Sir Isreal Julius Afiemo is from Uzere kingdom in Isoko South Local Government Area of Delta State. He is a retired Director of Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN). In this interview with our Reformer Crew he talks about how the crisis in Uzere started and how the people of the community have been suffering as as a result of the crisis. He and some concerned members of the community recently formed the Uzere Peace and Development Movement to see how they can reach out to all the warring parties so that they can end the crisis without any external forces coming in. Excerpt.

  Sir may we know you briefly?

I am Sir Israel Julius Afiemo, a retired Director of Central Bank ofNigeria. I am a son of the soil here in Uzere but based inAbuja.

How do you feel seeing your community fighting one another?

This is the saddest moment of my life because this is a community I live for, the community I was bread and buttered in this community, a community that we all laugh and rejoice together but now it has turned into this situation and it is pathetic. That is all I can say. It is not the dream ofUzereKingdom.

What is your dream for Uzere Kingdom?

TheUzereKingdomthat we dreamt four years ago is a place where you can come and relax, a place where you can share, a place where you can walk the streets without looking back whether an enemy is there or not, a place where you can walk at night, either3amor5am. That is our dream. A beautiful and serene place to live in. a place where everybody can take care of themselves whether you are rich or poor. That is our dream for theUzereKingdom. A place that can be the best not only in Isoko but all over the world because we have endowed children in this community. I do not think there is any community inDeltaStatethat well boast of saying that they have better resource children than Uzere. A dream that we can be able to hand over to brilliant children – when I say brilliant children I do not mean my own children but every child in the community. Every child in Uzere is my child, and I think that is also what everybody is thinking.

So how do we piece this shattered Uzere together and have a peaceful Uzere?

That is why I am here. This is a voluntary body because the government did not appoint this body and Uzere Community did not appoint this body. These are people who volunteered and say we cannot allow thi community to die. There are people who are better place than me, they will equally have come and do the same thing but it may not be acceptable to all of them. But we have done this not today but I have continued to do that all my entire life and even when I retired I continued to dedicate my life to peace in Uzere Commmunity. What we are doing now is that we are interacting with both parties. We have been here for the past four days and there is no day I slept earlier than12 midnightsince I came here.  This is the beginning of the move. Let the police and army leave it to Uzere people to have an internal solution. And by internal solution we are not forcing anybody. We let them know that they are brothers. One thing I must say is that this is not an issue of party politics. It was a developmental issue. I think it is important you stress this. Anybody that is going to brainwash anybody and say it is party A or B is saying nonsense. The truth which you can emphasis in your paper to the whole world is that the problem has nothing to do with party politics. It is absolutely an issue of development. I will want you to go to the inner city and move around and you will see what I am talking about. Do not be deceive by this highway new layout that you are seeing and for anyone to come out and say Shell is not cheating the Uzere community is not fare– go to Eket, they have free light, water is not a problem because it is either Agip or Chevron that is taking care of that place. Go to Burutu or anywhere where there is oil and you will see how they are taking care of them. But Shell milked this community for a very long time – go to the Guardian of 1992 I have granted an interview to this effect. I feel sad that a kingdom of this nature has been milked dry and they are no more here. They have sold these things out, and all these people asked was an MoU, nothing less nothing more. Uzere person is not a greedy person. The common man is not busy. I am sorry for been too emotional about this because when it comes to Uzere I am always emotional.

How did we get to this sad situation in Uzere where brothers are now killing brothers and they are chasing their traditional ruler away?

I do not want to be seen in issue as partisan. I want to say that this thing started because of greed or lack of sympathy for the downtrodden. I would come out and tell you what happened. This recent incident you are seeing today, the exco wanted Shell to sign an MoU with them. Pure and simple and I was part of the whole system from 1992 when Shell was recruiting people. And I did mention to them that they should give employment to the sons of this community, not as day and night guard to be guarding your pipes. I did say if you cannot provide any care for this community a time will come when these people you are making as day and night guards to your pipelines will see thief and they are not going to shout thief. That was quoted verbatim in that write up. I am sorry I do not have a copy of the that paper. I was then in service. When people were saying, you are staff of an organization therefore you cannot decide. Then I said when I die I will be brought to this place and that is the place I am going to be buried. And if I cannot speak at that point in time then there is no point for one to be silent. When the women went to Shell to go and protest, the placards they carried were tied on their neck. But someone was called. A force was called and they came in without knowing what the people where doing and they started shooting and they killed two young men of this community. And everyone ran away. There was an announcement that time that nobody should carry a gun, cutlass or knife. Just go with your placard and let the world know that this is what Shell is doing. It was all in good intentions. There was no one going there with the intention to die. But these people went there and they started firing. What do you want these children to do? They should lie down like that when they went there in peace to just tell people that we are oppress, let someone carry it. It is out of that anger that they ran to the king to tell him that this is what is happening. When they got there they did not see him and nobody came out to address them. Out of anger they burnt down the palace. Now people are saying that it is political. It does not happen that way. Thereafter it started to lead to other issues. That is the case.

What effort are you making to ensure that you bring peace to your community?

This movement that we have in place come out to say enough is enough. No more bloodshed in this community. We are all brothers. No one has the right to say that I am to stay in this community and you are not to stay. As long as we all embrace peace please come in and let us embrace peace. And that is the process we are in now. When we have finished that there are other issues that will be taken care of as time goes on. We are going to reach all the stakeholders in this matter. We are not in a rush but we must start somehow and that is the step we are taking now.

You just had a peace meeting, are you satisfied with the outcome?

Yes. I am absolutely satisfied because in war you need to talk and we were talking and we were able to get the anger of the people. The bitterness was there, it was clear and we were able to get the feeling of everybody that was there. That is the gain that we had from it. From there we can move forward. We can then tell the other party that this is how this people felt. We would have another meeting tomorrow and say let the people come but from that anger that we saw there it will be premature and suicidal to say let this people come in tomorrow because there will be another crisis immediately. It is a gradual process and we are not in a hurry. Time is the healer of all pains and I think that was a major beginning. We have other people we are going to talk to and we will appeal to them just as we were appealing there and telling them to calm down, telling them that we will address everything and everything they have said we are going to touch them. We are not going to neglect anything.

END.