Tantita Security Services Chairman High Chief Government Ekpemupolo, known widely as Tompolo, has appealed for restraint and dialogue after women and youths from several communities in Delta State occupied oil and gas installations in the Escravos and Warri River areas to protest what they described as an unfair ward delineation exercise by the Independent National Electoral Commission in Warri Federal Constituency.
The protests, which began on June 8, saw demonstrators take control of facilities across the affected areas in a show of force designed to draw attention to grievances over how INEC had handled the delineation process, which communities said had been conducted in ways that marginalized certain groups within the constituency.
Tompolo, issuing a personal statement, said he understood the depth of the communities’ frustrations and acknowledged their right to express those concerns, but warned that the protests must not be allowed to slide into violence or be exploited by individuals with interests in creating broader instability rather than resolving the specific delineation dispute.
He said the Ijaw people had a historical reputation for peaceful advocacy and that the current situation should be resolved in keeping with that tradition through structured dialogue among community leaders and formal engagement with INEC rather than through actions that could endanger lives, damage infrastructure, or give security agencies cause to intervene in ways that might worsen the situation.
Tompolo called for an urgent convening of community leaders from the Ijaw, Itsekiri, and Urhobo groups affected by the dispute, proposing it as the most effective immediate step toward a negotiated resolution. He urged INEC to respond substantively to the communities’ concerns about the delineation process, saying the commission had an obligation to ensure that electoral boundary decisions commanded the confidence of those most directly affected by them.
