Rights Activists Weigh-In On RSG's Amnesty Policy

A large chunk of human rights activists, lawyers and educationists in Rivers State have continued to drum support for the Governor Nyesom Wike-led administration’s amnesty offer for cultists and other criminals, saying that the gesture would engender peace and sustainable development in the state.
In an interview in Port Harcourt, the Executive Director of the Institute of Human Rights and Humanitarian Law, Barrister Anyakwee Nsirimovu, said every well-meaning person in the state must support the programme to succeed.
He, however, said that the ongoing amnesty programme of the Rivers State Government for cultists and other criminals must be done thoroughly and comprehensively in order to achieve desired results.
Nsirimovu said any amnesty progamme that does not lead to the recovery of over 70 per cent of illegal arms in the hands of criminals is a failure.
He said the amnesty programme of the Rivers State Government would amount to a waste of time and tax payers’ money, if the proliferation of illegal arms remains high in the state.
The executive director, also said that cashless incentives offer of the Rivers State Government to the cultists for them to freely bring out their arms, was laudable.
Nsirimovu, however, faulted the composition of the Rivers State Amnesty Committee without the inclusion of well-known peace builders in the communities.
Also speaking, an education psychology counsellor, John Bright, advised the Rivers State Amnesty Programme Committee to include psychology in the rehabilitation programme for repentant cultists in the state.
Bright, who is of the Department of Education Psychology at the Ignatius Ajuru University of Education, Port Harcourt, said that granting criminals amnesty without attending to their psychological needs will not produce the desired result.
He, therefore, urged the state government to include psychologists in the amnesty programme committee.
A cleric, Reverend Minaibi Dagogo-Jack, said the amnesty programme will help in addressing the issue of insecurity in the state.
Dagogo-Jack, however, advised the state government to include some church leaders in the amnesty programme committee.
Similarly, a Port Harcourt-based Peace Advocate, Bright Abali, cautioned that the amnesty programme may not achieve the desire results, if data of repented criminals are not properly documented.
He advised the various cult groups, who have already embraced the state amnesty offer, to submit their names and all arms with them.
Meanwhile, some repentant cultists and freedom fighters have surrendered their arms to the Rivers State Amnesty Committee.
The cultists lived up to their promise, Wednesday, at a ceremony which took place in Emohua, headquarters of Emohua Local Government Area of the state.