Prof.Tony Afejuku is a professor of English and Literature at the University of Benin (UNIBEN). The Itsekiri nationalist in this interview with Vanguard, declares that the Itsekiris may secede from Nigeria if President Goodluck Jonathan fails to handle the issue of Export Processing Zone (EPZ) properly. He further declares that the president lacks all it takes to run for a second term in office just as he warns that 2015 may not be a reality. Excerpts:
By Simon Ebegbulem
What is your take on the Export Processing Zone (EPZ) tug-of-war in Ogidigben between the Itsekiris and the Ijaws?
I align myself fully with the position of the Itsekiri Leaders of Thought. Let President Jonathan tell his Ijaw folks without reservation to obey rule of law. He has disappointed a lot of Nigerians in particular the Itsekiris.
Clearly, we are happy to be underrated. As a minority ethnic nationality, we are weaklings, we agree, but we own our land, and we will not allow customary tenants to take over our territory and include them in phantom kingdom-less kingdoms.
Favourable court judgment
*Afejuku
We know all the lands in which we have got favourable court judgments as far back as when the grandparents and great-grandparents of troublemakers on and in our territory questioned the generosity of our ancestors to them.
Of course, I must add here that then, after all said and done, the ancestors of the current troublemakers accepted their real status. We have necessary documents to back us up. We are people of peace. We are not war mongers. When the time comes peace shall overcome war, peace ultimately shall triumph over war. Peace shall defeat war.
I affirm this as an ardent peace activist. Believe it or not, this shall and must be. For now, it is up to Jonathan to talk some sense into the war minds of his fellow Ijaw people. May he be as broadminded as the sky on the EPZ matter and all matters pertaining to Ijaws and Itsekiris and pertaining to all Nigerians. The choice is for him and his fellow Ijaw brothers.
Presidential election, APC aspirants and Jonathan
First, let me state that it will be an interestingly boisterous presidential election, if the election holds. But if I were Jonathan, I would not attempt to run not to talk of running. What he is aiming to go for is a third term. What for? Why? Technically speaking, he completed the PDP first term when he succeeded the late Yar’Adua.
So if I were Jonathan I would not run. What does he have up his sleeves going by what is going on in Nigeria? What does he want to achieve? Electricity zero, all tariffs in all sectors, including taxation, are very high, excessively so.
He has not achieved anything substantial with all the money generated from these tariffs and from petroleum wealth. Are the universities better? Has he kept his promises to that sector? And look at our roads, look at the East-West Road, how long will it take for that road to be completed? Eternity? The PDP told us long ago that there was a document to the effect that Jonathan would not go beyond one term, but they kept denying, those in the political camp of Jonathan.
The late Abacha who tried to succeed Abacha and the majority of the politicians who are working today with and for Jonathan, happened to partake in that regime. The sycophants should tell Jonathan what became of the hard man of black goggles. Obasanjo wanted to do a third term but he was clever enough to kick out himself because he knew what would have happened to him. Even IBB, why did he step aside?
So let me tell you, it will be a miracle if 2015 is a reality. Let the babalawos be working for them, but God is God because they have been given much time to repent but they have refused to repent. So let us wait and see.
Ijaw/Itsekiri problem and amnesty
This amnesty programme, I never believed and still do not believe in it. The amnesty programme, the amnesty thing was specifically designed as a bribery tool. Secondly, these are not militants, I said that before, and I am saying it again. They are pirates, oil-robbers, vandals and plunderers, criminals capitalizing on the foolishness and selfishness of the political gladiators running and ruining the polity. Simple. And the press is flattering them with flattery tales of their murderous exploits.
The tensions we witnessed, and the war and casualties we are still witnessing everywhere now in the land arose as a result of the tension between Ijaws and Itsekiris, tension that came as a result of greed, those who always want to grab things that don’t belong to them from one group.
Group of minorities
A group of minorities that own what they rightly own and given to them in their home-land by the Almighty God, and this group and its people happen to be a minority group.
Because you are in power, power that is transient, you are using every means of violence and terrorism to get what does not belong to you. You don’t run a nation that way.
Violence and terrorism will always beget violence and terrorism if not now but certainly tomorrow. So this so called amnesty is a kind of lull to retrain and retrain and equip and re-equip for tomorrow’s war but God is God. If we were the majority, for the purpose of argument, by numerical number this rubbish against Itsekiri would not be born. How many Itsekiris have benefited from the so called amnesty programme?
How many Urhobos, how many Isokos, how many none-Ijaws from the Niger Delta have benefited from it? And who are those running it? Answer: Ijaws. So they know what they are doing, they are buying time. If Jonathan happens not to be in power today or tomorrow you will see their true colour. But they will be caged and made colourless by the coming one. You will see.
We have three Warri Local Governments, now they want to share everything but Itsekiris don’t share their areas. We have Itsekiris in some Urhobo lands but we don’t go there to say we own their property. What is destroying us is greed even in Itsekiri-land as well.
The tension that is being generated is the tension of greed. If you look at the papers, Jonathan has set up a campaign team, you will not find any Itsekiri name there. You will not find any Urhobo there. Outside Ijaw nobody is in existence. It is just a question of time.
Northern threats to Jonathan presidency
There was an agreement and the agreement should be given its full meaning. If they agreed on rotation, why not? The North deserves it. Persons of worth do not unsay what they said yesterday for whatever reason. Yes, the North deserves it but the counter-argument is that the Northern people have been in power for several years, what did they do with it, with all the power over the years? But the real fear is that if they get back power they will deal with the South.
But the fear and question and arguments they generate are justified particularly with what a big minority President has been doing. If I were Jonathan I would govern and rule in such a manner that people would beg me to stay on.
And everybody would see me hence as a model of good governance and the Northerners would not be saying what they are saying now. The Northerners would instead be saying if we got power back we would beat your record, the North will not be agonizing the way they are agonizing today.
Let us face it: the man has let the us down, he has let the South-South people down, he has let even his Ijaw folks down, he has let the Niger Delta people down.
The people, some people, at least, will even tell you that he is not in control of the country, that they are just using him as a shield to cover their inefficiencies.
When we talk about nepotism, the first thing the President did was to establish six new universities and put one in his own village. So when he leaves office and power tomorrow as President he will go to the place and they will make him a Professor that he did not work for.
It is ridiculous. We are not saying you should not help your people but there should be some sort of responsibility, some modicum of integrity, some modicum of fairness and fair play in so doing so that we cannot say ah! ah! This man is a nepotistic president. Our founding political fathers never did what we are seeing now before our very eyes. He has over done it.
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