The Federal Government Should Declare a State of Emergency in Rivers State

15 people were Killed as rival cults clashed in Port Harcourt in the last three days.

A spate of gun battles and dynamite attacks rocked popular areas of the oil city of Port Harcourt in the Niger Delta, as the Nigerian police confronted the terrorists with guns and armoured tanks to overpower them. And at the end of the hostilities, casualties included innocent pedestrians. Among the dead were a nurse and another woman roasting pears and corn along the road who were hit by stray bullets.

The rampant cases of terrorism in Rivers State since 2003 to date have claimed hundreds of lives as rival cults, criminal gunmen and militants clashed in gun battles in their power struggle over illegal oil bunkering, terrorizing multinational oil companies and other criminal activities on land and in the creeks and waterways of Niger Delta.

The Nigerian police and armed forces cannot guarantee the safety and security of lives and properties in Port Harcourt. And the state government has failed woefully.

The Federal Government of Nigeria should declare a state of emergency in Rivers State to end the destruction of innocent lives and properties by these lawless and violent gangsters on rampage in the state.

Enough is enough!

No O! Not yet. They are fighting for the emancipation of the Niger-Deltans. Let all the people rally round and support them. Those innocent people that died are only the collateral damage. In every fight for freedom, there must be some casualties.

Let them continue. Shebi it's ordinary dynamite they are using now? They have not started using laser guided missiles yet abi?

Freedom for the Niger-Delta! Morons!

haba, do u realise wetin u de yan.i am sure u wont feel this way if some1 u knew was one of these collateral damage.there is nothing constructive dialogue cant resolve, haven't u learnt anyhing from mandela's story?if na civil disobedience and organised co-ordinated sit at home, that has a more effective result

all these violence only contributes to the depreciation of d quality of life in that part of the countryand it criminalises their struggle.mo over, it's perpetrated by petty criminals with no ideology to promote.

theuir actions should be condemned in totality by all well meanin naijalanders

State of Emergency is not the solution to everything, at least not this one.

Government should set up a Counter-Terrorism Agency that will be dedicated to monitoring the activities of these boys.

I don't understand why in these days of state of the art ICT, triangulaion etc. these boys will use mobile phones to make calls arrange to kidnap a hostage, contact the relatives of the hostage in mobile phones yet their is no agency monitoring all the calls made through the masts in that area. There is nobody using satelite Navigation to track down these boys and pick them up un-expectedly and individually.

I get so disappointed when I hear Army, Navy, or the creeks or terrain being too difficult. do they enjoy their wealth in the creeks? the flashy cars they use do they drive them in the creeks the clubs they go to are they in the creeks?? or are their girlfriends even in the creeks with them??

All this useless talk of release Asari today or release Alams tomorrow all in the hope of resolving hostage taking or stoping arms proliferation is arrant nonsense. Even if they like they should go and wake Isaac Adaka Boro from grave, he can not appeal to those boys to stop the multi million dollar business of hostage taking. You can not convince them to stop you can only stop them.

Nigeria is simply using 15th century tactics to address 21st century problems. How will it work?? 

Trust me if the Presidency uses better approach, the Odili's, Amaechi's, Omehia's, Alams, Clark that are backing these boys will start looking for a hiding place.

If these boys are pursued, it is the same indigenes that will say government is carrying out genocide. Let's leave them till they crawl to the Federal Government begging and they bring a petition signed by no less than 5 million people.

I'm waiting for a certain person to say that it is outsiders that are responsible.

You may not have to wait for too long. It's unfortunate that OBJ has retired if not we know who they'd have blamed.

Are you guessing who am guessing?

The truth is that the federal govt don't care about cultism cuz they also serve their intrest. There's no need for a state of emergency cuz those guys will just chill out until the state of emergency is over. The best thing is to have survelliance cameras and have drones and also make it comfortable for people to report cult activities without repacautions. And like someone said, they should have some sort of task force for this kind of problems and also they can make cultism useless by making it a kind of academic club something like press club and making it a mandate that everyone involved has their pictures taken and so on.

Surveillance camera ke? If you know the cost of those surveillance cameras, you will realise that within hours of installation, those touts will steal them all.

