…Govt must be deliberate to end hostility – Observers....CONTINUE READING THE ARTICLE FROM THE SOURCE
In 1990, when the late Ken Saro-Wiwa founded the Movement for the Survival of Ogoni People (MOSOP), the campaign or rather, agitation for socio-economic and environmental justice for Ogoniland was formalised.>>>CONTINUE FULL READING HERE
Since then, the Ogoni ethnic minority people of the South-South geopolitical zone have persisted with their non-violent resistance and protests, even after the death of their leader.
From the Movement for the Emancipation of the Niger Delta (MEND), to the Odua People’s Congress (OPC) and the Yoruba Nation the in South-West Nigeria, to Boko Haram in the North East, and probably, to the most pronounced, the Movement for the Actualisation of the Sovereign State of Biafra (MASSOB) and the Indigenous People of Biafra (IPOB) in the South-East, different demands have been made and are still being made on the Nigerian state.
But as every region of Nigeria agitates for one thing or the other, the demands keep breeding instability and heating up the polity, amid fragile peace.
Some pundits are not living in denial of the impact of the many agitations, especially on the economy and security of the country.
If there were no agitations, Bem Hembafan, a retired security officer, noted that the billions of Naira expended in fighting the agitators would have gone into developmental projects.
“In the last 10 years, Nigeria has spent huge funds, enough to build two new cities like Abuja, in fighting Boko Haram and insecurity. That fund would have built industries and other infrastructural amenities for the people of the North-East zone if there was no insurgency,” Hembafan argued.
Many businesses that closed down in the North-East at the peak of the insurgency are still struggling to rebound and some corporate organisations that left the region have not returned, leaving the region’s economy in shambles.
Moreover, the economic impact, according to Onyewuchi Akagbule, a senior university lecturer, is obvious in the South-East zone, especially with the sit-at-home order that grounds businesses across the zone every Monday.
“If it is possible, no government will allow public holidays because there are less activities, hence they lose revenue. Then imagine what both the government and businesses lose every Monday due to the sit-at-home order enforced by IPOB. So, agitations come with a huge cost on the economy,” he noted.
He further argued that the Federal Inland Revenue Service and even the state revenue services cannot collect revenues due to the government in places where agitations are rampant.
“You cannot go to a place besieged by agitators to ask for taxes because businesses are often closed down and the owners even need help from the government to rebound,” he noted.
Of course, the government has been tasked severally by some concerned citizens to find lasting solutions to the agitations.>>>CONTINUE FULL READING HERE
