PROACTIVE UNITED IJAW A Perspective 2

PROACTIVE UNITED IJAW: A Perspective [2]

Part II. Unity Proposal

II.a Re-Alignment Proposal
II.b Post Re-Alignment IYC Role
II.c Ijaws Political Empowerment
II.d New Functionalities
II.e Role of the Diaspora Ijaws

Introduction

The country of Nigeria is but "an alliance of convenience" of three inner countries: The Hausa/Fulani Country, The Yoruba Country, and The Igbo country. The currently adopted singular object of this alliance is the exploitation of the less established or smaller inner countries, as well as the prevention of such countries from ever becoming well-established. The Ijaw Group of Nations is one of those yet not-so well-established countries.

In the preceding segment of this article, I examined some of the obstacles erected on the way of the Ijaw peoples by both the Ijaws and by the three inner countries that prevent Ijaws from becoming a well-established inner country. I showed even if implicitly that, organizations formed out of ego-hegemony, and expediency are fundamentally divisive and constitute an impediment to Ijaw unity.

In this segment of this article, I put forward several recommendations, or if you will strategy, which from my perspective should enable the Ijaw peoples to become one of the well-established countries of Nigeria, and therefore evolve into a key player status within the "alliance of convenience" known as Nigeria. The recommendations are by no means realizable overnight and require an unflinching commitment by all Ijaw peoples. Moreover, the recommendations are by no means etched in stone, and as such, they constitute collectively a substratum for evolving an Ijaw inner country within context of the Nigeria-alliance.

The Re-Alignment Proposed

The architecture and base components of the development of the Ijaw country must necessarily be developed through the strategic integration of the resources currently available within the Ijaw-lands. A compilation of these resources, particularly, of active organizations, that can be integrated into a task-force or shadow government, or what have you, in the nation building endeavor of the Ijaw Country consists of Ijaw Council of Elders, Ijaw National Congress, Ijaw Youth Congress, and, the last but not the
least, the Supreme Egbesu Council. Of course, the order of enumeration does not and is not intended to reflect any order of significance.

Drawing from these resources, I propose that the current Ijaw National Congress (INC), Nigeria, and the Ijaw Council of Elders merge to form one Ijaw representative body, but assume the name of Ijaw National Congress, and that this new Ijaw National Congress be adopted as the single representative body of all Ijaws, all Ijaw organizations, and be mandated to address all Ijaw causes. The governance of this new body should be structured into two units, The Upper Congress, and The Lower Congress. The Upper
Congress shall be the same as and absorb the Ijaw Council of Elders, and The Lower Congress shall be formed from representations from the various dialectical groups, as discussed below under “Constructing Ijaw Country/Ijaws political Empowerment”. The Upper Congress though may still be addressed as the Ijaw Council of Elders reminiscent of the “House of Lords” of the Britain. In that case, all that need be done by these eminent dedicated fighters of the motherlands, Ijaw-lands, is merely a modification of the
Mission, the Memorandum (also called By-Laws) of Organization, and the Session Rules of Decision-Making. Alternatively, these men of respect may opt to be addressed as the Ijaw Congress of Elders, or simply The Congress of Elders, in reflection of the new Ijaw National Congress -- the one that obtains from the merger of the current Ijaw National Congress and the Council of Elders.

The foot-soldiers of the Supreme Egbesu Council, whatever is left of them, must be folded into this INC Nigeria as the great defenders of the Ijaw Country, for these mighty men of honor and nationalism have proven their mettle, and deserve to be treated with respect and be recognized for their valor and sacrifices. They should however, be incorporated into the INC Nigeria and become the operatives of the INC. They must also, be trained to become transparent because their transparency is critical and
requisite to the maturation and survival of the Ijaw Country. However, they too have to commit to take their matching orders from designated internal organs/committees of the Ijaw National Congress. This requirement, of course, can be easily satisfied with the embedding of the Supreme Egbesu Council in the INC Nigeria.

The Ijaw Youth Congress must also become active through this body of INC: a swat of the IYC should be incorporated into the INC as a standing agency, and should function as the security analysts and advisers to the Upper and Lower Congresses of the Ijaw National Congress. This subgroup may be called quite appropriately, The Congress Security Advisory Council (or Agency).

I advance that from the interactivity that obtains from this merger of the organizations will result a more effective coordination of the strategies consequent on the strategic thrust(s) on which these organizations have been operating.

