A combined team of the Joint Task Force, JTF, on the Niger Delta and Police were deployed in Ekpan, Delta State, on Tuesday, following resumption of fresh violence between warring factions in the community.

FOLLOWING Independent National Electoral Commission, INEC’s request for a postponement of the elections from January to April 2011, the National Assembly, yesterday, summoned the INEC Chairman, Professor Attahiru Jega and the Attorney-General of the Federation, Mr. Mohammed Adoke to a meeting next Monday, even as more Nigerians had declared their support for the postponement.

The Jonathan declaration was easily the largest crowd ever pulled to the nation’s foremost political arena. By most newspaper accounts, 23 governors attended. The entire National Working Committee (NWC), most members of the Board of Trustees (BOT) and the National Executive Council (NEC) of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) were fully mobilised.

The Bayelsa State chapter of the Civil Liberties Organisation, CLO, has alleged that some men of the Bayelsa Police Command and soldiers of the Joint Task Force, JTF, have been engaging in large scale extortion from commercial motorists and motorcycle operators in the state.

The VC hoped that at the end of the conference, “practical and implementable recommendations would be made that would serve as position paper for developing countries at the Mexico 2010 UN-Global Summit on climate change.”