The problem in rivers state cannot be solved by declaring a state of emergency. In fact that will only worsen things. Those boys are so heavily armed that they make law enforcement agents look like boys scouts. At first this whole kidnapping thing was a sign of protest. No ransom was being demanded but now, it is like a new era were everyone with a good car or dress is a potential target.
Like someone rightly said, kill the head and the body will die. The politicians and other prominent people behind these boys need to be stopped first and the rest will automatically fall into place.
The Federal Government needs to thread carefully otherwise it will end up with another Odi incident on its hands.
This is the time for dialogue. One were the federal government will offer something resonable to these communities. And offer them lasting solutions to there problems and not just handing them money as has always been the case in the past.
The avenues through which these weapons are gettin into the country and into the hands of these militants has also got to be determined and effectively blocked.
A few scapegoats will need to be sacrificed in order to send a message of how serious the government is taking the matter.

The Federal Government should take no action on the Rivers state issue pending when citizens of Rivers state can appeal to it with a petition 5 million signatories of which a majority must be Rivers state citizens.

If the government swings into action now, the people may use that as an opportunity to peddle stories of genocide, marginalization and ethnic cleansing. So let us be sure what they want.

These boys firepower is nothing compared to Nigerian Army Arsenal. Do not use the eye of all those worn out AK-47 you see with "korofo" at roadblocks to rate Nigerian Army armoury. Once a state of enmeshency is finally declared, Nigerian soldiers will slaughter those boys like chicken.

The same Arsenal that exploded on itself at Apapa?. . .Old crap from the Balkans!

Donzman:

The same Arsenal that exploded on itself at Apapa?. . .Old crap from the Balkans!

So you think that militants with their AK47s, world war 1 vintage GPMGs, and RPG2s can stand up to a couple of light tanks? The army wouldn't even need to deploy MBTs.

I suppose Donzman also believes that the militants have their own Fighter Planes and reconnaissance satellites.

These gunmen and militants in the Niger Delta captured a Naval boat in one their recent clashes with the Nigerian Navy. They now warned the oil companies to steer clear of the waterways and since their warning, oil companies now use choppers. And the Nigerian Armed Forces failed to stop them.

I cannot cross the sea to go to other states, because the gunmen and militants are now out of control and I cannot trust anybody again on land, sea or air in the Niger Delta.

The ruling People's Democratic Party (PDP) caused the chaos in the Niger Delta and Asari Dokubo said so.

The gunmen and militants on rampage are not even afraid of Asari Dokubo again.
Power has changed hands.

The poor mother was busy roasting maize and pear to earn some money to provide for her poor children and a stray bullet hit and killed her. The family is now in shock.
Their world seems to have come to an end.
But who cares?
It is business as usual in Abuja.

They are busy declaring the stolen millions of dollars they embezzled and nobody can query them?
While the demons they created are on rampage in the Niger Delta.

No investigation on those killed during the last April elections and Nigerians are talking about a future?

The fact is when the soldiers were in power, Port Harcourt was indeed a safer place.

Nigerian politicians are not ready for democracy, therefore the Army should return before anarchy becomes the order of the day in the Niger Delta of Nigeria.

Orikinla:


The fact is when the soldiers were in power, Port Harcourt was indeed a safer place.

Nigerian politicians are not ready for democracy, therefore the Army should return before anarchy becomes the order of the day in the Niger Delta of Nigeria.

You (Niger Delta) haven't started yet. When they were killing soldiers you were supporting them. Now they have turned on the people themselves you want the military to take over government. What did you really expect would happen? That they (militants) would go back to school after tasting power via the gun? You really haven't started yet.

na wa for you oh! how can you say army should return? even the worst democratic government is better than the best military one. this economic expansion we've witnessed in the last eight years wouldn't have been possible withe the soldiers in power.

na nitel line we for still dey use as we dey now. all the capital market boom we are enjoying, for no dey. And the painful thing is that the soldiers also steal when they are in power, even more than civilians. their problem is that they are usually afraid or dont know how to spend thier stolen wealth so they prefer to stash it abroad.

all the goverment need do to pacify the niger delta is declare state of emergency in the region and make it a federal protectorate/zone. All the local leaders/governors there are thieves.

