise.”

He flayed the task force for stooping so low to tell such fallacious stories and wondered “where is the honour of the soldier that we used to hear about, that an officer’s word is his bond?

“They didn’t see any gun, that I can tell you because if it was otherwise, they would have displayed it for all to see. I would not be surprise if they come up with some guns and say it was recovered here, we will insist that they prove it with finger prints because we have grown used to such lies by the police and military men.

“That claim (of weapons), I can tell you without fear of contradiction, I am a retired civivl servant, I am over 60 years old and I put in 35 years of service, I am telling you this to let you know that I can never stoop to their level of lying, they did not see anything here it is just military propaganda..

“They unjustly destroyed our town, innocent people are being victimised, we want justice. If they said we are militants, let them show the world how the ‘militants’ resisted them, they should show us their casualties and bring out the people they subdued here. If we had resisted them our people would have been killed. The only person that died suffered from cardiac arrest,” he maintained.

If the retired civil servant was angry, Monday Lugbeinwei, a member of the Redeemed Christian Church of God (RCCG), was despondent when our correspondent met him front of what used to be his house.

He was on his way to the Redemption Camp, bear Lagos State, that Monday when reports reached him that his house and all he has had been razed by fire set to his house by the soldiers.

“We were on the way to Lagos , I and my wife. In fact we were already at Benin , when my telephone rang and somebody from the town told me that soldiers had invaded the community and set everything on fire. They said my house was among the scores of houses razed by the rampaging soldiers,” he said.

At that point, Lugbeinwei, a marine transporter, said he was faced with a hard choice of running back to ascertain the extent of damage to his entire property and his faith and commitment to God. “But I decided that my loss can wait, I must go and serve my Lord with other members of my faith.”

But his faith did not undo, physically, the havoc the soldiers had wreaked on him: three outboard engines, worth over N1.5 million, household items, wares, fishing equipment, his wife’s items of trade.

“My entire life savings, what I spent the whole of my youth working to acquire are all gone. The only things left were the things we were taking to the camp for the programme. But we are giving thanks to God, because that is what he wants from us in everything.

“I lost the entire house built on a stretch of 100x50 land. You are asking me the extent of my loss, can you quantify the sweat of a life time; can you undo what the soldiers have done? I can tell you that I have lost over N7 million in this inferno. I came back here to see the extent for my self, I couldn’t bring my wife with me, she is at Aladja (in Udu Local Government Area of Delta State),” he stressed.

Perhaps the man that suffered the most material lose was Chief Samuel Alla, a famous deep sea fisherman, who lost seven houses – one of his, one each of his three wives, three for his children.

Alla, a chief of Kou Clan, was still dazed, ten days after the incident. He said, “As I stand before you, this is all there is to me, I have no other cloth, no other hat and no other shoe. You are seeing the whole of me.

“They came , destroyed shot at engine boats they saw on the waterside, I am a fisherman, that is why if you see one of the outboard engines they burnt it is 40hp Yamaha, what does a bunkerer need a 40hp engine for? It is fishermen who use them. Who do you think can console me; do you think that even if the government comes here and say they want to compensate us I can get my life back on track with the cost of what I lost? If we had arms we would have resisted this destruction,” he lamented.

But our correspondent gathered that a man did resist the soldiers. His name is Alfred Omonifegha, who resisted, not with guns, but his will. “When they came, I ran initially, but later when I saw people’s houses going up in flames, I returned.

When they got here they said they were going to burn down my house and I should leave, but I told them they have to burn me with the house, I cannot rebuild another one if they burn it any way. So that started beating me, flocked me, but I insisted that they burn me along in the house. Later, they saw some government books inside the house. The books belong to the primary school, I offered to keep it for the teachers because they have no space for them. So when the soldiers saw the books, they said, ‘this house must be government house, lets leave it’, he said even as he showed our correspondent the marks of his torture.

