The Nation Newspaper

Tag: Indigenous People of Biafra

  • IPOB and the future of southeast

    IPOB and the future of southeast

    • By Sunday Olagunju

    Sir: Four years since the Indigenous People of Biafra, IPOB, declared an illegal sit-at-home order in retaliation to the arrest and prosecution of their leader, Nnamdi Kanu, the now outlawed organization has held the entire east and their socio-economic and political well-being at the jugular.

    Like a child play, the sit-at-home order has ballooned into a fixtual phenomenon, creating embarrassment and diversionary to people’s socio-economic wellness, including education, where schools and universities presently stand the severe threat of calendar derailment. The Nigerian Civil war ended over 50 years ago, but the monumental ripple effects of colossal damages to lives, properties, economies and human psyches, still litter the entire gamut of south-eastern states of Abia, Anambra, Ebonyi, Enugu and Imo.

    Even if members of IPOB were either too young or not actually born during the war, today, they could see the extent of runs and degradations to which the once viable and prosperous patrimonies of their forebears have become, owing to the avoidable war. More than 50 years since the end of the civil war, lots of older Nigerians, not to talk easterners, seem to be scared of anything likely to remind them of the war or any war whatsoever.

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    Now,  the four years of IPOB Monday sit-at-home is already crippling and making mockery of whatever gains the people have made in their strive to recoop years of loses and dehumanization caused by three years of an unfortunate civil war.

    Now, unable to bear it anymore, university students who initially pretended not to see anything wrong in the IPOB sit-at-home order are now crying about the woes the order is inflicting on their studies with the possibility of derailing and truncating their future educational trajectory and development.

    IPOB is an outlawed freedom fighters but their hold on the whole southeast in the past four years has become a great burden. It behoves the governors of the five states of southeast to unite with a view to finding a lasting solutions to the IPOB menace and excesses now fast becoming the nemesis of a whole race to guarantee their people peace and tranquillity, being their inalienable rights as a citizen of Nigeria.

    The former Biafran war lord, late Odemegwu Ojukwu, the Ikemba of Nkewi, not only regretted the Nigerian civil war, but also admitted that the Igbos, his own people, do not need a second war. IPOB order is like a war that is self-inflicted and now ravaging and erupting like an active volcano. Nnamdi Kanu would invariably be released, but will the east be able to regain and recall their untold loses these past four years?

    A stitch in time saves nine.  

    •Sunday Olagunju,

    Ibadan, Oyo State.

  • Kanu’s broadcasts led to killing of Jonathan’s ex-aide, retired judge, others – Witness tells court

    Kanu’s broadcasts led to killing of Jonathan’s ex-aide, retired judge, others – Witness tells court

    A Federal High Court in Abuja heard on Thursday that the broadcasts made by the leader of the proscribed Indigenous People of Biafra (IPOB), Nnamdi Kanu, led to the killing of a former Senior Special Adviser (SSA) to ex-President Goodluck Jonathan, Ahmed Gulak, and others.

    An official of the Department of State Services (DSS) said this as he resumed his testimony as the second prosecution witness in the ongoing terrorism trial of Kanu.

    The witness, who said he was part of the DSS’ team that investigated the complaint made against Kanu by the then Attorney General of the Federation (AGF), Abubakar Malami, said the defendant’s broadcast also led to the killing of a retired judge, Justice Stanley Nnaji and an intending military couple, Sergeant Audu Lucas, Private Glory Matthew.

    The witness said Kanu, in one of his broadcasts, ordered his followers to enforce a sit-in at home in all South-Eastern states, and as a result, many people who went out of their houses on that day were killed.

    He said investigation revealed that Sergeant Lucas and Private Matthew were not only killed by those who were enforcing Kanu’s sit-at-home order, but they were also beheaded.

    The witness said investigation also revealed that before killing Gulak, those enforcing the sit at home directive by Kanu, blamed him (Gulak) for coming out on a day their leader asked people not to go out of their homes.

    He added that, from their investigation, they found that Kanu founded IPOB and ESN, which is the armed wing of IPOB, and that he was the leader of both groups.

