Many NDA members were ex-MEND commanders, fighters

…warns communities harboring Avengers

THE Movement for the Emancipation of the Niger Delta, MEND, has said that many members of the rampaging Niger Delta Avengers bombings oil installations in the region were mostly its former commanders and fighters who received the Abuja olive branches in 2009 without clear understanding.

But MEND warned communities in the region providing a haven for lawbreakers such as the Avengers, NDA, that they were not protected by the extant principles of international and/or municipal law during a conflict.

 “However, we hereby remind our communities, which harbour criminals such as members of the NDA that their communities are not protected by the extant principles of international and/or municipal law during a conflict’’, Gbomo Jomo said in a statement,  but advised the Nigerian military high command  not to go outside the rules of engagement and international best practices.

MEND sympathized with the affected persons, families and communities and called on the international community as well as the National Emergency Management Agency (NEMA) to ship relief materials to the region, as a matter of utmost priority.

“The Movement for the Emancipation of the Niger Delta, MEND notes with grave concern the recent renewed spate of unprovoked and persistent attacks on Nigeria’s oil installations by the Niger Delta Avengers, NDA, many of whom were MEND’s commanders and fighters who jumped on the Presidential Amnesty gravy train without knowing why they took up arms in the first place.

“What are more worrisome to us is the ungodly conspiracy of silence of the region’s elite and their tacit support of the NDA’s conduct under the pretext of a so-called “Niger Delta struggle,” it said.

MEND accused the region’s elite of going “to sleep in luxury hotel suites in Abuja and around the world for the entire duration of the 6 years of Mr. Jonathan’s binge and unmitigated disaster as President.”

It, however, commended President Muhammadu Buhari for his political will and sagacity in commencing the cleanup of Ogoni land in Niger Delta region with the June 2 launch and implementation of the United Nations Environmental Programme UNEP, Report.

The group said Buhari’s decision was heartwarming in view of the fact that a son of the region, former President Goodluck Jonathan, was in charge for six years and did nothing about the cleanup.

 “Nevertheless, equally of grave concern to MEND are the disproportionate use of force and the sheer unimaginable dimension of the ongoing reprisal Nigerian military onslaught in the Niger Delta region’’, it said and how decried, “the attendant collateral damage done to the political, social and economic lives of the ordinary people, especially in the Ijaw communities.”