Says Appointment Of Igbo Son As Minister For Works 53 Years After The Civil War Won’t Pacify Agitation, Group Insists
The leadership of MASSOB has sharply disagreed with Ohaneze Ndigbo for positing that the former Nigerian President, Chief Olusegun Obasanjo allegedly appointed some Igbo sons into some sensitive positions during his tenure as President.
While it has lauded the efforts of the Apex Igbo Socio-Cultural group towards ensuring the freedom of the detained IPOB leader, Mazi Nnamdi Kanu, MASSOB however disagreed with the Igbo group in principles, stressing that the current agitation for Biafra was started during Obasanjo’s regime.
It equally appreciated the efforts of the MASSOB leader, Chief Ralph Uwazuruike and some political leaders in the Southeast for working tirelessly to ensuring the release of the detained IPOB leader, Mazi Nnamdi Kanu, but urged them to do more to effect his immediate release .
In a statement, on Tuesday, BIM, MASSOB recalled that for about 30 years after the civil war, the Igbo Nation had suffered internal colonialism, exploitation, apartheid , indignity, exclusion and marginalization in silence, hoping and praying to God that a Moses would emerge one day to tell Nigerian pharaohs ” let my people go”.
It also observed that several years after the Biafran – Nigerian civil war, the Igbo man was subjected to a similar situation that brought out the non -violent genius of Mahatma Gandhi, hence the formation of MASSOB by Chief Ralph Uwazuruike.
A good historian knows that in an oppressed society like the precarious situation Ndigbo still find herself in Nigeria, that such a Moses of our time like Uwazuruike would always emerge.
For the purpose of keeping the record straight, the BIM, MASSOB leadership added that, ‘from 1970 till September 13,1999, the Igbo had suffered the exploitation which led the American leaders to challenge the then ‘Almighty ‘ British colonial power in the battle field”.
The statement said when Gen. Olusegun Obasanjo (Rted) became President, he acted out the familiar script of his predecessors when he took what belonged to the Igbos and used it to pacify the Hausa- Fulani in gratitude for conceding power to him as it had been the practise of the Hausa-Fulani who used what belonged to Igbos since January 12, 1970 and compensated the Yorubas for winning the war for them.
Mazi Chris Mocha who signed the statement as Director of Information/Senior Special Assistant to BIM and MASSOB lamented that even after Ndigbo gave Obasanjo the highest number of votes in the 1999 Presidential election to win his rival as against his kinsmen from the Southwest, no Igbo son or daughter was considered fit for appointment among his service chiefs.
BIM-MASSOB alleged that as part of the unwritten policy of Victor and Vanguished instituted against the Igbos after the war, the former President and his predecessors had always reserved the best parts of appointments for themselves including the Petroleum ministry and took those that should come to the Igbos to pacify the Yorubas of the South west.
While BIM- MASSOB lauded President Bola Ahmed Tinubu when he appointed an Igbo illustrious son, Senator.(Engr.) Dave Umahi as the Minister for works 53 years after the war, the appointment it said will not pacify its genuine demand for the creation of a State of Biafra through a non- violent process.
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Like the Versailles victors, every 15th January was marked off in the Nigeria calendar as a day Nigerian soldiers celebrated their military prowess in killing millions of their supposedly Igbo countrymen, women and children in a war that was tagged civil.
It has noted that the Igbos have continued to suffer the apartheid humiliation like South Africa that sent
Dr. Nelson Mandela to jail for 27 years.
