Biafra war: FG to pay N88bn compensation to victims as parties agree to settle out of court

THE Federal Government has agreed to pay the sum of N88 billion as compensation to victims of the Nigeria/Biafra civil war, as well as for the completion of demining and destruction of abandoned explosives within the South-East, South-South and North Central zones of the country.

In the terms of agreement reached on Monday before the ECOWAS Court in Abuja, the Federal Government agreed to pay N50 billion compensation to the victims of the civil war and will also pay another  N38 billion to contractors for total and complete demining and destruction of abandoned bombs and landmines within the regions.

According to the agreement document which the ECOWAS court adopted as its consent judgment, two firms, RSB Holdings Nigeria Limited and Deminers Concept Nigeria Limited, were said to have been contracted in 2009 to carry out demining exercise in the war affected areas.

The document said, after an exercise that was conducted by medical experts employed by the two contractors to screen and identify true victims of the war, “All the parties to this suit acknowledge that 685 persons were selected and classified as survivors while 493 of them were confirmed as victims of either landmines or other dangerous military ordnance including locally fabricated weapons, hence entitled to compensation including their families and communities.”

“Whereas the parties also acknowledged that a total of over 17, 000 bombs were recovered and destroyed by the 4th and 5th Respondents (the contractors), while a total of 1, 317 are still in the stockpile located at the Mine Action Center, Owerri, Imo State, large quantity of live bombs still litter the Applicant’s communities.”

The decision followed a suit marked ECW/CCJ/APP/06/12, which was filed before the ECOWAS Court on May 2, 2012, by one Vincent Agu and 19 others against the Federal Government and five others.

Government opted for an out-of-court-settlement of the matter after four years of negotiation.

States listed to benefit from the deal are Anambra, Rivers, Akwa Ibom, Delta, Ebonyi, Cross River, Abia, Enugu and Benue.

The ECOWAS court, at its sitting on the matter yesterday, granted the application for the matter to be setlled out of court and ordered parties to abide by the terms of the settlement.

Part of the terms of the settlement stipulates that the federal government “undertakes to pay, without delay, compensation in the summer of N50 billion in full and final sum to the victims, their families and communities as contained in Schedule 4(1) to this terms of settlement.

“That the federal government  undetakes to the pay a total sum of N38 billion as contained in schedule 4(2) to the terms of settlement for the purposes of carrying out total demining and destruction, rebuilding of public buildings, mine centre activities, construction of class rooms, provision of prosthetics and all other activities enumerated thereunder.”

 

Source: Nigerian Tribune