President of the Isoko National Youth Council, INYC, Matthew Edugbo, has urged the Federal Government to as a matter of urgency give attention to the Isoko ethnic nationality in the Niger Delta region, South-South Nigeria as it concerns youth empowerment, growth and development.

Edugbo made the call at the one-day pan-Niger Delta Peace and Security Summit, themed: Sustaining Existing Peace in the Niger Delta held in Port Harcourt, the Rivers State capital, Monday. He noted that his call lends credence to the struggle by the Karo Edor-led 11-Man Isoko Group to free both nationalities from the shackles of marginalisation and avoidable poverty.

Edugbo bemoaned what he described as the deliberate marginalisation of Isoko nation in the distribution of national wealth under the current administration noting that it wicked for the Federal government to have for instance award pipeline security surveillance contract to one man who is seated somewhere and been paid huge sums of money for a contract he does deserve let alone have the prerequisites to effectively manage.

According to the youth leader who spoke eloquently at the Portharcourt Sunmit, the FG has overtly turned the Isoko nation and her people into mere onlookers in the scheme of things, particularly in its distribution of resources including infrastructure development in the Delta region.

The livid Isoko youth leader said the proper thing is for the FG to award the surveillance contracts to youth leaders of each ethnic nationality. He stressed further that such a step would not only effectively pave the way for effective management of the oil infrastructure in their domain but the youths will take responsibility for the security and protection of same but it will remove idle youths from the streets and ultimately stem the tide of crimes and criminalities in the region.

Edugbo maintained that the contractors currently managing the surveillance security contract ought not to have awarded the surveillance security of ethnic nations outside their indigenous areas but as it is, the contract reeks of nepotism, racketeering, and rent-seeking in a prebendal politics a development he said is retrogressive capable breeding anarchy.

Indigenous youths, Edugbo further stated should be awarded the surveillance contract in their domain adding, a system whereby a politician is awarded the contract and paid huge sums of money in hundreds of millions of naira for a job not done at the detriment of thousands of unemployed youths of the area is uncharitable and unacceptable to the people of Isoko nation.

He called on President Bola Tinubu, to immediately revoke and re-award properly the surveillance contract to those who are genuinely entitled to it. Indigenous youths he noted, know the terrains and locations of the pipelines and their capacity for a watertight protection of their national monument.

“The billions paid to a political moneybag who has no link with Isoko is enough to favourably engage all Isoko youths for same job in the spirit of promoting public good as against one man’s interest. We have lamented the marginalisation of Isoko nation over the years by successive administrations and we want to call the current FG to as a matter of urgency right the wrongs in the award of the surveillance contract.

“Isoko nation is reputed as a single entity to have the largest number of oil wells in the world, why the Nigerian state find us so cheap to undermine is a puzzle yet to be solved. We seek the surveillance contract for our people, I don’t this is too much to ask from the state,” Edugbo stated.