The list of victims is endless: Tom Selegha, a 29-year-old okada rider, married with two wives ad two children. The carcasses of his three motorcycles were lying forlornly beside his burnt house, during our visit.

“Please tell the government that they should remember me and send me even one okada so that I can feed my wife and children. Life must go on, you see me now, I am trying to rebuild my house,” he said. And, he was. He had, with the help of his wife, retrieved dozens of burnt roofing zincs and was cobbling them together when our reporter met him.

“I have to get something to cover up the place because we now sleep in the open but some nights when it rains, like it did last night, it is terrible. We have to stay awake until rain stops. Even at that time it is no longer possible to sleep because the ground would be soggy,” Selegha said in Pidgin English.

Apart from the widespread burning of property, the soldiers also allegedly raided various homes and stole money, GSM handset and portable electronic devices from the victims of the raid.

Retired primary school teacher, Chief Lawrence Orukemezougha, wondered who N80,000 disappeared from his wife’s house that was partially burnt, wondering, “The boxes where also not burnt yet the money disappeared, who took them, the soldiers of course.

‘True’, chipped in Mrs. Eunice Eddy who claimed she lost over N750,000:00 both in cash and valuables to the invaders. “I had just returned from Onitsha where I went to stock my shop the previous night when they came, by the time I returned from the bush, my money and other valuable were stolen and burnt down by the soldiers, god will punish them,” she vowed amidst tears.

Meanwhile, the community members were trying to pick up the bits and pieces of their lives again. Those who able to savage half-burnt zincs and other roofing materials are cobbling them together for protection against the elements.

SHELL BOOST NIGERIA OIL PRODUCTION BY 500,000 BARRELS PER DAY

Repair works on the strategic Trans Ramos Trunk Line and other facilities of Shell Petroleum Development Company that were damaged by militants in the Niger Delta region are getting closer to completion.

Similarly, our correspondent gathered that the company’s re-entry programme into oil facilities shut down during the 7-year Warri Crisis among others is progressing.

Already, clean up of crude oil spillages resulting from the militants’ attacks on the facilities are nearing conclusion, our correspondent gathered.

But there were concerns that the Egwa and Odidi Flow Stations in Delta State may not come on stream as quickly as was expected because of paucity of funds.

It was gathered that the Federal Government’s inability to provide its counterpart funding for the Joint Venture projects could mar progress so far recorded in the re-entry programme.

But SPDC’s Precious Okolobo told our correspondent in an email interview that SPDC was making good progress in its re-entry and repair works in Delta and Bayelsa states.

On its re-entry in the West, Okolobo said, “(Shell) is working closely with communities and the Delta State Government”, adding, “We have made good progress in repairing facilities damaged in militant attacks.

“And also, (we are) cleaning up the environment from spills resulting from these unfortunate incidents. We are continuing to progress the restoration works in the West,” he added.

On the fate of the company’s facilities in Ramos River boundary between Bayelsa and Delta states, Okolobo said: “Restoration works are continuing in some of our facilities in Bayelsa State including Trans Ramos Trunkline.”

Independent investigation by our correspondent however revealed that the company’s repair activities are being hampered by paucity of fund.

It was gathered that the Federal Government, which own 60% of the Joint Venture has consistently defaulted in meeting its funding of the partnership, a development oil industry sources said the company has forced to the company to work at a pace dictated by available fund.

Nevertheless, our investigation further revealed that SPDC’s production from Delta State hovers between 180,000 to 200,000 barrels of crude oil per day.

Delta State Governor, Dr. Emmanuel Uduaghan, whose state has slipped to fourth on the list of oil producing states, confirmed that oil production from SPDC has gradually risen to 200,000bpd.

Uduaghan, who spoke at a programme organised by Vanguard for Transparency and Democracy at the PTI Conference Centre, lamented the slow pace in repairing other strategic facilities, including the Odidi and Egwa platforms of the company.

Oil industry sources said the restoration of the facilities to full production could take SPDC yields in the state to 500,000 barrels per day.

