NIGER DELTA REPUBLIC DECLARATION: Military storms Bayelsa

·  Planners abandon plot

 

Troops on Monday took over strategic positions in Boro Town, Kaiama, in Kolokuma-Opo­kuma Local Government Area of Bayelsa State over threats by militants under the aegis of the Adaka Boro Avengers (ADA) to declare a “Niger Delta Republic.”

Before the military’s action, the militants had slated yester­day both to declare the purport­ed republic and open its head­quarters in Kaiama, the country home of the late Ijaw freedom fighter, Major Isaac Adaka Boro.

Apparently dazed by the huge presence of the soldiers and other heavily armed secu­rity agents, the planners imme­diately cancelled the exercise.

The plot by the Avengers to declare a Niger Delta Repub­lic comes after members of the Indigenous Peoples of Biafra (IPOB) and the Movement for the Actualisation of the Sover­eign State of Biafra (MASSOB) have long initiated the struggle for the creation of a Biafra Re­public from Nigeria.

The push for Biafra Republic and Niger Delta Republic how­ever share similar historical back­grounds.

On February 23, 1966, the late Boro declared the Niger Del­ta Republic under the Ijaw Volun­teer Force but his ambition was truncated by federal forces after 12 days of fierce battle.

And between 1967 and 1970, the Federal Government waged a war to abort Biafra Republic an­nounced by the late Chief Chuk­wuemeka Odumegwu-Ojukwu.

Shocked residents of Kaiama told journalists yesterday that they started noticing mass move­ment of troops in their area on Saturday, adding that by Sunday, more troops had arrived the com­munity with soldiers conducting stop-and-search operation on ve­hicles on the East-West Road.

One of the residents said that they became calm when none of the soldiers molested them.

Top military officers were however not forthcoming on their mission in Kaiama.

In a statement, ADA said that the exercise was because of the in­tervention of some prominent Ni­gerians from the region.

It particularly praised former President Goodluck Jonathan for moving to stop the declaration of the Republic.

In the statement signed by ‘General’ Edmos Ayayeibo, the militants ordered the Yoruba and Hausa to leave the Niger Delta re­gion and asked their people leaving in other parts of Nigeria to re­turn home for the ceremony.

The statement read in part: “We received calls from prominent leaders like Dr. Goodluck Jona­than, Mrs. Ankio Briggs, Chief Ed­win K. Clark and especially King Alfred Diete-Spiff, calling on the freedom fighters to abort their mission to declare a Niger Delta Republic.

“We adhere to the voice of our people, because our struggle is for the Niger Delta people and not for selfish reasons. But this is not the end. More is yet to come.

“Our mission to cripple the economy of the Nigerian na­tion will not stop until the Nige­rian government is ready to sit on a roundtable to dialogue and re­structure Nigeria.”