    “We were also able to establish that he (Kanu) founded Radio Biafra through which he made inciting comments like the killing of police officers and burning of property,” the witness said.

    He added that they also found that Radio Biafra was not registered in Nigeria and that, owing to Kanu’s broadcast, police stations in Cele and Ilasa (both in Lagos) were burnt by his followers.

    The witness said investigation also revealed that about 100 luxury buses, belonging to the Lagos State Government and part of the Murtala Mohammed International Airport in Lagos State, were burnt as allegedly directed by Kanu in one of his broadcasts.

    The witness added: “He (Kanu) not only called for the killing of security officers, he called for them to be beheaded, which they (his followers) did.”

    He said their investigation revealed that Kanu’s agitation for Biafra was to secede the states of southeast and part of Benue and Kogi states from Nigeria, adding that the defendant “called for the establishment of the state of Biafra by any means possible, including war.”

    Earlier, the video recording of the session where investigators, including the witness, interrogated Kanu and obtained a written statement from him, was played in court.

    The witness identified Kanu in the video as well as two of his lawyers who were with him during the session, including Alloy Ejimakor.

    During interrogation session, which, took place under a convivial atmosphere, as Kanu, his lawyers and the DSS official were seen throwing banters and laughing intermittently, Kanu confirmed being the founder and leader of IPOB and ESN.

    At a point during the interaction session, Kanu sought and was granted permission to ease himself. He went into the restroom, returned a moment later, and the interview session continued.

    Kanu said he was not directly involved in the day-to-day running of both organisations (IPOB and ESN), which he said were managed by their states’ coordinators.

    The defendant also said, in the video, that he made broadcast in respect of the EndSARS protest and other broadcasts on Radio Biafra.

    He said the protest in Lagos during the EndSARS protest was outside the Biafran territory and that the destruction witnessed during the protest could not have been due to his broadcast.

    Kanu said he does not have authority over his members, adding that if he had authority over them he would not have subscribed to referendum, he would have just pronounced Biafra into existence.

    In the video, Kanu denied that IPOB is responsible for the violent attacks in some parts of the south east and the killings witnessed, adding that “IPOB is a peaceful movement. The IPOB is a non-violent movement.”

    Kanu, who said he facilitated the establishment of ESN, explained that the organisation was necessitated by the killings of the people of the South East.

    Read Also: DSS reveals how Nnamdi Kanu was arrested as prosecution opens case, calls first witness 

    He added, “If you look at what was happening in our land, that was what gave rise to ESN. If our people cannot go to the farm, and people are killed on their land, do you sit down and do nothing?

    “People can no longer go to the farm; people can no longer carry out their economic activities.”

    Kanu faulted the invasion of his house by armed soldiers, which he said accounted for why he left the country for fear of being killed.

    He argued that the invasion was unnecessary and also faulted the manner he was arrested in Kenya and brought back to Nigeria.

    At the conclusion of the witness’ examination in chief, lawyer to the defendant, Paul Erokoro (SAN), sought an adjournment for the defence to cross-examine him.

    Following agreement by lawyers to parties, Justice James Omotosho adjourned till May 14, 21, and 22 for further hearing.

  • Sit-at- home: IPOB berates Ohaneze, S/East governors

    Indigenous People of Biafra (IPOB) has berated the president of Ohaneze Ndigbo, Chief Nnia Nwodo, three out of the five South east governors over what it said was their historical ignorance of canvassing that 12 hours of  buying and selling is more important than honouring the brave Biafra men and women that fought they may live.

    IPOB accused the Ohaneze president and the South East governors who it described as the “caliphate slaves” within of canvassing against her declaration of May 30, as sit-at-home for the remembrance of 3.5m Biafrans killed during the Nigerian civil war and at other times.

    It named the governors to be David Umahi of Ebonyi, Willie Obiano of Anambra and Okezie Ikpeazu of Abia.

    In a release signed by comrade Emma Powerful, media and publicity secretary of IPOB, the group said, “It has been brought to our attention that the usual suspects are it once again in their bid to undermine the collective will of all patriotic and genuine children of Biafra to honour those that died for us and 3.5 million victims of the second largest holocaust in modern history.

