AMNESTY: KILLE SELKY DIVIDES MEND

Tuesday 08-09-09

Ex-militants made good their threats last Friday to take to the streets of Yenagoa if they were not paid money owed them by their former commanders and the amnesty committee.
This came even as the ranks of men of the Movement for the Emancipation of the Niger Delta (MEND) have further been depleted with the acceptance of the amnesty by Kille Selky Torughedi a.k.a Young Shall Grow.

His acceptance of the amnesty offer has also pitched the Special Adviser to the president on Niger Delta Matters, Mr. Ndutimi Alaibe, against the Bayelsa State Government.
The ex-insurgents who had sounded a note of warning last Friday with a rampage on the popular Melford Okilo Road decided to up the ante on Monday when they marched the full stretch of the road terminating at the Government House.

The protest which started at the Biogbolo Close to Barath Hotel where some military personnel were being housed extended to Amarata and later the Government House by the ex-insurgents who were demanding payment of the money promised them by their former commanders and their feeding allowance by the Presidential Amnesty Committee.
The protest paralysed commercial activities on the busy Melford Okilo road and it would have become violent if not for the timely invitation of anti-riot policemen who were drafted to contain the situation.

The Secretary to the Bayelsa State Government, Gideon Ekeuwei, in a reaction to the disarmament that took place at the Azuzuma, Southern Ijaw Local Government Area of the state accused Alaibe of introducing politics into the amnesty exercise.
He also said the protest in Yenagoa is politically motivated to erode the gains recorded by Governor Timipre Sylva in the amnesty exercise.

Ekeuwei in a statement said the state government has no record of the arms collected in Azuzama, noting that the arms were taken to Elele in Rivers State.
The SSG accused Alaibe of going to Azuzama without informing the governor or security agents only for him to direct the boys who have been disarmed to see the governor.
“This is nothing but a slight on the part of government. Why all this infiltration all in the name of politics. Why gambling with the lives of the people. Whoever, went to Asusuama knows who he has gone there to represent,” he said.

MEND’s spokesman, Jomo Gbomo, in an interview with Daily Sun confirmed that Young Shall Grow had been part of the struggle of the militia group in the region.
Young Shall Grow and his 250 lieutenants had disarm and surrendered 31 Kala machine, 18 G.3 rifles, 8 FM rifles, 2 K2 rifles, 8 Pump Action, 5 Scorpion rifles, 8 General Purpose Machine Guns, 5 Rocket Propel Grenade Launchers, 7 Tear Gas Gun, 400 magazines, 6 Hand Guns, 4 box of explosives, 200 hand fire guns, 6 brandy guns, 1 pistol and three locally configured gunboats mounted with GPMGs and several rounds of ammunition in chains and boxes to Aliabe and the commander of Sector 2 of the Joint Military Task Force (JTF) Col Victor Ezegwu.
 

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