Post Re-Alignment IYC Role

What to do with the rest of the IYC? For the curious, I have deliberately left out defining that role of the IYC. Perhaps this is one area where someone else would do a better framework definition than I can. Given that I am not familiar with the IYC and its composition, I believe that someone who is knowledgeable about them should better handle the construction of the framework.

Ijaws Political Empowerment

The implementation of the Upper Congress as I have shown is not so complex, being that mostly paper work and change of members’ perspective are all that are required. However, implementing the Lower Congress, that is a different matter, and to accomplish this feat among the diverse Ijaw dialectical groups is not going to be easy, but that is what must be done. In this situation, the concept of governance is now prerequisite. In the simplest form, therefore, the Lower Congress has to represent all the dialectical groups of the Ijaw peoples and in proportions that are in consistence with the population within the country.

The approach I propose for adoption here is one of representative body -- the devolution of the present structure of the INC to the grass-roots level. Currently, the INC consists of three branches, the Eastern Zone INC, the Central Zone INC, and the Western Zone INC. Under this proposed approach, each zone of the INC is to further distribute itself to reflect the zonal dialectical composition. In effect the INC must
establish several chapters, making sure to have at least a chapter per zonal dialectical group. From each of these chapters should be elected into the Lower Congress the representative of that zonal dialectical group. Further, in the absence of a more rational method for defining the representation structure, the election of representatives into the Lower Congress should follow the prevailing local government council collection as apportioned by t he government of Nigeria.

With the formation of the dialect-specific chapters of the INC together with proper planning, the INC would then nominate its members to run for the local government council chairmanships. The INC must ensure that, the chairmanships of all the local government council are held by her members only. By ensuring that the chairmanships comes from the ranks of the INC, the implementation of the strategic plannings of
the INC for the uplifting of the Ijaw peoples will have a better chance of being realized. I say better chance, because, there will still be some political-chameleons who would abandon the INC-adopted platform after being elected into office. However, such people should be educated on the fact that they will only have one term and are finished in any political endeavors within the Ijaw lands. Once educated, the prospects of committing political suicid e, I argue, will get most such people in line. Under this
framework, I would argue that the Ijaw people can then begin to have political electees who would cause Ijaw-centric political platform to be implemented, as these people evidently are known to be subscribers to the platform of the INC which has the object of uplifting the Ijaw peoples.

Besides the implementation of the Ijaw-centric platform via these local government council chairmanships, the political education of the grass-roots of the Ijaw people will have started in earnest; and the cultivation of political-awareness of the Ijaw peoples could now be better managed by the INC. The fact is, now the Ijaw-centric views that will have been carefully crafted in the Upper and Lower Congresses, and will have been appropriately reconciled, can be debated at the local level, with the result of the local Ijaw citizens gaining that much needed political education.

This architecture of representative construct, though seemingly simplistic, actually has the added benefit of more sharply defining the Ijaw Country. The Ijaws now will slowly develop a sense of the definition of their destiny as emanating from the seat of the Ijaw National Congress instead of from the Aso Rock that is in that I-don’t-know place. Undoubtedly, this architecture puts the Ijaws on the driver’s seat of defining
their own destiny. Consider for instance that every politician who wants to hold a political office within Ijaw Country is both a member of one of the national political parties and also a member of the INC Nigeria. This situation clearly enables the Ijaws, particularly, through the INC to reach into the assembly and Senate of the government to politic Ijaw-centric concerns. Then the Ijaws will have really taken hold of their lives in thei r own hands.

So this year, this day, this moment, at this point of the article, I say to the Ijaw peoples, go ahead, “seize the day” and take control of your destiny.

New Functionalities

With the re-alignment in place, the Ijaw peoples can then begin the nation building process. To that end, I propose the Ijaw National Congress cause the formation of internal agencies including Information Agency, Congress Coffer Management Agency, Solicitors and Advocacy Agency, Economic Development Agency, and Foreign Relations Agency to coordinate and replicate in foreign countries the services of the aforementioned agencies. Each of these agencies must have well-defined well-documented missions, and I explain these agencies by their missions. Remarkably, these
agencies, except for the Foreign Relations Agency, must operate on experience and intelligence basis, and not on dialectical basis.

Solicitors and Advocacy Agency:

Defending the various components of the Ijaw Country must take precedence
over all else, this agency therefore should be charged with the legal defence of the Congress and citizens of the Ijaw country. The proposed defence is not limited in any way; it is expected to include the defence of the citizenry from the environmental pollutions caused by the oil companies on any part of Ijaw lands. The agency must necessarily be aggressive on this, filing lawsuits against and litigating the oil companies in just about every country where the oil companies have operations; it is expected to include the defence of the foot-soldiers of the Supreme Egbesu Council currently held in custody.

