FG Pays Ex Mlitants N65,000 Monthly

 

Presidential Amnesty Office on Tuesday insisted that it would continue to pay former Niger Delta militants their N65,000 monthly stipends despite the threat by Movement for the Emancipation of the Niger Delta (MEND) to resume hostility following the conviction of Henry Okah by a South African court.
Head of Media and Communications, Daniel Alabrah, told Daily Independent in Abuja, that payments to ex-militants are statutory and therefore could not be stopped by the office.
He said: “We are doing our own duty to implement the amnesty programme, but if they (ex-militants) renege, then they are the ones to answer questions.
“We cannot stop paying them because we have told them that for the period that the amnesty programme would run we will pay every person that is entitled to the stipend.
“So, if they around to criticise the government, the onus is on them to say why they doing so.
“We are not going to call them names, but government will continue to be diplomatic because the Niger Delta issue is very sensitive whether we like it or not.
“If the programme is going to fail, it should not be from our own side maybe because we did not have money to pay them.
“The fact remains that the amnesty office has not defaulted in any way in terms of paying them the stipends”, he added.