Nnamdi Kanu: It’s time to renegotiate Nigeria’s unity; Igbo leaders back Enugu monarch, re-echo call for IPOB leader’s release

Nnamdi Kanu: It’s time to renegotiate Nigeria’s unity

• Igbo leaders back Enugu monarch, re-echo call for IPOB leader’s release

By John Okezie

The call on President Bola Tinubu to release Nnamdi Kanu, leader of the Indigenous People of Biafra (IPOB) by the chairman of the Enugu State Traditional Rulers’ Council, Igwe Lawrence Agubuzu, has received the backing of Igbo leaders.

Igwe Agubuzo, while addressing participants at the National Traditional and Religious Leaders Summit on Health in Abuja attended by President Tinubu, appealed to the president to release Kanu.

He had expressed regrets that while His Imperial Majesty, the Ooni of Ife, was arranging to confer a very high honour on Sunday Igboho, the IPOB leader was languishing in Sokoto.

“My brother, fellow royal father, Imperial Majesty, does not seem to understand the pain in my heart when Nnamdi Kanu is in Sokoto (prison). So sir (President Tinubu), the ball stops on your court.

“Bring this man out. If we don’t want him in Nigeria, return him to Kenya or London where they took him from”, Igwe Agubuzo had appealed to President Tinubu at the Abuja event.

Reacting to the development, former National Vice-President of Ohanaeze Ndigbo worldwide, Chief Damian Okeke-Ogene, commended the royal father for speaking truth to power at the right place and time.

“Igwe Agubuzu’s message was direct to Nigerians, not only the president. The Hausas and the Yorubas knew that it was an injustice. And he said it at the right place he was supposed to say it”, Okeke-Ogene stated.

In their separate remarks, former Deputy Chief Whip of the Anambra State House of Assembly, Nze Tony-Uche Ezekwelu, and the Chairman of Campaign for Democracy (CD) South East zone, Dede Uzor A. Uzor, supported Igwe Agubuzu, and also demanded for Kanu’s immediate and unconditional release.

Ezekwelu said: “His Royal Highness Igwe Agubuzo spoke not only my mind but the mind of the majority of Biafrians, Igbo, and Nigerians. What he said was what many of us have been clamouring for over the years.

“In fact, it has become very obvious that there are other reasons why they are holding down Nnamdi Kanu; politically, business or personal reasons. But to me, Nnamdi has not done what no other person has done in Nigeria.

“So many others had done worse things. The leadership of Boko Haram has done horribly worse than Nnamdi Kanu ever dreamed of trying to do. The bandits, some of the northern elites have done worse than Kanu would ever have done.

“Sunday Igboho of the Yoruba ethnic independent movement. There are so many others, including Niger Delta militants have done worse violently. So many of them have carried arms against the Nigerian state and tried to divide Nigeria.

“Terrorists and herdsmen in the north have done far worse than IPOB had ever done or imagined to do. IPOB has remained a non-violent organisation. Maybe it’s because the majority of the people in it are Igbo people.

“So, what Igwe Agubuzu has said was exactly what the majority of the Igbo, majority of Biafrans and majority of Nigerians have been clamouring for and we give him kudos.”

The former lawmaker appealed to President Tinubu to listen to “the voice of reason” and release Nnamdi Kanu “unconditionally”. He also asked the president to invite all secessionist groups in the country to a round table discussion for the sake of peace.

“It is not only IPOB that is seeking to secede from Nigeria. There is also Hausa nationalistic movement currently. There is also the Middle Belt Movement and others.

“He should discuss with IPOB and other separatist groups in different parts of the country; bring them to the table so that we renegotiate Nigeria. If we don’t renegotiate Nigeria, nobody may be able to determine the direction the country may go.”

Ezekwelu, while commending Igwe Agubuzu for being courageous and firm in speaking out against injustice in the country; asked other traditional rulers to speak up for the sake of justice.

“Other traditional rulers: Ooni of Ife, Sultan of Sokoto, Obi of Onitsha, Attah of Igala, Tor Tiv, and other traditional rulers should speak out like Igwe Agubuzu has done.

“That is the way out for Nigeria, so that we have a country that can be accommodating; a country that may be a hybrid country like we have in Great Britain, United Arab Emirates or in Malaysia.

“That is the nature of things we need in Nigeria. Anything short of that, this country may go into confederation any moment and nobody may be able to control it”, he stated.

Uzor, on his part, said that it was unfair for the federal government to pardon Sunday Igboho who wanted his people out of Nigeria while still keeping Kanu in prison.

“Sunday Igboho was equally a freedom fighter just as Nnamdi Kanu. The federal government pardoned him. The government even intervened when he was arrested in Cotonou. The instruments of the state were used to release him”, he said.

The CD chairman suggested that a political solution should be applied so that Kanu could be freed, arguing that releasing the IPOB leader would help calm agitations in the South East region.

Uzor lamented the marginalisation of Igbo people, particularly the ones in the South East, saying that the federal government has been sending a message through its actions that it didn’t want the Igbo anymore.

“When you are part of a state or an entity, there must be government’s presence in your area. What is actually the government’s presence here? Is it scholarships?

“During the time of Buhari, he mapped out billions of naira for rail construction. Where is that rail in the South East? When you come up with the policy of exclusion; exclusion indirectly means you don’t want them.

“Referendum is a constitutional thing. If you say today that you don’t want to marry your wife again; probably, the reason may be personal, your wife will go. And if your wife thinks otherwise, that she’s no longer interested in the union, the best option for both of you is to separate.

“South Easterners have been agitating for separation. They say: I want my own. I want to live on my own. The central government is not favouring us; they are victimising us. We want to go.

“The right thing is to make a provision for them to go. They have enough capacity to live on their own. Niger republic here is not up to 5,000,000. But each state in the South East has more than 7,000,000.

“The South East has continued to be marginalised. It is the least among the other regions in the federation. Other regions have between six and seven states, South East has just five. Why must our own be five?

“So, they should allow us to be. It is not by force. Marriage is not by force. You cannot bring people to force them together. So, the Igbo have the right to determine their future if they are not wanted”, Uzor stated.