40 REASONS WHY GOVERNOR DIEPREYE ALAMIEYESEIGHA MUST NEVER RETURN TO CREEK HAVEN

40 REASONS WHY GOVERNOR DIEPREYE ALAMIEYESEIGHA MUST NEVER RETURN TO CREEK HAVEN

Sgt. Werinipre Noel Digifa Chairman SEA

This is a clarion call on all well-meaning Ijaw sons and daughters to challenge and reject bad government and civilian dictatorship. It is a call on our fathers and mothers to save the future of our generation and indeed, the threatened generations of unborn babies crying for true lasting and meaningful change in their wombs. After a careful and objective appraisal of the government of Chief Diepreye Solomon Peter Alamieyeseigha, therefore, the Supreme Egbesu Assembly, like the vast majority of Bayelsans, is completely dissatisfied and nonplussed over the poor state of affairs in Bayelsa State, and is prepared to take every possible step to halt their dangerous drift to the precipice; this unequivocal position is anchored on the following grounds which in themselves could not be said to be exhaustive enough in cataloguing the avalanche of social malaise and maladies that have bedeviled the state since Governor Alamieyeseigha assumed office on May 20, 1999.

1. He is an accessory after the fact in the destruction of Odi as he collaborated with President Obasanjo to wipe out a community of over 50,000 people! This is genocide and Governor Alamieyeseigh ought to be tried alongside President Obasanjo at the International Criminal Court of Justice at the Hague.

2. He has made his cousin, Abel Ebifemowei, transport officer government House, as the Hamza-Almustapha of Bayelsa State, who indiscriminately intimidates and brutalizes all perceived political opponents.

3. Government House itself, the seat of democratic power is run by a unitary and military system of government. Every thing rotates and revolves around Abel Ebifemowei. Nothing works for anybody without him. Most workers there know this and live with this fear daily but regrettably, their freedom of expression has been taken away.

4. Despite having collected well over N80 billion from the federation account, there is practically nothing to show for it in Bayelsa State.

5. A peripatetic governor, he governs Bayelsa State from Port Harcourt, Abuja, America and the United Kingdom. Like a growing child who sees less and less of his hopeless father, as the years go by, Bayelsa State does not in reality know Governor Alamieyeseigha except of course as a nominal governor.

6. Akesedo an ordinary civil servant is now the Sgt. Rogers of Abacha Junta in Bayelsa State. He mandated his cousin, the transport officer and his Chief Protocol Office, Joe Akedesuo to arrest and maim Chief Gbassa Ebiserikumo and Evangelist Bannerman Embiowei, among others.

7. He uses his terror machinery to issue threat letters to journalists who have been dispassionately protecting and projecting the endangered interests of Bayelsa State and the Niger Delta.

8. He plays father Christmas to his non-Ijaw friends and associates with our money by awarding over bloated contracts especially the construction of the NDU permanent site.

9. Three and half years into his administration, it is a thing of wonder and amusement that not a single kilometer of road has been completed and commissioned in Bayelsa State.

10. The so-called and much celebrated Niger Delta University is a glorified Secondary School as it lacks the basic rudimentary facilities to qualify for a University. It will be a miracle if the National University Commission Accreditation Panel gives it a pass mark, eventually.

11. He claims that there is no money in the state for project yet construction work on his multi-million naira Opolo residential house; his Kpansia Three Star Hotel; his multi-million naira Mgbuoba edifice at Port Harcourt; his multi-million naira residential building at New GRA Port Harcourt and his multi-million naira marble house in William Jumbo Street, Old GRA Port Harcourt has not stopped even for a day.

12. His fighting to relieve some well-meaning sons of Ijaw land particularly those from Bayelsa, of their federal appointments e.g. Chief Amange of Niger Delta Basin and Rural Development Authority, Ebiserikumo Gbassa of Federal Civil Service, Chief Sir, Charles Dorgu of Federal Capital Development Authority, Chief Alex Fouebide of Presidential Project Monitoring Committee on NDDC, is undoubtedly condemnable.

13. As a son of Bayelsa, he has refused to recognize the founding fathers who fought for the creation of the state like Late Chief Fred Agugu.

14. He is very selfish and arrogant. He thinks only about himself. That is why he is building another Government House in Yenagoa when the State lacks basic amenities like water, roads, good heath care services etc.

