FCT’s original inhabitants have called for the further strengthening of their cultural ties under a two-year project that will train 300 women and youths.
Godwin Arome Onoja, Program Manager, Helpline Social Support Initiative, who addressed a press conference in Abuja, said Helpline, in partnership with the Resource Centre for Human Right and Civic Education CHRICED, continues to seek to promote the Rights of the Original Inhabitants (OIs) of FCT with support from MacArthur Foundation.
He said the 2-years project is to promote the cultural rights of the OIs on three core objectives, and this second phase of the project titled “Strengthening the cultural rights of the FCT OIs” has the objective of training 100 more of the vulnerable women and youth on cultural attire production. Already 200 had been trained in the first phase.
“This is to increase the cultural identity awareness of the OIs and create job opportunities through skill acquisition in art and craft. We also advocate for the resettlement and adequate compensation of those whose land has been encroached upon or taking over by developers without adequate compensation”.
“Remember that the decree to turn their ancestral home to the nation’s capital in 1973 led to the OIs having to relinquish their ancestral land for the development of the nation’s capital this led to scattered indigenous people, lust of economic trees and farm lands thereby causing high unemployment rate among the OIs,” he said.
He said the 9 indigenous tribes in the FCT, namely, Amwamwa, Bassa, Egbira, Gade, Ganagana, Gbagyi, Gbari, Gwandara and Koro, are ones whose voices are gradually going on extinction hence the call on all stakeholders in this venture to empathize and sympathize with the OIs and join in order to create incredible impact that will out-live us and usher new generations to a life of ease in the FCT.
The project, he added, further aims at revamping the Asumbo the dye pit of Ushafa where their economic life was obliterating due to encroachment, and creating awareness about the existence of the Original Inhabitants in FCT and preservation of other cultural sites, and called on those in Diaspora to also patronise the local attires of indigenous inhabitants.
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