BIAFRA NEWS : Terrorists celebrate during ISWAP attack on Kuje prison in Abuja [Video]

 Islamic State’s West Africa Province (ISWAP) has released footage of the hit on the Medium Security Custodial Centre, Kuje, Abuja.

Scores of terrorists invaded the prison at about 10 p.m. Tuesday night, operating for more than two hours.

The attackers stormed the government establishment with bombs, grenades and assault weapons.

In the footage, the insurgents could be heard rejoicing after breaching the facility; some vehicles are seen on fire.

The incursion of the penitentiary freed several terrorists and other hardened criminals convicted or in remand.

The Nigerian Correctional Service (NCoS) confirmed that said out of 879 inmates who escaped, 443 have been recaptured.

Public Relations Officer, Umar Abubakar said 551 inmates are currently in the facility with 4 inmates dead and 16 injured.

An officer of the NSCDC paid the ultimate price, while at least 8 NCoS officers were wounded.

Video of the Kuje prison attack below:

BIAFRA NEWS : Kwankwaso believes Igbos are political forerunners – NNPP on anti-Igbo comment

 

The National Chairman of the New Nigeria Peoples Party, NNPP, Prof. Rufa’i Ahmed Alkali, has said the party’s presidential candidate, Rabiu Kwankwaso, did not denigrate Igbos.

Alkali said Kwankwaso believes that the Southeast are forerunners in the country’s political sphere.

He was reacting to a recent comment by the former Kano State governor that the Southeast was good in business but at the bottom of Nigeria’s political ladder.

Kwankwaso had made the remark in Gombe State while noting why he can’t be the running mate of the Labour Party, LP, presidential candidate, Peter Obi.

However, Alkali said Kwankwaso’s remark was taken out of context.

In a statement he issued, Alkali said: “Kwankwaso, while inaugurating the Gombe executive, was quoted as having said Southeast (Igbo people) are good in business, but at the bottom of politics in Nigeria.

“NNPP wishes to categorically state that the statement was situated out of context, as the NNPP presidential candidate has always emphasised that Igbo were frontrunners in the fight for the nation’s struggle for independence, and had produced the first President of the country in the person of the late Nnamdi Azikiwe, the first President of the Senate, Dr. Nwafor Orizu, former Vice President, the late Dr. Alex Ekwueme, four former Presidents of the Senate from 1999 till date, and other top political office holders.”

There have been calls for Kwankwanso and Obi’s parties to merge ahead of the 2023 general elections.

Amid the claims, Kwankwaso was said to have proposed the position of his running mate to Obi.

But, Obi had dismissed such, stressing that he can’t be Kwankwaso’s running mate.

BIAFRA NEWS : 2023, Why I visited Wike – Peter Obi

 

Peter Obi, presidential candidate of the Labour Party (LP) has given reason he paid a visit to Governor Nyesom Wike of Rivers State.

Obi visited the former presidential aspirant of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) at his private residence in Port Harcourt on Wednesday.

While details of the meeting remains sketchy, the former Anambra State Governor, hours later, took to his official Twitter handle to give a hint on why he met Wike.

He disclosed that he met with Wike to discuss vital national issues.

His tweet read: “Earlier, I visited Port Harcourt, to confer with H.E. @GovWike on vital issues of national interest.”

Obi’s visit came amid speculations making the rounds that Wike, former presidential hopeful on the platform of the main opposition Peoples Democratic Party, PDP, may in a showdown, defect to the Labour Party.

BIAFRA NEWS : Peter Obi not our member, stop linking him to us – IPOB warns Kwankwaso

 

The Indigenous People of Biafra, IPOB, on Tuesday, cautioned the presidential candidate of the New Nigeria Peoples Party, NNPP, Rabiu Kwankwaso, against linking its struggle with the presidential ambition of the Labour Party’s Peter Obi.

IPOB said Obi is not one of its members and has never supported the agitation for self-determination; hence Kwankwaso should desist from such connections.

