N/Delta amnesty saved Nigeria N6trn in 2011 - Kuku

Curled from Nigerian Tribune:


THE Special Adviser to President Goodluck Jonathan on Niger Delta and Chief Executive of the Federal Government Amnesty Programme for Niger Delta Ex-agitators, Honourable Kingsley Kuku, said in Abuja on Monday that the implementation of the amnesty programme for Niger Delta ex-militants saved the nation N6 trillion last year.
Briefing reporters as part of activities marking the third anniversary of the programme, Kuku recalled that the violent activities of the ex-militants disrupted oil production in the Niger Delta which lowered production at the peak of the agitation in 2009.
He said, “today, under the watch and able guidance of President Jonathan, the tranquility in the once restive Niger Delta has led to an astronomic growth in the nation’s economy.
“From a paltry production level of 800,000 barrels of crude oil per day at the peak of the Niger Delta crisis in the first quarter of 2009, Nigeria currently produces between 2.4 and 2.6 million barrels per day.
“To further underscore the fact that the proclamation of amnesty for former agitators in the Niger Delta as well as the successful management of the post-amnesty programme saved the economy of our great nation from a looming collapse, some clarifications may be necessary:
With Nigeria producing as of today between 2.4 and 2.6 million barrels of crude oil per day as against the abysmally low between 700,000 and 800,000 barrels per day at the peak of the Niger Delta crisis in January 2009, the nation and its Joint Venture Partners are currently making production savings of up to 1.9 million barrels per day.
“When computed with prevailing exchange rate of about N160 to $1, daily production savings for Nigeria and the JV partners currently stand at a minimum of N33.4 billion per day.
“Given that oil production in Nigeria hovered between 2.4 and 2.6 barrels for all of 2011, it would be safe to emphatically assert that savings for Nigeria and the JV partners for year ending 2011 is estimated to be a whopping N6 trillion,” Kuku asserted.
Going down memory lane, he said, “but the peace in the Niger Delta did not come on a platter of gold. Rather it was a product of dialogue, patriotism and tenacity.”

THREE YEARS AFTER AMNESTY

When next you meet a former Niger Delta militant, you may be face-to-face with the pilot that would be handling the aircraft flying you across Nigeria. You may be facing Dorathy Effiong, a repentant arms bearer, who has abandoned the world of fighting the state and embraced the amnesty programme of the Federal Government. She has, thanks to the scheme, undertaken a comprehensive training to qualify as a pilot with a license that now enables her to apply her talent, time and energy to serve the society. Again, when next you meet an ex-militant, you may be listening to the story of Clifford Wilson, who after years of life in the creeks as an enemy of the state, has become a pilot as a result of the amnesty granted the militants. Who knows, in the years ahead, he may be firing a jet ferrying the president of the Republic of Nigeria! Still more, when next you meet an ex-militant, he may be Godgift Okoye, a shipbuilder. Leaving the murky world of violence and sabotage behind, he decided to accept the government’s amnesty for those battling the authorities in the Niger Delta. He abandoned his weapons and the perilous life of perpetual uncertainty and settled for the full conditions of the amnesty. When next you meet citizens who have done the transition from years of a bitter armed agitation against the state to persons who have joined other citizens to build the society, you would be meeting the products of the success story of the Amnesty Programme of the Federal Government of Nigeria. The celebrated scheme is marking its third year in operation today, having been proclaimed into full flight on June 25, 2009 by then President Umaru Musa Yar’Adua. It was a masterstroke that has since established the government as a caring one, determined to fulfil its main constitutional role of providing enduring security for the people in return for the mandate the people gave it to rule. Amnesty has sharply defined the Nigerian state as a focused one that would deploy all creative means to protect the interests of the people, notably, when it has to do with the main source of the country’s revenue earner – oil. Crude oil sales outside our shores account for more than 90 percent of what we earn in foreign exchange in a world economy driven by oil. What we earn from the commodity is responsible for a large chunk of our social and economic development. All other things that accrue from these, international prestige, influence, respect, the leverage from these, flow directly or indirectly from crude and the creeks of the Niger Delta. The corollary is that a government would be irresponsible to watch unconcerned while that region is allowed to work as it did while the militants stuck to their guns. If it permitted that status quo, then the nation, its government and its people, would all eventually be denied its wealth along with the clout and global respect derived from it. We must ponder over some figures to appreciate what the successful post-Amnesty plan of the President Goodluck Jonathan administration has done for the economy and people of Nigeria. In 2008 alone, we lost N3 trillion as a result of the crisis of the militants in the Niger Delta. Later in the first quarter of 2009, Nigeria’s export dwindled to as low as between 700,000 and 800,000 barrels per day. Add to that the hundreds of lives lost, the insecurity that prevented social, economic and industrial development in the region and you would register the total aura of despair and its spiral effects on every facet of the Nigerian society. In the past three years, Nigeria has banished this spectre of destruction and deprivation, following the faithful prosecution and management of the Amnesty Programme. Our young men and women, in their thousands, are no longer battling the society in anger at perceived injustices. The Amnesty Office under the Presidency, anchored by special adviser to the president and chairman of the programme, Kingsley Kuku, has ensured that these compatriots now see themselves as part of the society, to which they have committed their time, talent and energy to serve. Amnesty has thus become a sort of all-cure magic wand. It has not only arrested the internecine war in the creeks, but has also reintegrated old enemies into the society. There is more: it has added to the productive capacity of the nation by enlisting hitherto parasitic segments of the society to contribute their quota to society. This is rare in the annals of Nigerian, indeed African, history, reversing a forlorn situation that threatened to put an end to the notion of Nigeria as a nation. It is our own Marshall Plan (initiated by the United States of America for the rapid recovery of Western Europe after the devastation caused by World War II). We need to hail the administration for this bold scheme the same way the world has continued to salute the Marshall Plan even decades after the global conflict.