MEND Nigeria-Movement for the Emancipation of the Niger Delta-MEND-Official News Site -tracking News, Articles, Interviews and Opinions, related to MEND- from 1999 to Present
Warri — THERE are fresh worries in Delta State that the nine foreign oil
workers kidnapped February 18 by the Movement for Emancipation of Niger
Delta (MEND) may not be freed soon with their abductors making a fresh
demand of compensation on the Federal Government for the families of
the villagers allegedly shot dead and injured by the Joint Task Force
(JTF) in the Niger Delta in the three-day bombardment of Ijaw
communities.
Lagos/Warri — Apparently dreading a possible all-out battle between militants, holding nine expatriate oil workers as hostages, and men of the Nigerian Army, hundreds of people from the Gbaramatu Kingdom in Warri have started moving out of the community.
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Lagos — Between the last two weeks when this column was last published and
today, three major incidents with grave implications for the peace of
the polity had occured. The first was the sudden outburst in Maiduguri
in which some deranged religious fanatics wreaked violence on their
fellow citizens simply because they came from other parts of the
country and belong to a different faith. The Maiduguri mayhem had
sparked a retaliatory one in Onitsha where many citizens were killed
equally on irrational basis and properties worth millions of naira were
destroyed.
GOVERNOR James Ibori of Delta State and the Federal Government
raised hope, Tuesday, that the nine foreign oil workers kidnapped in
his state, last weekend, were hale and cheerful and would be released
soon, but the next day, Wednesday, when the governor spoke again to the
press, he was not as promising and confident as he was 24 hours
earlier. Today makes it the eighth-day that the workers are in unlawful
custody and indication that they would be released in a jiffy is
fizzling out. The governor who preferred to call the militants "our
younger brothers" confirmed that the kidnappers said they would not
want to talk about the release of the hostages until they finished
mourning and burial of villagers that were killed in the air raid by
the Joint Task Force (JTF) at Okerenkoko.
IS the appalling show being adapted to stage by armed militants
in the restive Niger-Delta region, that is the kidnap of nine foreign
oil workers and devastation of the nation's oil installations in Delta
state of late, truly an aftermath of the February 15-18 operation by
the Joint Task Force (JTF), code-named Operation Restore Hope to
destroy some barges suspected to be used for oil bunkering?
Lagos — NIGER Delta militants yesterday paraded of the nine foreign hostages before newsmen, vowing not to release the kidnapped oil workers until the military pulls out of the Niger Delta region.
The hostage, Macon Hawkins. 68-year-old Texan, told reporters that he and his colleagues were unharmed and had been well treated since gunmen seized them from their pipe-laying barge.
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ONITSHA erupted. The indescribable anger that provoked the killings
in the city by the lordly Niger reflect the mood in the land. First,
was the killing of Igbo and other Christians, starting from Maidugri,
and spreading rapidly to other places in the North, in a familiar wave
of atrocity. This time, the excuse was provided by the images of
Muhammed. A mob of Moslem fanatics in the north of Nigeria, reacting to
the mostly unflattering representation of the prophet of Islam in a
Danish newspaper, over reached themselves when they began killing and
burning other Nigerians in protest. They went after a familiar target:
the ubiquitous Igbo; the symbol for the northern Moslem fanatic, of all
the things that is wrong with his world. The Nigerian version of the
protests against the Danish newspaper cartoons, in other words, took a
unique turn: while Moslems all over the world directed their anger
against the West, especially the European Union; burning flags and
torching embassies, the Nigerian Moslem turned his attention to the
Igbo, burning and killing; determined to throw one more symbolic punch
in the cycle which began with the killing of the Igbo in 1945 in Jos,
and when Inua Wada organized the first Kano pogroms in 1953. Needless
to say, it has always been taken for granted that the Igbo would roll
over and take it. But this proved to be a miscalculation.
Warri/Port Harcourt — The crisis in the Niger Delta assumed international dimension
yesterday as the Warri Ijaw Peace Monitoring Group (WIPMG) sent a
warning to the government of the United States of America (USA) to
steer clear of the Niger Delta or its forces shall be disgraced if it
dares the people.
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Lagos — December 10 last year, I gave a talk to the Rotary Club of Apakun
Oshodi, in Lagos. Because I had become bored by long written speeches,
where many government officials hide to dodge candid discussions on
critical issues, I decided to speak extempore. While I waited for the
flight at the Nnamdi Azikiwe Airport, Abuja, I tried to think of what
to speak on. One of the things that interfered with my concentration
was the noise and chatter of the happy students of Loyola Jesuit
College, Abuja, who filled the hot waiting lounge.
IJAW militants yesterday alleged that the United States of America (USA) military personnel have stormed the Niger Delta region following the crises that engulfed the area in recent times.
Movement for the Emancipation of Niger Delta (MEND) and Warri-Ijaw Peace Monitoring Group, made the allegation in separate statements and warned U.S government to steer clear of the Niger Delta so as not to aggravate the situation.