    “Rather than anger, we feel pity for these collection of desperados who through their hatred for freedom and historical ignorance are canvassing that 12 hours of  buying and selling is more important than honouring the brave men and women that fought they may live. It is the height of ingratitude, treachery and exhibition of crass ignorance that those who claim to be educated in this day and age do not understand the significance nor appreciate the symbolism of honouring those unjustly killed”.

    IPOB said it was disheartening that Nwodo and the governors led by Chief Dave Umahi would come out yet again to lead the effort to discredit this year’s planned honouring of the spirit of 3.5 million Biafrans, while they bore witnesses to the recent visit of vice president Yemi Osinbajo to Rwanda to remember the 150,000 victims of genocide.

     “Why didn’t Nnia Nwodo’s treacherous Ohaneze and the Fulani herdsmen loving Dave Umahi issue a statement condemning Yemi Osinbajo for attending the memorial in Rwanda? What Nnia Nwodo and Dave Umahi are saying in essence is that 150,000 Rwandan genocide victims are more important than 3.5 million of their own Biafran people slaughtered in similar circumstances from 1967 to 1970?

    The group went further to say that any leader worth his salt would canvass for Nigeria to understand the need to declare May 30, a national public holiday, adding that “not these traitors, all they care about is their little competition to see who among them will win their coveted Best Fulani Slave in the South East and South-South Award 2019”.

    IPOB reminded Ohaneze and the governors that Israel only a few days ago observed the annual Jewish holocaust memorial which it said had been running 70 years.

     “In November 11, 2018, world leaders attended the Armistice Day commemoration in Paris to remember those that fell in the First World War. This remembrance has been running for over 100 years. Britain that created Nigeria observe the same annual 11th minute of the 11th hour of the 11th month at the Cenotaph in London every year without fail.

     “Only those with a history of colluding with the enemy like Ohaneze and Igbo governors can come out against honouring the memory of their own people.

     “We know we live in an era of betrayal when mouthing nonsense against IPOB is considered a lucrative business because it attracts the attention of Aso Rock which often leads to financial reward. All inconsequential mushroom groups in the name of Biafra or Igbo hoping to attract favours from Aso Rock by issuing anti-May 30th sit at home statements will have themselves to blame in the future.

     “These Nigeria by day and Biafra at night mushroom groups without presence or followership in Biafra land have failed in the past and will fail again because as usual, there will be total compliance with the sit-at-home order come May 30th because IPOB is the people and the people is IPOB”.

    The group said such unscrupulous individuals, groups and politicians particularly some Igbo governors and Ohaneze Ndigbo can rant all they like on the pages of newspapers, but that IPOB must remember their fallen heroes and heroines who paid the ultimate price for the present generation to be alive today.

  • Ignore IPOB’s social media propaganda, Army urges public

    The Nigerian Army has condemned circulation of pictures and videos of gory images on social media, saying it is misinformation and propaganda by the proscribed Indigenous People of Biafra (IPOB).

    Acting Director, Army Public Relations, Col. Sagir Musa, stated this in a statement in Enugu on Thursday.

    Musa said that the illegal group was using the images for falsehood and hate speech to portray the Army and other security agencies in bad light.

    He said that the stunts were specially targeted at the South-East and intended to truncate the successes of Exercise Egwu Eke III also known as Python Dance 3.

    According to him, the posting and circulation of the disgusting videos and pictures is a wicked plot and deliberate campaign targeted at smearing the reputation of the military and other security agencies.

    The army spokesman said that the intention of the peddlers of those images was to insinuate that the bodies were victims of security clampdown in parts of the country, especially in the South-East.

    He said, “the Nigerian Army has observed with dismay that various social media platforms, of recent, have been inundated with gory images and horrific videos.

    “The videos are of few recycled corpses dumped at roadsides and refuse sites in Obingwa-Asa-Aba axis of Abia and other targeted areas in the South-East.

    “Members of the proscribed IPOB have been alleged to be behind the violence-inciting posts, apparently to create panic and tension among the public in their ill-motive towards free, fair and credible general elections.

