*Niger Delta militants.
Oscarline Onwuemenyi
23 November 2016, Sweetcrude, Abuja – The Vice President, Prof. Yemi Osinbajo has told a Niger Delta delegation that vandalism of pipelines and oil installations in the Niger Delta was a destruction of facilities meant to help the people of the region.
Osinbajo stated this when he met with leaders from Urhobo, including the All Progressives Congress’ governorship candidate in the 2015 elections in Delta State, Chief Ortega Emerhor, during a meeting at the Presidential Villa, Abuja.
A statement from the Vice President’s spokesman, Mr. Laolu Akande, quoted Osinbajo as saying, “So much damage is being done, governments will come and go, but these damages will ultimately destroy people’s livelihoods, aspirations and their future.
“Nobody else anywhere in the world will destroy the facilities meant to help them, there is no benefit whatsoever from the destruction.”
The President of the Urhobo Leaders of Thought, Chief Tuesday Onoge, on his own part, lamented that monies budgeted to the Niger Delta by successive governments in the last 16 years were diverted.
He said if such monies were judiciously spent on the region, the livelihood of the people in the area would have improved tremendously.
“What happened to these monies (budgeted for the Niger Delta in 16 years)?” the statement quoted Onoge as asking rhetorically.
While pledging support to the Federal Government, the leader of the delegation was further quoted as saying that the group condemns the vandalism of oil and gas installations in the Niger Delta.
He expressed the group’s readiness to assist in furthering peace in the area. He also stated that the group supported the anti-corruption efforts of the Buhari administration.
