President Muhammadu Buhari has directed Vice
President Yemi Osinbajo to head the special presidential delegation charged
with the task of resolving the crisis in the Niger Delta region.
The Special Adviser to
the President on Niger Delta Affairs, retired Brig.-Gen. Paul Boroh disclosed
this to newsmen on Monday in Abuja.
Boroh said the choice
of Osinbajo as leader of the government’s fact-finding delegation to the
crisis-ridden region was informed by President Buhari’s strategic plan to
engender peace in the region.
The News Agency of
Nigeria (NAN) reports that before now, the Niger-Delta elders were leading the
delegation on the resolution of the crisis.
However, with the new
presidential directive, Boroh said that the Vice President would henceforth
head the delegation.
According to him, this
will meet the President’s expectations of not only building confidence among
the people on government’s intentions but also help in its fact-finding mission
on a workable and lasting solution.
“President Buhari knew
what he was doing when he directed the Vice President to head the delegation.
“You need to see him in
action when he visited different communities in the oil-producing states.
“There is no doubt that
the President knows that peace in the Niger Delta region is crucial to the
development of the entire country,’’ Boroh said.
He said that the visit
of the vice president to the Niger Delta was in phases to cover all Niger Delta
states.
According to him, So
far we have visited Akwa Ibom, Edo, Bayelsa, Rivers and Imo states.
“The next phase will be
Cross River, Abia and Ondo states. By that we would have covered the entire
Niger Delta states.
“This visit is in two
folds. It is both a confidence-building and a fact-finding mission because a
lot of information has been heard about the Niger Delta but no single person
can claim to know all about the Niger delta.
“It requires effort by
all stakeholders toward ensuring that issues of the Niger delta are resolved,”
he said.
He also explained that
efforts were on to pay beneficiaries of the amnesty programme studying abroad.
Boroh said that the
problem arose due to the inability of the Federal Government to meet its
financial obligations in the various countries.
The coordinator
said the Amnesty Office would have to offset a lot of liabilities when
funds allocated to it were eventually released.
He, however,
said that priority would be given to the foreign
beneficiaries, especially those graduating soon.
Boroh said that the
Amnesty Office daily deals with false allegations made against it by some
aggrieved youth craving to benefit from the programme.
He said that the
programme is at the integration phase and it would be difficult to accommodate
new entrants, who were not captured when the amnesty offer was first
put in place.
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