CELEBRATING THE RETURN OF HENRY ORKAH IN PROPHECY.

(This piece is written in honour of and presented as a Birthday Gift to Prof. Wole Soyinka, Africa’s most revered luminary who clocked 81 today. Happy Birthday to the peoples’ KONGI ”)

The Niger Delta liberation struggle reached its lowest moment when the fighters decided to take the AMNESTY from the supposed terrorist and corrupt Government of the Federal Republic of Nigeria, and at the time Niger Delta desperadoes traded the real gains of that struggle for the presidential sloth. These two factors were the most effective disabling spanners the Nigerian technocrats threw at the rusty bolts that have held the different strands of the Niger Delta struggle together for the past fifty years.

But the Muslim Brotherhood (MB) had a different agenda that is different from and, as well, opposed to the vision and mission of late President Alhaji Musa Yara’dua in the Niger Delta.

Alhaji Asari Dokubo thus became the rallying point for the MB in the Niger Delta. 

While members of the different militant groups were made to embrace the Federal Government Amnesty project, the MB singled out Asari Dokubo and the yet-to-emerge-recruits as the new or renewed face of militancy in the Niger Delta. By his refusal to subscribe to Amnesty, Asari Dokubo has not entered and did not enter into any agreement with the Federal Government of Nigeria about disarmament and demilitarization of the Niger Delta. And, by the delay in the implementation of the resolutions of the National Conference, the International Community may not be in a hurry to label renewed hostilities in the Niger Delta as “terrorism”.

The MB stands to benefit more from an indicted Jonathanian administration and an Asari Dukubo – led insurgency that has the capacity to engage and subdue Henry Orkah – a Christian and possible militant leader with strong sympathy to a Buhari administration. Like Asari Dokubo, Henry Orkah rejected the Amnesty.  

The MB did not only want Henry Orkah dead but also struggled hard to bring about a major disconnect between the Christian members of the Niger Delta militant group and   Yar’dua/Jonathan presidency. The huge success recorded started with the October 1 bombing of the Eagle Square and the subsequent celebration of the Asari Dokubo personality by the Jonathan administration. 

But the most unfortunate thing about this disconnect was that what the Amnesty was meant to achieve for Nigeria, the Niger Delta and for the militants themselves as individuals was transformed into a hoax by the same MB which entertained strong fears about a united, stable, developed, prosperous and peaceful Niger Delta with vibrant economic, religious and political potentials situate in the Southern part of Nigeria. 

During my condolence visit to the family of the fallen Niger Delta hero, late Soboma George at the village in Buguma shortly before his burial, I took in at a glance what an Amaechi –Soboma peace solidarity could mean for the Rivers people with personalities like Prof. Tam David-West at the background and as supporters and sponsors. I was supposed to meet Soboma’s mother in Port Harcourt but that visit could not hold.
 The second time I visited Soboma’s   family, I took a bold step to initiate a meeting with Prof. Tam David-West by visiting his family house in the village also. The simplicity the man left behind in his village struck me with a deafening bang. The amazing thing about that visit was the hospitality of the old woman – Prof’s sister – who welcomed a poorly dressed and semi-mad man like me to the house of David-West.

When a similar visit took me to Warri in respect of the ex-militant warlord Tompolo, it was obviously clear to me that the Niger Delta struggle had been subverted and that the MB had also succeeded in subverting the Amnesty.

The return of Henry Orkah is surely going to change the Chemistry of Niger Delta politics.

Henry Orkah was a strategic intelligence officer and a worthy General of the Niger Delta struggle who was convinced that the Nigerian State was a sham and the most real usurpation of the Niger Delta as an independent nation.This is also the message he tried to propagate in his struggles. Regretably, some of his strong allies in the struggle had a different view as manifested in the manner the Amnesty Programme was embraced and the subsequent subscription to an Obasanjo presidency through a Niger Delta proxy. Such a presidency was, for Orkah, highly unacceptable and an easy sell-out. That he was making money selling arms, living in the comfort of a South African luxury apartment and hobnobbing with the North are all part of the propaganda of the war on militancy – whatever remained of that propaganda was the only hold which his allies had on Orkah  which they could front as the reason for his incarceration.

 

If only Rotimi Amaechi had departed the arena of militancy, thuggery and cultism earlier on than now to study the real ropes of Niger Delta diplomacy and the art of political expediency, he would have discovered the hidden road to the Vice Presidency that defined the very contents of his alliance with Bola Tinubu's (MB) APC even without engaging Celestine Omehia for too long in renewed hostilities. What Wike has given to Omehia is a birthright which Amaechi denied him. But regarding Rotimi Amacehi administration’s contributions to the development of Rivers State and the prudent management of the resources of the Niger Delta, Nyesom Wike is a liar! A pathological liar!!

 Yet, I have not departed from the earliest conviction I had about Rotimi Amaechi being “a lonely latecomer to development and good governance in Rivers State”.

 Patience Jonathan, Nyesom Wike and some of the Christian members of the Niger Delta militant group are on the road to prison, and may as well go down in history as the real “fraudsters”, "fundamentalists", "electoral robbers", “murderers” and “terrorists” that held Nigeria and the rest of her citizens hostage during Jonathan’s administration.

   

Therefore, enough of the politics of acrimony and bitterness in Rivers State. and in the Niger Delta.

Nevertheless, please lets join handsto welcome one of the greatest heroes of the Niger Delta struggle home in the person of Mr. Henry Orkah.

And we pray that Henry does not come home to fight or allow himself to be used to actualize the plan to rubbish former president Goodluck Ebele Jonathan who is emerging as Africa’s most revered leader and the best president Nigeria has ever had – a feat that lived and died with Chief Obafemi Awolowo as an ambition and a mere dream. Those of us on this side of the Niger Delta Walls pray that Henry would embrace the new realities on ground, strengthen himself and his colleagues up and then subscribe to a more mature approach in respect of the liberation of the Niger Delta - thanks to the friendly and fatherly disposition of President Muhammadu Buhari.

The conclusion is this:

Go Nyesom Wike !      Go!!     

 Let’s see how Rivers people will fold their hands, stay there and watch Governor Peterside hand over the whole of Rivers State and its resources to Muslim Brotherhood and to Ahmed Bola Tinubu, a terrorist and the Master Strategist of the Western Hemisphere, Lagos Logde even with the Report to Pope Francis at his disposal.

 My friendly, respectful but prophetic advice to Nyesom Wike:

Convince yourself and prepare your mind right now to accept the fact that a Rivers State run by Mr. Peterside is more Ikwerre-friendly and a development power-house for the Rivers people and for the rest of the Niger Delta than a Rivers State gubernatorial seat sold to and run by the MB or Bola Tinubu through a proxy – whomsoever that proxy is and whatever exchange that exists between the two of you. And if the Niger Delta wants to face facts – raw facts – then the Sacred Deed is given and left at their disposal.

Generally, and to all actors, let us relish the conviction that: If repentance is an issue in political life, then reconciliation is a catchment slogan for real democrats. 

Again, I send this as an appeal to Prof. Tam David-West, Prof. Wole Soyinka and President Muhammadu Buhari.