Many will remember Mujahid Dokubo-Asari for the gang wars that turned the Rivers State capital city of Port Harcourt into a garden of blood between 2003 and 2005. Pit against another dreaded gang leader at the time, Ateke Tom, their names evoked fear among residents of the famed Garden City.

Whenever they clashed, they left a trail of sorrow, tears and blood. But Dokubo-Asari metamorphosed into a ‘freedom fighter’, and through his group, Niger Delta Peoples Volunteer Force (NDPVF), began championing the Ijaw cause in what came to be regarded as the Niger Delta struggle. One of the consequences of his agitation was an almost two-year incarceration by former President Olusegun Obasanjo.

In the last eight months or thereabout, he had been on self-exile, having fled when he claimed his life was no longer safe in Nigeria. But his return to the country last week almost caused another stir as reports filtered out that some apparently overzealous security agents had arrested him at the Nigeria-Republic of Benin border at Seme. After about five hours, he was however asked to go. This was not before some highly placed Nigerians had intervened through phone calls from Abuja and all over Nigeria.

But the NDPVF leader, who has willy-nilly acquired fame, notoriety, and, perhaps, fortune, is an enigma of sorts. One moment, he talks softly and comes across as somebody that cannot hurt a fly. Almost immediately, the warlord in him manifests and he vibrates at the top of his voice - his passion effusive and vociferous as he kicks against former military president, Ibrahim Babangida’s bid to return to power in 2011.

Hear him: “…how can anybody allow IBB to even campaign? Everywhere he goes they ought to chase him. It is not democracy to allow a man who made thousands of people to die campaign for power…IBB ought to be in prison. Nigerians can stop him.

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