Ezekiel Daniel, the Senior Special Assistant to Delta State Governor Ifeanyi Okowa on Security Matters, has said that he will follow any direction that his boss takes as regards who succeeds him in 2023.
He was reacting to questions on his position as regards the debate that the next governor of Delta State should come from the Ijaw ethnic group in line with the rotational system that the state has adopted over the years.
“Governor Okowa is my boss wherever he goes I go. Whatever decision he takes is binding on me. I operate in line with his directives,” he stated.
On the Presidential Amnesty Programme, Daniel said: “The taste of the pudding is in the eating. I don’t belong to the class of people who that assassinate people’s character unduly.
“For now I cannot say much about Milland Dikio, the current adviser to the president on the Amnesty Programme because as they say action speaks louder than voice. The way he pilots the affairs of that office will determine the kind of assessment he will get from people like us.
“I was one of those that fought for the establishment of the amnesty office. In 2009 when the late President Shehu Yaradua came up with the idea of the amnesty programme he was antagonised throughout the length and breadth of the south-south region. Some people even said it was a setup meant to lure the agitators so that he can round them up.
“Then, I was among the few people who acknowledged the idea. I came out boldly to tell the people of the region, ‘let us give Yaradua the benefit of doubt. Let our people drop their arms and embrace this amnesty.’
“I now said let us come up with paradigm shift in the struggle. So, when you’re talking about the amnesty office I have the moral authority to speak about whatever goes on there. I don’t go to that office to beg for anything. My own is to be a watchdog so that the reason that the office was setup is actualised.
“The problem of that office is lack of accountable leadership. Secondly, apart from Kingsley Kuku none of the people that have occupied that office is a product of the struggle. As a result of this they don’t know the nitty-gritty of why that office came into being and how it should be run.
“That’s the reason people like us have being calling on President Muhammadu Buhari to let someone who is a product of the struggle to handle the office. Kuku’s era has been a benchmark.”
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