Prominent Niger Delta Activist, Ann-Kio Briggs has advocated the emergence of a Nigerian President of the South East extraction in 2023.
She said this was necessary if the mantra of “One Nigeria” was to be taken seriously.
The Social Crusader who was a guest of African Independent Television (AIT) breakfast programme Kaakaki, on Tuesday, said it would amount to injustice if a part of Nigeria that had not produced the President of Nigeria was denied the opportunity to produce one in the next presidential election in 2023.
According to Briggs who spoke on ‘Insecurity: Differences between Niger Delta Militants and Bandits’, the solution to the State of insecurity in Nigeria was to restructure the country to “ensure that equity and justice take the center stage.”
She said that restructuring of the country would be the panacea to the multiple problems bedevilling Nigeria.
She stated that a return to the regional government where each region would control its resources would be the cure for the insecurity in Nigeria.
On the demand of the bandits on the Federal Government to grant them amnesty like previous government did to the Niger Delta militants to stem the tide of incessant killings across Nigeria, Briggs described their demand as unreasonable.
She said Niger Delta militants’ case was different from what the bandits were doing.
According to her, while the militants had legitimate demands of being allowed to benefit from the resources from their soil, the bandits had no legitimate demand to make of Nigeria.
She therefore opposed granting of any type of amnesty to the bandits who she claimed were not even Nigerians but “invaders who flooded the country from the northern porous borders.”
Briggs called for fairness and equity in Nigeria as important steps to addressing the insecurity in Nigeria.
But Adamu Garba, former Presidential aspirant under the umbrella of All Progressives Congress (APC) disagreed with her on the bandits’ demands.
He said he was favourably disposed to the idea of granting them amnesty.
According to Garba “Sheikh Gumi who took it upon himself to go to the stronghold of the bandits has made public what their demands are and I agree with him that amnesty should be granted to them for peace to reign in Nigeria.” (AIT/PNO)
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