It maintained that its contract with the Igbo nation was to realise a Nigerian president of Igbo extraction. The Igbo apex socio-cultural organisation, Ohanaeze Ndigbo, on Tuesday said the Igbo did not mandate it to pursue the actualisation of a Sovereign State of Biafra.
It maintained that its contract with the Igbo nation was to realise a Nigerian president of Igbo extraction.
The President of Ohanaeze Ndigbo in Anambra State, Chief Damian Okeke-Ogene, stated this at the end of the groups’ meeting in Awka, the state capital.
“We are pursuing Igbo presidency because the executive of Ohanaeze, led by Chief Nnia Nwodo, has the mandate of Ndigbo to negotiate the Igbo position in Nigeria.
“He wasn’t given a mandate for the Sovereign State of Biafra. That’s why we are saying, give us what is due for us, and Nigeria’s president of Igbo extraction is what we are looking for,” a report by Punch quoted him to have said.
On deregistration of a splinter Ohanaeze group by the Corporate Affairs Commission, Okeke-Ogene commended the CAC for “throwing into the dustbin” the splinter group.
Okwesilieze Nwodo, a former Chairman of the Peoples Democratic Party, PDP, has warned that elites of the Southeast may begin to support the secession move of Nnamdi Kanu, leader of the Indigenous People of Biafra, IPOB.
Nwodo warned that the Southeast may be forced to support Kanu’s push for Biafra if the region is not allowed to produce Nigeria’s next president in 2023.
He issued the warning while backing an elder statesman, Tanko Yakassai’s call for Igbo presidency in 2023.
Yakassai had urged the Southeast to seek the support of other regions of Nigeria to produce the country’s next president in 2023.
He had explained that the Southeast was yet to produce Nigeria’s president, hence the need for them to take up the challenge in 2023.
Reacting, Nwodo told Vanguard: “Yakassai’s call is very fair and that is the correct thing.
“I agree with Nnamdi Kanu in everything he says about the marginalization of the Igbos. He, more than any other person, has put it on the international map.
“If Nigeria tells the elites from the South East that they would be treated as second class citizens in Nigeria, and that they can never be president, almost all of them will go with Kanu to fight for Biafra.
“Any Igbo man who wants to bequeath a secure future for himself and generation yet unborn should support this call for Igbo presidency.
“In the spirit of fairness and equity, Nigeria should give the presidency to the South East in 2023, otherwise, we will join him and fight for Biafra.”
Kanu and his group, IPOB have been in the forefront for the breakup of Nigeria and actualization of Biafra.
The Biafra Nations Youth League, BNYL, on Saturday, warned Miyetti Allah Kautal Haure not to allow the Fulani Security group to operate in the Southeast and Southsouth avoid bloody confrontation by both groups.
BNYL Chief Press Secretary, Dianabasi Odung, gave the warning while speaking in Uyo, Akwa Ibom State, and was contained in a statement he forwarded to DAILY POST.
The group said it will effectively use its grassroots structures to checkmate the activities of the herdsmen and the security group in the Southeast and Southsouth.
Odung said BNYL will tackle any suspicious activity, which may be bloody.
He said the Fulani security group if seen anywhere in the region will be attacked.
“We dare them to be more visible, we want to see them, if they’re man enough let them be visible like normal security group and face confrontations from us.
“But if they chose to operate like terrorists that they have always been known for, then we shall meet in the bushes. Their actions will only risk the lives of the cattle breeders” the BNYL warned.
The current mischaracterisation of the Igbo ahead of next elections must be cleared. Law Mefor writes
i was on the Arise TV where he also reiterated that it was the turn of Ndigbo. The elder statesman, however, warned against the Biafra agitation and polemics of a faction of the Indigenous People of Biafra (IPOB) led by Mazi Nnamdi Kanu, which he said was not helping the Igbo course.
“I want to say that our compatriots from the South East should wake up and realise that Nnamdi Kanu will not be the type of people, who will take the presidency to the South East.” He reasoned that Ndigbo must appeal to, not insult their sensibilities, to have their trust.
