Tamunotonye Martins Brown is vocal, pungent and articulate when harping on issues germane to his people, the Buoye Omuso Brown Major House (BOBH), Finima Community and Bonny Local Government Area, as a whole. The man who parades a consolidated and celebrated resume of professionalism is equally versed in the traditional and socio-economic issues affecting his people.

In this interview with the Publisher of Kristina Reports, Godswill Jumbo, in Finima recently, he tackles the issues relating to the managing of employment opportunities accruing to his chieftaincy house, BOBH, and Finima Community, the legal tussle over who is the authentic Chief and Head of the BOBH, amongst other issues. Enjoy the scintillating read!

Kristina Reports: Since exiting the office as Asawo Chairman, how has life been treating you?

Tammy Brown:  Honestly, no much difference from when I was in office and now, as I had always been a busy man right from when I graduated from the university, completed my NYSC more than two decades ago, 2001, precisely. Perhaps, it might also be because of the nature of my job as HR practitioner and being the people’s man. I take more interest in training and developing others, especially, young men and women. Most of our youths within and outside the island can attest to this fact.

So, no much difference between then and now, just that some pressures are off my neck as I do more of support and advisory role than the day-to-day activities in the community, like before. But as a community leader, I still provide that needed support here and there whenever necessary, especially, as it concerns my beloved Buoye Omuso Brown Major House and Finima in general.

There are insinuations that opportunities coming to your community, Finima, whether from the company or the government are being shared between different groups, is this true?

Well, I won’t really say whether or not, it is true, it depends on what you are referring to as opportunities coming to my community. Besides, we don’t know of different groups in Finima, rather we have three houses in Finima; that is the Brown Major House and Tobin and Attoni Minor Houses. So, like I said, it depends on what you meant by opportunities coming to Finima from the company and government. Of course, talking about the government, we had never felt any government presence in Finima and we are used to it, though the government usually generate heavy revenues yearly from our land, Finima. But had decided to neglect the Finima Community, “the goose that lays the golden eggs”, where they make all the revenues but nothing to show right from history.

From your own findings, is the BIRC staying with the employment quota system of 60/40 between Bonny and Finima?

Sincerely, we cannot ascertain the true position regarding the 60/40 ratio between Bonny/Finima because as it is at the moment, we see a situation where some traditional and government institutions have brought in divide and rule tactics into our 40% quota on employment. It is practically impossible to say in the affirmative whether or not it is working because they now share the 40% to the three houses at the BIRC. So, I wonder how in such situation, you will say yes, that what the BIRC is giving to Finima is the correct and complete 40% quota from source.

Do you think your complaint is justified given that you have representatives both in the BIRC and the Local Government?

Of course, yes, our agitation is very genuine, legitimate and justified. Take for instance, the state government, who, in their wisdom, gave the resolution in 2006 agreed to 60% for the entire Bonny and 40% to Finima didn’t say we should distribute or share the 40% employment quota at BIRC office. So, our agitation is in order. It is just a matter of time and all will be sorted out.

On the issue of representation, I am not sure of such representation at BIRC or Local Government. What I am sure of was that we use to have a Finima Rep that usually goes to BIRC to bring our 40% employment quota. But, like I said earlier, the traditional and local government interference had created some confusion. According to information available to me, we have it that there was an instruction to the BIRC not to recognize the legitimate community nominee appointed by the Finima Youth Congress but rather the BIRC should honour a nominee from Evans Brown and we well understand the antics and where it is coming from. But, at the appropriate time, it will be dealt with following legitimate processes.

This is the kind of situation that we are currently dealing with at the moment. Like I had always stressed that Finima youths are peace loving and law-abiding youths and so, no amount of provocation will push us to do otherwise. But our silence should also not be misconstrued for weakness as we have never been cowards from history, you can double check yourself.

We know how to get our rights but we shall continue to follow all due legitimate processes to press home our rights. After all, the 40% that everyone is now interested in didn’t get to us just like that. We were oppressed for so many years until we said enough was enough in 2006 where, at some point, we had to resist the oppressors before the state government intervened and today, they are back trying to take us back to the dark days.

The good thing is that as Finima people we have ways of managing the youths not to go outside the usual but always follow due process. We must follow due process to press home our rights. We have respect for our constituted authorities from the Amadabo-in-Council to all other structures in the Community, unlike other communities within and outside the Niger Delta. As the Governor of Rivers State, His Excellency Nyesom Wike will always say “If you don’t value Rivers people, the state will not value you”; that is Finima for you. As we believed that the time shall come when we will be needed as Finima for any kind of support, then we will remind them.

Last time we checked, the Bonny LGA Chairman was emphatic that her office cannot dabble into chieftaincy issues as the Local Governments are divested of such responsibility. How true is this allegation? What if someone is doing something she is not aware of?  

Well, such statements could be viewed or seen as political. If you remember in one of my interviews with Kristina Reports last year, where I advised then that for the LGA chairman to be objective in her functions, she needs to stay away from traditional matters and, particularly, chieftaincy issues, and focus on governance of the LGA because her role is clearly defined to be that of administration of local laws and the provision of social services and facilities by way of development, including security, etc. to the LGA. But like you can see, she has dabbled into traditional chieftaincy issues.

