IYC rejects calls for Lokpobiri’s redeployment as Minister, passes vote of confidence

The Ijaw Youth Council (IYC) has rejected calls by a faction of Ijaw youths calling for the redeployment of the Minister for Petroleum Resources (Oil), Senator Heineken Lokpobiri, just as they passed a vote of confidence on him, describing him as a great asset in the Bola Tinubu led administration.

The umbrella body of Ijaw youths worldwide in a statement after their meeting among the 9th leadership of the body, said they wholeheartedly reject in its entirety the publication, calling for the redeployment of Lokpobiri.

A press statement signed by its spokesman, Binebia Princewill, said the statement was not just a refutal but a position of the entire Ijaw Youth Council, covering all organs and structures of council in Delta, Edo, Ondo, Bayelsa, Akwa Ibom, Rivers, Imo, Abuja, Lagos, UK, other chapters in the diaspora and all affiliate bodies of the IYC.

He said the publication calling Lokpobiri as incompetent and heaping the blame of the fuel hike and other woes in Nigeria on him did not emanate from the Council and did not receive the blessings of the Ijaw people.

“Consequently, the Ijaw Youth Council is using this medium to call on President Bola Tinubu and all well-meaning Nigerians to completely ignore calls for Lokpobiri’s redeployment.

“Lokpobiri is competent and doing his job very well. It will be wrong for anyone to have called for his redeployment on the basis of incompetence as there is no Minister in Nigeria now that is more competent, resourceful and productive than our articulate and visionary Sen. Heineken Lokpobiri.

“The IYC as a struggle platform established in 1998 was to protect the interest of the Ijaw people at all point in time and not to antagonise and attack the interest of the Ijaws and her respected leaders.

” It is important to establish that Council has a well carved out channel of communication for which it is essentially the duty of the President and Spokesman of Council that are charged with the responsibility to convey the message of the Ijaw Youth Council to the public after due consultations as the case may be with relevant key stakeholders in Ijaw land.

“The founding principles of the Ijaw Youth Council forbid the IYC to fight against the interest of Ijaw nation hence we must always stand to defend Ijaw nation and her leaders, even if there are issues, this must be done through discreet means without coming to the public”, the statement reads.

It also added that it does not really tell well and totally wrong, condemnable to see that it’s an Ijaw son that is the one calling for his redeployment out of the 45 ministers