“If you can’t tolerate critics, don’t do anything new or interesting’-Jeff Bezos.
Presidential Amnesty Programme Interim Administrator, General Barry Ndiomu may not have taken this note of caution seriously from Jeff Bezos, one of the richest men in the world who obviously could not have done things the same way in business to have attained the billionaire status.
Innovators, initiators, inventors and men with exceptional ideas who changed their immediate environment and the wider society for the better, never went away unscathed. Ancient Greek philosopher, Socrates whose way of life, character and thought exerted a profound influence on Western philosophy in 399 BCE as reported in history willingly drank from a poisoned cup, a death he chose instead of going on exile following criticisms of corrupting the minds of youths through his teachings.
This to some extent implies that little or ordinary people are usually free from media bashings and because celebrities and people in positions of trust are always in the spotlight, being critical of such persons is worthwhile in the eyes of their critics no matter what. An uncle long ago told me “Don’t criticize a man for his actions or otherwise until you find yourself in his situation”. There is the contention that criticisms could be a way of a person wanting to assert power or social control on another, or of neutralizing competition. Another argument suggests of it being sharing a genuine grievance or speaking up for oneself. Some experts talk of criticisms being more of a reflection of the critic than who is being targeted because often, the person throwing the jabs does so to protect his own insecurities and overcome his complex challenges.
This reflects the barrage of attacks against the Presidential Amnesty Programme boss, as the critics find accommodation in social media platforms to launch their cowardly attacks hiding under faceless and ghost names like Boma Inewariku, Gabriel Atuma Victor, James Ebiaredei Collins among several nom de guerre. They attempt to expand the scope of repulsive and unfounded criticisms against a man who has retooled the Presidential Amnesty Programme from the big scam that it was to a transparent Agency in line with its founding ideals.
From all indication, any person who has been critical of the reforms introduced by General Ndiomu to clean the Augean stable is an enemy of the Niger Delta people and the Nigerian nation. A section of online media, which someone had earlier described as ‘’vagabonds of the media’’ are also culpable. They lack gatekeeping. They do not verify the truthfulness of their stories and credibility of their sources before pressing the send button to publish. They are not guided by journalistic and professional ethics with a known trademark of total disregard for social responsibility and self-regulation. Their reports are user generated contents and fall far short of what anything that should be taken seriously.
Men of good reasoning will want to ask why people who though constitute a minority few have been allowed to become pieces of a repulsive representation of the Niger Delta interest in the national discourse. In saner climes General Ndiomu would have been praised and encouraged with people of good will running with his ideas and initiatives to leave behind enduring and legacies through sustainable policies and projects.
Pap was set up with the clear mandate to cater for the welfare of ex-agitators and not to make some contractors presenting bills running into humungous amounts for jobs of doubtful execution smiling to the banks. Stopping them from stuffing their mouth with stolen bread is the challenge confronting Ndiomu as those involved in the sleaze are using the proceeds to engage online media to attempt to force the hands of the General to either do their bidding or be blackmailed. This is a classic case of corruption fighting back. If only Ndiomu could revert to the old ways, the mad media frenzy would have ceased.
Under his watch, the Presidential Amnesty Programme Co-operative Society Limited, PASCOL with leadership of all phases of the ex-agitators as drivers of the cooperative society. PASOCOL is overseen by a board with Justice Francis Tabai, a retired Justice of the Supreme Court of Nigeria as chair and team of consultants to nature it to maturity. The cooperative society is the game changer and a more practical approach to ensuring an effective reintegration of ex-agitators. When fully functional, it will re-write the socio-economic narrative of the Niger Delta and put an end to agitations in the region. It is probably worthy to mention that following its inception, the PAP has initiated numerous reintegration empowerment programmes which have delivered less or no fulling results.
General Ndiomu has been disparaged for sanitizing the data base of the PAP, an exercise to weed out beneficiaries with multiple accounts linked to a single BVN. This is an unhealthy financial practice which former chief executive officers of the Programme have deliberately looked the other away allowing some ex-agitators’ leaders collect monster payments as stipends to which ‘boys’ in the camps were not giving what was due them. Names of underaged children, wives and concubines and relatives are on the PAP list collecting money meant for genuine ex-agitators.
The objectives of the Presidential Amnesty Programme are quite simple and clear; to secure, manage and sustain peace through the process of disarmament, demobilization and re-integration of ex-agitators. The Programme is currently in the re-integration phase. Which aims at reforms, training and empowerment. The novel idea under empowerment is the introduction of the legacy projects to. As it stands, if the Federal Government chooses to wind down the Programme the large majority of ex-agitators including some of the camp leaders and people of the Niger Delta would have nothing to show as legacies or inheritance from the decade and a half existence of the Presidential Amnesty Programme.
Those persons from the region who have refused to support Ndiomus’s legacy projects, are the real enemies of the ‘’creek dwellers’’. Despite the huge deposit of natural resources, the region has remained the most underdeveloped while those few elites from there have through politics and unwholesome means enriched themselves at the expense of those dwellers who drink from the same river, they defecate in. Armed agitation has deprived the region of several benefits as almost all the IOCs operating in the region have relocated leaving behind the carcasses to remind those who could recall the glorious days of industrial and commercial activities in Port Harcourt, Warri, Burutu, Forcadoes and Calabar of those good old days. Seaports which were drivers of economic activities in the region cannot recall when last a cargo ship berthed in their wharves.
The Presidential Amnesty Programme comes an opportunity for the Nigger Delta to create a basis to conceive, birth and nurture micro economic and commercial activities in the region which accommodates states included in the ten worst performing states in the country. Those who clamoured for a better region should also encourage initiatives for economic growth and inclusion and expectedly should be in the drivers’ seat to navigate the process for up and coming youths to key in. Unfortunately, the Programme has been grossly mismanaged and the Amnesty office is seen as a cash cow creating an entitlement mentality among the ex-agitators and other stakeholders. Over time, beneficiaries have become attached to the monthly sixty-five thousand naira stipend which from all indications is no longer sustainable. Ironically, the uninformed majority of beneficiaries would rather wait and collect that stipend at the end of every month for doing nothing and encouraging indolence rather than engaging in something meaningful for sustainability to justify the saying, “There’s Dignity in Labour”.
Ndiomu comes with integrity, transparency, devotion and scholarship. Considering where he is coming from where esprit de corps is the watchword, he has encouraged team-spirit by shouldering the liabilities he inherited from his predecessors. A case for reference is the scholarship scheme under which beneficiaries were deployed to schools without funding but he picked up the bills, backlog of contract payments dating back three predecessors and ensuring the completion of empowerment programmes for beneficiaries. Good things are happening in the PAP with huge potentials to impact positively on the region and the people need to grab or take advantage of it.
Apart from being humane, General Ndiomu is ingenious with creative ideas for sustainable development. If previous chief executive officers of the Presidential Amnesty Programme had shown similar commitments earlier, ex-agitators would have long been weaned off the sixty-five thousand naira monthly stipend and the attendant entitlement mentality. The ceaseless criticisms of General Ndiomu’s initiatives instead of distracting him, have rather given him the oxygen to trudge on and bequeath a Programme worthy of the ideals of the founding fathers. He needs to be encouraged and he requires the support of true lovers of the Niger Delta and the Nigerian nation.
Frederick Abaziowei is a social commentator and a Niger Delta activist
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