The Nigeria Senate constituted an ad-hoc commission on Tuesday to investigate what they call the illegal annexation of certain parts of the Nigerian territory by the Cameroonian government, notably the Mangrove islands of Efiat-Mbo, in the South-South of Nigeria.
The resolution of the plenary session follows a motion presented by Senator Aniekan Bassey, representing the Senate District of Akwa Ibom North East, and co-worked by five others, in which the legislators expressed their concern in the face of the brutal attacks against the Nigerians living in the areas concerned.
The motion, presented under articles 41 and 51 of the internal regulation of the Senate of 2023 (as modified), attracted the attention of the upper chamber to the illegal annexation of the Nigerian mangrove islands located in Efiat, in the local area of โโgovernment of Mbo, in the state of Akwa Ibom, by the Republic of Cameroon.
They expressed their concern about the fact that the islands concerned were not sold to the Cameroonian government in accordance with the Anglo-German treaties of 1913 or the judgment of the International Court of Justice of October 2002, stressing that the encroachment of the Republic of Cameroon led to economic losses for Nigeria. The motion revealed that more than 2,560 oil wells and gas income, which should return to Nigeria, were illegally exploited by the Republic of Cameroon, deploring that Cameroonian gendarmes impose foreign laws on Nigerian citizens living in the corridor.
The motion stipulated: โThese islands and these waters are important economically for the region, because they house fishing roads, and approximately 2,560 oil wells and gas reserves are there. The authors of the motion said that there was no doubt that 16 villages in the mangrove islands were inscribed in the Constitution of the Federal Republic of Nigeria, but that the Republic of Cameroon, by its expansionist foreign policy, sought to appropriate these 16 villages, their waters and their oil resources, which constitutes a violation of international law.
Senator Abdul Ningi, representing the Bauchi district, deplored this development, in particular the judgment of the International Court of Justice, and urged the Nigerian government to seize the opportunity to secure “16 villages of the Mangrove Islands, seriously threatened, and their economic resources”.
The other senators who spoke on the motion unanimously called the Nigerian government to act urgently. In his intervention, the president of the Senate, Godswill Obot Akpabio, after thanking the perpetrators of the motion, stressed that the mangrove islands and their oil well did not only benefit individual states, but also from the country’s economy. After the adoption of the motion, he formed an investigation committee responsible for taking immediate measures and reporting in plenary session.
Discussions on the diplomatic field will inevitably open between Yaoundรฉ and Abuja again.
