Ahead of the amnesty granted by President Umaru Musa Yar’Adua to end hostility in the Niger Delta region, Federal Government yesterday said it already has over 300 militants who declined militancy and have benefited from retraining programmes aimed at reintegrating them back into the society.

Director General of the Citizenship and Leadership Training Centre (CLTC), Amb. Adamu Yusuf who spoke ahead of the 2009 Millenium Development Goals (MDGs) training slated for Knarda Training Institute in Kano, said its centre is engaged in retraining of youths in leadership qualities and patriotism.

Yusuf blamed the on-going decadence in the society on the negative example the older generation shows to the younger ones. He said: "Most of us parents have failed in our responsibilities of giving our youths more of guidance and then also living our daily lives by examples.

"You cannot tell your child when he knows may be you are nothing and you are just a boss or elected into a position of authority and out of the blue you are the owner of multi million naira mansions all over the country, you have fleet of fifteen to 20 cars, every week or every two weeks you are abroad flying to doctors abroad, what kind of example are you giving?

"Aren’t you not saying okay, when you grow up and you are put in the same position or you find yourself in the same position that’s how you should live your life. So we are not giving them the best of example and I think the first port of call is lets go back to our conscience, lets search our mind are we really doing the right thing. Nobody said you should suffer in life, no but there are parameters, there are some things that when you do them, you know that you are not doing the right thing and it is high time we went back to our conscience to see whether we are giving the children the right examples."

Speaking on the Niger Delta problem, Yusuf said over 300 youths from the region who retraced their steps from the act of militancy had been retrained by the centre and are now ready to mix with other citizens without any trouble.

He said the facilities provided by government were available for the states from the Niger Delta to use in rehabilitating their indigenes and return them to the path of patriotism.

"Our centre is a citizenship and leadership training centre and by that we try to make sure or we try through our training programmes which are really practical training programmes to teach them the love for their country and there are a lot of programmes there that will evoke patriotism in them and we also try and ensure that they cherish the qualities of being a leader through team work, honesty and perseverance.

"Our doors are open; our training facilities are open after all they are being funded fully by government for any of the state in the Niger Delta who feel that it needs our expertise so that we can change and remodel these young people who have gone astray, we are ready" he said.

On the 2009 MDGs training, he said the centre was working towards achieving the objectives of the Seven-Point agenda of the present administration especially Human Capital Development and Empowerment.

Yusuf said that in 2008 under the same programme, the centre trained 1,800 Student Union from universities and other tertiary institutions in the country at training units located in all the six geo-political zones.

"The 2009 MDGs programme is made more broaden with participants drawn irrespective of union affiliations. It is intended to provide additional training to empower Nigerian Youths across the country and make them more responsible and agents of change in their various communities, he said."