Movement for the Actualisation of Sovereign State of Biafra (MASSOB) has warned governors and traditional rulers from South East not to give any part of Biafraland to Fulani herdsmen for the purposes of cattle colony.
Speaking yesterday in a telephone chat,
MASSOB Director of Information, Sunny Okereafor, said the warning had
become imperative because of information at the organisation’s disposal
that some state governors and traditional rulers from the South East
were negotiating with the Northern oligarchy to give out some portions
of land in Biafra to Fulani herdsmen to serve as cattle colonies.
“Anybody doing this dangerous negotiation
should be aware of the consequences of giving out Biafraland to Fulani
herdsmen, which we see as abomination, and which not only them will pay
for, but, also, their children’s children,” Okereafor warned.
The MASSOB director of information said
it is a known fact the North has large expanse of land, far more than
the South East, adding that it would be callousness for anybody to
contemplate to cede any portion of the little land, that is not even
enough for the Igbo to do their farming, to Fulani herdsmen.
“If the federal government wants to
create cattle colony, let it be in the North that has large expanse of
land and when we need their cattle, we will go over to buy them; but to
cede any part of our land to Fulani herdsmen, we say no!”
Meanwhile, the Catholic Bishop of Awka
Diocese, His Lordship, Most Rev. Paulinus Ezeokafor, has described the
proposed setting up of grazing reserves and colonies for herdsmen as a
time bomb waiting to explode. He emphasised that ranching remained the
only solution to the Fulani herdsmen and farmers clash.
Bishop Ezeokafor, who stated this
yesterday in Awka during the 2018 Armed Forces Remembrance Day Mass at
St. Patrick’s Catholic Cathedral, said killings in Benue State needed
Operation Python Dance and Crocodile Smile put together, adding that
deploying the officers and men of the Nigeria Police to the troubled
state may not yield the desired result.
He challenged the Nigeria security agents
to apply similar measures used in unmasking those behind the killings
of over 20 worshippers on New Year’s Eve in Omoku, Rivers State, in
fishing out those behind the Benue massacre.
Bishop Ezeokafor wondered why the Federal
Government should even deploy police to tackle such heinous act which
he said left so many people dead. He said he expected them to apply the
same measure used in tackling South East and South South, even as he
accused them of treating Benue’s issue with kid gloves.
The Catholic Prelate called for urgent
renegotiation of Nigeria, noting that going by the current situation of
things in the country, Nigeria deserved to be renegotiated even as he
said the states should be allowed to take charge of her Mineral
Resources to enable them to develop at their own pace.
The MOASSOB director of information said
in as much as MOSSOB believe in the non violence approach to actualize
Biafra, it nevertheless said the group would employ every available
civilized means to ensure no portion of Biafra land was given out to the
Fulani herdsmen.
On the massacre in some parts of Benue
and Taraba States by the herdsmen, Okereafor said it was pay back time
for the people who he accused of conniving with the Hausa/Fulani to kill
the Igbo in their numbers during the civil war, saying MASSOB has no
sympathy for them.
“This is just pay back time for them and
this is just the begging. All those who took part in the unjust killing
of the Igbo from 1967 to 1970 will have no peace until they apologise
for their misdeed”, Okereafor stated.