VANGUARD  Report, Wednesday 26 June, 2001

ASABA, DELTA—CHAIRMAN of the Nigeria Labour Congress (NLC) in Delta, Ovuozourie Macaulay has advised Senator Fred Brume to apologise to the people of Delta for his recent condemnation of the resource control agitation, or risk the wrath of the people.

In a statement in Asaba, Macaulay said it was difficult to understand how the Senator, elected to represent the people, could publicly condemn what his people and others had accepted as a noble course that would improve the condition of oil-producing communities.

He said the Senator was being used by a section of the leadership of the country to stir up confusion in the resource control struggle and that was why Brume had not bothered to refute the newspaper publication in spite of the outrage it has elicited.

"If Brume lacked the courage to refute what the press credited to him, then he must be holding brief for some persons," the NLC chairman said, "but as long as he remains a senator elected from Delta, he owes the people an apology for his utterance or he will face their wrath."

Macaulay also dismissed the notion that Delta was currently the richest state in the country, saying the needs of the state far outstripped its revenue.

"The problems of the state will be appreciated, if the plight of riverine communities, starting from Oko in Oshimili South council area, Inyi, Aboh and Asse in Ndokwa East, Unuoghoko in Isoko South, Bomadi, Burutu and villages that constitute Warri North area, were known," he said.

"These problems bothered Gov. James Ibori and tasked the revenue of the state.

‘’I have no doubt that it is the pains of how to link the riverine communities with their kiths and kins in the state that pushed the governor into the battle for resource countrol.’’

He, therefore, called on Brume and people like him to support the governor and others in the resource control struggle or relinquish all that they got through the cooperation of the people.