Emma Powerful, the spokesman of IPOB, said the group is not interested in the process of Nigerian elections.

A statement by Powerful reads: “The global family of the Indigenous People of Biafra (IPOB), under the command and leadership of our great leader, Mazi Nnamdi Kanu, wish to advise the former Governor of Kano State, Rabiu Kwankwaso not to involve IPOB in the selection process they call an election in Nigeria.

“The Nigerian politicians generally and Kwankwaso, in particular, should desist from linking IPOB with Peter Obi’s political ambition and campaign. Peter Obi is not an IPOB member, and never supported our agitation for freedom at any time because he pursues a totally different goal from that of the Indigenous People of Biafra (IPOB). We have no interest in the Nigerian morally decadent and fantastically corrupt political system and landscape.

“If Kwankwaso is threatened by the Labour party & Peter Obi’s teeming support by the creative and talented but downtrodden, neglected, deceived, deprived, killed (Endsars) Nigerian youths from even the North which your generation does not have any good intentions for, then he should go forward and settle his differences and stop linking IPOB to their problem.

“IPOB is not interested in the worthless politics you play in Nigeria, we don’t regard such daylight robbery, fraud, manipulation and selection as election. Maybe there is something Kwankwaso is not telling the world. Instead of saying the truth that because he is Fulani with the (born to rule mentality), he cannot play second fiddle to a Southern Christian presidential candidate, he has the temerity to associate our hallowed liberation movement with the shameless murky waters of the Zoo politics.

“IPOB is not concerned with the waves of this election; we have never asked for nor said anything contrary to our goal and demand. What we need is a referendum, and a referendum we must have. There are no middle ways for us as a people as far as our liberty and freedom is concerned. There is, therefore, nothing anybody can do to change our resolve towards our stated goal, which is the restoration of Biafra.

“If there is a region to avoid due to criminality with Terrorism, it is Northern Nigeria which sponsors several terrorist groups as joint venture partners and recycles them in the military and ministries, you should feel non – Northerners’ pulses when they helplessly tag along with you guys to ascertain the sensitivity of their irritations and pounding of hearts in silent prayers for safety.”

Powerful reiterated IPOB’s agitation for a referendum in the Southeast as stipulated by the United Nations, UN.

“Peter Obi is not a member of IPOB and he is neither agitating or in support of our Self Determination struggle. Why associate him with IPOB’s struggle for freedom. IPOB does not know who Peter Obi is going by our biodata bank. Our demand is our inalienable rights to self-determination and this we seek through a universally recognised and accepted political process called *REFERENDUM* as stipulated by the United Nations Charter.

“IPOB wish to use this medium and opportunity to warn every politician in Nigeria to desist from linking IPOB with their politics and selection process because we are not politicians and have no common interest. We are freedom fighters,” he added.

BIAFRA NEWS : IPOB, What I will do about agitation if elected President – Peter Obi

 

The Labour Party presidential candidate, Mr Peter Obi has revealed that if elected as president of the country in 2023, he would engage in dialogue with those agitating for secession.

Speaking on Arise TV morning show on Wednesday, Obi said he had observed how issues of agitations were handled in other countries.

According to him, the agitation was birthed by poor leadership in the country which, according to him, had been the issue with Nigeria over the years.

Clearing the air on his reported support for the Indigenous People of Biafra, IPOB, the former Anambra State governor said he had never been involved in any agitation.

He said, “I have never been in any agitation. I had said that the agitation is because of leadership failure over the years. I will engage them in dialogue if elected into power”.

BIAFRA NEWS : Kuje prison, Anxiety, outrage over terrorists’ attack, escape of hardened criminals

 

The breach of the Medium Security Custodial Centre, Kuje, has elicited palpable fear and condemnation.

It happened hours after President Muhammadu Buhari’s advance team of security and protocol officers was ambushed en route to Katsina.

The audacious attack in Kuje started at about 10 p.m. Tuesday night and lasted nearly three hours.

A Twitter user @AlBayozBabs wrote about the magnitude of the incursion of the penitentiary.