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    “Some of the images and videos analyzed by the intelligence services show that most of the corpses were suspected to be victims of road accidents, jungle justice or ritual killers.

    “None of the images or videos could be attributed to any military operation as there were no footages to indicate so.

    “While the Nigerian Army will ensure that the peddlers of such fake news and hate speech that could create insecurity in the country are nabbed for prosecutions, the public is urged to ignore such wicked and sickening propaganda.’’

    Musa called on health and emergency agencies at the state and local government levels to be proactive in ensuring adequate evacuation of corpses of victims of road accidents, ritual killings and jungle justice in communities.

    “It is also of security concern that the dumping of abandoned corpses of loved ones in unorthodox mortuaries is becoming rampant.

  • IPOB: 33 detained traders released in Nnewi

    Nnewi, the industrial city of Anambra State, was agog following the release of 33 traders who were arrested and detained on the presumption that they were members of the Indigenous People of Biafra (IPOB). The arrest took place during the recent clash by the group and the police in the town.

    The traders, arrested from different markets in the area and subsequently detained after being paraded by the police, were reportedly released last Saturday after spending eight days in police custody.

    No fewer than 5,000 traders from the major markets in the area converged on the Agboedo motor spare parts Nkwo Nnewi market, where they offered praises to God in appreciation for the release of their members.

    Speaking to The Nation shortly after the event, Chairman of Agboedo Motor Spare Parts Dealers Association (AMSPDA), Chief Gabriel Chibueze, said the gathering was essentially to appreciate God for the unconditional release of their members.

    He said the traders were arrested from the eight major markets in the industrial city, expressing worry over the eight days they spent in police custody, regardless of their innocence.

    He said the detained members could have spent longer time with the police if not for the relentless efforts of members of his executive and other relevant stakeholders.

    He said, “Ever since their detention, the entire executive have not rested and were fighting for their release. We wrote letters to all authorities concerned, including the IGP, the commissioner for Trade and Commerce, our representatives in Abuja, among others.

    “We also had to shut the entire markets in the town for three consecutive days in solidarity with our detained members.”

    Chibueze refuted reports alleging that one of the traders died in police custody, saying all of them were released hale and hearty.

    Also speaking, Vice President, Amalgamated Markets Traders Association (AMATA), Gozie Akudolu, disclosed that no money was paid for their release, though he regretted that some went ahead to engage the services of lawyers contrary to his instructions.

    “I’m happy to announce to you that we didn’t pay any dime for their release because I instructed that no lawyer should be engaged in the process.

    “Those who defied the instructions and paid should find a way of going after their money,” he added.

    He appreciated those who contributed towards ensuring the release of the traders, praying God to reward them abundantly.

    “I’m overwhelmed with joy today. Special thanks go to the IGP, leader of police delegates from Abuja, the state governor and commissioner for Trade and Commerce, state CP, AC Nnewi, and a host of others.”

  • Sit-at-home: Total Failure in Ebonyi

    The sit-at-home exercise called by the Indigenous People of Biafra, IPOB, failed in Ebonyi state

    The group called for the sit-at-home to commemorate and protest the invasion of the country home of its leader, Nnamdi Kanu, exactly one year on Friday.

    Since that invasion by the Military during the Operation Python Dance 2, Mr Kanu and his parents have not been seen.

    The new Commissioner of Police, CP Musa Kimo had urged residents to go about their normal business. He also held series of meetings with business owners where he assured them of adequate security.

    It was business as usual in the state capital Abakaliki, on Friday as residents went about their normal daily business activities.

    Read Also: 378 bags of ‘poisonous rice’ impounded in Ebonyi

    Shops, motor parks, banks and other major businesses remained open in the city from 8 am in disobedience of the order by the pro- biafran group.

    The Abakpa main market in the city, the mechanic village and other markets in the city were open as traders began making brisk business.

    However, Transporters had no buses going to Onitsha or Aba in Anambra and Abia states respectively.

    Joint security patrol teams patrolled the streets of the city with some others on standby at strategic points in the city.

