Ijaw, Itsekiri face-off

There are fears that the peace deal reached between the Ijaw and Itsekiri communities of Warri South West Local Government Area over the groundbreaking of the $16 billion (about N3.2 trillion) export processing and gas free zone at Ogidigben may break down again.

At the recent Asaba peace deal, the communities were said to have agreed that the EPZ and Gas City Project would be named after Ogidigben, an Itsekiri community, and the Deep Port project after Gbaramatu, an Ijaw community.

But feelers SUNDAY PUNCH got from the two communities during the week indicated that the peace deal did not go down well with the youths of the two communities.

Two issues were said to have been thrown up by the youths. One of them was that the Asaba peace deal did not touch the boundary and land ownership dispute between the two communities, which was the basis of the disagreement over the naming and siting of the projects in the first place.

The second issue, the youths raised was that they, who ought to be the principal beneficiaries of the employment and empowerment fallouts of the projects, were not carried along in the Asaba negotiations.