So Asari said the PDP caused the Niger Delta crises and so we should believe him?


The army should return? Wow! The more I stay on Nairaland, the wiser I become.


@Orikinla

we are in a Federal system of government here. If you want military rule in your state or local government, it can be arranged as long as you follow due process. But you can't impose you will or desires on the rest of Nigerians. Like I said, it's a Federated system.

The people of your local government can go and tap Abacha or Saddam in his grave and raise him up to be your leader. No body will complain. You forget that during the last administration, there was a military government in Ekiti State. So if you want it so much, you could just get it. But remember say military rule no get tenure O!

Every one should put his or her mouth in his pocket because the clashes or crisis are political
We all know the people involved.

@rolandwhy

it is you who should put your mouth in your pocket before you send us all to jail.

We do not all know is behind the crises O! Speak for thyself.

oga dimka wetin now? why are you spamming this thread??

@denex, surveillance cameras cannot all be stolen like that. If it were so, why haven't they stolen all the ones in uk, China, America, and other places. Nobody puts it where it should be stolen and if it is reachable it is a private property not in the public. It should be deployed in ten notorious Nigerian states and should be used for containment and logicistics.
My thing is, if we are tired of these things something should be done; if we are tired of naija being unsafe, we should start making it the most secured country in the world by us making the surveillance cameras ourselves instead of buying it. After cameras it will be sensors that can be connected to cameras and sound sensors too.
Believe me when we begin seeing cameras here and there and knowing that we are being watched/recorded many craziness will stop and it will make the jobs easier for our police force. 
Is better to do something and fail than do nothing and complain/procastinate.

The idea of video monitoring in my views isn't far-fetched,matter of fact would be very effective .However wouldn't a surveillance camera require functional lightning fixtures [i.e street lights]and constant electricity?

Err, dimka, are these the same robbers you talked about earlier or these are a new set?

Because the first ones met their waterloo in a "beer parlour", now these ones have met their waterloo in a "bear parlour".

How far? Clarify issues.


@naijaway

me I fit steal surveillance camera. Na people wey don chop belleful and wey get records of photos, fingerprints and real identities go dey fear to commit crime due to surveillance camera.

Even if the police records a video of me stealing the camera (though most likely, I'd wear a ski mask) but what records will they compare it to?
Even if they see me live on their monitors removing the equipment, what is their response time. Their "rapid response" time?

The first thing we have to do in this country is to build a solid database from information available to employers, banks, schools, INEC, Immigration, National Identification programs, Hospitals and unions. Once this database is built and people become aware that the government has solid records on them, crime rate in Nigeria will drop by about 30%.

Why do you think the Nigerian police never collects fingerprint, blood evidence or even make sketches? No database to work with or compare.

And this database costs less than one million Naira to set up, yet it is not available. How much more installing surveillance gadget?

When Gen. Yakubu Gowon was in power, Nigeria was one of the best countries on earth.
So, who says military rule is bad or wrong.

What makes a bad or wrong government is not the system, but the people who abuse and misuse the system.

Well, the Nigerian Army has landed to confront Niger Delta kidnappers until peace is restored.

Meanwhile the Rivers State Commissioner for Information, Mr. Emma Okah has said that those calling for the declaration of state of emergency in the state miss the mark.
According to him, "such calls are from enemies of the people. They are myopic and selfish in the reasoning. They do not know what they are saying.

The Sun News Online, Saturday, August 11, 2007

The commissioner is only trying to save his job and that of his boss.

The FG sent the Army, Navy, and the Air Force to root out the lunatic fringe elements on rampage in Rivers State.

Military rule no good O! If e good, request it for your hometown.

There was never a time that Nigeria was one of the best places in the world. Never! It's only now we're trying to see if we can achieve it.

I repeat, military rule no good O!

mckren,

You rae really at home with the niger delta issue,but you should have added Obasanjo as one of the supporters becuase he knows everything and encouraged Odili's cultism in Rivers state and beyond in the hope that he could achive third term through the insecuirty in the Niger delta

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[b][color=#006600]McKren (m)
Posts: 1511

Online

Re: The Federal Government Should Declare A State Of Emergency In Rivers State
« #3 on: August 09, 2007, 12:56 PM »

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State of Emergency is not the solution to everything, at least not this one.

