Abuja—A socio-cultural group, the Niger Delta Women for Sustainable Development (NDWSD) has appealed to the Presidential Amnesty Programme (PAP) to accommodate rural women in the region in its mandate.
The group, which is comprised of “selected women of like-minds whose mission is to ensure the advancement of the rural Niger Delta Woman,” said this is necessary in that the hope of the average Niger Delta woman for economic survival and good health is fading away due to the environmental hazards caused by oil exploration and exploitation in the Niger Delta region.
Led by its coordinator, Hon. Helen Bob, NDWSD made the appeal during a courtesy visit to the Interim administrator of the Presidential Amnesty Programme, retired Major General Barry Ndiomu in Abuja on Tuesday.
The group argued that empowering and educating women plays a significant role in the development of nations around the world more so the rural women of the Niger Delta.
It insisted that women in the creeks of the Niger Delta can no longer meet their needs as fisherfolks because of the waterways and inland pollution and degradation arising from oil exploration as well as illegal bunkering of crude oil.
The group therefore pleaded with the PAP to consider their demands to ameliorate the sufferings and plight of the average Niger Delta woman.
The NDWSD while thanking Ndiomu for the opportunity to visit him, appealed to people in the region “to stop fighting our sons in enviable positions serving the region and the nation.”
“We are aware all PAP administrators have faced this very challenge and it doesn’t tell well of us as a region.
“Therefore, as daughters of the Niger Delta, we are calling on everyone to give maximum support to the present administrator of PAP to demonstrate his vast knowledge of leadership.”
The women also made the PAP boss their first patron and pledged to stand by his “pragmatic leadership style of service delivery in achieving the desired goals of the Presidential Amnesty Program for the region and the nation at large.”
They equally thanked the Nigerian state for establishing the Amnesty Programme to originally cater to the needs of ex-militants in the Niger Delta and ensure their reintegration back into society via training, further education, job placements, and business startup support.
