More
than 400 ex-militants today took to the streets of Yenagoa, capital of
Bayelsa State, to protest against the new deal given to them in the
third phase of an amnesty program with the federal government. The
protesters smashed the windscreens of 10 cars and burnt one car during
their demonstration. In addition, the former militants looted shops
along Otiotio Road and Mbiama-Yenagoa Road in the Yenezuegene area of
the state capital.
The
protesters used a machete to cut an unidentified hawker in the back.
Apprehensive businesses in the area hurriedly locked up for fear of
being attacked by the ex-militants, eyewitnesses said. The mayhem
erupted around 9 a.m. and lasted for almost three hours, clogging up
traffic in the state capital as residents scampered for safety. Several
of the protesters said they were dissatisfied with the proposed slots to
be allocated to them under the new amnesty deal.
Last
year, President Goodluck Jonathan had approved 3,642 ex-militants for
training under the new amnesty program. Some protesters told
SaharaReporters that trouble began to brew when the Inter-Agency
Taskforce headed by Air Vice Marshall Gbum told the ex-militants that
they would be entitled to one amnesty training slot for every 15 guns
handed over by a militant camp. The task force is currently on a
verification exercise of ex-militants in the state. It took the
intervention of operatives of the Joint Taskforce (JTF), anti-riot
policemen, officials of the State Security Service and the Nigerian
Security and Civil Defense Corps to bring the tense situation under
control.
The
JTF’s spokesman, Lieutenant Colonel Onyema Nwachukwu, confirmed that
the protest had been quelled, adding that the security outfit played no
role in it. In another reaction, Daniel Alabrah, a spokesman for the
Presidential Amnesty Office, condemned the violent protest, noting that
the ex-militants’ destruction of vehicles was uncalled for. Mr. Alabrah
clarified that the Amnesty Office had no hand in the allocation of slots
to the ex-militants. He added that the Inter-Security Agency would only
recommend a number of slots to them after its verification exercise. A
source said the taskforce was appointed by the Chief of Defense Staff to
verify the quantity of weapons submitted by the former militants.
Our
efforts to reach the head of the Inter-Agency Security Taskforce were
not successful as his mobile phone was not reachable. In an interview,
one of the ex-militant leaders, Tonye Bobo, rejected the proposal to
offer one training slot per 15 guns turned in. He argued that all the
ex-militants who surrendered arms to embrace amnesty should be given a
slot in the amnesty program. “The federal government should abide by the
agreement reached between [the] late President Umaru Yar'Adua and the
ex-militant leaders,” he said. He added: “The proposed 15 guns to one
slot won’t be acceptable to us.”
Another
ex-militant leader, known as Gen. Ebi John, expressed similar
reservations about the controversial proposal on slots. He said there
was the prospect of more mayhem unless the issue was satisfactorily
resolved. “We cannot condone this shabby treatment from the federal
government after surrendering our arms and ammunitions to government to
embrace the amnesty program,” he said.
Source: Sahara Reporters
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