Ikiba was said to have threatened the management of Agip through a text message he composed and sent to the company on January 25, 2016. The suspect in the text message allegedly asked the company to either award him a surveillance contract or risk an attack on its pipelines.
A charge sheet signed by the DSS’ Prosecuting Lawyer, Victor Uchendu, said Ikiba committed an offence punishable under Section 389 of the Criminal Code, Law of Bayelsa State, 2006.
The charge sheet said: “That you Nengi Samuel Ikiba, on or about the 25th day of January, 2016 in the Yenagoa Magisterial District caused the management of Agip Company Limited to receive an SMS via your GSM number 08037028391 “in which you threatened to cause damage to the company’s facilities unless they award you a security surveillance contract and thereby committed an office punishable under Section 389 of the Criminal Code Law Cap C14, Law of Bayelsa State, 2006.”
The court, however, adjourned the case to March 3, 2016, for hearing.
Meanwhile, the President, Ijaw Youth Council (IYC) Worldwide, Mr. Udengs Eradiri, and the Bayelsa State chapter of the Association of Nigeria Authors (ANA), warned youths in the Niger Delta region against vetting their anger of perceived injustices on oil installations and pipelines.
Eradiri noted that the region’s agitations for social justice and equity had gone beyond violence, youth’s restiveness and economic sabotage.
He called on the youth to embrace the new approach of intellectualism in engaging the government with the problems of the region.
According to him resorting to sabotage through bursting of pipelines to send a message to the authorities was crude, uncivilised and against growth and development of the area.
Eradiri spoke when the Association of Nigeria Authors (ANA), Bayelsa State chapter, in collaboration with A.J. Alagoa Library, donated thousands of books to Oronto Douglas Library and ICT Centre established by the IYC.
He told the youths that education remained the key to development adding that without it, socio-economic and political development would continue to elude the region.
He said: “We have come to realise that without education, there is nothing you can achieve and that is why we dedicated this library to our comrade, late Oronto Douglas, former Presidential aide.
“We want every Ijaw youth to begin to think about change in our community via the pen instead of destruction of pipelines and activities that will not bring glory to our people.
“In fact, for me, for somebody to burst pipelines in orded to send a message, is a crime against humanity.
“This is how I have always classified sabotage via destruction of pipelines because at the end of the day, the government will continue to take their money, pump their oil and the environment is usually meant to suffer as a result of such activities.
“In the long run, the diseases and all those other things that are associated with environmental degradation are meted to the same people they claim to want to liberate via agitation. So, it is a crime against humanity for somebody to destroy pipelines as a means of agitation.”
Also, the Chairman, ANA, Bayelsa State, Michael Afenfia, said the books were donated by the association in collaboration with A.J. Alagoa Library to enhance capacity building of Nigerians, particularly the Ijaw youths.
Afenfia, who commended the Eradiri-led IYC for its laudable capacity building programmes, said: “I am very glad that the struggle for social justice and equity is taking another dimension.
“We are going away from militancy and agitation through violence and combatant struggle and pushing it to the arena of academic and intellectualism and we really commend this effort.
“We hope that the whole world can see this and elevate IYC to a status of an organisation that wants to give the Niger Delta struggle a new face.
“That is the kind of thing the Ijaw nation needs at this time. We, therefore, urge the youth to use the facilities in a bid to compete favourable with their contemporaries in any part of the world.”
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