Yes, I studied in the former Soviet Union. While there, I developed contacts and privileges, which have been of immense benefit in this programme. I am also very much aware of the fact that the average Russian lecturer is dedicated to his student's programme. The Russian environment is free from such local banes as incessant strikes and cultism that often disrupt the academic calendar and make graduation year unpredictable.
On what the Bayelsa State government under Governor Alamieyesiegha hopes to accomplish before 2007.
We know that in 2007 the state University established by the governor would have graduated its first intake and this is a major achievement for us. About this time, most of our students on overseas scholarships would have graduated and come back home. I am certain that by the time the government is ready to leave office, the number of all our educated men and women would have gone up by an appreciable percentage that is above average compared to what the situation was before we set out and of course our given target.
Youth restiveness in the Niger Delta, its causes and solution.
There are three major areas that help to reduce youth restiveness. These are education, skill acquisition and employment. Before now the civil service strength was below 4800 but now it has gone up to 23,000. This is a major cushion to youth restiveness in the state.
The other has to do with the upgrading of the education sector. First was the establishment of the College of Arts and Science which tries to absorb those crop of students who could not secure university admission because of their inability to have the required minimum qualification requirement. We also established the Niger Delta University, a school of Nursing and College of Health Sciences.
The governor's leadership qualities have also gone a long way to quell youth restiveness. Youth restiveness is a phenomenon that has been discovered to be genuine. You may quarrel with the method of expressing this form of disenchantment but it is the result of long periods of neglect. Perceived injustice to the people of the Niger Delta. They genuinely and rightly feel that revenue sourced from their soil is being used to develop elsewhere in the federation while the Niger Delta - the goose that lays the golden egg is being neglected with or without physical or human development being felt in the zone.
D o not forget that most of the youths who ordinarily knew little of the life style of the affluent society, youths who were content with their local life style went to Abuja during General Abacha's three million man march. Most of them returned to experience a backlash effect. In Bayelsa State the effect was the Kaiama Declaration. After seeing Abuja in its entire splendor, the youths returned home to fight for the development of their land and to secure resource control.
Do not forget that before the precipitate actions of late Ken Saro-Wiwa, oil companies had it completely their own way. The picture of total damage and cruelty initiated on a people is evident in Oloibiri Bayelsa State, where the first oil well of quantitative commercial output was discovered in 1956 and where oil, a wasting asset is now exhausted. The town remains in darkness and its environment is permanently injured. The youths are therefore of the simple opinion that money derived from the area should be used to develop it now.
Nigeria as a nation must consider youth restiveness as a phenomenon with serious implications for national security and development. The logical starting point is to understand the causes of the restiveness.
At the state government level, the above action plans were mapped out to help curb restiveness. Following this explosion in restiveness after the Abuja stampede, the government set up a skills acquisition centre to prepare the youths for a handwork, some of the very difficult ones about 63 of them were sent to the International Institute in Craft Training in Cameroon. When they returned cooperative centres were established for them with some money in their kitty. This went a long way in helping to sort out the restiveness.
Contemplating a repeat of the Warri crisis situation in Bayelsa State
We have moved away from that. We no longer have the problem of incessant restiveness now. One reason is that the state government has shown it has the will to move development to the people, and speak on their behalf. So people no longer feel it is necessary to take the law into their own hands. Again the response of the Federal Government to the people of Bayelsa State is changing on a positive note. Recently when the president visited the state, the governor made a case for the construction of roads, the establishment of a federal secretariat and the need to curb the incidence of fuel scarcity in the state. Immediately, the president directed the opening of a mega-station in Yenagoa and called for a tender for the construction of the roads in the state. So with this type of response, most people no longer feel that confrontation is the best weapon to fight with. They would rather embrace dialogue.
Secondly, we have been talking to the oil companies to change their tactics, not to adopt their usual divide and rule approach, which tends to create unnecessary tension in the whole region. They have been urged to give the government a properly constituted authority. They should also pay a lot of attention to community development by honouring their memoranda of understanding (MOUs) with the people we will be able to move forward.
On the response of the oil companies to community needs and the MOUs