“I worked in Kuje prison for more than 6 years and mostly on night shifts where danger is on the high risks.

“I have witnessed so many attacks but you see this one, these boys came prepared for us. Imagine an attack for more than 2 hours”, he tweeted.

Scores of terrorists stormed the location with motorcycles and detonated improvised explosive devices (IEDs) and grenades.

The delay in reinforcement allowed them to have a field day as a barrage of bullets was fired throughout the assault.

Some Nigerians living around the area took to social media to give live updates of the incident.

The Nigerian Correctional Service (NCoS) noted that the assailants were repelled by armed officers.

But an unspecified number of hardened criminals, including terrorists, are now on the loose.

The situation has caused panic in and around the Federal Capital Territory (FCT) with residents apprehensive about the safety.

Meanwhile, there is a heavy presence of the police and military around Kuje as security agencies begin to search for the escapees.

The attack on the prison occurred nearly one year after terrorists hit the Nigerian Defence Academy (NDA).

Nigerians are knocking the Federal Government in their reactions to the latest terror act, warning that the country is sitting on a time bomb.

Despite the arrest and elimination of terrorists, several surviving members of different sects continue to kidnap and kill citizens week in, week out.

The United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) estimates that more than three million Nigerians are displaced in the North-East alone.

BIAFRA NEWS : 2023, We’ve lost faith in Nigeria’s electoral system – Igbo group

 

A socio-political organisation in the southeast has said it has lost faith in Nigeria’s electoral system ahead of the 2023 general election.

The Alaigbo Development Foundation, ADF, noted that it didn’t hide its reservations about the current electoral process in the country, which would signal the election of the nation’s leaders come 2023.

The President-General of the group, Prof Uzodinma Nwala, made this known in a statement signed and issued to journalists during a reception organized in honour of the former presidential aspirant, Sam Ohuabunwa, who contested for President on the platform of the Peoples Democratic Party, PDP.

Prof. Nwala described as brutal, undemocratic, and highly monetised the recent primary election of PDP that was held in May 2022.

He said: “This is a special moment for us, members of the Alaigbo Development Foundation, as we welcome one of our most remarkable leaders, Mazi Sam Ohuabunwa, who has just returned to us after a brutal encounter with the undemocratic mode of selection of candidates for the presidency of the Federation of Nigeria.

“Right from the beginning of the current electoral process, even before and in fact till tomorrow, the ADF never hid her lack of faith in the highly monetised and corrupt electoral system in Nigeria.

“What Ohuabnunwa has undergone is a brutal experience with the Nigerian electoral system, which ADF has consistently referred to as the game only vampires can play.

“ADF is of the view that Ohuabunwa lost in the undemocratic delegates mode of selection in the Nigerian electoral system and that the masses of Nigeria had no hand in what happened at the National Stadium on May 28 and 29, 2022.”

Speaking at the reception, Ohuabunwa, said the occasion rekindled his burning desire to replicate the Igbo entrepreneurial attitude in the Nigerian system, saying he wasn’t oblivious that Nigerians watched keenly as events unfolded before, during, and after the presidential elections.

While thanking the ADF for the honour accorded to him, he observed that the Igbos were currently misconstrued, mischaracterized, and misunderstood in the country, adding the people of the South-East region were broad-minded, accommodating, and fair play seekers.

He said, “You know when you go into this race sometimes, it’s a fairly lonely battle and you know, everybody is watching you as if you are a movie.

“As I often say, the Igbo man in Nigeria is not well-represented. He’s largely mis-characterized, misunderstood, and mis-profiled. And one of my desire is if I have an opportunity, I will show the difference. I tried to show the best of what a Nigerian of Igbo extraction can be.

“We seek justice, equity and fairly. We are a people who move on in life inspite of challenges and we are also interested in others moving on , too. We are not lazy; we are not laid-back; we are not fraudulent and we are not mischievous and we are not mercantilist. But we have a sense of justice and equity; we don’t like to beg.”