Pro- Biafra protesters

Leader of the Movement for the Actualization of the Sovereign States of Biafra, MASSOB, Solomon Chukwu, may have stirred a new controversy  by appropriating the people of Nigeria’s South South region as part of  his group’s dream of a new Biafra Republic.

Several opinion leaders in the South South region have repudiated the campaign and have categorically said they were not part of it.

But Chukwu in a statement said that the people of the Niger Delta area, being part of  the former Eastern region are part of Biafra, and remains committed to actualize an independent state of their own.

Chukwu who spoke through MASSOB’s National Director of Information, Sunny Okereafor, dismissed reports that the people of South South states like Akwa Ibom, Rivers, Bayelsa and Cross River, are not Biafrans, adding that the former Eastern region has refused to be deceived by what he described as federal government’s divide and rule policy, Vanguard Online reported.

The new MASSOB leader added that the people of Biafra cannot find peace in Nigeria until the actualization of an independent state where there will be limitless freedom to develop their land.

” Anybody who says that Akwa Ibom, Rivers, Bayelsa and Cross River states are not part of Biafra is deceiving himself. These are Biafran territories. Biafra encompasses all the states of the former Eastern region, including Anioma clan in Delta state. It has been part of the Federal government’s divide and rule policy to tell the World that only Ndigbo want Biafra; but this is false. Do you remember Ojukwu’s second in command, Philip Effiong? Was he not from Akwa Ibom? When he was here, can anybody doubt his commitment to the actualization of Biafra?

“If you see the kind of support from the local people of Ugep, Ikom, Ogoja and adjoining areas when we held our meeting there last week at Ugep, you will be shocked. Over 2,000 people registered as MASSOB members at that meeting. In fact, from what we saw at the meeting, the people of Ogoja, Ugep and Ikom are more Biafra than even Ndigbo.”

Chukwu, who commended MASSOB’s Regional Administration for Ogoja, Rex Egberebi, for the massive mobilization of members in Ogoja, urged them to insist on the group’s non violent approach to the struggle, stressing that Biafra would soon be achieved.

In November, a spokesman  for Urhobo Progress Union in Delta State,  Alhaji Mumakai-Unagha, warned that Urhobo and its territories should be counted out from any Biafran plan.

“IPOB(Indigenous Peoples Of Biafra) have their rights of agitation for freedom of self determination as enshrined in the united nation declaration stressing that other ethnic groups should not be dragged along to avoid the mistake that led to the civil war.

“The magnanimity of Urhobos in allowing Igbos celebrate the Igbo Cultural Day should not be taken for granted as we urge IPOB to delist Urhobo from its proposed map.”