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Warri: Urhobo's Exclusion Counter-Productive, Says Okumagba

This Day (Lagos)
NEWS
July 5, 2004
Posted to the web July 6, 2004

By Onwuka Nzeshi
Warri
Delta State Primary Education Boards Chairman, Chief Emmanuel Okumagba
yesterday faulted the ongoing peace process in Warri, saying the exclusion of
the Urhobo ethnic group from the current efforts to restore peace amongst the
feuding groups could be counter-productive and delay the actualisation of the
peace agenda.
Okumagba, a Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) chieftain and former local council
chairmanship candidate for Warri-South council said though there was every
reason to rejoice at the peace process, it was wrong to exclude any of the
contending groups since each of them had a role to play in the quest for peace.
He also faulted the process on the grounds that the peace deals so far signed,
according to him, failed to address the fundamental issues of the crisis. In
his own view, it is these holes in the peace basket that is responsible for the
various dissenting voices especially in the ranks of the Ijaw leadership.
Some Ijaw leaders notably, chief Edwin Clark and Chief Samson Mammy last week
criticised the peace pact signed by the leaders of Ijaw and the Itsekiri ethnic
groups on the grounds that those who signed the deal.

   

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