    A resident, who spoke to our reporter, Geoffrey Igboke said he did not observe the exercise because he did not see the need for it.

  • Sit-at-home: Ebonyi Police Commissioner, Ohaneze Youths warn IPOB

    Commissioner of Police in Ebonyi state, Musa Kimo has warned members of the Indigenous People of Biafra, IPOB, not to use the sit-at-home exercise to harass and intimidate law-abiding citizens of the state.

    Kimo, who gave the warning on Wednesday during his maiden prese briefing in Abakaliki, said responsible law-abiding citizens should go about their lawful businesses, assuring their security.

    Read Also:Police warn IPOB against sit-at-home order

    “Information reaching us that the Indigenous People of Biafra, IPOB, have concluded plans to harass, intimidate, and molest law-abiding citizens.

    “I want to assure all responsible and law-abiding citizens and other people who are here to do their legitimate business, that they have nothing to fear as measures are in place to guarantee everybody safety. I also want to appeal to you parents and guardians to warn their wards to desist,” he said.

    The Police Commissioner, who assumed office on Monday, debunked insinuations making the round that he was working for any political party, adding that he was apolitical.

    He warned criminals to stay away from the state as the Police under his command will deploy every strategy to ensure that the state is crime free.

    The CP also warned politicians in the state to play by the rules at all times, warning that the Police will not spare any politician who breaks the law before, during or after the elections.

    “Officers that will work with me have been directed to ensure that they operate in line with international best practices. By this, we are going to be responsible, responsive, reliable and one that you can always trust.

    “We will always work with your cooperation and with you the good people of the salt State-Ebonyi State. We intend to achieve that feat by reducing crime and criminality to its barest minimum.

    “Strategies we are going to employ include community policing, inter agency cooperation ie synergy with other security services, visibility policing, massive deployment, intelligence gathering, stop and search and raid on identified criminal hideout.

    “Let me cease this opportunity to warn unscrupulous elements, hoodlums and people who do not choose to be law-abiding, people that have penchant for inflicting excruciating pains on law-abiding citizens to have rethink because the police in conjunction with other security agencies will not fold their arms”.

    “Let me vociferously yell you that that insinuation is mendacious and totally false. There is a saying that if the head is perfect, other parts of the body certainly will be perfect.

    “We have an Inspector General of Police that is allergic to corruption and allergic to anything that is anti-social. And by this, we have been directed to ensure that at all times; we should be professional before, during and after the elections. I assure you that we are going to be apolitical”, he stated.

    Meanwhile, the Leadership of Ohaneze Youths Council, OYC, has dissociated itself from the sit-at-home order called by IPOB for Friday.

    The group also said there is a possibility of further loss of lives if the sit-at-home turns bloody.

    “Security agents may capitalize on the exercise to unleash state terror on unarmed Biafra agitators”, said the statement signed by Obinna Achuonye, Deputy President General of OYC.

    “OYC insists that to avert and save the lives of our Igbo Youths who shouldn’t lose their lives while remembering those who lost their lives, we thereby ask IPOB to join Ohanaeze Ndigbo Youth Council Worldwide in the Prayer sessions and Candle night we are organizing on that day”.

    “We have also checked the economic loss and implications the sit-at-home will bring to Ndigbo especially now that parents are struggling to return their children back to Schools. IPOB should re -consider their stand and call off the sit-at-home,” OYC added.

     

  • IPOB accuses Swiss Embassy of frustrating Kanu’s family quest to justice

    The leadership of the Indigenous People of Biafra (IPOB) has accused Switzerland’s Embassy in Abuja, Nigeria of being used to frustrate moves by Kanu’s family to get justice.

    Recall that IPOB  accused the federal government of being behind the sudden disappearance of its leader and director of Radio Biafra, Mazi Nnamdi Kanu after the invasion of his father’s palace in Afaraukwu Community in Umuahia North Local Government Area of the state on September 14, 2017 and has since gone to the International Court of Justice in Hague, Netherland to seek justice despite being outlawed by the Nigerian government.

