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Besides the Ijaw Agenda for Self-Government Committee, the following are the Ijaw Foundation Committees with their terms of reference.
1. FUNDRAISING COMMITTEE:
(a) To mobilize and persuade Ijaws in the Diaspora and at home to voluntarily make regular monthly contributions to the Foundation.
(b) To solicit funds from the general public in the United States, Canada, United Kingdom, Nigeria and elsewhere.
(c) To solicit funding for specific projects from philanthropists, Foundations, governmental agencies and international agencies.
(d) To write fund-raising proposals for the solicitation of funds for specific projects.
(e) To organize the Formal Launching of the Ijaw Foundation and fund-raising events in collaboration with other Committees such as the Cultural Committee.
(f) To design and publish fund-raising brochures for the Foundation.
(g) To build a platform of cooperation and joint-financing involving all Ijaw Local Government Councils in Akwa Ibom, Bayelsa, Delta, Edo, Ondo and Rivers States, the respective Governments of these States, the Oil Companies and the NDDC; to fund Ijaw nationwide electricity, water, telecommunication and other development projects. A framework for joint-financing may be established as follows:
(i) A Trust Fund or Escrow Account for each particular project is established in a reputable Bank in Ijawland and two readily available individuals of transparent integrity, acceptable to all joint-financiers, are appointed as trustees to oversee deposit of funds into the Account. Each participating joint-financier shall be issued a certificate of financial sponsorship indicating the amount and date of its contribution.
(ii) The Ijaw Local Government Councils shall collectively fund twenty percent of the cost of the project. Each Local Government Council shall contribute a proportion of its monthly, quarterly or annual revenue.
(iii) The Bayelsa State Government shall contribute twenty percent of the funds for the project.
(iv) The Akwa Ibom, Delta, Ondo and Rivers State Governments shall collectively fund twenty percent of the cost of the project; each State contributing a fair proportion of its revenues derived from its Ijaw communities on the basis of the derivation principle.
(v) The Oil Companies shall collectively contribute twenty percent of the cost of the project, each company contributing a proportion based on its quota of oil production and/or revenues.
(vi) The NDDC shall also fund twenty percent of the cost of the project.
2. WATER AND ELECTRICITY COMMITTEE
(a) To assemble Ijaw and non-Ijaw technocrats from all relevant professional fields to plan, design and execute short-term water supply projects to provide hygienic/drinkable water to the Ijaws in their communities. Water Purification Plants will be constructed to produce drinkable water in packages for distribution throughout Ijawland at the most affordable price. This project would generate revenue for the Foundation while providing an essential necessity for our people.
(b) To work with the technocrats to design and construct Water Purification Plants and Reservoirs that will provide hygienic and safe pipe-borne water to individual homes throughout Ijawland.
(c) To assemble Ijaw and non-Ijaw technocrats from all relevant professional fields to design and construct financially self-sustaining environmentally friendly Electricity Generating Plants, using locally available resources such as natural gas, to provide electricity to all Ijaw communities at an affordable cost.
3. TOWN PLANNING AND HOUSING COMMITTEE
(a) To design standard model family houses, condominiums, housing complexes (apartment buildings) of varying sizes for our people; with due regard to our climate, environmental conditions, safety, hygiene, ecological preservation and the availability of land in Ijawland. The model housing units must have standard toilets and proper drainage systems as well as accommodation for proper electrification and plumbing.
(b) To design Recreational and Sporting Facilities such as parks, sports arenas or stadiums for Ijaw Communities.
(c) To recommend a standard distance of separation between housing units, the standard distance of housing units from Streets and Roads and the standard widths for roads, streets, pavements and drainages in our cities, towns and villages.
(d) To recommend a standard elevation for housing units to protect houses from flooding when water overruns the banks of the rivers or seas during the rainy season or when a large volume of water is suddenly released from dams upstream.
(e) To design a standard drainage system for Ijaw Communities, cognizant of our peculiar terrain.
4. ROADS AND INFRASTRUCTURE COMMITTEE
(a) To assemble Ijaw and non-Ijaw engineers and other allied professionals to design a network of roads and bridges that will ultimately link all Ijaw communities. The network of roads should be carefully designed not to damage the ecology (swamps, rivulets, streams and other fisheries) of Ijawland.
