NIGER DELTA SUMMIT: A VIEW FROM THE

S E C R E T ABUJA 001226 SIPDIS STATE FOR AF/W, INR/AA DOE FOR GEORGE PERSON E.O. 12958: DECL: 06/06/2028 TAGS: PGOV NI SUBJECT: NIGER DELTA SUMMIT: A VIEW FROM THE VICE-PRESIDENT'S OFFICE REF: ABUJA 643 Classified By: Political Counselor Walter Pflaumer for reasons 1.4. (b & d). ¶1. (S) Summary: On June 18, 2008, Poloff met with Rajakumari Jandhyala (strictly protect throughout),a United Nations employee on loan to Vice-President Goodluck Jonathan's office to aid in the development of a strategy to end unrest in the Niger Delta. While describing the GON's Niger Delta initiatives to Poloff, Jandhyala complained that the team in the Vice-President's office was not up to the challenge of properly formulating, vetting, and implementing a comprehensive plan. She also said President Yar'Adua was unaware of how poorly crafted the process has been to date. While Jandhyala claimed to be making efforts to fix some of the process's flaws, she worried that the GON's whole Niger Delta strategy was moving too fast and in the wrong direction, and ultimately could end up a failure. End Summary. ¶2. (S) Jandhyala described a four-step process by which the GON plans to address the unrest in the Niger Delta region: 1) the development of a guiding strategy, a roughly 10-page document which she helped write; 2) the internal and external vetting of this strategy by relevant stakeholders, led by an independent committee to be headed by UN civil servant and professor Ibrahim Agboola Gambari; 3) the long-awaited Niger Delta Summit; and 4) the implementation of the plans and decisions that result from the Summit. A management team, currently consisting of only Jandhyala and a Nigerian counterpart, is to assist the committee in Step Two to ensure that the root problems of the marginalization of aggrieved interest groups, lack of effective investment, and poor security are addressed. The problem, she says, is that staff in the Vice-President's office (which currently has the lead on Niger Delta initiatives for the GON) are incompetent, inexperienced, and are trying to rush the process, leaping ahead before each successive planning step has been fully accomplished. According to Jandhyala, the GON needs an elite group of strategists to tackle the Niger Delta crisis instead of the "low-tech team" currently working on the issue. She noted the Vice-President's aides already want to move on to Step Three (the Summit) already, though she believes that Step One (a written strategy for Niger Delta security and development) has not been fully accomplished. Jandhyala also noted that in her opinion, the GON's coordinator of its Niger Delta strategy should be a ministerial-level appointee (someone with experience and political clout); instead, the current lead is one of the Vice-President's Special Assistants, Akachukwu Sullivan, an Igbo with no previous government experience, or, she says, any apparent qualifications for his job. ¶3. (S) The result, Jandhyala said, is that the Vice-President has received false assurances of the quality of both the process and the overall Niger Delta strategy. He, in turn, has briefed the President, who believes everything is on track, but is unaware that these serious gaps exist. The whole thing, she said, is moving too fast and in the wrong direction, and if unchecked the result will be the same as past attempts to resolve the Delta crisis, i.e. little or no substantive progress. Going back to the 10-page document that should contain the President's strategy, Jandhyala reported she is attempting to rewrite it to compensate for some of its weaknesses and skipped steps. (Note: World Bank country representative (strictly protect) told Ambassador June 12 that the 10-page non-paper on the Delta drafted in part by some international partners was not well developed, and in his view was not a strategy at all but a discussion paper. End note.) In light of the fact that parts of the document called for the President's input, and she is aware of no such input from him, she doubts that he has really studied it on his own. Jandhyala explained that she is trying to ensure the President has indeed given his approval of the strategy by writing a six-point decision memo to forward along with her rewritten Niger Delta policy paper, to draw attention to the neglected areas. (Note: Jandhyala did not elaborate as to what the six points in her memo to Yar'Adua would be. End note.) ¶4. (S) Respected UN civil servant Ibrahim Agboola Gambari, she opined, is the wrong man for the job to head the Niger Delta consultative steering committee. She noted that as a participant in the Abacha regime (which took a very heavy-handed approach to the Delta) he has "too much baggage" to be viewed by stakeholders as neutral party. Indeed, for this reason, she said the office of the UN's Resident Representative in Nigeria Alberic Kacou did everything in its power to dissuade the GON from choosing him, despite his otherwise strong conflict resolution credentials. (Note: The VP's Special Assistant Sullivan started off Gambari's hiring on the wrong foot by sending him a faxed job offer to the UN, without GON clearance to do so. According to Jandhyala, Secretary General Ban Ki-Moon angrily contacted the GON and forced them to approach him properly to request Gambari's services by sending Foreign Minister Ojo Maduekwe personally to New York City. Maduekwe told Ambassador June 4 that he had to personally appeal to UNSEC-Gen in order to secure Gambari's release for the job. End note.) Gambari's appointment has been mired in controversy, as several Delta ethnic groups -- most notably the Movement for the Survival of the Ogoni People and the Ijaw Youth Council -- have voiced strong public opposition to his participation in the committee. It is too late to retract Gambari's appointment, Jandhyala said, but in order to appease critics and regain credibility, a co-chair might be appointed. ¶5. (S) With the appointment of Gambari, the UN's behind-the-scenes role helping the GON craft a Niger Delta strategy has come to light, and Jandhyala fears that the UN could be discredited by the possible eventual failure of this strategy. Jandhyala reports directly to Kacou, and she speculated that Kacou might approach the GON and demand that it make improvements in the process. (Note: Kacou has asked to meet with Ambassador and U.K. High Commissioner June 26. End note.) ¶6. (S) Jandhyala mentioned that Secretary to the Government of the Federation Babagana Kingibe has been officially sidelined from any significant role in the formulation of the Delta peace strategy due to mistrust between him and Vice President Jonathan. (Note: Jandhyala reported that she knows Kingibe well from eight months of working for him as his special advisor when he was the AU's Special Envoy in Darfur. End note.) She commented that while he would be a man capable of taking control of the entire Delta strategy and shepherding it to a successful conclusion, he is at heart too self-interested and too political to be considered an honest broker. She has, in general, avoided meeting with him during her time here, though he has called her several times. ¶7. (S) Comment: Poloff has met with Jandhyala repeatedly over the past three months, and has seen her attitude towards the GON's nascent Niger Delta strategy turn from guarded confidence to frustration. With a resume that includes many years of high-level African conflict resolution, including playing a key role in recent efforts in Uganda, she says she is shocked and dismayed at the unprofessionalism on display on a daily basis in the Vice President's office, and the GON's overall inability to manage a conflict resolution process, despite years of efforts. While it is encouraging that the GON has turned to the good offices of the UN for help, it appears its greatest obstacle in producing a worthwhile Niger Delta strategy may be the GON's own lack of capacity and strong leadership either from the President, his Vice President, and any other GON interlocutor. End Comment. SANDERS