    In a release by the group through its spokesman, Emma Powerful, the pro-biafra group described the denial of younger Kanu visa by Switzerland as laughable stated that Prince Emmanuel Kanu was officially invited by the United Nations to Switzerland as part of their investigation of the September 14, 2017 incident in Umuahia and wondered why he was denied visa.

    According to Powerful, “The conduct of the Swiss Embassy in Nigeria is unbecoming of a civilized country, who by this action, appear to be collaborating with the Buhari regime in their persecution of Biafrans. IPOB will have no option than to regard it as an accessory to mass murder and promoter of human rights abuses in Africa.”

    “This is a clear case of criminal conspiracy between a member of staff of the Swiss embassy in Abuja and the Nigerian Government to deny United Nations investigators access to vital information and facts surrounding the murderous invasion of Nnamdi Kanu’s compound by the Nigerian military

    “Instead of commending the UN for their intervention, the Swiss embassy instead chose to act out of character by appearing to support impunity and gross violations of the rights of the Kanu family to seek justice.

    “It should be pointed out to the Swiss embassy in Abuja that Prince Emmanuel Kanu, the younger brother of our leader visited the United States of America recently on a two year multiple entry visa and returned to Nigeria.

    Read Also: Police warn IPOB against sit-at-home order

    “With all due respect, it is given that most people seeking to overstay their visa would rather prefer to do so in the US than Switzerland. Therefore the reasons given by the Kogi born employee at the Swiss embassy for refusing visa to the Kanu family is laughable.

    “We must also remind the Swiss embassy that IPOB women also in the past months attended a conference in Baltimore, Maryland USA and duly returned to their respective countries of abode after the event.

    “We are at a loss to understand why Swiss embassy chose this line of action when the lives of human beings are at stake. Is the Swiss government through their embassy in Abuja giving tacit support to abuse of human rights in Nigeria? Is Switzerland seeking to influence or impede the work of the United Nations? We the indigenous people of Biafra (IPOB) and it’s leadership worldwide note with grave sadness the role Swiss embassy in Abuja have elected to play in aiding and abating the unlawful disappearance of people in Nigeria by denying entry visa to Switzerland to members of Kanu family and other firsthand witness to the Nigerian army massacre of unarmed civilians at Nnamdi Kanu’s compound in Isiama Afaraukwu on 14 September 2017.

    “Should the Swiss government allow this travesty to subsist, IPOB will have no option than to regard it as an accessory to mass murder and promoter of human rights abuses in Africa,” the release read in part.

  • IPOB: Relatives kick over denial of access to detained women

    Family members of the detained female members of the detained female members of the Indigenous People of Biafra (IPOB) on Wednesday protested the refusal of the Owerri Prisons Authority to grant them access to the women.

    The 112 women were arrested and remanded in custody for protesting against the Federal Government over the whereabouts of the IPOB leader, Nnamdi Kanu.

    The women who protested half naked in Owerri, demanded for a referendum and boycott of the 2019 general elections in the Southeast.

    They accused the Prison Authority of deliberately denying the detained women, who are mostly nursing mothers and pregnant women access to their families in order to break and punish them to expressing their opinion.

    But the Public Relations Officer of Owerri Federal Prisons, James Madugba, said that prevailing circumstances made the Prisons Authority deny families members access to the detained women.

    Madugba, a Deputy Superintendent, described as untrue the allegation that the prison officers received an order from “above” not to allow the remanded women access to their loved ones.

    He said that the Armed Personal Carrier deployed in front of the prisons facility with Police and Soldiers was not to scare the relatives of the pro Biafra women from visiting their loved ones in their facility.

    He said that the Armoured Personnel Carrier (APC) and the Police and Army officers deployed in front of the facility were part of the security measures in all the prisons nationwide.

    Madugba said “We did not ordinarily deny family members access to the Biafra women who are in our facility and there is no order from above asking us not to allow relatives of the the women access to them.

    Read Also: Anxiety as IPOB resumes call for election boycott

    “It is not also true that we exposed the women, especially the pregnant ones to cold and inhuman environment”.