(b) To assemble Ijaw and non-Ijaw architects, engineers and allied professionals to design schools, markets, supermarkets, hospitals, research centers, industries and other development infrastructure in Ijawland.
(c) To establish a system or mechanism whereby Ijaw engineers, builders and artisans readily maintain and repair roads and infrastructure in Ijawland in a cost-effective and profitable way.
5. EDUCATION AND YOUTH DEVELOPMENT COMMITTEE
(a) To promote education in Ijawland by well structured campaigns to encourage and facilitate every child to acquire basic education to be functionally literate.
(b) To prepare for the Ijaws an EDUCATIONAL POLICY that emphasizes vocational training and acquisition of technical skills that would promote entrepreneurship, self-reliance, productivity and economic empowerment.
(c) To help teach our schoolchildren and youths honesty, hard work, ambition, discipline, respect for elders and authority, character, self-esteem and community service.
(d) To help attract qualified teachers to schools in Ijawland to provide qualitative education to our children.
(e) To establish prerequisites for establishing primary and secondary schools to ensure that the schools provide qualitative education.
(f) To establish a framework to continuously monitor the performance of the various schools in Ijawland, identify problems and make recommendations to improve standards.
(g) To promote and help to organize inter-school sports in Ijawland as a vehicle to promote brotherhood among Ijaws and to promote talents.
(h) To develop and facilitate an IJAW NATIONAL SCHOLARSHIP PROGRAMME funded by the oil companies and other agencies to offer scholarships to Ijaw students at secondary, undergraduate and postgraduate levels of education.
6. MANPOWER AND ECONOMIC DEVELOPMENT COMMITTEE
(a) To identify, promote, modernize and propagate the various indigenous vocational skills in Ijawland.
(b) To promote and modernize Ijaw indigenous technology.
(c) To develop plans for the establishment of Skills Acquisition Centers for carpentry, lumbering, masonry, fishing, weaving, pottery, textiles, ceramics manufacturing, etc.
(d) To develop and execute plans to modernize our traditional Palm Wine and Gin Distillation industry with a view to producing methylated spirit (isopropyl alcohol) used for antiseptic cleaning.
(e) To develop, design and execute plans to use our abundant Silica Resources to manufacture glass and glass products.
(f) To develop, design and execute plans to extract and purify salt from the sea water that surrounds Ijawland, for domestic use and export.
(g) To develop, design and execute plans to develop and modernize our traditional soap and detergent manufacturing (saponification) system.
(h) To develop, design and execute plans to make various products from the raphia palm, oil palm and mangrove trees.
7. HEALTH AND HUMANITARIAN COMMITTEE
(a) To develop contingency plans and strategies for providing timely, adequate and effective technical and material relief in event of humanitarian disasters in Ijawland and elsewhere.
(b) To assemble Ijaw healthcare and allied professionals to develop short-term and long-term plans to provide basic healthcare to all Ijaws in their communities.
(c) To continually monitor and assess the basic healthcare needs of the Ijaws and develop plans and strategies to overcome deficiencies to meet these needs.
(d) To develop plans for the establishment of financially self-sustaining secondary and tertiary hospitals to be located equitably throughout Ijawland to provide specialist medical care in obstetrics, gynecology, pediatrics, medicine, general surgery, orthopedics and neurosurgery.
(e) To develop a plan for training and recruiting health professionals to provide healthcare to our people in our communities.
(f) To facilitate the formation of professional associations and healthcare regulatory bodies for healthcare professionals in Ijawland to ensure adherence to professional standards and ethics.
(g) To develop, design and publish brochures that educate our people on preventive and first-aid healthcare.
(h) To publish or cause to publish Health Advisories to our people in their local communities especially in outbreaks of epidemics and environmental disasters.
(i) To assist our local government councils to develop and implement Vital Statistics programme in every Ijaw community to ensure the registration and certification of births and deaths.
8. ENVIRONMENTAL PROTECTION COMMITTEE
(a) To identify all causes of environmental pollution arising from our traditional ways of life and to recommend behavioral changes that would stop us from polluting and degrading our environment.
