Nigeria Considers Buying Back Bakassi Instead as Deadline to Appeal Expires

AGF, Mohammed Adoke

As the deadline for Nigeria’s legal appeal over Bakassi Peninsula’s cession to Cameroon expires, Nigeria’s justice minister and attorney general, Mohammed Adoke said Nigeria might consider buying back the territory.
Residents of the disputed area along the Gulf of Guinea had been pushing for Nigeria’s government to take action as the 10-year deadline to seek a review of the October 10, 2002 ruling approached.

Adoke categorically said Nigeria will not appeal the 2002 International Court of Justice ruling ceding the potentially oil-rich Bakassi peninsula to Cameroon, bringing the long dispute to an apparent end, a statement said Tuesday.
He said an appeal would have been a waste of time and resources as no new facts had emerged in Nigeria’s favour.
“Government has therefore decided that it will not be in the national interest to apply for revision of the 2002 ICJ judgment in respect of the land and maritime boundary between Cameroon and Nigeria,”he said.
He however said Nigeria was concerned about the plight of its nationals living in Bakassi and would address allegations of rights abuses being perpetrated against them.
The government faced heavy pressure from local politicians and residents in the region of the country’s southeast, where Bakassi is located. Militants in Bakassi have also raised concerns over potential unrest.

In an interview with local television Channels early Tuesday, the traditional ruler of Bakassi, Etim Okon Edet, rejected the government’s decision not to seek a review of the ruling.
“The ICJ judgment is fraudulent. The review of the ICJ judgement was still possible. I do not see any crime in doing so. Nigeria has abandoned the people,” he said.
Cameroon took Nigeria before the ICJ in 1994 over the border dispute involving the 1,000-square-kilometre (386-square-mile) patch of Atlantic coastal swamp between the two neighbours.

The peninsula is seen as potentially oil and gas rich, and it is considered to offer a rich fishing ground.
After a drawn-out legal battle, the ICJ ruled in October 2002 that the peninsula should be given to Cameroon. It based its decision largely on a 1913 treaty between former colonial powers Britain and Germany.
Nigeria formally handed over the land to Cameroon on August 14, 2008, ending an almost 15-year-old feud between the two countries that had occasionally seen bloody clashes.