The Egbema Youth Progressive Foundation (EYPF) has vowed that there will be no election in Warri North Local Government Area of Delta State by January 2018, if an Egbema Ijaw candidate does not emerge for the Local Government chairmanship position.

In a statement issued over the weekend in Warri signed by Comr. Miyenpirigha M. Ebidouwei, President; Comr. Lawoni Dumofaye, Secretary General; and Comr. Governor Ekpokeme, PRO, EYPF declared that Egbema people are not going back on their word.

The group said they are not in any way ready to compromise the chairmanship position of the Local Government, because since 26 years and two months of the creation of Delta State the noble Ijaws have not produced chairman of Warri North LGA, neither have they produced a House of Assembly nor House of Representative member.

“Despite all the social and political violence and dialogues that took place some years back, the Itsekiri still impose their candidate on us. This time, we cannot keep silent and die in agony.”

It called on the State Governor, Senator Dr Ifeanyi Okowa, and the Federal Government to advise Itsekiri leaders in Warri North to accept and support Egbema Ijaw people “if the Itsekiris in Warri North still want us to live together in harmony and sustain our existing peaceful relationship.”

The youth group also demanded that the Itsekiris should accept an Egbema Ijaw candidate and share all the positions in the council equally, if peace must reign.

“We call on Sen. James Manager and the House of Representatives member, representing Warri Federal Constituency, to as a matter of urgency look into the Warri North chairmanship issue without compromise and use their exalted offices to resolve the alarming and pitiable situation of the Egbema people in the council.”

The group lamented that although Warri North LGA belongs to the Ijaw and the Itsekiri, but for 26 years the Itsekiris have held on to power from the chairmanship of the Local Government to Heads of Department (HOD) and others exalted positions at the federal level.

EYPF also warned all the Egbema Ijaw aspirants to stay out of the position of vice chairmanship of the Local Government, threatening that should any leader ignore this warning and aspire for the rejected vice chairmanship seat, such an aspirant “shall no longer stay in our kingdom. But will rather remain in the city with his cohorts to betray his kingdom.”

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