(b) To develop and implement a plan to construct modern toilet, bathing and laundry facilities in every Ijaw community to abolish the age-old primitive, shameful, unhygienic and unwholesome practice of discharging human effluents and laundry wastes into our rivers from which we obtain water for drinking and cooking.
(c) To work with environmental rights groups and agencies to develop plans and strategies to prevent oil spillages and to stop gas flaring in the Niger Delta and elsewhere in the world.
(d) To develop contingency plans and strategies to clean up affected rivers, streams, lakes and lands in event of oil spills.
(e) To assemble scientists and health professionals to conduct detailed studies on the hazardous effects of environmental pollution occasioned by crude oil prospecting and gas flaring.
(f) To develop and execute ECOLOGICAL RESTORATION AND PRESERVATION PLANS AND PROJECTS for the IJAW HABITAT that has been severely damaged from decades of oil exploration.
9. AGRICULTURE AND FISHERIES COMMITTEE
(a) To develop and implement plans that will boost agricultural output for cassava, yam, cocoyam, potatoes, plantain, banana, groundnut and rice in Ijawland by natural means.
(b) To develop and execute plans for the establishment of needed food processing plants especially for production of garri, flour and other staple foods.
(c) To develop and implement plans to encourage our people to collaborate to establish Co-operative Farms which may employ environmentally friendly mechanized large-scale farming methods.
(d) To develop and implement plans for the establishment of produce markets at strategic locations throughout Ijawland.
(f) To recommend environmentally friendly pest control methods.
(g) To develop, design and help establish fisheries in Ijawland to produce adequate fish for the needs of our people.
(h) To help establish fisheries for replenishing the stocks of the various species of fish which face the danger of extinction.
10. LANGUAGE AND CULTURE COMMITTEE
(a) To develop and implement plans and projects that promote the speaking of Ijaw language in our communities and by Ijaw families in the Diaspora.
(b) To develop strategies to promote Ijaw literature, history and culture.
(c) To develop and implement strategies to collate, record and preserve Ijaw folklore, music, dances and festivals in written and audiovisual documentaries.
(d) To develop and implement plans to revive and restore the basic tenets of Ijaw culture; such as purity, chastity, decency, honesty, love, kindness, diligence, respect for elders and constituted authority, self-respect and responsibility.
(e) To develop and implement plans to strengthen our traditional institutions to protect the sanctity of Ijaw culture and the integrity of the Ijaw Society by enforcing effective sanctions against all abominable and evil practices; cognizant of the fact that the demise of any society always results from the abandonment of vital spiritual and moral values.
(f) To develop and implement plans to promote and defend, in Ijawland, the sanctity of marriage which being the bedrock of society, creates the family which is the basic unit of society. To defend social equality of men and women, and to ensure economic security and proper parental care for children, a plan should be developed to persuade our people to choose Monogamous Marriage: the union of one man and one woman.
(g) To develop and implement plans to revive traditional Ijaw ceremonies such as “AYORO PAMO OGE” that honor and promote chastity of our girls so as to build strong marriages and families besides protecting against sexually transmitted diseases such as AIDS, gonorrhea, herpes and syphilis.
(h) To develop and implement plans, by the instrumentality of our traditional rulers and traditional institutions, to stigmatize and discourage the evil practice of seducing and snatching another man’s wife which has unfortunately become so rampant.
(i) To plan and organize Ijaw cultural shows at home and in the Diaspora to showcase our rich cultural heritage as well as promote Ijaw brotherhood, solidarity and nationalism.
11. RESEARCH AND PUBLICATIONS COMMITTEE
(a) Create a database of Ijaw professionals, entrepreneurs, technocrats and technicians in various fields: architects, artisans, artists, engineers, geologists, doctors, pharmacists, nurses, lawyers, academics, writers, poets, teachers, journalists, musicians, industrialists, etc.
(b) To design and publish Ijaw Yearbook and Diary that provide nation-building information on Ijaw language, culture, music, dance, festivals, sports, commerce, landmarks and historical events.
(c) To research and publish relevant information on Ijaw history and culture; ensuring truthfulness and accuracy of historical records.
