From Juliana Taiwo-Obalonye, Abuja
National leadership of Ijaw National Congress (INC) has backed the Southern Governors’ call for the restructuring of the country, declaring that it will correct all anomalies and marginalisation of some parts of the country.
INC President, Prof. Benjamin Okaba, stated this in Abuja when he led INC Executives on a visit to elder statesman and Ijaw leader, Edwin Clark, at his Asokoro residence.
The INC president urged Senators to consider voting on restructuring to check marginalisation of some sections of the country as they vote on the 16 thematic areas highlighted in the 1999 Constitution in the ongoing amendment process.
“Unless this country is restructured, we cannot move forward, we shall continue to tell people that unless we go back to the understanding we had in 1960, unless we go back to the same fiscal federalism that was practiced when cocoa, groundnuts were the mainstay of our economy, we cannot achieve much. We are convinced more than before that the Ijaw agenda is all about survival. We slave in a nation where we should be the chiefs. We have been subjected to all forms of victimisation to the extent that they even threaten us with their rifles, and they are trying to impose a bill, the water resources bill. As if the land use decree is not bad enough. All these are unacceptable. We will pursue our course further.”