ASARI TASK NIGER DELTANS TO MONITOR THEIR GOVERNORS

Niger Delta activist, Alhaji Mujahid Dokubo Asari, has called on the Federal Government to as a matter of urgency grant amnesty to repentant criminal gang leaders, militants and their members.

He said the militants’ state government should provide encouragements to the militants in the area of scholarship for them to get educational qualification and skill acquisition.

Besides, Asari advised people of the region to hold their governors accountable, saying it is the only way of ameliorating the crisis in the region.

In a paper titled: The Role of Niger Delta Communities in Conflict Resolution, delivered at a workshop organised by National Union of Petroleum and Natural Gas in Owerri, Asari accused political officeholders of frittering away 13% derivation fund won by Niger Delta activists, some of whom paid the supreme price.

He said, “One way of ameliorating the crisis in the region is for the state government to be held accountable to the people. The monies accruing to the oil bearing states under the 13% derivation was from the painful struggle and sacrifices of the people of the oil bearing communities as exemplified in the supreme price paid by Ken Saro-Wiwa and other martyrs.

“It was not the political office holders who made it possible for the Nigerian state too grudgingly part with the so-called 13% derivation funds. It is therefore ironical, that the people who fought and paid the supreme price for the realisation of this fund are no in charge of its management and disbursement and it is the people on the side of the Nigerian state who are known collaborators and “Uncle Toms”, who now manage and disburse these funds.

“How can this conflict and crisis be abated while the real stakeholders are not even given the back bench but are totally driven away with scorn and insults by the very people who claim that all was well and fine with the Niger Delta when most of us were in the trenches.

“With this situation, the crisis, conflict, strife and circle of violence wwill never come to an end in the region. Until these government officials are made to surrender a greater percentage of these derivation funds to the people of the oil bearing communities through the setting up of state oil producing areas development commissions as it has been done in Ondo, Edo, Delta and Imo States.”

Similarly, the leader of the Niger Delta Peoples Volunteer Force and Alabo Ed-Abali of Kalabari Kingdom suggested that a minimum of 70% of the derivation fund should be paid to the oil commissions.

“I suggest that 70% of the 13% derivation fund should be allocated to these commissions and the managers of these commissions should be nominated to the commission by the oil bearing communities themselves and not political appointees of the various Niger Delta state governors’, he added.

NIGERIAN TROOPS THWART THEFT OF $7 MILLION CRUDE OIL

The Joint Task Force code-named ‘Operation Restore Hope’ in the Niger Delta engaged suspected illegal crude oil bunkerers in a fierce gunfight that lasted for several hours between Thursday night and Friday morning.

Casualty figure, if any, was not known at the time of this report yesterday.

However, our correspondent reliably gathered that it occurred around a boundary community between Delta and Bayelsa State.

Three suspects were arrested along with some paraphernalia of the illicit deal by the JTF troops, which later subdued the suspected hoodlums shortly before the break of dawn.

Confirming the report, the Coordinator, JTF Media Campaign Centre, Lt. Col. Rabe Abubakar, said, 20 barges used to convey stolen crude oil from oil facilities to waiting vessels in the high sea were seized during the operation.

He said, “In continuation of the efforts of the JTF to eradicate the illegal bunkering and pipeline vandalism to the barest minimum and also restore peace and sanity in the Niger Delta, the men of the JTF through its intelligence, surveillance and proactive operation led to the intercepting and arrest of 20 crude oil barges at the sea close to Aggei in Delta State.”

Our correspondent’s investigation revealed that the JTF’s effort on Thursday night may have saved the nation a whopping $7.1 million.

Oil industry sources told our correspondent that the 20 barges could have been laden with up to 62,000 barrels of crude oil.

“An average barge can take up 3,105 barrels of crude oil depending on the size and other factors including the quantity those involved are able to siphon into it. Assuming all the barges were loaded, we could be talking about over 60,000,” an oil expert who craved anonymity revealed.

