THE Senate, yesterday, totally rejected the ceding of Bakassi Peninsula to Cameroon following the judgment of the International Court of Justice, ICJ, and directed President Goodluck Jonathan to urgently appeal the judgment. Senate President, David Mark, after the resolution, said “in spite of what President Goodluck Jonathan said at the United Nations (UN), we still have not accepted the ICJ judgment, though we obeyed it as a law-abiding nation.”
The deadline of the judgment of the ICJ on the International Boundaries between Nigeria and Cameroon including Bakassi that cedes Bakassi Island from the Federal Republic of Nigeria to the Republic of Cameroon would expire by October 9, 2012
The Nigerian Senators Lokpobiri, PDP, Bayelsa West and Atiku Bagudu urged the Federal Government to use its physical might to quickly reclaim the Island while pursing the appeal.
According to Lokpobiri, “two options are available to Nigeria: the first option is to appeal. Second option is to go back to Bakassi and reclaim it. It is very unfortunate that in the 21st century, we could just hand over part of the country just like that. We should physically go and repossess the land. Since we have a bigger military might, we should go to Bakassi and repossess it.”
Retired jurist of the ICJ and former Nigerian Minister of Justice, Prince Bola Ajibola, has expressed disappointment that Nigerians put themselves in the mess they now bemoan.
He spoke to the Vanguard in Abeokuta, Ogun state. The former Chairman of the Boundaries between Nigeria and Cameroon, said Nigeria sent a note to Cameroon in 1961 admitting and conceding the ownership of Bakassi to the Francophone country.
Nigeria and Cameroon are not the only countries that have been facing such crisis
Diplomatic ties between China and Japan have been repeatedly strained by a territorial row over a group of islands, known as the Senkaku islands in Japan and the Diaoyu islands in China. Japan says it surveyed the islands for 10 years and established determination that they were uninhabited.
China says that the Diaoyu islands have been part of its territory since ancient times, serving as important fishing grounds administered by the province of Taiwan. The Ministry of Foreign Affairs says that this is "fully proven by history and is legally well-founded".
The subject of a sovereignty dispute between Britain and Argentina, who waged a brief but bitter war over the territory in 1982, waged on for long. Argentine forces, where said to have landed on the Falklands to stake a territorial claim, were ejected by a British military task force.
While on the other hand says Argentina says it has a right to the islands, which it calls the Malvinas, because it inherited them from the Spanish crown in the early 1800s. It has also based its claim on the islands' proximity to the South American mainland, Britain rests its case on its long-term administration of the Falklands and on the principle of self-determination for the islanders, who are almost all of British descent.
Back to the ordinary Bakassian; Nigeria's Professor Anthony Ijaola Asiwaju, an emeritus professor of history and borderlands studies from the University of Lagos who was pioneer commissioner for international boundaries at the National Boundary Commission and a strong advocate of Nigeria developing its border communities, providing infrastructure for the communities, so that they can bear greater allegiance to Nigeria and feel the impact of the nation, said they warned the Federal government not to go into litigation with Cameroun at the Internatonal Court of Justice but the government didn't listen.
Today, according to the Chairman of Bakassi LGA, the situation is quite painful. Livelihood, human rights violation and loss of identity are not easy to manage; he says they want their identity and heritage. he further said that the only unprotected environment in the whole of Africa is Bakassi being a peninsula where for instance if there is an oil spillage from Cameroon flowing to Bakassi, who would one hold responsible.
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