Radical Ijaw youth group, Ijaw Youth Council (IYC) has said that President Muhammadu Buhari was carrying out political victimization against the Niger Delta region following alleged moves to frustrate the take-off of the Maritime University, Okerenkoko as well as the continuation of the NIMASA Science and Technical College, Okoloba, Delta State.
The group in a statement by its spokesman, Eric Omare said that the President Buhari’s administration was frustrating any project or programme perceived to be of benefit to the Niger Delta region adding specifically that the deliberate efforts by the administration of President Buhari to frustrate the take-off of the Maritime University, Okerenkoko as well as the continuation of the NIMASA Science and Technical College, Okoloba in Delta State is political victimization taken too far.
“Since assumption of office, all steps taken by President Buhari and his kinsmen with respect to the Nigerian Maritime Administration and Safety Agency (NIMASA) are all geared towards the frustration of the Maritime University, Okerenkoko, NIMASA Science and Technical College, Okoloba, Delta State and any project or programme perceived to be of benefit to the Niger Delta region.
IYC said that President Buhari’s administration has ordered all ongoing projects, programmes and the take-off of the Maritime University, Okerenkoko to be stopped, whereas other tertiary institutions in other part of the country where maritime programmes are being sponsored by NIMASA are allowed to continue.
According to IYC, institutions like Ibrahim Babangida University, Minna, Niger State, University of Lagos, Federal University of Technology, Gombe and the University of Nigeria, Nsukka that got approval for the maritime programmes same time with the Maritime University, Okerenkoko are allowed to continue.
“The IYC is convinced that this is a continuation of President Buhari’s victimization of the Niger Delta region especially the Ijaw people as a fall out of the last Presidential election.
“This is totally unexpected of a statesman which President Buhari ought to be.
“It would interest Nigerians and the world to know that these institutions and a few others are the only federal presence in the Ijaw areas of the Niger Delta region apart from the oil and gas facilities littered everywhere and acting as a curse and sorrow to our people.
“The IYC cannot fathom any reason why President Buhari administration cannot allow institutions that would address some of the educational challenges facing our people in the Niger Delta region, but is only interested in the free flow of the crude oil resources in the region.
The IYC therefore called on President Buhari “to act like President of Nigeria by embracing all sections of the country rather than his very sectional approach to governance and political victimization of sections that did not support his Presidential ambition in the last elections.
“The Niger Delta people would not accept a situation where the federal government is only interested in the free flow of crude oil and not in the human and infrastructural development of the region, the statement added.
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