While Pa Yakasai and several others have been quite mature and responsible in putting their concerns across, there are many, who are so illogical and insensitive in aggressively pushing the narrative that Ndigbo cannot be asking for the presidency and Biafra at the same time. Some even equate Igbo presidency to breakup of Nigeria. This is as untrue as it is blackmailing.
It is a gross misrepresentation of the thinking of Ndigbo. While Nnamdi Kanu and his disciples might be more vociferous in marketing their belief, they do not represent the true stand of the greater number of Ndigbo and Igbo intelligentsia, which is captured in the “Awka Declaration” in May 2018.
That summit was attended by both the ordinary men and the cream of Igbo leadership, including the President General of Ohanaeze Ndigbo, Chief Nnia Nwodo; Deputy President of the senate and highest Igbo political office holder at the time, Senator Ike Ekweremadu.
There were governors of South East states, including the host Governor, Chief Wille Obiano; Chief Emmanuel Iwuanyanwu who chaired the event; Dr. Chukwuemeka Ezife; Chief Guy Ikokwu, former Ohanaeze Secretary General, Dr. Joe Nwaorgu, representatives of the National Assembly like Senators Enyinnaya Abaribe, Victor Umeh and Sam Daddy Anyanwu, among others.
Also there were speakers of South East State Assemblies and wife of the late Biafran warlord, Ambassador Bianca Ojukwu, and of course, former Central Bank Governor, Prof. Chukwuma Soludo, who read out the Igbo position. Presenting a 10-point demand of Ndigbo, Soludo explained that the positions presented for adoption by the 100-man committee were distilled from accumulated years of work on the subject by successive regimes of Ohanaeze Ndigbo, submissions of the Igbo Leaders of Thought for the 2014 National Conference, 1994 constitutional conference and 2005 and 2014 national conferences.
It is heartwarming that the quest for a Nigerian President of Igbo and South East extraction is gaining traction across regional, ethnic, religious and political divides. The show of good faith by prominent politicians, elder statesmen, and ordinary Nigerians alike, rekindles the hope that a greater and more equitable Nigeria is feasible in our lifetime.
In January this year, elder statesman and political veteran, Alhaji Tanko Yakasai, said: “Nigeria had three major blocks. Two of these three, namely, the North and the West have had the opportunity of producing the President. Therefore, the Igbo have a good argument because out of the three siblings, two have already succeeded at producing the President, but the Igbo have not.
“I for one – I am in support of it. I did it before in the era of NPN (National Party of Nigeria), when we had the arrangement that the next president after late President Shehu Shagari would come from the East. We would have settled this problem long ago if not for the military intervention.”
Only last Tuesday, August 4, 2020, Yakasai was on the Arise TV where he also reiterated that it was the turn of Ndigbo. The elder
Okwesilieze Nwodo, a former chairman of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), says the elite in the south-east will join Nnamdi Kanu, leader of the Indigenous People of Biafra (IPOB), to demand for Biafra Republic if the region does not get the presidency in 2023.
Kanu has been in the forefront of the agitation for Biafra over the claim that the Igbo are being marginalised in Nigeria.
He said the Igbo have been persecuted for over 50 years, advising those who want a secure future for their children to elect an Igbo man as president.
“Yakassi’s call is very fair and that is the correct thing. “In the first republic, the country was led by Tafawa Balewa, in the second republic, it was led by Shehu Shagari and then, those of us in PDP made a very strong case to move the presidency to the south-east, because even the military people were all from the north, apart from Aguiyi Ironsi who presided over for a very short time,” he said.
“For 50 years now, we have been persecuted for having fought for freedom. When will this marginalisation stop? Anybody who loves Nigeria and who wishes Nigeria well should go for Igbo Presidency in 2023 for unity, fairness, equity and for Nigeria to move forward.
“It is only an Igbo man who will not marginalise any part of Nigeria because we constitute the semen that holds the country together. We are the only tribe that you find in every nook and cranny of Nigeria; doing business and developing wherever they are as if it was their own place.
“I don’t believe that the Igbo are not united, there has never been a time when any region produced a consensus candidate, everybody emerged through primary elections.
“There is no zone that has produced a candidate by consensus. It doesn’t matter how many people are interested, they will be subjected to party primaries and the person with the highest vote will win.
