A group of ex-militants who claimed to belong to the Bakassi Freedom Fighters have protested the non-payment of their allowances since March 2011 by the amnesty office in Abuja.
They accused the leader of the BFF of conniving with Amnesty Office to short-change them.
The protesting ex-militants who besieged the Cross River State headquarters of the State Security Service in Calabar yesterday, where it was gathered, BBF was, said they were supposed to have been paid their allowances directly from the amnesty office but for some reasons, had to be paid by the BFF leader.
One of the ex-militants, Daniel Asuquo, who said he also goes by Commander Saddam, said: “We are all ex-militants of the Niger Delta, Bakassi Freedom Fighters. We are here for the fact that our general, is sitting on our allowances. For the past two years, we have not been paid our monthly allowances.
He said they had to mobilise themselves to the airport where they caught up with the BBF leader.
“Except something is done today we will not vacate this premises. If he does not give us our money, we are ready to fight him to the finish. We are ready to die. As you can see, the sun is beating us. Nobody on earth would stop the BBF leader from paying us our money. All our allowances, transition safety allowance, housing allowance must be paid. We caught him at the airport yesterday and brought him to the SSS office.
One of the protesting ex-militants, Victor Edet, accused Special Adviser to the President on Niger Delta Affairs, Mr. Kingsely Kuku of not handling the situation well.
“We have been writing to Amnesty Office, but nothing has been happening. So that is why we brought him to SSS so that the agency can help us and do the job.
But the spokesman for the BFF, Nicholas Theophilus, told The Nation yesterday that they did not recognise the protesters as members of the BFF,” adding that “if they are aggrieved, they should channel their grievances to the proper channel and not take the laws into their hands.”
–
Source: The Nation
