There was a cloud of invasion, and there was death and anguish in a Kingdom once upon a time in 2009 in the Niger Delta region. When Women lost their homes and ran into the forest in a nude state at night from their lovely husbands’ beds, in distress, children were forgotten, and displaced, husbands ran away from their homes into the thick forest of no road, and men lost their lives, siblings, old men, and women, a note of death on their palms nowhere to run to, surrounded with the rhythm of deafening fusillade blocked their ears at the dead of the night. Hunger strike on the roof of women and women were barricaded from the rivers for fishing expeditions as khaki men mounted every creek against the most wanted Man called Tompolo in Gbaramatu Kingdom to give Niger Delta region a sense of freedom, development, coastal roads, good health care, and school for the deprived oil region to have a sense of belonging and benefits from the dividend of Natural Resources.
The khaki men came on both river and air raids and bombarded the Gbaramatu Kingdom consecutively in three days. War film-like, in reality in Ijaw land, the ultimate sacrifice, was made by Tompolo.
They destroyed all the houses in Okerenkoko, including uncompleted foundations of blocks, but they could not destroy Oyain and Ekarikatekabou Deities. Humans, like Fowls in their homeless way of a mother- chicken, were the conditions of Okerenkoko’s sons and daughters to bring Tompolo and his boys dead or alive was the command from the military base. But Aziza beheld the immortal mortal son of the gods and protected him for a better tomorrow. Tears, properties, lives lost, and floating like fishes doped out of the deep were the sordid state of things. The land of Oporoza, Okerenkoko, kurutie was urinating blood, Tompolo wept, “I have put my people in distress in the name of freedom in my hidden abode under the divine protection of Aziza Deity, Egbesu Torumobramo.”
The agitation that some people have enjoyed, they don’t know the sacrifice made by the Gbaramatu Kingdom. Yes, khaki men destroyed Camp Five to the ground with no grasses, Kurutie, they destroyed, but they couldn’t destroy Amadifiye. Tinbai, the gods, watched the land, Benikrukru, then Oporoza communities were destroyed, and the ancient Palace of the kingdom made the king homeless and in tears. The bombardment made the king join his ancestors as the greatest sacrifice for the Niger Delta region to leave a better life.
The resource control and the emancipation of the Niger Delta movement ended up in the saga of death. Children became the casualties of Prof. JP Clark’s poem, women, and aged men. People cried on the streets of the various communities. High Chief Government Oweizide Ekpemupolo, aka Tompolo, wore the Toga of the Niger Delta agitation for a better living than a region of oil that had become a blood of death as JTF invaded communities at random. Yet Tompolo beheld his blueprint to the federal government to make the Niger Delta region a better place where the poor man children from the oil-rich region can also go to school in their environment.
Yes, that gave birth to the Federal Maritime University Okerenkoko where the children of Fishermen are going to school and those from afar too. Who gains it? The people or Tompolo, it is the people in the region
In the dark days of the Niger Delta struggle, he spearheaded it. Until Late President Umaro Yaradua declared Amnesty for peaceful Dialogue on a blueprint.
Yes, another May 15th is a reminder of death, a reminder of fallen heroes, a reminder of a people who survived the cruel bombardment of the voiceless children and women in agony
The cry of the people and the international declaration of genocide against the Gbaramatu Kingdom and the gun approach will not favor the Nigerian state as Government Oweizide stood for the oppressed and subjugated people of the Niger Delta region to be a beneficiary of their oil thereby the declaration of the Presidential Amnesty Programme. Yes, Gbaramatu Kingdom survived the federal government’s pot-of-death invasion and later resettled in their communities. GBARAMATU won the case against the Nigerian government to be compensated for the genocidal killing.
The battle of May 15th survival was declared by Gbaramatu Kingdom Survival Day where people gathered at Oporoza, the traditional headquarters of Gbaramatu Kingdom in Delta State to celebrate themselves, the return of the homeless people once upon a time made the ultimate decision and sacrifice for declaration of the Presidential Amnesty Programme.
Yes if there is no Gbaramatu, there is no Amnesty in the Niger Delta region because there was one man whose resilience, focus, and dedication to his vision for a better Niger Delta region, a greater hope beyond his personal gain became the gain of the region. The death was for him alone, but the benefits came to all, but people bereft of history would want to stand against Tompolo.
On the stages of the Amnesty Disarmament:
Repentant militants from the Niger Delta voluntarily surrendered their weapons to the Federal Government in 2009. Arms and ammunition from over 29, 000 ex-militants were recovered. Yes, the second was demobilization and
Essential information on the background and stations of the disarmed ex-militants is to be collected. They were then counselled, trained, and documented, and they were enrolled in the program.
The third point was Reintegration. It is our mandate to reintegrate beneficiaries fully into society after training and empowering them to the status of entrepreneurs and/or employable citizens who will become net contributors to the economy of the Niger Delta region.