“I agree with Nnamdi Kanu in everything he says about the marginalisation of the Igbo. He, more than any other person has put it on the international map. If Nigeria tells the elites from the south-east that they would be treated as second class citizens in Nigeria, and that they can never be president, almost all of them will go with Kanu to fight for Biafra.
“Anybody who wants to be a second-class citizen can support whoever he wants. Any Igbo man who wants to bequeath a secured future for himself and generation yet unborn should support this call for Igbo presidency.
“In the spirit of fairness and equity, Nigeria should give the presidency to the south-east in 2023, otherwise, we will join him and fight for Biafra.”
SIR: The proponents and advocates for the creation of the new sovereign state of Biafra are either through ignorance or wilful negligence selling a Utopian aesthetic political ideology. The fanatical adherent of this new gospel of ‘liberation’ will roundly attack your personality, insult your tribe and question your education for daring to ask them to explain the difference in this new proposed country and present day Nigeria.
That was my experience in a grocery store last week in United Arab Emirates where a fellow described me as a fool who preferred to be a slave to a ‘HAWUSA’ man than be free to live my life under (not even within or inside) Biafra!
While the right to self-determination as enshrined in the UN charter is clear and revocable, subjecting a tribe, nation and ethnicity into your agenda so as to pull crowd is annexation, which is contrary to known public international law and against the same canons that the proponents routinely cite. The resolution of May 27, 1967 that gave Col. Ojukwu, governor of the then Eastern Region, was supposedly made up of delegation of stakeholders from the present day Cross River State. But the same cannot apply in the present day reality. For while the new breed Biafra apologists have consistently bemoaned the amalgamation of the northern and southern protectorate by Lord Lugard, the same set of critics of Lugard’s imposition see nothing wrong in redrawing the international boundaries of Nigeria, calling their new project Biafra – without first consulting the inhabitants of their new country.
Maybe a referendum was done and I wasn’t aware. I doubt if anything close to even an opinion poll was ever held.
I do not lack the ability to live free and live my life as enshrined in the constitution and other treaties, articles, charters or conventions that Nigeria is a signatory to; I just wouldn’t want to be a denizen in 21st century colony of disgruntled irredentist that spawn bigotry into national discuss.
This country has been looted dry by her haters irrespective of tribe and ethnicity. If Nigeria were a mother, she would’ve died of cancer. She has been sucked dry, exposed to scavengers, nationals and foreigners alike. I seriously don’t see what difference being a ‘Biafran’ will make. The last time we see our politicians is during elections, they abscond and come back only for re-election. How these and other governance issues and public policies can be resolved only through self-actualization is what I haven’t been exposed to by the new mongers of the Biafra confraternity.
I will work and pray for the restoration of Nigeria’s glory and hope to see Nigeria prosper rather than see her fall.
General Overseer of Mount Zion Faith Global Liberation Ministries, also known as By Fire By Fire Bishop Abraham Udeh has advised politicians from Southeast to drop the Igbo presidency agenda and pursue actualisation Biafra.
He said Biafra independence or Nigeria restructuring would favour the Igbo more than the presidency.
Udeh, who addressed reporters in Nnewi, argued that the solution was to divide Nigeria into three or make independent from the centre each of the six geopolitical zones.
He said: “An Igbo man might become president in 2023 but he would either be killed or overthrown by the military. I saw that situation in the spiritual realm and warned the Igbo personalities warming up for the 2023 presidential election to have a rethink and rather channel the energy and resources to …Biafra actualisation.
“The only solution is to divide Nigeria into three or each of the six geopolitical zones to be independent of the centre. It is a sealed deal that an Igbo man will never be allowed to rule Nigeria.
“According to how it was revealed to me, an Igbo man, after much pressure to rule, may be allowed to become president but shortly after, insecurity, including Boko Haram insurgency and banditry, will be intensified to discredit such president.
“The military by that reason will strike. I don’t see the Igbo man president surviving the military.”
The cleric, who maintained his prophesy must come to fulfilment, described the president of Igbo extraction as a deceit and scam.
On reports that proscribed Indigenous People of Biafra (IPOB) was quoted as supporting Igbo presidency, Udeh said “if IPOB has succumbed to Igbo presidency politics, it’s on its own and not representing the opinion of all its supporters.”
