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… Sieze Workers’ Phone, Forcefully Collect Passwords
By Amos Odhe, Yenagoa
There is confusion within the fold of the Presidential Amnesty Office (PAP) in Abuja and the Niger Delta region following the rising calls for the sack of the interim administrator, Maj. Gen. Barry T. Ndiomu (rtd.) over alleged “gross misconduct and complicity in the revelations trailing the deputy governorship candidate of the All Progressive Congress (APC) in Bayelsa State.”
While statekholders, ex-militant leaders, groups and beneficiaries of the Presidential Amnesty Programme (PAP) have called on President Bola Tinubu and the National Security Officer (NSA), Nuhu Ribadu, to sack Maj. Gen. Ndiomu (rtd.) as the interim administrator, noting that his tenure expired on May 29, 2023, and that no documented extension of his stay in office had been issued, they added that his “continuous stay in office while signing payments in billions of naira from the Amnesty coffers is illegal.”
Others, including the APC elders from Bayelsa, are accusing Maj. Gen. Ndiomu (rtd.) of allegedly colluding with the People’s Democratic Party (PDP) over the recent claims on the status of the APC deputy governorship candidate on the Amnesty programme.
The series of calls for Maj. Gen. Ndiomu’s sack however coincided on Tuesday with the invasion of the Presidential Amnesty office by military personnel who reportedly seized phones belonging to Amnesty staff and forcibly collected their passwords at gunpoint.
It was gathered that most of the affected Amnesty staff have contacted their legal counsel and filed a complaint of alleged harassment, losses and abuse of their fundamental rights, and are seeking for damages of over N5 billion. Our correspondent also gathered that they have written to the Chief of Army Staff, Chief of Defense Staff and the director general of the Department of State Security (DSS) over the matter.
Some of the aggrieved stakeholders and ex-militant leaders in a statement on Thursday claimed that “there is chaos and anarchy at the Amnesty office as Ndiomu has illegally militarized the Amnesty office and threatened staff. Imagine a Department of State Security Officer (DSS) official, Mr. Oyinkuro Ndoni, is allegedly holding all their phones and passwords there were forcefully and illegally obtained by soldiers, and he is searching through their phones and dialing random numbers without any warrant from the courts and he claims to have more powers bigger than the director general (DG) Yusuf Magaji Bichi due to his blind loyalty to Ndiomu.”
According to the elders, “He seized the phones of Amnesty staff at gunpoint using his soldiers and forced them to write down their phone passwords, while threatening them with assault and sack. We are giving him 24 hours to return all seized phones otherwise we will have no choice than to commence massive protests against him and most importantly commence legal action where he will be personally held liable as this illegal action is beyond his mandate.
“To make matters worse, all those whose phones were not seized, Ndiomu banned them from bringing their phones to work despite pleas from senior directors that many of the staff are mothers and fathers and that they have nursing children and family members with emergency issues that needs to reach them, but Ndiomu ignored their plea.
“They have kept their phones for days; thus causing these individuals pain and suffering, loss of business, transactions, ongoing educational programs, and these loses will definitely cost the Amnesty office billions of naira in legal fees and damages.”
The stakeholders and ex-militant leaders in their joint statement, represented by Dr. Angbari L. Oyinmiegha, stated that, “the Niger Delta region is boiling and there is tension everywhere, and Ndiomu is playing politics with the Amnesty programme.
“We all know that from the onset, Ndiomu never supported the presidential campaign of now President Tinubu. In fact, Ndiomu drove away Tinubu’s supporters who approached him for support. Now he has refused to leave even as his tenure expired on 29th May 2023, and there’s no signed document from the Presidency extending his tenure.
“We urgently call on President Tinubu and the NSA, Ribadu to sack Ndiomu as interim administrator of the Presidential Amnesty Programme (PAP) and allow the most senior civil service director to head the Amnesty office until a new administrator is appointed.”
“Ndiomu has illegally removed over 3,000 legitimate Amnesty beneficiaries’ names from the database and diverted the billions of naira allocated to these beneficiaries to private pockets. That’s illegal and he could be jailed for it when he leaves office.
“The ongoing fraud must stop; we cannot stand by and watch it continue. The Amnesty office does not belong to Ndiomu, that is why we are calling on the President and the NSA to act immediately before the region descends into chaos.”
Meanwhile, thousands of Amnesty beneficiaries from across the Niger Delta region had already planned to storm the Amnesty office in Abuja and the National Assembly to protest for the immediate sack of Maj. Gen. Barry T. Ndiomu (rtd.), and to make their grievances known to the authorities, but the aggrieved Amnesty beneficiaries were asked to delay their planned protests by the ex-militant leaders in order to provide room for the President and NSA to intervene.
Efforts to get reaction from the special adviser to the interim administrator on Media and Publicity Freston Akpor, proved abortive as WhatsApp messages sent to him were not answered as the time of going to press.
