Buhari
advised to sustain amnesty programme
By
Oriaifoh Godwins
The need for the amnesty programme for the Niger Delta agitators to be
sustained by the All Progressives Congress, APC administration has been
emphasised. This emphasis was made by the Senior Special Assistant, SSA, on
Niger Delta Affairs to President Goodluck Jonathan and the Chairman of the
Presidential Amnesty programme, Honourable Kingsley Kuku while addressing the
press in Abuja.
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Hon. Kingsley Kuku |
Explaining the landmarks of the presidential amnesty programme, Kuku
said, 30,000 ex agitators have so far graduated from different disciplines and
have been certificated, including the 67 licenced commercial pilots, while
others are currently undergoing one form of training or the other in different
institutions in several countries including the United States and the United
Kingdom. These he added has made the Niger Delta area relatively peaceful
compared to what it was during the pre amnesty period.
Corroborating Kuku’s assertion, one of the beneficiaries of the
programme, Mr Tarila Nathan Dressman, who is currently a chemical technician
with Impact Chemical Technologies, Texas, USA, said if not for the amnesty
programme, he would have been useless to himself and a nuisance to the country
in spite of the fact that he had a bachelors degree at the time he was in the
creeks with the Niger Delta agitators, but today, through the amnesty
programme, he has not only been able to obtain a masters degree, but has also
secured a befitting job with a petrochemical firm; saying, he plans to work out
ways of the company he works with, setting up a subsidiary in Nigeria for the
benefit of the country as well as to create employment for other less privileged
youths in the country.
On the issue of granting amnesty to Boko Haran insurgents, Hon, Kuku
who has always been in support of granting amnesty to Boko Haram insurgents,
said those that are sympathetic to the cause of the insurgents, as well as the
members of Boko Haram that are currently being held by security agents can be
used to find a lasting solution to the Boko Haram problem if these sets of
people are properly managed and their psyche worked on.
Kuku also used the opportunity to call on the federal government to
fulfill the promises they made to the people of the Niger Delta with respect to
the provision of infrastructure, which was one of the reasons for the
agitation.
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