In a related development, Col. Abubakar told our correspondent that a 5-man gang that specialised in oil pipeline vandalism was intercepted and subsequently arrested in Ughelli South Local Government Area of Delta State.

He said the gang members were arrested at the Otorogu Gas Plant operated by Shell Petroleum Development Company (SPDC).

The suspects (names withheld) were reportedly caught while scooping petroleum products, including condensate, from the pipeline.

“Items recovered from the pipeline vandals included one 18-seater midi bus with registration number Nassarawa XA 147 KEF, eight empty drums and four hose used in siphoning petroleum products,” he added.

Similarly, the JTF image-maker revealed that its troops discovered 52 12” pipes vandalised from the Odidi Platform of SPDC: The facility has been down since 2006 when suspected militants invaded the station and looted strategic equipment.

He said, “The JTF Commander (Brig. Gen. Wuyep Rimtip) while inspecting the stolen piles, stressed that he will not rest on his oars in the patriotic assignment given to him to rid the region from all forms of illegal oil activities.”

Rimtip, according to Abubakar, appealed to community leaders and well meaning indigenes in the region to assist the JTF with useful information that could lead to “combating miscreants in their areas.”

REBUILD DESTROYED AGGE: NIGERIA GOVT URGED

FROM DIMENE EGBAIMO

The National Union of Ijaw Students (NUIS) has called on the Federal Government (FG) to immediately rebuild Agge just as it called for withdrawal of the Joint Military Task Force which razed down the community in alleged chase of militants which attacked its base in Bomadi and allegedly carted away weapons.

In a statement endorsed by Comrades Stephen Omare, Endurance Bekenawei, and Ebilade Obiri, President, Vice President and Public Relations Officer respectively, the NUIS said it was shocked that the FG was yet to visit Agge to ascertain the extent of damage with a view to ameliorating the suffering of the law-abiding citizens whose sources of livelihood were lost to the invasion. The body said if the FG was not in an orchestrated decimation, by installment, of the Ijaw nation, it was now more than apparent that military occupation of the Niger Delta through the JTF was a menace to law-abiding citizens.

“We wish to let the FG and the world know that as students, our stay and sustenance in Nigerian Universities not sited in our lands depend on our parents’ means of livelihood now damaged in Agge by the JTF. Let the FG rebuild Agge so that things can begin to look up from the difficulties Ijaw students of Agge extraction and environs have been thrown into. Why is it that each time the JTF is in pursuit of criminals, it is the innocent, defenceless mothers, fathers, citizens and communities that suffer assault while the culprits remain at large? Is that professional soldiery. ?”, NUIS queried.

Meanwhile, the Secretary of the Ijaw Youth Council, Western Zone, Comrade Preye Okaba says the 8pm-till-dawn curfew imposed by the JTF on Bomadi should be lifted or greatly relaxed. He stated that while military occupation in the Niger Delta is undesirable, a military that is alert and professional need not impose curfew and make residents uncomfortable before it could ward off feared attack from so-called militants.

TROOPS KILL 12 CIVILIANS - MEND ALLEGES

SHOLA O'NEIL, Warri.

The Movement for the Emancipation of the Niger Delta (MEND) yesterday accused the Joint Task Force (JTF) of fatally shooting and killing civilians in Bayelsa state on Sunday afternoon.

Twelve persons reportedly died when soldiers allegedly opened fire on a boat conveying students from Yenegoa to Fropa in Southern Ijaw Local Government Area of the state.

A man in his early 20s, who sustained severe gunshot wounds, was among the survivors, it was gathered.

Although the report could not be independently confirmed at press time yesterday, the JTF debunked the report, describing it as cheap propaganda by MEND

Lt. Col. Rabe Abubakar of JTF’s Joint Media Campaign Centre said the report was “utterly baseless, false and irresponsible”.

But a statement by MEND’s Jomo Gbomo claimed that the incident occurred around Yenegoa-Fropa route in Southern Ijaw Local Government Area of Bayelsa State.

