The establishment of the Presidential Amnesty Programme, PAP, was the magic wand with which the late President Umaru Yar’ Adua peacefully ended militancy in the Niger Delta in 2009. It forever endeared him to the people of the region.

The programme was designed to provide the framework for disarmament and reintegration of ex-militants. It offered about 20,000 agitators the opportunity to surrender their arms and accept rehabilitation, which came in the form of providing them with vocational education, training and employment opportunities.

Within its first few years, the PAP rolled out a number of training programmes that included scholarships for ex-militant youths in domestic and international institutions. But due to overwhelming pressures from stakeholders clamouring for direct personal benefits, many of the beneficiaries were stranded for lack of funding. The same factor led to leadership instability, as administrators were fired shortly after assuming office.

The appointment of Dr Dennis B. Otuaro as Administrator by President Bola Tinubu on March 14, 2024, has changed the paradigm at PAP. The shift of focus from sharing of the programme’s limited funds among influential stakeholders to training of manpower and their outsourcing for profitable employment has repositioned it squarely to fulfill its original mandates.

Within the past one year of Otuaro’s stewardship, 40 pilots and aircraft maintenance engineers have been deployed for their on-the-job training, OJT, within and outside Nigeria. Some have already graduated. Also, Otuaro sent 98 maritime cadets stranded in Poland, Vietnam and Sweden due to the instability in the PAP, to the Joemarine Institute of Nautical Studies and Research, Warri. They have since completed their boot camp.

Apart from ensuring greater involvement of Niger Delta women in PAP’s activities, Otuaro has also built synergies with stakeholders such as the ex-warlords, traditional rulers and community leaders. He has held extensive collaborations with government agencies to promote peace, security, anti-terrorism and economic development in the Niger Delta.

These include the Defence Headquarters Joint Monitoring Team led by Major General Jamil Jimoh, which is largely instrumental to President Tinubu’s success in improving our daily crude oil production from 1.181 million barrels per day to the current level of 1.8 million bpd. A similar collaboration with Dame Didi Esther Walson-Jack, Head of the Civil Service of the Federation, is aimed at creating pathways for employment of PAP products.

We call on all stakeholders to join hands with the Otuaro administration in the PAP to continue breaking new frontiers. The peddling of baseless and self-centred allegations and distractions could play into the hands of those who want the Amnesty Programme scrapped. The PAP is the primary reason for the ongoing peace, security and stability in the Niger Delta.

It must be allowed to focus on what is best for the Niger Delta and Nigeria at large.




https://www.vanguardngr.com/2025/03/year-of-paradigm-shift-at-pap/