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Nigerians displaced
from Bakassi following an agreement between Nigeria and Cameroon to
return the peninsula to the latter, took to the streets of Calabar at
the weekend to protest their year-long neglect.

Numbering over 70,
they commandeered the Cross River State government owned Metro Blue Bus
from New Bakassi Local Government Area to convey them to Calabar, about
40 kilometers away. There mission was to present a petition to the
state governor, Liyel Imoke over their plight.

The scared driver
dropped them at the Etta Agbor Roundabout and they found their way on
foot to the Governor’s Office, some three kilometers away. Afterwards,
they hoped to return to the same roundabout, hoping to jump into
another bus back home free of charge.

These people defied
the scorching sun to invade the governor’s office, holding everyone at
the gate to ransom. With placards to give voice to their anger, the men
and women chanted solidarity and war songs which attracted the
attention of senior government officials.

They came with eyes
downcast. Silently edging through the mangrove forest of Cross River
South from the Ikang border, the displaced persons looked haggard; with
some hobbling on crutches as they arrived the governor’s office looking
quite hungry. This poor appearance was a convincing evidence of their
untold hardship.

Some in rags,
staggered into the main entrance to this seat of power waiting for the
governor to address them. Nursing mothers came along with kids; some
covered with sores, many of them naked, stumbling along at their
parent’s heels and crying of thirst.

Parade of zombies

It was like a
parade of zombies. For those who witnessed the macabre march, it was an
unforgettable reminder of what some Nigerians have been forced to pass
through. Most of the refugees were clad in black, appropriately
indicating the horrors they had passed through. Hunger, poverty,
idleness, high cost of living, lack of water, accommodation and health
facilities are some of the daily realities the Bakassi returnees said
they had to face. They said they decided to see the state governor for
first hand information on why they have been abandoned by the federal
government.

Leader of the
demonstrators, Innocent Asuquo told Bassey Okim, the state’s security
adviser who represented Mr Imoke, that since they were forced out of
their ancestral homes at Abana, Atabong,

Archibong Town,
Amoto and other creek communities in the aftermath of the formal
handover of the peninsula to the Republic of Cameroon, they have become
refugees in the new local government area.

“We have no food to
eat, nowhere to fish since we are fishermen, no roof to sleep under,”
Mr Asuquo said. “We have been abandoned and forgotten at the camp where
we were brought into in 2008. Our children are no more schooling for
want of schools even as there is no health institution to readily
attend to our health needs.

We have been
patiently waiting for government to come to our aid. Now we have ran
out of patience. Let Nigerian government tell us what sin we’ve
committed. We were advised to come here. Now that we’re here, nobody
cares about us again. The houses built to resettle us are too few.

Secondly, there is
no water in them for domestic use. We trek many kilometers to fetch
water from streams. Because of this suffering, some have died.

We have called on
government repeatedly to resettle us on a river bank to enable us
continue with our fishing occupation to no avail. We only hear of plans
for such a resettlement. Nothing concrete is on the card yet. Please,
let government stop this inhuman treatment being meted out to us. We
did not tell the Nigerian government to handover our territory to
Cameroon.”

Threat of revolt

They vowed to
revolt violently if government continues to be nonchalant towards them,
stressing that because they have been quiet for almost two years now,
government thinks all was well. They also called on the state and
federal governments to make provisions in this year’s budget for their
rehabilitation before things get out of hand.

Some of the placards carried by the protesters read:

Bakassi returnees
no water; Bakassi returnees have become refugees in Nigeria; No food
for Bakassi returnees; No employment for Bakassi returnees; Government
give us our right; We are for peace.

We lost all our belongings to Cameroon gendarmes who chased us out; We are Nigerians too.”

Mr. Okim, who addressed the restive Bakassi natives, appealed to them to be more patient as government was working on their welfare.

“Mr Imoke would
have personally granted you audience if he had not travelled to Abuja
on official duties,” he said, adding that it would have been better if
they had written down their grievances and presented them to the
government rather than mobilise in large numbers to Calabar.

Mr Okim said Obioma
Liyel Imoke, wife of the state governor, had, last year, donated food
items to them and promised to let her extend another hand of
benevolence to them in view of the acute food shortage experienced in
the crowded camp.

“On return from
Abuja, the governor will attend to your demands without delay as he has
been discussing with the federal government over your plight,” Mr Okim
said, just as he promised to visit their camp to see things for himself
before the governor returns to know what line of action to take.

Bodies of scores of
newborn babies and adults are to be subjected to mass burial by the
University of Benin Teaching Hospital (UBTH), Benin City, Edo State,
the federal tertiary institution’s management said at the weekend.

The Senior Public
Relations Officer of the institution, Ibitoye Kehinde, said 186 dead
babies and 40 adults in the hospital morgue will be disposed of, if
they remain unclaimed in two weeks’ time.

