By Anayo Okoli

UMUAHIA—THE high spate of kidnapping in South-East states in recent time has been blamed on the inability of the Federal Government to integrate the people of the zone, particularly Abia and Imo states which are members of the oil producing communities, into the amnesty package given to militants in the Niger Delta.

A conference organized by a civil rights group, the Human Rights, Justice and Peace Foundation, to seek a lasting solution to the problems of crime, especially kidnapping, urged the Federal Government to, as a matter of national importance, consider a comprehensive amnesty package for those militants in Abia and Imo States.

The conference, which was attended by leaders of Non-Governmental Organizations, NGOs, Community Based Organizations, CBOs, Faith-Based Organizations, FBOs, Road Transport Workers, Market Traders Associations, Youth Organizations, Socio-Cultural Organizations, Religious bodies, Traditional Institutions, Media, Government, among others, in Abia State, also called for constitutional power for governors to enable them have control over the police.

The conference said it was erroneous to hold the governments of the South-Eastern states, including Abia, where the problem of kidnapping appeared to be spiralling of out control, responsible for the crime, instead of the Federal Government which left out the states in its amnesty programme.

The conference maintained that kidnapping was incubated and hatched by the people of the South-South geo-political region in their agitations for self-determination and resource control and some of them, having lost media attention and the palliative measures dished out by the Presidential Amnesty Committee, were depressed and frustrated and moved to the South-East and resorted to creating insecurity in the entire South-East.

“That the Presidential Amnesty Committee, apart from not taking adequate care of Niger Delta militants, excluded Abia and Imo from the amnesty package, not minding that youths from the oil producing communities of these states participated in the militancy in the Niger Delta. For examples, the committee did not open arms collection centres in Abia and Imo, let alone cater for the militants from the oil producing communities in these two states.”the conference observed.