People Think Am Asking for Resource Control for Succession Sake – Attah
Former Akwa Ibom governor, Victor Attah has said that he was accused of starting militancy in the Niger Delta simply because he called for resource control.
Attah, who revealed this on Friday while speaking to journalists in his Uyo residence recalled how the Nigerian president then had shouted and pointed accusing finger at him during a political function in Port Harcourt that he was the cause of militancy in the region.
He noted that people tried to stop his agitation for resource control because then they had suspected he was planning a secession, which he described a grievous thing to charge anybody with.
“And it is still hunting me. But the problem is that even the Niger Delta people don’t even appreciate what I did for them.
“In Port-Harcourt, the Nigerian President then pointed fingers at me, you were the one that went and put resource control in their head and now they are fighting, they are breaking pipelines. So I was accused of starting the militancy in the Niger Delta simply because I preached resource control.”
Noting that then agitation is no longer a secret, the former governor said there was a time that people in the villa at the time he was governor were wondering whether he was thinking of seceding.
“They were asking why is Obong Attah building a deep seaport, an international Airport. He is building an Independent Power plant, is he going to secede?
“That was the fear people had about the vision we had then, yet people came and disrupted that. So I can say I feel disappointed that that vision was disrupted. I used the word disrupted because I believe in this regime of Udom Emmanuel unfettered, we are going to see the state fly again”
