We know those bombing pipelines, Buhari should go after them — Ayiri Emami

NIGER – DELTA activist and Itsekiri leader, Chief Ayiri Emami, said on Friday that those bombing pipelines in Delta State were not ghosts, but known human beings living in the state and urged security agencies to go after them. He told Saturday Vanguard on phone yesterday: “We know them, the security agents know them too, they are not ghosts, and we will support President Muhammadu Buhari to bring them out no matter where they hide.” Emami, who was a former chairman of the Delta Waterways Security Committee, DWSC, Warri and a stalwart of the All Progressives Congress, APC, faulted the Delta state government over its alleged laid-back response to vandalization of pipelines by the Niger Delta Avengers. He also lambasted APC leaders in the state for purportedly sitting back while some criminals under the guise of agitating for the Niger Delta region, destroy oil facilities and give the state a bad name. “APC leaders in Delta state should rise up and condemn the activities of these militants, we are not part of them, they should not destroy our state, we are in support of Buhari government, government should isolate the criminals and deal with them,” he said. His words: “What is going on is not surprising to some of us and I want to say that government security agencies should be more serious about finding the perpetrators. I know that if they were serious, they would have fished them out because they have information on what is happening.” “It is just some few persons that are doing all these things and security agents should not stand and be looking at them and pretending that they do not know them. This matter is beyond what the Delta state government can handle even though it has not demonstrated enough commitment,” he said. “I want to suggest that President Muhammadu Buhari, the National Security Adviser, Minister of State for Petroleum, the Army, Navy, Air force and Police, the state government and the communities should all wake up on this matter. The communities should identify the militants doing these things because they know them and point them to security agents for arrest,” he said. Emami asserted: “I have interacted with people from the area, they are not happy with just some few persons that are bringing bad name to all of them for self-centered reasons and government should stop them, who they are avenging.” “ I can tell you that the name, Niger Delta Avengers, chosen by the criminal elements and economic terrorists bombing oil and gas installations in the state and their demands roundly expose their political, selfish, corrupt and destructive mission. “They are on their own, the good people of Niger Delta are not with them, we are in support of President Muhammadu Buhari and his government, we want him to transform Niger Delta, what are these masquerading economic saboteurs avenging? “When positive reforms on going in the oil and gas sector are already yielding dividends, with the coming on stream of the nation’s refineries as well as other infrastructures in the sector hitherto abandoned,” he said. Emami continued: “Every responsible Niger Deltans is ready to render needed support to the government to track down these selfish criminal elements to enable the Buhari administration achieve its desired goals in the South-South, especially the realization of mega people –centred projects.” “We are interested in the completion of the Lagos- Calabar Rail Project in the just signed 2016 budget, the EPZ project in Escravos, Warri South-West Local Government Area, Delta State and other worthy projects, not bombing of pipelines. That image of Niger Delta does not represent us, it is the selfish desire of few criminal elements,” he added.