1. The peaceful protests/calls for DIALOGUE by the Ijaws and peoples of the Niger Delta has been visited by orgies of violence and sheer slaughter on the streets of Yenagoa. Is this the New Year gift that the military regime has for Nigerians? Can bombs silence the resolve of an oppressed people? Wont the polluted waters of the creeks, now running with blood respond to this injustice in the land of our birth?

At the last count about 20 people have been murdered in this gory display of state terror. How many more lives must be lost before the government and the oil giants realise that a conquered territory is not the best environment for business?

2. In the midst of mass poverty the government of General Abubakar, an offshoot of the infamous General Abacha junta, has inflicted a massive petrol price hike (from 11 naira to 25 naira or 31 cents a litter). The prices of kerosene and diesel have been raised from 8 and 9 Naira respectively to 23 Naira. One implication of this is a huge inflation for a people with no buying power. The implication is that our poor people who cannot afford to buy kerosene or gas for cooking now have to resort to the fast disappearing forests/bushes for fuel wood. For the entire world, Abubakar’s policy is a negation of all that has been proposed to halt the negative climate change for the preservation of life on planet earth.
3. When the government says that the price of petroleum products should be negotiaited between oil marketers and the consumers what sort of dark humour is that for a civil society that has been virtually totally castrated by repressive military regimes?
4. In September 1998 the government of General Abubakar announced a wage raise for workers. The minimum wage was pegged at 5,200 naira ($65) per month. Now the story is that this new increase has to suffer a decrease down to N3, 000 ($37.5) a month. The government’s plea that they have been messed up by advisers does not address the issue of how much they have messed up the people. In what area are the advisers and the advised not messing up one another?
5. The transition to democracy programme has so far shown that as everyone knows, the military cannot husband a true democracy. Fraud and violence in many areas marred the local government elections. The gubernatorial primaries have best been marked by brazen display of well-learnt military tendencies by the so-called politicians. Money and raw power appear to be the decisive factors in who becomes what. It has now become even clearer that sanity can only return to the political scene through a Government of National Unity whose fundamental work will be to gather the peoples of this nation together for dialogue on how best to march into the next millennium.

• The military government should halt the ethnocide being visited on the Ijaw people. The killings must stop, NOW! The terror in Yenagoa cannot bring the peace we need to face our future as a people.
• It is NEVER TOO LATE FOR DIALOGUE. GUNS cannot silence the Niger Delta people or any other sufficiently suppressed people for that matter. This is one war that has NO VICTORY.
• It is time for the soldiers to return to their barracks. We also call for the disbanding of all military taskforces for internal security.
• It is time for the immediate release of all detainees. We demand the provision of access to medical care for those who have been wounded in the fray. From our reports many of the victims have been innocent standersby.
• The military government and the oil companies should not think of drilling oil from the blood of Nigerians because crude oil prices are falling. Budgetary deficits are not handled by emasculating the populace. Government should immediately reconsider its stand on the pricing of petrol, kerosene and diesel and return all to their former pump prices.
• We call on all lovers of (Environmental) Justice to note that the lot of the Ogoni and the Ijaw will become their lot too if they don’t speak up now.
• We call on the multi-national oil companies to immediately heed the call of the people.

If we do not speak up now, we will do well to note that in the smoke of battle sitting on the fence opens you to stones from both sides.