By Patrick Ochei
The Traditional Amazon and Royal Image Maker, HRM Obi Martha Dunkwu (Omu Okpanam/Omu Anioma/Nneoha), has received the prestigious ‘Call To Service’ Distinguished Merit Award as a member of the Conflict Prevent Council, a 12-man body of Traditional Rulers and key stakeholders in the society with a view to advancing peace in the Niger Delta region.
The appreciative award from the Foundation for Partnership Initiatives in the Niger Delta (PIND), was in recognition of Omu Dunkwu’s intellectual contributions and selfless services with regards to peace development and advancement in the Niger Delta in 2022.
The award was presented to her during the Conflict Prevent Council workshop, recently at the Villa Toscana Hotel in Asaba, where they had three days intensive dialogue and brainstorming on the issues of peace in the Niger Delta region.
Presenting the award was Pastor Edewor Egedegbe who is the Lead Consultant, Conflict Prevent Council, Delta State, which is funded by PIND Foundation.
He eulogized Obi Martha Dunkwu and appreciated her for being a support pillar to the Prevent Council in terms of leadership assertion, way forward initiatives and diplomatic alternatives to peace and sustainable development.
Pastor Egedegbe affirmed that the award took recognition of the enormous contributions Omu Anioma had patriotically made towards peace and leadership re-engineering, not only in the Niger Delta but Nigeria as a whole.
On the critical agenda of the Prevent Council, Pastor Egedegbe said it was established for purposes other than engaging peace and reducing conflicts in the Niger Delta region.
According to him, “The Prevent Council was established to reduce conflict over the long term, which the Foundation for Partnership Initiatives in the Niger Delta (PIND) launched the Partners for Peace (P4P) Network in 2013, with the intention of engaging and empowering local actors in peace-building and conflict mitigation. P4P was designed to build capacity, social capital, and local ownership among key stakeholder groups in the Niger Delta through the facilitation of a platform by which men, women, and youth can work together to promote peace in their communities.
“In 2015, PIND established the Integrated Peace and Development Unit (IPDU) to implement peace-building programs to provide operational level support to the P4P and other organizations through: research, capacity building and applied learning aimed at early targeting and mitigation of potential drivers of conflict and instability.
“IPDU was designed specifically to promote collaboration and synergy among the existing local, regional, and national efforts of peace actors in both public and private sectors to address conflict early warning and response.
“However, in spite of these efforts in promoting peace-building and conflict mitigation, the risk of violent conflict arising from the interaction of various forces and actors in the region remains.
“Available data from PIND peace map organized by the IPDU reveals Delta State as one of the states with the highest incidence of lands/boundaries disputes and other communal conflicts that have resulted in the destructions of numerous lives and property among the various states in the Niger Delta region.
“If existing tensions and grievances are not addressed appropriately, they could escalate into another cycle of violent conflicts that could derail the broader peace-building objectives of PIND and other stakeholders in the region.
“Therefore, the need for strategic engagement of notable traditional institutions to advise on what actions to take and with whom to engage to prevent, mitigate and resolve violent conflicts in the State. This informs the need for the establishment of a ‘Prevent Council’.
“The role of traditional institutions in any society is very important. This is because they occupy a critical and vantage place in traditional administration.
“Apart from being the custodians of their cultures and traditions, they are seen as crucial agents in grassroots mobilization and development.
“The program action is addressing existing tensions and grievances that may emanate from boundary disputes, historical tensions and other communal clashes in the Niger Delta by establishing a Conflict Prevent Council.
“The action intends to fill knowledge gaps that may hitherto hold back local peace agents from taking their efforts to scale, to provide skills and information for advocacy, conflict analysis and mitigation to promote the peacebuilding objectives of PIND and other stakeholders in the region.
“Traditional institutions will therefore serve as positive influencers and conflict mediators in their respective domains and respond to identified potential precursors of violence and instability in collaboration with other stakeholders at the state, local and community levels”, Egedegbe explained.
Meanwhile, in her usual characteristic way of appreciating kind gestures towards her person, Omu Anioma, HRM Obi Martha Dunkwu commended the Prevent Council and the Foundation for Partnership Initiatives in the Niger Delta, for recognising her modest contributions to peace and value reorientation advocacy in the society.
She said she finds it natural and expedient to be patriotic in things that require her passion and intellectual disposition as a citizen.
Her words, “What does it cost to love and be loved? It’s our region afterall. We need peace in place to be able to make the necessary progress required for sustainable development.
“As leaders who have seen the way nations advance, we can’t fold our arms with complacent attitude to watch things degenerate to an irreparable state. Disputes can come, but nations sit down to dialogue and find solutions.
“This is what we must continue to do in the Niger Delta and Nigeria as a whole, without glossing over issues as if they don’t matter. We need to constantly discuss with a view to finding solutions to our challenges.
“So, I commend PIND for creating the Niger Delta Dialogue platforms for our people to always meet to interact on ways of mitigating conflicts. It’s a perfect initiative towards prosperity for all.
“I am in always in this kind of roundtable discussions that will continue to get us out of the quagmire of conflicts to peace, prosperity and sustainable development. Once again, I say a big thank you for this well cherished award”, Obi Dunkwu said.
