the Federal Capital Territory in a bid to convince the Federal
Government to take necessary steps to review the International Court
of Justice ruling that ceded the oil-rich area to Cameroun 10 years
ago.
But neither President Goodluck Jonathan nor the Attorney General of
the Federation, Mr. Mohammed Adoke, was in Abuja to listen to the
embattled Bakassi indigenes, who claimed to have been armed with new
incontrovertible facts to aid the government in pressing for the
reversal of the ICJ judgement in Nigeria's favour.
Both Jonathan and the AGF are in New York for the first-ever
High-Level Plenary Session of the United Nations on the Rule of Law,
which opened on Monday.
The Bakassi indigenes pointed out that the information at their
disposal was enough to swing the ICJ to reverse its October 10, 2002
ruling in favour of Nigeria and pleaded with President Jonathan not to
listen to the enemies of Nigeria who claim that the issue had been
laid to rest.
The Coordinator of the 'Save Bakassi Group' in the FCT, Mr. Solomon
Inameti, told News men that they were ready to assist the Federal
Government with fresh evidence that was not available at the time of
the judgment.
Inameti said, "we have 100 new information and we are ready to give to
the Nigerian Government to use and approach the ICJ and conveniently
pursue this case to a logical conclusion.
"To the best of our knowledge, the evidence is concrete enough to
secure us victory at the ICJ and the Federal Government can take us
for our words.
"We went out of our way to secure this vital information that was not
there before to assist the Federal Government because we believe that
it is in our own interest to continue to remain in Nigeria.
"Let us make it categorically clear that no matter what happens we
will not accept Cameroun as our own country. Subjugating us to
Cameroun would not only be humiliating but dehumanizing to us and our
generations yet unborn.
"Anyone who thinks that we the people of Bakassi can come under
Cameroun is wasting time because that will not work. We are ready to
go to the United Nations and seek a referendum on where we want to be
and how we should be administered.
"If the Federal Government of Nigeria does not want us we will
approach the UN at the end of October 10, 2012 to seek the way forward
for ourselves and our respective communities in Bakassi," Inameti
said.
FG should reclaim Bakassi
A historian, who is very familiar with the Bakassi history, Mr.
Emmanuel Doh, said the AGF had no reason to hesitate in approaching
the ICJ for the immediate review of the 2002 judgement given the
weight of evidence now at his disposal.
Doh pointed out that Cameroun even committed a serious blunder by the
way and manner it adjusted the boundary between it and Southern
Cameroon encompassing Bakassi, after the African Union had asked all
countries to respect their boundaries with other nations.
Doh said Cameroun's fraudulent boundary adjustment coupled with
numerous actions, which the UN and the ICJ were not aware of at the
time of the ruling in 2002, were enough to swing judgment in Nigeria's
favour, if a review was sought.
A member of the House of Representatives from Cross River State,
Ambassador Nkoyo Toyo, warned yesterday that it was in the interest of
the government of Nigeria to take urgent legal steps to reclaim
Bakassi, as the people of the area would never surrender their fate to
another country.
Toyo, who is a former Nigeria's envoy to Ethiopia, said the Bakassi
people would continue to fight for the territory until their rights
were restored.
The lawmaker maintained that the people were hit below the belt when
the AGF declared recently that Nigeria was not going to ask for a
review of the ICJ judgment, a development, she claimed smacks of
insensitivity on the part of the government.
She noted, "The people of Bakassi have always been demanding a review
of the judgment. But unfortunately, former President Olusegun Obasanjo
adopted a unilateral approach towards it.
"You will recall that Obasanjo did not bring up the matter to the
National Assembly, the National Boundary Commission has not adjusted
the boundary despite the ruling, the Bakassi Local Government is still
in Cross River State and it is still being paid monthly subvention by
the Federal Government.
"So there are many illegal things still going on as far as the issue
of Bakassi is concerned. But the Bakassi people have never had a
chance to decide for themselves where they want to go and how they
want to be administered," the lawmaker said.
It could not be established last night whether the government would
accept the new evidence being claimed by the Bakassi natives and use
it to press for a review of the judgment before the expiration of the
deadline on October 10.
No comments:
Post a Comment