The unclaimed
bodies reportedly came to light as the hospital management was taking
stock of patients who have disappeared from its wards, leaving huge
medical bills unpaid. The patients allegedly absconded during a recent
strike by medical staff. The strike had been called to protest the
recent kidnap of UBTH’s Chief Medical Director, Michael Ibadim.

No fewer than 25
patients, earlier discharged but who could not leave because of unpaid
bills, were said to have left their hospital beds during the strike.
The hospital’s loss in unpaid bills is said to run into millions of
naira.

NEXT investigations
revealed that one escaped patient, Okereke Clifford, 32, had been on
admission on Ward A5 of the UBTH, for diabetes (Type IDM), and was
discharged close to two months before he went missing on April 14.
Clifford is believed to have left behind a medical bill of about N120,
000.

The consultant in charge of the escapee patient, K.P Kubujinje, was not available for comment at the time of going to press.

However, experts
say that Mr Clifford’s medical condition, as with many other escapee
patients, is terminal. It is doubtful whether such patients can afford
the medications to manage their illnesses.

Meanwhile, 120 of
the remains of dead infants went unclaimed at the first generation
varsity teaching hospital mortuary in the last quarter of the year
ended 2009, while another 68 who died between January and March 2010
are also yet to be claimed.

A breakdown of
recent records of unclaimed corpses of babies, include: one stillbirth,
25 who died at one-day-old; and 26 that lost their fight for life
within one week. Eighteen others died within two weeks. Also unclaimed
is the body of a 15-year-old that died after a brief illness.

Arrived without identification

About 40 corpses
are of adults said to have been brought to the UBTH by the Federal Road
Safety Commission (FRSC), the police, Non-Governmental Organizations
(NGOs) and public spirited individuals. Many of these arrived at the
hospital without proper identification and have been at the morgue for
great lengths of time.

“The hospital will be left with no other option than to dispose of
the corpses en-mass and unsung [in] any way the hospital management
deems fit,” Mrs Kehinde said. “It is a regular exercise of the hospital
carried out quarterly, as most of the unclaimed bodies are unknown
accident victims deposited by security agents or by the Benin-based
Save Accident Victims Association (SAVAN), an NGO that caters for the
welfare of accident victims at expressways.”

The Edo State
chapter of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) and the leadership of the
state House of Assembly yesterday differed over the reception of the
Edo State assembly’s speaker at the recently concluded Speakers
Conference held in Makurdi, Benue State.

A statement
yesterday by the PDP’s state director of publicity and strategy,
Okharedia Ihimekpen, commended the Speakers’ Forum for allegedly
sending out of the conference, Bright Omokhodion, Speaker of Edo State
House of Assembly on the ground that he was not the duly recognized
speaker of the state House of Assembly.

The statement said
since he was not recognised by the Speakers’ Conference, Mr. Omokhodion
should stop parading himself as the speaker.

“Bright Omokhodion,
you will recall, forcibly and with the tacit support and script written
by the AC led government but with less than the constitutional
two-third necessary tried to take over the speakership of the of the
Edo State House of Assembly,” the statement said. “The state assembly
has a speaker and that is the person of Zakawanu Garuba”.

Swift rebuttal

But in a swift
reaction yesterday, the senior special assistant (media) to Mr.
Omokhodion, Ralph Okhiria, denied the allegations that Mr Omokhodion
was not allowed into the conference as Edo State Speaker.

He said his boss
was only told not to be signatory to the communiqué, since issues
relating to his emergence as Speaker are still in court.

“All they have said
is not true,” he said. “First, we got our invitation card, we got there
and we were given accommodation, we were accredited and attended the
opening ceremony. The Speaker went with two other lawmakers, the
Majority Leader; Philip Shaibu and Etiosa Ogbewei who all participated
in deliberations.

“How could they
have said that when the same organisers even relocated the Speaker and
the lawmakers to another hotel when they complained that where they
were lodged was not good enough. The delegates were part of the team
that visited the governor, Gabriel Suswam and they were at the
entourage when the went on inspection of projects on two occasions. It
was the drafting of the communiqué that the PDP dominated conferences
said the Speaker should be excused not to sign the communiqué because
of the cases in court and this they said with sincere apologies asd
they said they don’t want to be seen as being involved in contempt of
court.”

Mr. Okhiria said the PDP statement is part of the plans of the
opposition party to continue to deceive the people “after they have
lost out in the state.”

The National Drug
Law Enforcement Agency (NDLEA) on Sunday disclosed that it will charge
the couple that allegedly used their six-year-old twins in smuggling
cocaine at the Murtala Mohammed International Airport (MMIA), for money
laundering.

