Assistant Editor (North), CHUKS EHIRIM, writes on attempts by delegates from the South-South to resurrect the resource control debate and strategies by the North to thwart the moves.
With delegates to National Conference delving into their committee deliberations, there is the fear of the issue of resource control which the South- South geo-political zone has made its main agenda, becoming a major source of division among the conferees.
Reports for instance, have it that delegates from the South-South zone have been instructed to insist on 100 percent resource control or nothing. But sources close to Northern delegates told TheNiche that everything humanly possible, will be done to frustrate the demand.
It would be recalled that during a similar conference in 2005, convened by former President Olusegun Obasanjo’s is administration, the issue of resource control was the major point of disagreement between the representatives from the South-South and their counterparts from the North. While the South-South wanted at least 50 per cent control then, the Northern delegates insisted on the prevailing 13 per cent regime. The disagreement between the two groups eventually led to a walk-out by the South-South delegates, a situation that resulted in the abrupt end of the national dialogue then.
In the current dispensation, there are indications that both parties are preparing to maintain very hard stance and dig deeper in their trenches. While an average delegate from the oil-rich South-South does not conceal his or her desire for the zone to have substantial control of its oil wealth, his or her counterpart from the North has devised his or her counter offensive to the agenda.
One of the strategies by the North to disarming the South-South, according to a delegate who pleaded not to be quoted, is to play on sentiments that would work against cohesion from Southern delegates. One of such plots is to resurrect the issue of abandoned propertyof Nigerians, mainly of Igbo extraction, in some parts of the South-South, especially Rivers State. The Igbo had collectively agitated in the past that those whose property in Port Harcourt and other parts of Rivers State, were seized by the military regime after the unfortunate civil war of 1967-1970, should be compensated adequately. This demand has however not been met by successive Nigerian administrations.
It is suspected that in what appears a desperate move at political expediency, the North will use this issue to divide the southern delegates and in the process, stave off the increasing agitation, by South- South, for absolute resource control. According to the source, “there is no other part of this country where Igbo people’s propery were seized by the government after the civil war apart from the South- South. We are demanding that those Igbo property that have been tagged ‘abandoned’, should be returned to their owners”.
He argued further that “up till today, the Jews who have document that could prove their ownership of any property in Europe, are getting them back the holocausts and the World Wars. Why must it be different in Nigeria? We are in the process of healing, so we are demanding the return of the so-called abandoned propery to their rightful owners”.
Apart from this weapon, the source added that the North will seek resource control on the lands in its region, including the Federal Capital Territory, Abuja, as well as on the electricity generated from the Hydro-electric power source at Kainji Dam in Niger State. In his words, “we are also going to agitate for resource control on our lands. If you say you want to control the resources from your oil, we have no problem with that but we too will demand the same thing for our lands in Abuja and other parts of the North as well as for the electricity generation from this place”.
Asked if the Northern delegates have the support of the South-East counterparts on the issue of abandoned propey, he said the Igbo are divided on the issue. “There are those who are here to support President Goodluck Jonathan. They have told us that they will not come out openly to support this demand but that they will offer their support from behind the scene”, he said.
But reacting to an enquiry on this, a Northern delegate and former National Secretary of the Congress for Progressive Change (CPC), Buba Galadima, denied being aware of it, stressing that nobody had told him of such move.
Galadima pointed out however, that part of the demand he and others will make at the conference, is that the resource control as being demanded by South- South, if it sails through, the money must not be given to the governments in the zone but directly to the communities that make up the place.
He also said that the North will present the statistical data of how much that has accrued to the South-South and demand to know what the money had been used for. “We have the data of resources that have been given to the South-South all these years. We are going to demand for what such resources have been used for because we know that the huge sums collected by the leaders from there all these years, have never been put to the use of the common people of the South-South’’, he said.
In his remark, another delegate and the Secretary-General of the National Council for Islamic Affairs (NCIA), Professor Ishaq Oloyede, said he is indifferent to the resource control debate. “As far as I am concerned, I am indifferent because whether it is 10 per cent or 20 per cent, proper management is the issue. People are asking for things that will favour them. As far as I am concerned, mine is devolution of power. I am interested in devolution of power.
“There are certain things that the Federal Government has no business in. More resources should be given to the states to improve the lives of the ordinary citizens. Whether it is 10 percent or 20 per cent in term of resource control is not my business”, he stated.
