By Soni Daniel, Northern Region Editor
High Chief Mike Ekayama Loyibo is the convener of the Niger Delta People’s Congress and a former leader of the Pan Niger Delta Elders Forum, PANDEF, the group at the forefront of the talks with the Presidency on how to end the standoff in the Niger Delta.

In this interview, Loyibo, an Ijaw leader, says the direct talks which the Vice President, Yemi Osinbajo, held with Niger Delta elders in Gbaramatu Kingdom, Delta State, has sent packing people who, according to him, have been using negotiations for pecuniary gains under the guise of dialogue and peace.

He also descends on Niger Delta leaders who, he claimed, have used the money earmarked from the federal purse for the transformation of the region for personal interest and turning round to blame the Niger Delta’s stagnation on the centre.

Excerpts:

Ekayama Loyibo

What does the visit of the Vice President to the Gbaramatu community mean to the Niger Delta?

It means that the President means well for the people of the Niger Delta and has shown commitment to take the peace move to the next level. It was a timely meeting which demonstrates Mr. President’s commitment to treat the people of the oil communities as a special people who deserve better attention than they are currently getting and who deserve better amenities and respect for their enormous contributions to the development of the country. It  has never been this good. He has been able to bring his government closer to the oil producing communities more than ever before. Don’t forget that the problems of the Niger Delta have been known over the years but that no serious effort has been made to confront the challenges headlong. What this government has done by sending the Vice President to meet the people directly means that he has been able to build confidence and move a step further to remove the age-long suspicion that the Federal Government is against the Niger Delta and its interest. You can see that the entire Ijaw nation and other ethnic nationalities were there to meet with the Vice President during the visit.

But a former Minister of Education, Kenneth Gbagi, has warned the Vice President not to joke with the Urhobo. What did the Vice President do to warrant that threat?

With due respect, Kenneth Gbagi is my friend and I do believe that he was speaking for himself. I don’t see what the Vice President said that made him to take him on as if he did anything wrong.  Sometimes, people try to overreach themselves but the visit of the Vice President to Gbaramatu Kingdom was one of the best steps ever taken by any administration to give hope and sense of belonging to the people of the oil communities who bear the brunt of oil production and rightly deserve all the attention that they can be given. We know Kenneth Gbagi   and we should not allow his comment to stall the move being made for the overall well being of the people. He is entitled to his own opinion but such opinion should not be taken to represent the views of the people he is claiming to be speaking for because I don’t think he is the spokesperson of the people.

But Gbagi made a point that the visit excluded key Urhobo leaders and traditional rulers despite the fact that key oil and gas institutions are situated in Urhoboland?

Let me also tell you that if the Presidency wants to solve the problem of militancy, it is not in Urhobo land. We must give priority to the people who are facing the challenges. The current crisis is not   in Urhobo land. It is not Urhobo people who are being killed on daily basis. The military is not in Urhobo land. So,  government knows where they went to and why they went to Gbaramatu. Let me also tell you that by this visit, the Presidency has cemented the ceasefire we worked for and any person who disagrees with the visit is selfish and falls among those who do not want the Niger Delta crisis to come to an end for reasons best known to them.

What are we going to dialogue again when we already know the problem? We have the feeling that the Federal Government is ready to solve the Niger Delta problem and all we need to do is to support it to do so instead of creating new and impossible conditions and turning round to accused the same government of not willing to do our bidding. It is treacherous to do so and we warn those who have been standing on the way of resolving the Niger Delta crisis to give way and allow peace to reign once and for all.

All Nigerians have benefitted from the Niger Delta over the years as the economic zone of Nigeria. What the Buhari government has done is good and we should stop blaming him because even when we had our son in the Presidency,   he did not do anything to address the age-long problems of the Niger Delta. President Jonathan came and left the Niger Delta the way he met it and people are now complaining against Buhari as if he created the problems of the Niger Delta. We must desist from demonising Buhari on  a problem his government merely inherited and team up with him to address whatsoever is the problem. Those criticising Buhari for Niger Delta problems have not been fair at all and we should speak the truth no matter which part of the country we come from.

But President Jonathan laid the foundation stone of the Maritime University in Okerenkoko and also paid billions of Naira for the take-off of the same institution even before the passage of the enabling law by the National Assembly?

He did not have the mind to establish the university because nobody establishes a university without a legal mandate. As far as I am concerned, Jonathan, a son of the Niger Delta, never had the political will   to make the Maritime University a reality in Ijaw land. To me, he failed Ijaw people and Nigerians. So, when we continue to blame other leaders in Nigeria, let us first ask our leaders   from the Niger Delta what they have been able to do for our people with the billions of Naira that they have been receiving from oil and other sources since the advent of democracy in 1999. Where have our governors and other leaders from the Niger Delta who have held strategic offices since then and now kept the money allocated by the Federal Government for the development of the Niger Delta?

Where are the projects and programmes that have been specifically executed by the governors of Cross River, Akwa Ibom, Bayelsa, Delta, Edo, Rivers, Abia, Imo and Ondo states   with the huge billions they have been receiving from the statutory 13 percent? Have our Niger Delta advocates ever sat down to ask them where they have taken the money to or demanded to see the projects they have executed with the huge cash accruing from the derivation fund? It is very annoying for our leaders to always instigate the undiscerning and gullible to criticise the Federal Government of not doing enough for the Niger Delta when they are the real enemies of the Niger Delta people by not making judicious use of the resources made available by the centre for them to develop the Niger Delta. We should start by examining ourselves whether we have done the right thing before blaming the centre for the squalor that has become the lot of the region. We have our sons and daughters in strategic positions but they have failed us woefully by not delivering on their mandates. We should first and foremost search our conscience in this case.

Some people are only criticising the Presidency just to be seen to be relevant and if you give them the responsibility to lead, they become opaque in their dealings with the people.

Where does Tompolo stand in the visit by the Vice President because he was not at the venue as a major stakeholder and High Chief in the Gbaramatu Kingdom?

Well, what I want to say is that Tompolo is in support of the peace move and development of the Niger Delta.   He is one of us and we are in touch with him.

Why was he not at the meeting with the Vice President?

He was not there because all the issues are yet to be settled.

What are the issues?

The issues that   gave rise to militancy in the Niger Delta.

Does the visit by the Vice President satisfy the demands of the Pan Niger Delta Elders Forum, PANDEF?

With dues respect to the leaders of PANDEF, we are very clear on our demands. All of us were there with the Vice President. Our agenda is the same and we all want peace and development in the Niger Delta. Unfortunately, there are some elders among us who want to be seen as the beginning and the end of the Niger Delta who must be worshipped and appeased before there could be peace and development in the area. This is wrong and we need to separate those who ware fanning the embers of discord for their personal benefit and not the overall interest of the Niger Delta.