Lucky Obukohwo, Reporting
In the spirit of fairness and equity, the Ijaw National Congress (INC) has called on President Bola Tinubu to appoint an Ijaw person as the next Managing Director of the Nigeria Port Authority (NPA) to give the people a sense of belonging.
In a statement titled “We Demand Equity And Justice In Federal Appointments”, by Prof. Benjamin O. Okaba, the president of (INC), he said that the demand arose because no Ijaw person has occupied that office since the establishment of the organization in 1955.
Okaba lamented the recent publications which reported the proposed appointment of a certain fellow (not Ijaw) as the boss of NPA.
He decried that Ijaw people who are major contributors to the Nigerian economy have been left out of the present government of President Tinubu and have no representation in the entire executive branch of the Federal Government of Nigeria, except for only one federal ministerial position.
While asserting that the situation is not acceptable to the Ijaw people, the president insisted that the acceptance of amnesty by Ijaw people, which has drastically reduced the multifaceted and multidimensional agitations, some of which occasionally injured the national economy, should not be seen as an instrument of subjugating and cowing the Ijaw people.
As the dominant population in five coastal states of Nigeria which contribute immensely to the revenue of the country, he said that Ijaw live in and occupy no less than 65% of Nigeria’s coastal lands, adding however that they have no representation in government ministries charged with the development of the nation’s region and homeland economy.
“These ministries include but not limited to the Ministries of Marine and Blue Economy and its parastatals, transportation and its agencies, etc.
“The Ijaw people have been precluded from participating in matters of the development of their own territory even when the resources of these territories contribute immeasurably to the revenue sustaining the entire nation. We do not and shall not accept this practice of exploitation and under-representation”, Okaba said.
Okaba demanded inclusion in the federal government, particularly the executive branch, insisting that Ijaw be adequately represented in policy formulation, planning and implementation of development projects and programmes in Nigeria’s marine economy and associated ministries, parastatals and agencies.
“We state unequivocally that the only way to allow sleeping dogs lie is for the Federal Government to be fair, equitable and just to the Ijaw who are the real owners of the marine economy.
“We are constrained by the exigencies of the recent federal political developments, especially in terms of appointments, which are skewed in favour of one ethnic nationality to make the following assertions”, Okaba lamented.