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Port Harcourt – Movement for the Emancipation of the Niger Delta (MEND) has condemned the attempted blowing up of a Delta airline Flight 253 by Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab whom it described as an Islamist extremist. The group said it was a proof that threat to world peace would never come from the Niger Delta but from other sections of the country.
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Spokesman of the militant group, Jomo Gbomo, in a statement, insisted that all fighters within the Niger Delta region were only doing so because of the injustice which successive administrations in the country have refused to address but would rush soldiers to crush them when they complain. Gbomo therefore drew the attention of the Federal Government to the continued wastage of lives in the northern part of the country where religious extremists kill people at will and also produce the likes of the bomber whose instruments to blow up the plane failed him. Coming during the Christmas day celebration, according to Gbomo, the botched bombing was aimed at throwing hundreds of Christian families into mourning on a day that was used to mark the birth of a peacemaker who is Jesus Christ.
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“The Movement for the Emancipation of the Niger Delta (MEND) condemns the attempted act of terrorism on Delta Flight 253 into the United States by a misguided Islamic extremist from the Northern part of Nigeria. “Had the plan been successful, it would have left many families across the globe grieving on a day when Christians celebrate the birth of a peace maker, Jesus Christ. “It should by now be evident that the threat to world peace will not emerge from the Niger Delta, a region agitating for justice as is acknowledged by every right thinking human being, but from the Islamic extremist northern part of Nigeria covertly supported by its elite who assume leadership of Nigeria to be the birthright of this region. usafis.org”This attempted act of terrorism by this northern Islamic extremist does not come as a surprise to any Nigerian. For decades, Christians have been murdered and raped in the north of Nigeria with impunity. No northern Muslim has ever been brought to book for the thousands of Christians killed in this region. Northern Nigeria is fertile ground for international terrorism. “The Nigerian government has persistently turned a blind eye to Islamic extremists coming from Northern Nigeria, chosing instead to focus and waste its resources on military hardware and troop deployment in the Niger Delta. “The government of Nigeria which unfortunately has been dominated by the north since independence has bred such undesirable elements under false pretense with the hope of creating a reserve army to counter agitation in the south and other parts of Nigeria”, he said.