I submit that, this team-defence construct is better, than the engagement of individual lawyers for the defence of Ijaw citizens, because a planned successful assassination of any member of the lawyer-team, as has happened with respect to the defence of the Egbesu foot-soldiers currently in custody, will not cause the loss of the adopted strategic-posture of defence planned to be deployed with respect to any given case.

Without any equivocation, the lawyers of this agency must be nothing short of legal eagles who must be exceptionally creative in searching for and discovering technicalities in the laws of the lands, on the basis of which law suits can be brought against these companies.

Information Agency:

Managing the forums, Ijaw_National_Congress@yahoogroups.com , and
INCUSA@aol.com must be formally handed over to this Agency. These information-disseminating machines should be transferred into the direct control of a cyberspace newsgroup such as will be set up by the agency.

Further, the agency should also set up a hard-copy news group, and that this newsgroup should have within their rank journalists who gather news about developments for dissemination on the various machines. This group should be considered critical, because, we need to heed the call by one Prince Cornelius Abelyekoroghaii to establish our own newspaper, with the singular aim of educating our peoples at home. Therefore, I propose that the INC Nigeria also equip this agency with the necessary tools to conduct newspaper publication.

Finally, a website should be developed and maintained, under the name of
www.ijaw-national-congress.org , or www.ijaw-national-congress.com , or something along that line. This site should be managed also by the cyberspace newsgroup.

Economic Development Agency:

Rapid economic development will also eliminate the tensions on the Ijaw lands,
and to a great extent the Ijaws must commit to an optimal use of the monies disbursed to the Ijaw lands by the oil companies and the Nigeria. Such optimal use I submit will develop the Ijaw Country to an extent that marginalizes the oil revenue. Now then, I propose that the Agency be responsible for availability of employment opportunities for the citizens of the Ijaw lands. Hence, this agency must assume the responsibility of talking with the oil companies and evolving plans and programs for the employment of the Ijaw graduates in the oil companies. In the event that all attempts at negotiating the issues are rebuffed by the oil companies, then the matter should be referred to the Solicitors and
Advocacy Agency to initiate legal proceedings.

Of course, the economic development of any society always requires human resources –well-educated skilled people to man the economic activities of the economic growth. As such this agency should also undertake the responsibility of keeping uniform the syllabuses of the schools in the Ijaw lands. Moreover, the agency must ensure that not only are the schools teaching Ijaw students only satisfying the national syllabuses, but rather that the syllabuses followed in Ijaw lands are always relatively slightly higher than
the national standard. With means this agency must developed based on the nationally adopted syllabuses, Ijaw-specific syllabuses that are of a higher standard. This is a necessary condition, as the Ijaws must not just hope to catch up to the other inner countries, rather the Ijaws must walk bounding to catch up with the other inner countries; and if Ijaws should happen to leap-frog them, so much the better. The need to leap-frog the inner countries is an imperative if the Ijaws must be able to work around the
political obstacles placed or will be placed on their way to maturation. The fact is society that adopts technology as its strategic-driver always continue to flourish no matter the political obstacles that may get erected impedes their growth in one economic sector of the “nation”.

Finally, foreign investment must be attracted to the Ijaw Country, and this agency must also be thoroughly focused on attracting foreign investors to invest in the Ijaw lands. This agency must therefore slowly begin to develop within the Ijaw youths, the young graduates, skills for developing investment structure, conducting investment banking, and specialized technical skill-set.

Foreign Relations Agency:

The operations and responsibilities of the agencies discussed above shows the
conduct of activities in foreign countries as well, if the Ijaws must develop economically and experience a higher standard of living. The activities of the INC, it is understood, must also include a dedicated exposure of the development on the motherlands to foreign countries. Accordingly this agency will be charged with the management of the projection into foreign countries of the activities of the INC agencies.

Therefore satellite arms of the INC Nigeria must be created to manage these activities on behalf of the individual agencies. Besides, establishing satellite offices are sensible because, given such offices, then in the face of crises, all queries can be directed to a single office for answers or for conduit to the INC Nigeria for answers. In essence then, bringing any issue to the attention of any foreign office, must be tantamount to having been brought the issue to the attention of the Ijaw representative body of INC Nigeria. Now then, I propose that the agency appoint “INC Foreign Representative” for critical sectors of the world. Each Foreign Representative will be charged with the development of INC presence in the specific sector of assignment. In particular the INCs to be created should include INC-Asia, INC-Europe, INC-Canada, INC-USA. In addition, th ese continental INCs obviously are then projections of the INC Nigeria into foreign countries.