So, she cannot claim ignorance of the happenings in Finima, especially, regarding employment for our youths. From her body language, we can see where her sympathy lies. Obviously, we don’t need anyone to tell us what she has been doing to shortchange the Finima people; to the point where it was rumoured that she even tried to order the stoppage of the renovation of the Palace of the Amadabo of Finima.

To confirm our fears, she recently convened a meeting where she invited Evans Brown and the Aseme Alabo Engr. Dagogo Lambert Brown and opted to share Brown House employment quota to parties instead of settling our 40% issue, which, of course, we rejected. Pretending like there were factions in Brown House, which is not true and those that know the truth, know that someone was only trying to lay claim to the Buoye Omuso Brown chieftaincy stool. But I will not want to speak much on this as the matter is already in court and soonest it will be decided. So, let’s wait till then.

Even if she was misinformed that there are factions in Brown House, are there also factions in the youth body, Finima Youth Congress (FYC) led by Shedrach Brown and his team representing the three houses? So, you can see obviously that there is more to what we are seeing physically. Why not allow the youths to manage the employment because they are directly involved and they are the end users?

But have there been complaints from the Attoni and Tobin Houses as to the sharing formula back home in Finima?  

As you know, people could be funny and raise unnecessary alarm sometime, just to get their ways and sympathy but such complaints may not be the true in the real sense. Like when I was in office, the system I introduced to then LGA chairman, who is late now, Hon. David Rogers Irimagha, was that for all requisitions from the companies, the stakeholders, especially, for Finima, as a critical stakeholder with 40% quota, should be issued a copy of the requisitions showing the number of slots/positions that is requested by the companies. Now, with this, when the Finima Reps bring ours home to Finima you can clearly see and understand what makes the 40% allocated to Finima. In the same vein, the reps from the three houses will also see what the Finima rep had brought home and what is due all as per their ratio. So, you will see that no one is cheating the other. When you have such transparent process of sharing, there is nothing to fear if we apply this system and all will be on the same page. And it worked perfectly.

Whose responsibility is it to nominate a representative for Finima to the BIRC? 

Like I explained earlier, it is the responsibility of the Finima Youth Congress to handle employment matters for the youths because you have the three houses represented at that level. So, it is the responsibility of the Central Executive Council of the FYC to nominate to BIRC a Finima rep and then the various house youth bodies will nominate their reps that meets with the Finima rep when employment slots are brought from BIRC and agree on which skills goes to which houses and then they apply the quota as applicable.

Given that Dagogo Lambert and Evans Clement are still in court to determine who should step down and who should stay on as chief and head of the BOBH, making it a bit tricky ascertaining who to relate with between the two of them, what do you propose as the proper approach to this situation at this time? 

Again, as I earlier explained, there is no confusion about who the chief of Brown House is, Aseme Alabo Engr. Dagogo Lambert Brown but since the matter is in court, we will patiently wait for the court to determine the matter. However, Finima employment should not be mixed up with that of chieftaincy matter. We have the leadership of the Finima Youth Congress and they are capable of managing our employment perfectly well. This is not new to us as they are the end users.

So, even if we have our chieftaincy case in court, does it also mean that we don’t have the Buoye Omuso Brown House leadership, that is the Council of Wari-Alapu, that have been managing the affairs of the house and Community for all these years that even the traditional council and local government are fully aware of.

Days ago, youths of Buoye Omuso Brown House (BOBH) went to pledge allegiance to Chief Evans Clement Brown, how do you react to that?

For those of our younger brothers that, according to your Kristina Reports, went to pledge allegiance and loyalty to Mr. Evans Brown on Sunday, 28th August, 2022, I personally don’t see anything new because we are not surprised. Meanwhile, do you need to pledge allegiance or loyalty to your own father? What was the need for the drama? It shows that they don’t even know what they wanted.

There is a saying that “if you want to be a good leader, you must be a good follower”. one of the young men, Moses Brown, that I saw there, was aspiring to be the leader of one of the structures of the Buoye Omuso Brown House, “the Ogbobiri Asawo” and was disqualified for not meeting the set criteria/requirements. He was annoyed and led the few to where they felt was better for them. So, no issues.

In another hand, one would wonder if that is his reason for aspiring for the chairmanship position initially. Or, perhaps, one would also wonder if he failed in his mission of becoming the leader of that particular structure and so he had to return back to where he rightly belongs and where they might have projected him from.

There might be more to this very action. However, they are free to their opinions and very free to aligning themselves with anyone whether Finima or not, because there is freedom of association. As far as we are concerned, It is everyone’s right to visit whosoever they feel like visiting as long as they don’t have the mandate to speak on behalf of the Buoye Omuso Brown Major House, leadership structures or the community. I wish them luck, but they should not regret their actions or inactions afterwards because we have seen similar situations in the past with my experiences in Finima community.