15. His development projects are seen only on the pages of newspapers, signposts and radio Bayelsa, which he employs at will to blackmail the opposition and hoodwink Bayelsans.

16. It is shameful that as Governor for three and half years he could not complete even the sand filling of the 21 kilometer road project of his hometown Amassoma.

17. He replaced Amassoma Secondary School with the glorified Niger Delta University without providing any alternative for the people. As a result, the existing secondary school is now an afternoon school sharing the same building with a primary school.

18. Since assumption of office, he has not embarked on a working visit to the original eight Local Government Areas, not to talk of his fraudulent additional 24 local governments areas which he cannot fund.

19. Despite repeated calls by the civil populace for an unbiased investigation into the appropriation and judicious use of the N5 billion-development fund launch for the State in 1998, he has maintained a sickening silence.

20. He cannot even rehabilitate the only Yenagoa-Mbiama Road, which connects Bayelsa to the outside world. The road presently is a death trap, claiming lives daily.

21. He has abandoned the much-celebrated and advertised Yenagoa-Oporoma-Ukubie Road, Yenagoa-kolo-Nembe-Brass Road the Sagbama-Ekeremor-Agei Road.

22. His government is a government of fraudulent feasibility studies and not a government of actual development.

23. It is incontrovertible that President Obasanjo hates Ijaws with all his soul. But unfortunately, our dear governor is now the campaign manager of Obasanjo's 2003 project. He was among the governors and political office holders that visited Otta Farm to beg Obasanjo to re-contest. He formed part of the team that went to broker peace between President Obasanjo and the National Legislators in the wake of the impeachment moves against the President, even when Ijaws want Obasanjo out.

24. He has been looking for investors abroad for three and half years without even providing a sound bread baker. He is deceptive and would do worse if re-elected.

25. Development outside Yenagoa is frustratingly slow. Yenagoa is being knocked into shape and the expense of the rural communities where over 80 percent of the people reside.

26. He encourages electoral fraud and violence in the State as witnessed in the last PDP council primaries where over 40 Bayelsans died.

27. He claims to be an apostle of resource control in Ijaw land when he cannot galvanize the State House of assembly to pass a bill in this regard.

28. He has wasted so much of our resources on frivolous projects. For instance, the OBJ airport and his tollgate at Igbogene along Yenagoa-Mbiama Road.

29. He has failed the people by not fulfilling any of the electoral promises he made e.g. the road project at Ekeremor.

30. Our governor always travel abroad as if it's from Yenagoa to Amassoma. He has become Nigeria's Foreign Affairs Minister. Thereby, putting a halt to all economic, political and social activities of the state during his sojourns abroad.

31. He has forcefully annexed the Amassoma market, converted it to his private property and built his house there instead of his father's compound, as is the tradition in Amassoma.

32. He prevented multi-national oil companies like Shell, Texaco and Agip from establishing in yenagoa.

33. He built a public market and gave out all the stores to his wife. No wonder the market could not function.

34. He spent our money to buy guns and speedboats for his campaign instead of building infrastructures for the people.

35. Governor Alamieyeseigha operates an over bloated government with a bogus number of Special Assistants and advisers with serious duplication of functions.

36. A governor that has been indicted by the Independent Corrupt Practices Tribunal has no legitimate business governing Bayelsa State.

37. In spite of the fact that Bayelsa is one of the smallest and youngest States of the federation, the Punch of September 23, 2002 quotes governor Alamieyeseigha as earning the highest annual remuneration of N18 million naira per annum.

38. Governor Alamieyeseigha has desecrated Ijaw land and the ancestors are angry. The series of fatal accidents he has had lately is only a warning signal. He better think twice because the These series of accidents have rendered the siblings of the victim families hopeless.

39. Since assumption of office he has not published quarterly audited financial accounts of the state.

40. His recent secret moves to obtain a N2 billion loan for the State from Standard Trust Bank is not only disgusting but preposterous. And also the youths have been advice not to allow themselves to be used as political thugs. Because non of the aspirants children is in Nigeria they are all abroad not to talk of partaking in the election.

We are asking the Nigeria Police Force and the State Security service to watch careful the flow of arms in Bayelsa State. And that the police should try as much to bring any-body caught with arms to book to observe the rule of law. We will not accept intimidation as true Ijaw people. God bless our father land.

March 2003