“A civilian commercial transport boat which plies the Yenagoa - Fropa (southern Ijaw) route of Bayelsa state was attacked by the men of the military Joint Task Force (JTF) on Sunday, August 24, 2008 by about 16.30 Hrs.

“The JTF's explanation of the attack which led to the death of 12 passengers and one critically injured survivor made up of students, women and children was that they heard the sound of gunfire minutes before the emergence of the passenger boat.

“This unfortunate killing of innocent civilians again calls for the replacement of the military task force with the police in civilian areas. It is clear that the soldiers acted out of panic and indiscipline and may even have been drunk.

“MEND will not issue any threat over this painful waste of lives but will retaliate at the appropriate time before notifying the public.

“We call on the Bayelsa state government to investigate the incident and compensate the families of the victims as soon as possible,” Gbomo added.

The Movement for the Emancipation of the Niger Delta (MEND) has rejected an offer of $20 million dollars (about N2.3 billion) made to it by the Federal Government to fend off attack on staff of Julius Berger Nigeria Plc in the Federal Capital Territory (FCT), Abuja.

The militant organisation had on Monday 4 August, warned the German construction giant to vacate all project sites in the FCT as from today.

Following the threat, MEND claimed in a statement on a website that the Federal Government, through the Secretary to the Government of the Federation, Alhaji Babagana Kingibe, offered $20 million to it as bribe to prevent the impending attack on Julius Berger.

In a statement signed by Jomo Gbomo, the group’s spokesman, and made available to P.M.News, MEND reiterated its warning that staff of Julius Berger vacate all project sites in Abuja, from today.

“To demonstrate our seriousness, MEND has rejected an offer of a $20 million bribe by the Federal Government through its Chief negotiator, the Secretary to the Federal Government.

“We suggest that the government puts that money to better use through the moribund National Emergency Management Agency (NEMA), by providing relief materials such as tents, blankets, medicine, pottable water to the displaced Agge Community in Bayelsa state,” MEND stated last night.

However, effort to confirm MEND’s claim about the bribe from the Federal Government proved futile at press time.

The Niger Delta militant group warned that disregarding its threat would amount to putting the expatriate staff, including the two currently being held hostage, at risk.

MEND, in a statement issued last week, warned that failure to vacate its staff from construction sites and halt all ongoing projects in the FCT “will result in unprecedented deadly attacks on the expatriate staff of Julius Berger inside Abuja and other parts of the country, until they comply.”

The police authorities, which are not taking the threat lightly, have warned MEND not to come near Abuja, as such move would amount to a suicide attempt.

According to reports, security has been beefed up in Abuja and its environs, while security agencies have intensified patrols in the FCT to ward off any attack by the militants.

IJAW STUDENTS CONDEMN INVASION OF AGGE

The National Union of Ijaw Students (NUIS) has called on the Federal Government (FG) to immediately rebuild Agge community, which was ravaged during August 4 invasion by the Joint Task Force.

The student group expressed surprise the Federal Government was yet to send official delegation to ascertain the extent of damage and ameliorate the suffering of the people, three weeks after the attack.

NUIS also called for the withdrawal of the Joint Military Task Force from the region in the wake of the action, which the task force said was in pursue of militants who attacked its base in Bomadi and carted away weapons.

In a statement signed by Comrades Stephen Omare, Endurance Bekenawei, and Ebilade Obiri, President, Vice President and Public Relations Officer respectively, NUIS urged the government to take urgent steps to ameliorate the suffering of thousands of residents of the area.

They expressed “shocked that the FG is yet to visit Agge to ascertain the extent of damage with a view to ameliorating the suffering of the law-abiding citizens whose sources of livelihood were lost to the invasion.”

The body said if the FG was not in an orchestrated decimation, by instalment, of the Ijaw nation, it was now more than apparent that military occupation of the Niger Delta through the JTF was a menace to law-abiding citizens.

