Itsekiri Rep's Hopes, Claims On Otuaro-led PAP, False, Laughable--Ijaw Journalists
By Bulou Kosin
The Itsekiri representative at Office of Presidential Amnesty Programme (PAP), Dr. Shola Mese's wrong expectations and claims about PAP led by Dr Dennis Otuaro suggests Mese, may be on personal and divisive mission disapproved by the Itsekiri Monarch.
Addressing the press, President of the Ijaw Journalists Association Worldwide, IJAW, Bulou Kosin, urged Dr. Otuaro to "ignore distractions and sustain the commendable relations with all ethnic groups in the Niger Delta while aiming greater success for the PAP".
"From current reports, Dr. Shola Mese is not and cannot talk about Itsekiri exclusion at the PAP. His grouse is that the Itsekiris that got opportunities under Otuaro's PAP are not from his created divisions among Itsekiri. There were not less than 500 Itsekiri persons graciously accommodated almost at inception who were not captured by the presidential amnesty proclamation terms. Otuaro, by Dr Mese's own admission of amnesty, scholarships and reintegration slots for Itsekiri, is improving on the past, but implying as Dr. Mese does that the Itsekiri must have equal opportunities with the Iarger Ijaw nation within and outside Warri South-West LGA, is to eat their cake and want it back in full. That is inordinate ambition. The more populous Ijaw remain in the driver's seat of the agitations and the hardest hit by the consequences", Kosin informed.
"The Itsekiri, loudly claiming they were not criminals, were civilised and polished citizens incapable of committing pipeline vandalism and associated crimes, were accordingly not captured by President Umar Musa Yar'Adua's verifiable amnesty proclamation terms which bordered on pardon for the aforementioned and related vices. It was not an all-comers' affair", he stressed.
"The Itsekiri also claimed, on record, that their communities were not affected by the military pounding of Ijaw communities in the Niger Delta years up to the Presidential declaration of Amnesty. So how come he presents the Itsekiri as suffering as much as their Gbaramatu-Ijaw neighbors whose communities were confirmed destroyed by the Federal High Court, Asaba, with yet unpaid N99billion cost awarded against the Federal Government/military. This is the fact. Dr. Shola Mese cannot twist or rewrite for us around who watched history turn its pages on the Amnesty issue", Kosin emphasized.
"Also, we find Dr. Shola Mese's claim he was part of the founders of the PAP, laughable. We know Dr. Shola Mese pulled a fast one to facilitate surrender of some dane guns by certain Itsekiri youths at Koko. Were the guns owned by the Itsekiri who earlier claimed they could not be criminal arms-bearers? If he knew the Amnesty Programme was not only for militants, why did he arrange for the arms surrender in Koko after earlier doing same on behalf of the Governor Uduaghan-led Delta State Government for late John Togo and Gen Ezekiel of the Underdogs militant group from Egbema-Ijaw. In any case, what he did, amounted to facilitating the disamarment of persons, not founder of Amnesty Programme as he claimed in reports. Dr Mese should know the difference! Barring facts he should furnish in the public place for effect, we know he was not near the radar of those who conceived the idea that convinced President Umar Yar'Adua to agree and proclaim the Amnesty Programme", Kosin insisted.
