Former President Goodluck Jonathan has urged Niger Delta youths to shun violence to support the economic development of the region and the country.
Jonathan spoke on Tuesday in Yenagoa, the Bayelsa State capital, when executives of the Movement for Survival of Izon Ethnic Nationality in the Niger Delta (MOSIEND) visited him.
Jonathan said the youth remained the focus of most developmental policies of government, noting that any attempt at restiveness and violence was against their strategic interest.
He said: “The future belongs to the youth who are at the centre of most developmental endeavours and policies of government, so the diversion of youthful energy towards violence is not desirable at all.
“The future of this country belongs to the young ones, not for those of us who have given our youthful years and are on the verge of exiting the scene. The youth should resist every attempt to take to violence.
“Peace in the Niger Delta is very essential as any disturbance in the Niger Delta affects the country because the region suports the economy of the nation.”
MOSIEND President Kenedy Tonjo-West appealed to the former president to intervene in the boundary dispute between Rivers and Bayelsa states to avert impending violence among residents of the two states.
He said the group, which was formed in 1993 as a non-partisan Ijaw pressure group, played a vital role in the advocacy for the creation of Bayelsa and formation of the Ijaw National Congress (INC).
Tonjo-West said the 9th National Executive Council of MOSIEND was seeking the advice of the statesman on the plethora of challenges confronting the Ijaw nation, Niger Delta and Nigeria.
He said the group was still in pursuit of the resource control agenda of the Niger Delta and noted that calls for the restructuring of the Nigerian nation was drawing attention to the non-implementation of the 2014 National Conference.
The MOSIEND President appealed to Jonathan to use his position as a member of National Council of State to mobilise former heads of state to persuade the Federal Government to reverse the hike in electricity tariff and pump price of petrol
“MOSIEND is uncomfortable with the level of insecurity along our waterways and communities.
“Your Excellency Sir, we most respectfully appeal that you intervene in the Oluasiri/Soku boundary issue with a view to finding lasting solution to these intermittent squabbles between Rivers and Bayelsa states.
“Please prevail on the two state governors in the region that are supposed to close ranks to address this dispute and its associated problems limiting our progress in the region,” he said.