Seyi Tayese, Yenagoa
The Movement for the Survival of the Izon Ethnic Nationality in the Niger Delta (MOSIEND) has warned youths in the Niger Delta region to desist from sponsored attacks and raising frivolous allegations against their leaders and those piloting government affairs, to attract more development in the region.
MOSIEND maintained that rather than expending energy on supporting leaders of the region, youths are being used by desperate politicians to score cheap political points through blackmails.
MOSIEND in a statement issued on Tuesday through its National Secretary, Amb. Amain Winston Cotterel and made available to Daily News Hub in Yenagoa, said it was very shameful the high rate at which the pull-down syndrome continues to hinder the growth of the region, when youths are used by politicians to discredit others.
The group was reacting to a statement it described as a blackmail against the person of the Managing Director of the Niger Delta Development Commission (NDDC), Dr. Samuel Ogbuku, in an attempt to smear his reputation and drag him in the mud.
Reacting to a publication credited to one Mr. Bedford Benjamin Berefa, who is hiding under the umbrella of the Ijaw Youth Council (IYC), and suspected to be sponsored, MOSIEND warned that this is yet another untamed act by another misguided and uncivilized youth who runs to the media to make cheap defamatory publications against their leaders whenever they are hungry and not attended to personally.
The statement reads, “He is bringing unfounded allegations of bribery and corruption against the MD, and calling on President Bola Ahmed Tinubu to probe the expenditures of the NDDC over corruption; saying that the Ijaw Youth Council has passed a vote of no confidence in him.”
The group noted that this is the reason the region is backward in terms of development because, no matter how hard leaders with genuine intentions try to develop the region and empower its people, they will always turn against them in the end, thereby making political office holders to see it as a needless thing to think about their people.
He said that for the records, Bedford Benjamin Berefa, is impersonating as the spokesman of the Ijaw Youth Council; neither does any institution of the Ijaw nation know him, as he was never elected at anytime to speak for, or represent the IYC or the Ijaw nation.
According to him, since Jonathan Lokpobiri and his executive members were elected and endorsed by the whole Ijaw nation as leaders of the IYC, Benjamin Bedford has been moving from one office to another parading himself as spokesman of the council to solicit money from politicians, and anyone who does not welcome him, he launches a media blackmail against them.
Amain said Dr. Samuel Ogbuku is the latest victim and wonders who will be next.
He urged the Presidency and members of the public to pay no attention to the publication made by Benjamin Bedford as it is done out of hunger, hatred and foolishness, since he has no place among Ijaw people.
He said everybody who has eyes can see for themselves clearly what the Ogbuku-led NDDC is doing with the commission’s funds.
According to him, it is an act of witchcraft for anyone to criticize the stakeholders engagement meetings, which the NDDC is having to get the views of leaders of the region to know what they need in terms of development which comes in the form of education, training, infrastructure and human capital development, etc.
He wondered why Benjamin Bedford and his likes of anti-development groups are never satisfied with any good thing anyone does and always have to resort to agitating for a change of one NDDC leadership to another since the commission was created.
Furthermore, the MOSIEND secretary urged Ogbuku to take legal actions against Bedford to prove the unfounded allegations against him to serve as deterrent to many others who can’t survive without pulling others down.
