A lecturer at the Federal University, Otuoke, Bayelsa State, Dr Coronation Tokpo Edward, has said zoning of House of Assembly seats amongst wards and communities in the various Constituencies of the state would foster unity and ameliorate the spate of marginalisation in parts of the state.
The lecturer, a one-time councillor in the Southern Ijaw council area of Bayelsa State expressed this view while speaking with The Tide in Yenagoa on the sidelines of the calls by a group, ‘Ogboin-Ibe forum,’ that the Assembly seat for Southern Ijaw Constituency One be rotated amongst the three communities of Amassoma, Otuan and Amatolo, which make up the Constituency, respectively.
Tokpo, who said the Amassoma Communitiy has systematically denied the two other sister Communities of Otuan and Amatolo the privilege of occupying the Assembly seat, revealed that from the beginning of the present democratic dispensation in 1999 till date, all the elected Assembly members from the constituency have been indigenes of Amassoma Communitiy.
He called on stakeholders to prevail on Amassoma and all political parties in the state to ensure that there was a level playing ground in the forthcoming election and consider to cede the position to aspirants from Otuan and Amatolo as candidates for the seat and not contrary.
He noted that though performance rating records at his disposal show that some erstwhile Assembly members of the constituency of Amassoma origin initiated and carried out impactful projects in the constituency, no meaningful impact has been made by the current representative of the Constituency since assumption of office in 2019.
“Southern Ijaw Constituency One comprises Amassoma, Otuan and Amatolo Communities. But as we speak,from 1999-till date, all the House of Assembly members that the constituency has had were from one Communitiy, Amassoma.
“Infact, these three Communities and their two sister communities that are now in Delta State were of the same ancestral origin of Ogboin Kingdom. Very recently, following the growing concern for zoning of the Assembly seat of the Constituency among the three sister communities of the Kingdom that are in Bayelsa state, a group, the ‘Ogboin-Ibe forum, has added its voice calling on rotation of the seat to give all the three Communities and each ward a sense of belonging.
“The calls are getting stronger each day and I hope that political parties and stakeholders in the name of Justice, equality and fair play would listen to these voices calling for a common understanding for the avoidance of political marginalization.
“ The issue of zoning has been a thorny one over the years. That Otuan in the Second Republic produced the Assembly member in the old Rivers State House of Assembly and that because Otuan had also had one or two members of the National Assembly in the distant past is not a yardstick that Amatolo and Otuan can not or should not produce a member of the Bayelsa State House of Assembly in the current democratic era”, he said.
“In 1999, the late Chief DSP Alamieyeseigha was elected Governor of Bayelsa State and the Otuan and Amatolo people massively supported him like many other parts of the state. Someone from Otuan, the late Hon. Foster Otoko was also elected to the House of Representatives and the brothers worked together. Why can we not now have an understanding on the issue of zoning so that the three communities can have a sense of belonging?”, he asked..

By: Ariwera Ibibo-Howells, Yenagoa