“We wish to let the FG and the world know that as students, our stay and sustenance in Nigerian Universities not sited in our lands depend on our parents’ means of livelihood now damaged in Agge by the JTF.

“Let the FG rebuild Agge so that things can begin to look up from the difficulties Ijaw students of Agge extraction and environs have been thrown into. Why is it that each time the JTF is in pursuit of criminals, it is the innocent, defenceless mothers, fathers, citizens and communities that suffer assault while the culprits remain at large? Is that professional soldiery?” NUIS queried.

Meanwhile, the Secretary of the Ijaw Youth Council, Western Zone, Comrade Preye Okaba says the 8pm-till-dawn curfew imposed by the JTF on Bomadi should be lifted or greatly relaxed.

He stated that while military occupation in the Niger Delta is undesirable, a military that is alert and professional need not impose curfew and make residents uncomfortable before it could ward off feared attack from so-called militants

$7.5m (N800 Million) Voodoo Money Scam: Calls for probe of NDDC

$7.5m (N800 Million) Voodoo Money Scam: Calls for probe of NDDC

Calls for comprehensive probe of the Niger Delta Development Commission (NDDC) mounted yesterday on the heels of suspension of its Chairman, Amb. Sam Edem, for allegedly spending N800 million on voodoo.

The acting chairman of the commission, Barrister Bassey Dan-Abia had said last Thursday at NDDC’s headquarters in Port Harcourt that the Agency’s money was not in any way involved in the ugly development around the suspended chairman.

But Niger Delta activist, Alaowei Afro Biukeme, vowed to mobilize one million niger Deltans to Abuja on a peaceful protest if investigation on the suspended chairman of the Niger delta Development Commission (NDDC), Ambassador Sam Edem and the entire Board of the commission was not made public within 30 days.

He said Dan-Abia was being economical with the truth, wondering how the Chairman of NDDC could raise N800 million for such flimsy use.

Alaowei Biukeme, the chairman of Izon-Ebi Oil Producing Community Task Force, insisted yesterday that NDDC money was involved in the matter that led to the suspension of Ambassador Edem.

While saying that the acting chairman of the commission was being economical with words, Alaowei Biukeme said the whole world must be told where a public servant like Ambassador Edem got a whooping sum of N800 Million to splash on a native doctor.

According to him, if the outcome of the investigation was not satisfactory, he would mobilize men and women to demonstrate before the President at Abuja .

Alaowei Biukeme who is also the CEO of Afrotex International Marine Services warned that any attempt to sweep the matter under the carpet would not be accepted and tasked the Senate House Committee on NDDC, the House of Representatives Committee on NDDC and the Police to get to the bottom of the matter.

“We want the Senate Committee, the House of representatives on NDDC and the Police to properly investigate the suspended chairman of the NDDC within 30 days and give the Nigerian people, especially those of us from the Niger Delta Region a feedback or we will mobilize our people to Abuja to demonstrate for the President to sack the entire members of the NDDC Board,” he said.

According to him, “The whole world is aware already of the fraud that the commission has become and this is one case these people cannot use money to influence, therefore we are giving them 30 days to tell us the outcome of the investigation, if not we will go and protest before the president because the Due Process that he is campaigning if it does not work out, then we will take other ways to make it work”

Said he; “If we keep silent over this matter and he is left off the hook by the police that it is a ritual case, we are not going to accept it because that money belongs to us. We want that money back into the coffers of NDDC for the development of the neglected region”

“We want our police to carry out a proper investigation on the suspended chairman as well as the entire Board of the commission because all funds of the Agency are strictly meant for our development. The suffering people of the oil rich Niger Delta wants to know where a public servant like Ambassador Edem who has not served for four years got N800 Million to pay a native doctor,” he stated.

STUDENT SET UP RANDY LECTURER IN COEWA

A sex scandal has hit the College of Education Warri, Delta State, after a staff of the institution was caught literally pant down with a female student, Ms Joyce Sidi.

Sidi said the the lecturer, a Mr. Akpohwohwo allegedly being harassing for sex.