(d) To write and produce audiovisual documentaries on Ijaw history, culture, music, dance, festivals, environmental protection and struggle for self-determination.
(e) To chronicle the annals of the Ijaw Struggle for Self-determination and environmental protection.
(f) To conduct research on notable Ijaw nationalists to facilitate the publishing of biographies of such persons.
(g) To develop and implement a plan to establish a world-class Publishing and Printing Press in Ijawland to facilitate the publication of newspapers, magazines, journals and books by Ijaws and others at much more affordable costs.
(h) To assemble a reservoir of editors to be readily available to help edit literary works embarked upon by Ijaw sons and daughters.
(i) To encourage research and innovation among Ijaws in medicine, science, technology, engineering and any other field of human endeavour.
12. SPECIAL AFFAIRS COMMITTEE
(a) To assist the Foundation’s Legal Counsel to provide legal advice to the Foundation whenever the need arises.
(b) To develop and implement well-structured and effective mechanisms, by the instrumentality of the INC, IYC, ICHR, FNDIC, other non-governmental organizations, Ijaw Traditional Rulers, and other Ijaw Traditional Institutions, to mediate to peacefully resolve, as well as prevent, intra-communal, intra-ethnic and inter-ethnic disputes involving the Ijaws.
(c) To help assemble appropriate Legal Teams to obtain redress for the Ijaw nation or individual Ijaw Communities when our socioeconomic, political, environmental and fundamental human rights are violated.
(d) To consult with Quantity Surveyors, Estate Valuers and other relevant professionals to formulate Compensation Rates Oil Companies must pay for damages done by oil prospecting activities and oil spills to our farmlands, fisheries, streams, canals, swamps, rivers and real estate. For instance, the Compensation Rate for damages done to farmlands could be $250.00 per square foot.
(e) To formulate an Annual Compensation Rate to the Ijaws and other Niger Deltans for the health hazards of gas flaring; to provide healthcare for the Ijaws and other Niger Deltans until gas flaring is completely stopped.
(f) To draft and facilitate legislation that defends and promotes justice, equity, human rights, self determination, true federalism, resource control and environmental protection in Nigeria. Specifically, the Special Affairs Committee shall be responsible for the drafting of legislations (bills) and presentation of same to the Nigerian National Assembly demanding/seeking the creation of another two or more homogenous Ijaw States, enthronement of true federalism and Resource Control as well as environmental protection measures and adequate compensation for environmental and ecological damages caused by oil prospecting activities, oil spills and gas flaring.
13. PUBLIC RELATIONS AND MEMBERSHIP COMMITTEE
(a) Polish and present a positive image of the Ijaw Foundation to the public.
(b) Act as a conduit between the Ijaws on one hand and governments, individuals, private enterprises, and the rest of the world on the other hand; to present success stories as well as positive images of the Ijaw community to the world.
(c) Present the Ijaw side of the story and perform necessary "damage control" in emergency situations.
(d) Document and publicize when necessary, Ijaw Foundation activities and accomplishments to the public.
(e) Publicize all Ijaw Foundation and other Ijaw Organization activities for public information.
(f) Organize membership drives and retention; and encourage All Ijaw citizenships to participate in Ijaw Foundation activities.
(g) Communicate Ijaw Foundation positions to other Ijaw Organizations and the public.
(h) Interact with Ijaw Foundation members and educate members on various aspects of the Foundations activities and policies.
(i) Highlight both positive and negative developments regarding government projects, private projects/developments) in Ijawland, etc.
P.S: Each committee is also required to conduct appropriate research to prepare cost analysis or estimates for the various projects under its purview.
Notwithstanding the grand vision enunciated herein, Ijaw Foundation shall advisedly begin with a modest and tangible project that it could readily finance and execute.
No project shall be embarked upon until adequate funds have been secured.
Dr. Ebipamone N. Nanakumo
President, Ijaw Foundation Board of Directors
549 LEFFERTS AVENUE, BROOKLYN, NY 11225, USA* Phone & Fax: (718) 778-0536*
Ijaw Foundation is a charitable nonprofit organization with Section 501 (c) (3) Tax Exempt Status granted by the United States Internal Revenue Service.
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