Government should set up a Counter-Terrorism Agency that will be dedicated to monitoring the activities of these boys.

I don't understand why in these days of state of the art ICT, triangulaion etc. these boys will use mobile phones to make calls arrange to kidnap a hostage, contact the relatives of the hostage in mobile phones yet their is no agency monitoring all the calls made through the masts in that area. There is nobody using satelite Navigation to track down these boys and pick them up un-expectedly and individually.

I get so disappointed when I hear Army, Navy, or the creeks or terrain being too difficult. do they enjoy their wealth in the creeks? the flashy cars they use do they drive them in the creeks the clubs they go to are they in the creeks?? or are their girlfriends even in the creeks with them??

All this useless talk of release Asari today or release Alams tomorrow all in the hope of resolving hostage taking or stoping arms proliferation is arrant nonsense. Even if they like they should go and wake Isaac Adaka Boro from grave, he can not appeal to those boys to stop the multi million dollar business of hostage taking. You can not convince them to stop you can only stop them.

Nigeria is simply using 15th century tactics to address 21st century problems. How will it work??

Trust me if the Presidency uses better approach, the Odili's, Amaechi's, Omehia's, Alams, Clark that are backing these boys will start looking for a hiding place. [/color[/b]]

I really find Port harcourt strange these days,i will like to express my disgust with the administration in Rivers State since the Odili administration. They encouraged cultism because they do not have superior arguments,they alsways like to resort to threat and intimidation whenever you tackle them.

The characters in Government have no moral scruples,i keep blaming OBJ because he was a head that was rotten. What incidences that has and continue to unfold in Rivers state is not up to what happened in Jos and yet a state of emergency was declared.Why not  Rivers state.?

The reason is simple Odili has thought Celestine well to bribe security agents to doctor security reports whereas they are the cause of the problems.

We should stop being diversionary and ask the following relevant questions to Goverment officials

1) Why have they not refuted Asari's statement that Omehia and Odili know about the situation in Rivers state?

2)Who always gives orders for the release of Cultists in Rivers state whenever they are arrested?

3)How is it that cultist who have been declared wanted and roaming the streets to the knowledge of security agents?

4)who are those that influenced the transfer of the sss director in the state that started mentioning cultist and their govt sponsors in Rivers state?

5) who gave Ateke the info to escape and willingly surrendered Asari to the federal Government?

6) what did Obasanjo do after Asari told him that all the high profile assasinations and crises where orchestrated by Odili?

The list is endless,it is only God and the arrest of Odili,sekibo,Ake,Amaechi,Harry,and all the Govt warlords that will settle this problem in Rivers State.

Orikinla:

When Gen. Yakubu Gowon was in power, Nigeria was one of the best countries on earth.
So, who says military rule is bad or wrong.

What makes a bad or wrong government is not the system, but the people who abuse and misuse the system.

Well, the Nigerian Army has landed to confront Niger Delta kidnappers until peace is restored.

The commissioner is only trying to save his job and that of his boss.

The FG sent the Army, Navy, and the Air Force to root out the lunatic fringe elements on rampage in Rivers State.

I do not believe in state of emergency for Rivers state. It will not solve the problem.

Here are some suggestons:

1 Stem the flow of arms into the state, without which you cannot stop the violence.

2 The state government as a matter of urgency settle all political disputes becuse part of these violence can be traced to them.

3 Invest in the police force and intelligence for wheneve there are disturbances the police are the first to runaway.

4 Community policing as a matter of urgency should be instituted.

5 Improving the economy of Rivers state should be the govenments' priority.

Finally these will not done in isolation but other neighbouring states should be involved.

Odili should be held responsible for the mayhem we are experiencing now if we are to go by the rumour making the rounds that this people have been on the state government payroll and the new governor has refused to co-operate as at other times. Our Commander in Chief should send the army to the strongholds of this gunmen - be they called sea pirates, militants, cultists or criminal gangs which exist in marine base, abonema wharf, diobu, ogbakiri, abuloma and even buguma. They should control the influx of dynamite into the entire country. The sound of those things - My God you wont even know when you run out of your house.