She reportedly set up the lecturer after he allegedly refused to allow her graduate because of her refusal of his sex advances.

The alleged victim, Miss Joyce Sidi, was admitted in 2001/2002 session and she is yet to graduate: she blamed her fate on her refusal of alleged sexual overtures from some lecturers of the institution.

However, our correspondent gathered that a lecturer at the Religion and Social Studies Department, identified as Mr. Felix Akpowovwo, may have become the scapegoat after the lady set her up.

He was caught naked with the lady at a hotel located in Marine Quarters area of Warri.

It was gathered that Sidi had earlier informed some top officials of the institution as well as a reverend father of Akpowovwo’s alleged overtures after which she plotted his ‘downfall’.

“He told me that if I would go out with him my result and graduation would be guaranteed, that he is the god of CRS (Christian Religious Studies) and that his words are law,” Joyce Sidi told our correspondent.

The 27-year old student further revealed that the lecturer then asked her to move to an hotel in the area, where he usually took other students to adding, “He said I should pay the hotel bill and get back to him.”

But she said she took a step further by informing her spiritual father, who advised her on how to handle the lecturer.

“After I paid the bill, I called my spiritual father and informed him that we were about to move into the room, I told him the room number and he assured me that he would be there at the time.”

Thinking he had finally gotten his heart desire, it was gathered that the randy lecturer took off his cloths and jumped into bed expecting the lady to join him.

Rather than following suit, Sidi reportedly opened the door and let in an official of the college (names withheld), who came in with the reverend father.

But in his version of the story, Akpowovwo who was contacted by our correspondent, denied coercing the lady to have sex with him, saying the incident, which occurred on 29^th of July, was by mutual consent.

He said, “I did not force the girl to the hotel. Beside, I am not the cause of her failure am not her lecturer; she was attracted to me. I asked her for outing, she accepted; she called me on the phone and she even chose the hotel.”

He said it was the student who offered to go with him to the hotel; contrary to Sidi’s claim that he coaxed her into the rendezvous at the hotel.

Consequently, he said, “I did not see anything wrong loving a girl that is not married. I spoke to the girl and she offered to pay part of the hotel bill. I did not force her to the hotel, when has it become a crime for a man to take the girl to hotel?”

Sidi, who spoke with our correspondent on the fall out of the plot, insisted that she wanted Mr. Akpowovwo to be used as a lesson to teach lecturers and other staff of the institution that young girls in the school are there to learn and not to be harassed.

ANOTHER IJAW/URHOBO CRISIS LOOMS IN DELTA STATE OVER OGBE-IJOH

The Ijaw and Urhobo ethnic groups that fought a fratricidal war in Delta State in the 90s could be set for a fresh showdown over the ownership of Ogbe-Ijoh, whihc ironically is the headquarters of Warri South West LGA..... below is a stern warning from the Ogbe-Ijoh people

The attention of the Ogbe-Ijoh Clan Governing Council has been drawn to a publication in the Daily Independent Newspaper of 5th August, 2008 with the above caption and the " The Nation" Newspaper of 7th August, 2008 with the caption " Delta Communities Fight Over Land".

In the said publication, the Aladja Community through its Chairman, Mr Bright Gbada referred to the Ogbe-Ijoh people as ungrateful tenants and that the Headquarters of Warri South-West Local Government Area which is in Ogbe-Ijoh Town is in their land.

The publication is not only misleading and provocative, but it is also subjudice (sic) in that the Aladja people are already in Court with the Ogbe-Ijoh people and also the publication is capable of igniting another round of crisis between the two Communities.

Ordinarily, the Ogbe-Ijoh people would not have joined issues with the Aladja Community, however, because of the misleading nature of the publication and for the public not to take our silence as admission of the assertions of the Aladja Community, we wish to react as follows in order to set the records straight :

1. That the Ogbe-Ijoh people are not tenants to the Aladja people not to talk of being ungrateful tenants. On the contrary, the Aladja people are customary tenants to the Ogbe-Ijoh people, hence they are called Ogbe-Sobo ( Ogbe-Biyou ), a name given to them by the Ogbe-Ijoh people from time immemorial. This fact is clearly stated in their own Udu / Aladja Intelligence Report.