The agency
disclosed that its latest findings on the duo, Jimoh Bashir and Jimoh
Milikat, revealed that the couple has assets valued at over ₦50
million, adding that this discovery contradicts the couple’s claim of
financial difficulty that resulted in their inability to afford their
children’s school fees.

“The assets include
two luxury houses in Lekki, Lagos, and three posh cars,” said Mitchell
Ofoyeju, spokesperson for the agency. “Preliminary investigation has
also revealed that the couple, believed to be professional couriers,
had travelled to London with the twins 17 times since 2006, under the
guise of holiday or visit.” Ahmadu Giade, chief executive of the
anti-drug outfit, disclosed that the agency will impound all assets
traced to the couple, that are believed to have been acquired with
illicit drug proceeds.

Assuring that he
will probe further into the matter, Mr. Giade disclosed that the agency
will see to it that they uncover any other asset that is yet to be
discovered.

“We have
successfully traced houses and some vehicles belonging to the couple,”
he said. “Given the competence of the team of investigators, we hope to
uncover more assets.”

Background

Early this month,
the agency announced the arrest of the family of four as they were
about boarding an Arik Air flight to London, Heathrow, after white
substances detected to be cocaine were found in their possession.

The 46-year-old
father was alleged to have connived with his wife in concealing 350g of
cocaine each, in the diaper of their six-year-old twins. The wife also
concealed 3.35kg in her bra and underwear, bringing the total quantity
of cocaine to 4.05kg.

Victoria Egbase,
director of assets and financial investigations, NDLEA, disclosed that
the recovered properties include three cars – Toyota Matrix, Lexus and
Mazda; two three bedroom flats; and another building where they operate
a supermarket at Lekki, Lagos.

The agency,
however, disclosed that the couple will face multiple charges because
of the nature of their case, stressing that besides being the first
family to be nabbed over cocaine trafficking in the country, they are
also the first to use their twins in smuggling cocaine.

“The likely charges
hanging on their necks include unlawful possession and exportation of
4.05kg of cocaine, money laundering as well as child abuse for using
their six-year-old twins in cocaine smuggling,” said Mr. Ofoyeju.

The agency’s
Murtala Mohammed International Airport commander, Hamza Umar, disclosed
that investigation into the case is at an advanced stage and that other
accomplices shall be made to face the wrath of the law.

“The case is under investigation and we have made significant
progress,” he said. “All the people involved shall be brought to book.”

Nigeria’s former military president, Ibrahim
Babangida, has advised other parties in the country not to imitate the
measures adopted by the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) in handling
disagreements among members.

Mr. Babangida, who spoke to aviation correspondents
at the presidential wing of the Murtala Mohammed Airport (MMA), Lagos,
on Sunday, disclosed that the ongoing dispute among the nation’s ruling
party officials should be addressed according to the laid down dictates
of the party.

“The truth is, I do hope that they should be able to
resolve it by playing by the rules. If they allow it to escalate, they
would be showing bad examples and other parties should not emulate the
PDP,” he said. “Going after party officials and this and that is not
the solution to the problem.”

Maintaining that the right procedures be adopted when
suspending members, the former president disclosed that party officials
can only be removed after an agreement in a conference.

“Due process must be followed in handling issues.
Therefore, if some executives were brought in by the national party
convention, the only people who could remove them are the convention
and not any other arrangement,” he said.

Last week, the PDP announced the indefinite
suspension of 19 members, which included key officers like Peter Odili
and Achike Udennwa, former governors of Rivers and Imo States; Ken
Nnamani and Adolphus Wabara, former Senate Presidents; Aminu Bello
Masari, former Speaker of the House of Representative; among others.

A statement signed by the National Secretary of the
party, Abubakar Kuwa Baraje, disclosed that “their case has been
referred to the National Disciplinary Committee for further necessary
action.” Meanwhile, Mr. Babangida implored the party to give room for
free dialogue, adding that political parties globally are faced with
similar problems.

“The leaders of the party should allow internal
democracy to flourish. It is not news, this thing is all over the
world. Political parties do have some of these problems but the ability
to resolve it internally is what they should be preaching now, not
party,” he said.

The former General, however, called on party
officials to desist from condemning the head of the PDP, adding that
the recommended procedures must be adhered to when handling divides
among members.

“They should allow internal defence, internal
democracy, and people should express their views and not to fault the
chairman,” he said. “If the chairman has done something wrong, the
process must be followed and that is why it is called a political
party.”

“They shouldn’t behave like the military,” he added, laughing.

Atiku leaves without a word

While the interview with the former president was
going on, Nigeria’s former vice president, Atiku Abubakar, arrived the
airport and headed straight for his private jet parked on the tarmac,
without saying a word neither to the ex-military leader or to reporters.

Though approached by reporters to get his comment,
Mr. Atiku, who appeared to be in a hurry, could not be reached, as his
officers guarded him to his aircraft.