Why Ogonis need Bori State ~ Nunieh
By Chimex Ndubuisi
The President of Bori State Movement, Senator Dr. (Gbene) Cyrus Nunieh said if the federal government creates Bori State out of Rivers State, it would soothe the wounds inflicted on Ogoni by the brutal, judicial and callous hanging of nine Ogoni sons which included the playwright and intellectual Ken Saro-Wiwa on November 10, 1995 by the federal government.
He said before now, there was the Ogoni State Creation Committee, formed to seek and demand for a state for the Ogoni people, saying that the committee successfully mobilized Ogoni people under tense situation though, and submitted its request for Ogoni or Rivers East State to the military government of late General Sani Abacha.
Senator Nunieh opined that the people of Ogoni, Andoni, Opobo, Nkoro, Oyigbo and Eleme ethnic nationalities have come together and agreed to form a formidable front and to request from the federal government of Nigeria a state that would be called Bori State with capital at Bori town.
The President said their coming together was informed by their contiguity and long history of harmonious relationship and co-existence for decades and the mutual benefits derivable from trade and inter-martial relationship that had been practiced over years.
He said these communities have common features and abundant resources that would put the state ahead most of the already created states in the country.
“Bori State, if created, would be much self-sustaining as the area is economically viable and blessed with abundant human and material resources needed to advance a state. There are many functional oil wells and sufficient untapped oil and gas reserve. The rich alluvial plain with which this area is endowed will not only swell government coffers, it will create more jobs, thereby eliminating the perennial crises in the Niger Delta”.
Senator Nunieh maintained that the common belief and convinction of the communities that make up Bori State was that the different ethnic nationalities that make up Nigeria should co-exist and practice true federalism and that the people that produce the bulk of the wealth of the nation should adequately benefit from it.
He said the body had used the occasion of the Public Hearing of the South-South Zonal Forum of the Senate Committee on the review of the 1999 constitution in Port Harcourt on December 15th 2009 to submit their memorandum on the request for the creation of Bori State for the people of the Rivers South East Senatorial district which he said would alleviate the sufferings of these minorities.
He said the call on the federal government to give Ogoni people a state was long over due, saying that if the federal government thought that giving a state to only Ogoni people was being tribal, it would deem it fit this time that the other tribes are also involved.
The president called on the President Yar'Adua, the Senate President, David Mark, Dimeji Bankole and the chairmen of the Senate Committee on State Creation and Constitution Review and all members of the National Assembly to consider the Ogoni people and all those that make up the Rivers South East Senatorial District requesting for Bori State.
He said their demand was just and would result to unity of the nation, peace in the Niger Delta and development at the grassroots.
Bori State Movement is a body accredited to demand for a state for the people of Ogoni, Andoni, Eleme, Opobo, Nkoro and Oyigbo ethnic nationalities of the Rivers South East Senatorial District of the Federal Republic of Nigeria.