Yes, Tompolo was the last man to drop his arms in agitation as he refused to become a victim of deceit over the insincerity of the federal government against his own people. Those who came to join the fight for gain had all run to Abuja to sign a paper to build a mansion to enjoy their lives but Tompolo refused to be deceived until they came down to the forest of the gods that if this region didn’t change it would be a shame for us to live here as Ijaw people. Tompolo wept and accepted the Presidential Pardon and dropped his arms for the return of peace. A board called the Presidential Amnesty Programme was formed, and people came to head the program. Those who never lost even a broom in their houses became the administrators, and the real agitator went back to his village to commune with the gods that protected him in times of trouble.
Yes, it’s barely the 15th year of the declaration of the Amnesty Programme now. Those who have the blueprint must come to map the roads on the key agenda of the Presidential Amnesty Programme to succeed on his core mandate areas of engagement
High Chief Dennis Otuaro PhD. is a roadmap of the agenda of Tompolo’s Presidential Amnesty Programme on the renewed hope to address the educational needs, health, youth training, and empowerment and infrastructural development of the region through strategic collaboration.
This sub-title is the reality of the totality and the essence of the presidential Amnesty Programme.
Those who fought for the liberation of the Niger Delta region know the essence of the agitation to address critical needs to change the narrative of the Niger Delta story, after the rehabilitation of the people who were in the forest back home, the blueprint as a roadmap is in the hands of the core fighters who envisioned to transform the people in both educational, good roads, infrastructure, human and capacity building.
Chief Dennis Otuaro who was a soldier in the liberation Struggle, from the forest they were trained to go to school to prepare ahead of the leadership responsibilities to make a change, not those who do not even know their villages or rather nothing about the struggle making inflammatory and derogatory comments.
Yes, many came and turned the Programme into retired military affairs without understanding the yearning of the people until strategic planners like High Chief Dr. Dennis Otuaro was appointed as the administrator of the Amnesty Programme. The dream of Tompolo’s transformation has come true. The that the train is moving to take corrective measures on the existing lacuna.
Yes, Dr. Otuaro revisits the Original Blueprint from the Master, High Chief Government Oweizide Ekpemupolo, the Originator and the essence of the agitation for the reality and transformation of the Niger Delta people for Education as the key to a developing region, Dr. Otuaro has visited all the students who are beneficiaries in their various Universities to have a chat with them to know their challenges and solutions to make them come out with flying colors and other strategies agitators and critical stakeholders to have clear guidelines with the already established blueprint of the Amnesty formation.
Where others have failed Dr. Dennis is making strategic implementation plans to address them with the federal government.
Yes, with Dr. Dennis Otuaro should also review their so-called generals who are embezzling their boys’ payment should also be looked into, then those who went for the training as core agitators with their code numbers but have not received salary or payment have stopped many years, Dr. Otuaro should revisit such issues as well as address the peoples problems, too.
The best thing President Tinubu has done at this critical time of Nigerian history is the appointment of High Chief Dennis Otuaro, who knows the root of the Amnesty, a strategic planner, and what it takes to align with the people across Niger Delta states as the first man from the home of where the agitation started from, Dr. Otuaro will build on it strongly, where others failed to make the Nigerian state continue to enjoy the Peace from the Niger Delta region and the Federal Government. The NSA should collaborate with the blueprint of Dr. Otuaro to implement Tompolo’s mission as the Pathfinder of the Presidential Amnesty Programme, and that is the only way the clear roadmap will be achieved, including the various stakeholders of the Niger Delta region.
Yes, this 15th year military invasion survival celebrations in Gbaramatu Kingdom, let High Chief Dr. Dennis Otuaro should also come home with critical stakeholders to have plans to visit homes of fallen heroes, their wives, children, and mothers to inculcate them into the program for them to feel that the labor’s of their husbands as heroes are well appreciated.
And let Niger Deltans be calm to let Dr. Dennis works to achieve the great hope we all hoped for.
As Gbaramatu Kingdom celebrate their survival party, let’s be hopeful that this will one day become a national day in the Niger Delta with international support to be celebrated nationwide as the Niger Delta of our dream with the Natural resources.
I am also a victim of the Ayakoromo military invasion in 2010 as the Bobougbene community received bullets on their roofs as an impacted community.
Let us celebrate this day in Gbaramatu Kingdom to reflect on the tragedy and the joy of the living.
The celebration is a sign of Gbaramatu Kingdom resilience, hope, commitment, and belief on the core values of Egbesu, Woyin protection, and the ancestors that blessed them with the natural resources.
Long live Gbaramatu Kingdom!
Long Live Dr. Tompolo!
Long live the Niger Delta region!
Asiayei Enaibo
Writes from GbaramatuVoice media organization
