Some Abuja natives affected by the location of the Centenary City project, under the auspices of Centenary City Affected Communities Airport Road, Gbagyi Women Association, have accused former President Goodluck Jonathan of being insensitive to the “wicked, malicious” removal of their means of livelihood and “false misrepresentation by the (former) Minister for FCT, Senator Bala Mohammed”.

Women Leader of the association, Mrs. Ladi Danladi, who on Wednesday availed DAILY POST a copy of the protest letter they had written to the then President over the Centenary City project on April 28, 2014, alleged that the former President was not fair to residents of the Federal Capital Territory, FCT, as regards compensations over their means of livelihood, affected by the Centenary City project.

The women, in the said protest letter written last year, expressed how the former FCT Minister, Bala Mohammed worked against them, thus:

“We write to vehemently protest the wicked, malicious and unfortunate deprivation of our means of sustainable livelihood, false accusation, discord and hatred being sown in our community that may lead to breach of peace by the Minister of Federal Capital Territory, Senator Bala Mohammed.

We write to you as the leader of the Nation and request that you quickly order the correction of this injustice. We have faith in your ability to intervene as our last hope, even though we have been pushed to the wall.

Your Excellency Sir, we are the entire women representing the original inhabitant communities of the area presently designated as the centenary city, consisting of the following communities… 1. BARUWA 2. DAYISNA 3. KPAIKPAI 4. TOGO. We as women are the last bastion of peace, as we have been intervening and preventing our men from carrying out their threat of outright confrontation. We, our ancestors and children have lived in these places for years and earned our sources of livelihood from there. We have cultivated several hectares of economic trees which have sustained our lives over the years. Your Excellency, these means of livelihood is about to be removed forcefully from us FOREVER without adequate compensation for us and the future of our children. Mr. President we are also Nigerians.

We are aware that the law squarely places the FCT under your purview, and the Minister administers the FCT on your behalf, but it becomes more worrisome when the person you have placed to look after us on your behalf is not only orchestrating the removal of our means of livelihood from us, he is also disseminating false information and bringing your name to disrepute.

Mr. President our communities have always loved and supported you and your administration and we are willing to give you more support. However, following the recent development, many of our people are beginning to question the sincerity of your administration based on the actions of the FCT Minister.

The Minister has announced that he is compensating us for our means of sustainable livelihood with a sum of One billion Two Hundred Million Naira (N1, 200,000,000). Your Excellency, this sum is very paltry considering the huge number of our people whose means of livelihood will be terminated. No proper enumeration has been conducted and these figures do not in any way represent the quantity of losses that has been and will be incurred on the loss of our livelihood.

Unfortunately, while we are still reminiscing over the purported one billion two hundred million naira announced to us as compensation, it is on record that the minister has only released the sum of three hundred, nineteen million, five hundred and seventy four thousand, nine hundred and seventy eight naira only.

The actual amount paid was N319, 574,978 the affected communities are BARUWA with a population of 702 people paid N80, 467,925, KPAIKPAI with a population of 656 people paid N55, 551,641, TOGE with a population of 681 people paid N86, 614,069 and DAYISNA with a population of 1,015 people paid N96, 941,343. Putting these people together, you will have a total number of 3,054 persons from the 4 communities.

We are, therefore, amazed that a whopping sum of 1.2 Billion Naira was reported to have been disbursed by the Hon. Minister of the FCT for this purpose as reported by the Weekly Trust of Saturday April, 12 2014 and carried by various electronic media. We confirmed that indeed the minister did issue a press release to this effect. On the basis of this purported payment the Minister has instructed the various affected communities to vacate to enable the contractors to mobilize to site.

The information is causing ripples in the affected communities and they have vowed not to vacate the land until the full amount as stated by the Minister is paid to the affected communities or the FCT Administration should prepare for a showdown, even if it means dying for our indigenous rights. We may be forced to notify the United Nations on our plight as indigenous people.

The non-release of the remaining compensation of Eight hundred and eighty million, four hundred and twenty five thousand, twenty two (N 880,425,022) Naira is therefore causing serious disaffection within our community. Our people are saying that we are willing to sacrifice our lives for our heritage and our livelihood. They are beginning to question the sincerity of your administration.

Civil society groups, anti-corruption organizations have shown interest in helping us fight against this injustice, but Mr President Sir, we are interested in your intervention first, because as a father of the nation, we must give you the benefit of hearing from you first”.

The women consequently called on then President to: “sanction the Minister for FCT, Senator Bala Mohammed for pitching you and your administration against the people.

Compel the Minister for FCT Senator Bala Mohammed to immediately provide adequate compensation for our lost means of livelihood.

Professional estimates put the compensation value at more than ten (10) billion (N10,000,000,000)Naira. A lot of our young people are going to be rendered idle and we do not want this to happen because an idle mind is a fertile mind for anything.

Compel the Minister to retract his malicious and false accusation that he has paid us one billion two hundred million (N1,200,000,000) naira as compensation.

Reassure us that we will not regret our support for your administration by correcting this outright injustice.

Proactively handle this to avoid a breach of peace within the FCT and by extension the Nigerian nation.”