2. That to justify the fact that the Aladja people are customary tenants to the Ogbe-Ijoh people, after they were permitted by Ogbe-Ijoh people to settle at Aladja ( formerly Tambiri ) they bear the name " Ogbe-Sobo" meaning Ogbe-Ijoh Urhobo people until the 1940's. It was the Ogbe-Sobo name that they bore when they had a land case with Isaba Community in 1934 in suit number B / 10 / 1934 between Aya for himself and on behalf of Ogbe-Sobo and Okoro and, Donokoromo for and on behalf of Isaba Communoty, a case the Aladja people lost.

3. Also during the colonial administration in 1952, the Western Region Government established the boundary lines between Ogbe-Ijoh and Aladja when it created the Warri and Urhobo Divisions. Ogbe-Ijoh and it farmlands was placed in Warri Division why Aladja was placed in Urhobo Division and this is still maintained till date by virtue of the boundary between Warri South-West Local Governemt Area and Udu Local Government Area. For the avoidance of doubt, Ogbe-Ijoh Town is in Warri South-West Local Government Area while Aladja is in Udu Local Government Area.

Consequently, we wish to call on the Delta State Government and the Law Enforcement Agents to call the Aladja leadership and the Aladja Community to order in the interest of peace and to stop the persistent harassments of Ogbe-Ijoh indigenes and visitors to Ogbe-Ijoh who are passing through Aladja Community to Ogbe-Ijoh especially property developers.

SIGNED FOR AND ON BEHALF OF OGBE-IJOH CLAN GOVERNING COUNCIL :

MR SAMSON OYIMI

Chairman

MR CLEMENT TEKEDOR

Secretary-General

YOU CAN NOW DRIVE FROM bOMADI TO TUOMO - NDDC COMMISSIONS ROAD

Delta State Governor, Dr. Emmanuel Uduaghan, on Wednesday inaugurated a N2.3billion Bomadi-Tuomo Road project built in Bomadi Local Government Area of Delta State by the Niger Delta Development Commission (NDDC).

Speaking during the ceremony, Uduaghan, who also flagged off the Tuomo-Tamigbe road, urged the Federal Government to ensure even development of the country.

He said his government was committed to development of the state in spite of its lean resources, adding that Vice President Goodluck Jonathan would soon visit the state to inaugurate the Gbaramatu Road projects in Warri South West LGA.

While commending NDDC for the projects, the governor appealed to citizens of the state to cooperate with the contractors handling various projects even as he urged Deltans living outside the state to return home and contribute to its development.

The about 3km road was the first of three-phase road/bridge projects by NDDC in the Bomadi area of the state. Already, the Tuomo-Tamigbe (2^nd phase) was also flagged off yesterday.

The Managing Director of the NDDC, Mr. Timi Alaibe, said the commission took a study on road link from Bomadi to Ojobo, adding that due to the difficult tterrain, decided to embark on the project in phases.

He said the second phase of the road would be the Tuomo – Tamigbe road, while the third, he said would lbe from Tamigbe to Ojobo.

Mr. Alaibe also revealed that the NDDC will handle the opening up of Gabanjolor to Obotebe in Burutu Local Government Area of Delta State.

Also speaking at the occasion witnessed by prominent Niger Deltans, Senator James Manager, representing Delta South at the Senate, commended the NDDC under Alaibe for the road projects.

Manager, who is also the Chair of the Senate Committee on the NDDC, said his committee would be in the area in November to inspect the second phase of the road project.

For his part, the Acting Chairman of the NDDC board, Mr. Bassey Don-Abis, said all the Niger Delta region needed was development, promising that the commission would do its best in this regard.