However, each of the continental INCs must enable the representation of all the dialectical groups within its territory of representation. In particular, each of the continental INCs shall establish itself as the single representative body in that sector of the world. For this situation to obtain, the Foreign Representative will have the power to form a committee of advisers, The Directing Committee, for each INC. The members of
The Directing Committee will be electees from each of the dialectical groups, and will have been elected for this representation by the members of the dialectical groups. In effect, the Foreign Representative will have to meet with members of organizations of the different dialectical groups or group members to set up dialectical group-specific organizations where non-exists; and then urge each organization to elect a representative into the Directing Committee. To achieve this uniform representation, the Foreign
Representative will not permit the nomination of a representative from any multi-dialectical organization. Such multi-dialectical organization must first be restructured into as many dialectical group-specific organizations as necessary in order to develop the collections of organizations that facilitate the representative construct.

The Foreign Representative will have to work hard to have the INC of his/her charge to be adopted by existing dialectical organizations as the sub-parent organization on the specific continent. However, the role of the Foreign Representative should not be limited to that of constructing the INC presence in the specific sector. The Foreign Representative must also become one of the spokespersons of the INC Nigeria. This person must assume the responsibility of meeting with companies and governments and
agencies in the assigned sector to represent to the members of such entities the issues that confront the Ijaw peoples in Nigeria. This person must go out and canvass the support of these entities for the Ijaw peoples. The Foreign Representative must develop and emplace task-groups as appropriate for specific projects as defined by the other agencies for implementation in the respective sector. Such activities may include the researching of legal precedence and basis for bringing lawsuits against entities that perpetrate crimes against the Ijaw peoples in Nigeria; and the scouting for investment firms as well as making presentation of proposals eliciting investment opportunities with respect to targeted market developments.

Clearly then, these offices are indeed miniature INC Nigeria in the different foreign sectors of operations and must therefore be dedicated to the tasks of attracting investments to the Ijaw Country; be continuously engaged on the dissemination of news about the Ijaw Country for the consumption of that sector of the world, with the explicit object of creating awareness of the Ijaw peoples; and researching legal basis for filing lawsuits against every entity that committed any acts that are defined or definable by
appropriate world bodies as crimes or even skirting the boundaries of criminality.

Izon Treasury:

Of course, these activities will cost money, so I propose that the satellite INCs
raise funds by whatever legal means possible and fund these nation-building activities through the INC Nigeria. Moreover, I propose that the members of the dialectical Ijaw-organizations contribute regularly towards the support of the satellite INCs and INC Nigeria. Further, the emissary must stay in constant touch with the foundations and charity organizations for the purposes of securing grants to the support of the efforts. Business entities of the Ijaw peoples in the Diaspora should also be contacted for donations to the cause.

Donations and contributions made to the satellite INCs whether by the Ijaw dialectical organizations with representation in the Directing Committee, by individual Ijaws in the Diaspora or charity organizations are to be deposited in a coffer of the INC Nigeria to be identified as Izon Treasury. This treasury is to be located in a world class financial center. Naturally, the accounting of these funds must be transparent, and any misappropriations must be prosecuted to the full extent of the laws of the land in which the Treasury is situated and where the perpetrator assumes residence. Such prosecution should aim to cause the imprisonment of the criminal. The “we-are-all-Ijaw cloak” must be rend: Criminal is a criminal.

Of course, donations and contributions made to support the newsgroup must be kept separate to unsure that these operations are performed interruptedly. Also funds raised to address specific issues of concern to the Ijaw Country must be spent to that end, and to that end only; and only upon the conclusion of the task can the left over be deposited into the treasury. Of course, the contributors must be informed of the leftover and the deposition of the said portion into the coffer.

Role of the Diaspora Ijaws

In all of this evolution of single representation body for the Ijaw peoples, the Ijaws in the Diaspora must equally recognize their roles. Each Ijaw person should aim to facilitate the formation of a dialectical group to enable the implementation of the representative construct, for instituting the satellite INCs. Individuals from the different dialectical groups who have a friendship should also commit to develop ventures for implementation both in their sector of residence and at home, and also commit to fund the INC Nigeria
through these ventures.

OGB, USA.

...........Next posting: The Epilogue........

PROACTIVE UNITED IJAW A Perspective Part I
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