The Kingdom Coordinators of MOSOP met on Wednesday, January 15th
January to assess events, issues and developments as they affect the
people and land of Ogoni, and came out with the following resolutions:
1. We condemn the indignant tendency by the leadership of MOSOP to
attack individuals in Ogoni as a diversion from the issue-centered
tradition and practice of MOSOP; thereby trivializing the focus of the
Ogoni cause, reducing it to a game of interpersonal disagreement and
quarrels which is counter-productive to the execution of the Ogoni
struggle.
It is noted with disapproval how Legborsi Pyagbara attacked the person
of Fred Kpakol on Rhythm 93.7 fm shortly after the December 10, 2013
protest on the UNEP report, painting him as an enemy of Ogoni. The
tradition of MOSOP leadership has been to gather Ogoni people, not to
cast unwarranted aspersions on individuals and scatter.
The MOSOP Coordinators feel persuaded to state that whatever Legborsi
Pyagbara would want to say about Fred Kpakol cannot be equated to what
Senator Magnus Abe did and has been doing to sabotage and destroy
Ogoni. Senator Magnus Abe acting as president of Sani Abacha Youth
Vanguard led Col. Paul Okuntimo in search and killing of Ogoni people
in the years of persecution of Ogoni people. As reported in The Punch
Newspaper of May 17, 2000 Senator Magnus Abe went as far as
castigating and condemning international organizations including
Troicare, BodyShop, Amnesty International etc for speaking in defense
of the Ogoni people. At the sitting of the Oputa panel in Port
Harcourt, Magnus Abe as commissioner under Dr. Peter Odili alleged
that Ledum Mitee attended the sitting with “hired crowds” and not
Ogoni people.
Senator Abe led youths to Abuja to thank the late General Sani Abacha
for hanging Ken Saro-Wiwa and 8 other Ogonis and for bringing peace to
Ogoni. In the killing and destruction of Sogho people and communities
between 2011 and 2013 by soldiers and mobile policemen, Magnus Abe was
in the ranks of Governor Rotimi Amaechi’s helmsmen.
It is our position that in the equation of sabotaging and destruction
of Ogoni people and land of Ogoni, Fred Kpakol or any other person
could not be worse that Magnus Abe. There is no moral justification
for Legborsi Pyagbara attempting to paint some persons black and
making some to look like saints.
2. That MOSOP is now advertently taken away from the masses of Ogoni
and surrogated to operate as affiliate to a political party under the
leadership of our brother, Legborsi Pyagbara. The Coordinators took
note of statements by Legborsi Pyagbara as reported in The Nation
Newspaper of August 26, 2013 attacking the person of Hon. Nyesom Wike,
Felix Obuah on matters that should purely go as inside party affair.
Note was also taken of the buildup to the December 10, 2013 protest
against the non-implementation of the UNEP report on Ogoni.
It also revealed a political game work to which Legborsi Pyagbara did
sublet MOSOP to be used to score political points against the federal
government. The sponsorship of the protest and the manner the Rivers
State Television (RSTV) was detailed to cover it sabotaged the
independent, non-aligned status of MOSOP to political party
manipulations, thereby undermining the indefeasibility of the focus of
MOSOP. The practice of harloting with politicians is bound to deflate
the strength and dilute the focus of the organization.
We condemn the unstable disposition of Legborsi Pyagbara and advise
all to learn from the past
.
3. In political party elections we re-iterate the stand that MOSOP
encourages and mobilizes support for every and any credible and well
meaning Ogoni persons whose antecedents and character assure of good,
responsible, reliable and quality representation and leadership.
It is blindness, insincerity and betrayal asking the Ogoni people to
support someone whose accumulated role in anti-Ogoni activities have
contributed so much to set the hand of the clock of Ogoni development
backward. We should not allow MOSOP leadership to sojourn into the
reckless and arrogant defilement of confusing the people of Ogoni on
issues that require that the people honest, sincere and enduring
choice of options be it local, national international; be it economic,
social, environmental and political. MOSOP is light of Ogoni working
with God leading.
4. On the issue of corruption in Nigeria, the position of the Kingdom
Coordinators remain as ever before that the root and foundation of
corruption in Nigeria is the seizure and confiscation of the wealth of
the minority Ogoni and the entire Niger Delta by the arrogant majority
ethnic groups which have created fundamental imbalances in social,
political, economic organizational and institutional frameworks of
society and which have stifled development based on capacities,
abilities, endowments and promoting instead, stealing, robbery,
manipulations, dishonest acquisition of wealth by coercion and
political terrorism.
It is the opinion of the Kingdom Coordinators of MOSOP that the
Petroleum Act, Land Use Act instituted by General Olusegun Obasanjo
and some other obnoxious laws are instruments constructed by
mercenaries of the majority ethnic groups to consolidate and
perpetrate corruption and other vices that have bedeviled Nigerian
society.
It is in the light of this that we give strong support for the
National Conference or dialogue which we hope will provide the
platform for all to amicably discuss these problems. It is on this
same ground that we support the re-election of President Goodluck
Jonathan for a second term in office as representing our effort to
seek accommodation for minorities within the Nigerian nation. Attempt
to block this will be seen as practice of intolerance and oppression
against the minorities by the arrogant majority ethnic groups which
have to be resisted in total.
5. The forum is concerned about the naked and selfish ambition of some
members of the defunct 2012 MOSOP Care-taker committee allegedly
itching to buy oil blocks. It is recurring theme associated with the
character of some of these individuals, who pretending as leaders; use
the name of MOSOP to pursue their never appeased selfish appetite,
even at the detriment of the lives of the Ogoni people.
We need to warn here and now that the Ogoni people are watching.
Buying of oil blocks is not the object of the struggle of the people
of Ogoni. The Ogoni Bill of Rights is clear of what Ogoni is asking
for.
6. The forum condemn in strong terms the purported claim by the
Governor Rotimi Amaechi of Rivers State that he defected to the All
Progressive Congress (APC) because of the failure of president
Goodluck Jonathan to implement the UNEP report on Ogoni.
This is the highest level of hypocrisy for a high public personality
like the Governor. Ogoni people know that Governor Amaechi is not a
lover of Ogoni. It is the same Governor Amaechi who had on 15th
August, 2010 at Saint Augustine Anglican Church, Bane, Khana Local
Government Area declared that “as far as he remained the governor of
Rivers State nothing will make Ogoni people realize their desire for
self determination. That any person that dreamt about that should go
and burn the mattress he or she slept on” Did Governor Amaechi not use
soldiers and mobile police to kill and destroy Ogoni people and
communities of Sogho? Ogoni people are not fools. Amaechi should leave
Ogoni people alone.
Conclusively, we want to re-iterate the obvious that the fight against
oppression and exploitation of Ogoni and any other minority
nationality in Nigeria is a collective struggle. The people of Ogoni
cannot afford to sabotage, betray the sacrifice of our fathers who
laid down their lives for Ogoni survival. The struggle continues. It
requires sacrifice by all of us.
Good people and organizations are with us. God is with us.
Long Live MOSOP
Long Live Ogoni NATION
Long Live Nigeria.
Signed:
Frank Jonah (Chairman)
Bartholomew Oluji (Secretary)