    He added that, “the task of admitting and registering 112 people in any prison facility in Nigeria is tasking. You don’t just bring people into the prisons and the next minute you want to start visiting them .prisons is a regimented environment. There are regulations.

    “The responsibility of interviewing, admitting and registering such number of women would take four days. It is after these processes that you now allow families members to start visiting.

    “When the relatives came, the Deputy Controller of Owerri prisons, Freedman Ben-Rabbi addressed them but they started protesting. It is the routine and now we are through with the registration processes their relatives can visit.

    “The Deputy Control has equally taken special attention on the women,especially the pregnant ones because of their gender.

    “They are being taken care of properly .They are our responsibility. There is no order at all commanding us to be hostile to them.”

  • Steps that ended Niger Delta militancy, IPOB secessionist plot – Osinbajo

    …Nigeria’s foundation deficient, threatened, say Monarchs

     

     

    The Vice President Yemi Osinbajo on Wednesday said that the intervention by traditional rulers at the wake of bombing of oil installations by the Niger Delta militants and the secessionist uprising in the South East was the panacea that brought relative peace in the two regions.

    He spoke in Abuja while declaring open the 10th National Development Summit of Nigerian Traditional Rulers.

    According to him, the natural rulers have played crucial roles at the point that the country was threatened by the Niger Delta militants and the separatist group, Indigenous People of Biafra, IPOB.

    Read Also:FG to assist, compensate victims of Jibia flooding – Osinbajo

    He challenged traditional rulers in Nigeria to take greater responsibility in resolving conflicts in the country, saying dialogue and engagements are as just as important as law enforcement in tackling disputes.

    He said that traditional rulers were better placed “to champion this vision of continuing dialogue and engagement because of the respect you command from the widest possible range of stakeholders and parties.

    Osinbajo said “Dialogue and engagement are just as important as law enforcement, especially in situations triggered by misunderstandings and disagreements between people and communities who have existed peacefully side-by-side for centuries.”

    The vice president also said even though the law enforcement agencies are critical elements in deterring criminality and ensuring that perpetrators are brought to justice, overlooking the place of non-coercive conflict prevention and resolution mechanisms would do a great disservice to the people of Nigeria.

    He said, “You are also repositories of important intelligence that can be useful in detecting suspicious or criminal activity. The partnership between traditional authority and government is therefore crucial.”

    According to him, it was in recognition of this critical role of traditional rulers that informed government’s approach to dealing with Nigeria’s most pressing security issues in the Niger Delta and in the Middle Belt.

    “I can say without fear of contradiction that the New Vision for the Niger Delta would not have happened without the support of traditional rulers and leaders in the region. We have made it a priority to meet with them and carry them along, and ask for their wisdom and their support in resolving issues with stakeholders and communities. This was also our approach in the wake of secessionist agitation by IPOB in the South East.”

    He said government has been engaging traditional rulers in the flashpoint regions, counting on the influence they wield to chart a new and collective course of understanding, instead of the default approach of resorting to violence as a way of dealing with grievances.

    “As custodians of our rich history, we also believe that you have a duty to remind us of the things we have got right in the past, but from which, for some reason or another, we have departed from, to our detriment,” he stated.

    The vice president said Nigeria’s traditional cultures had long ago perfected timeless dispute-resolution and community-engagement mechanisms that are now under threat of being lost forever.

    “As traditional rulers, your forebears and ancestors were the initiators and implementers of many of these mechanisms, and our cultural institutions have evolved ways of passing this knowledge down the generations – even if we have not been paying attention as we should.

    “May I therefore most respectfully ask that you take this as a call to you, as royal fathers, as traditional rulers, as elder statesmen, to commit yourselves to deepening your partnership with government, to achieve our shared goal of laying the foundation of peace and security that will guarantee true greatness for Nigeria.” he added

    The Traditional Rulers at the summit expressed fears that the foundation of Nigeria as established by the founding fathers had been visibly deficient and threatened.

    They also said that the only way the country could be made great was when the leaders and different ethnic nationalities resolve to build a nation on a foundation of equity, justice, fairness, labour and high moral standards.

    In his welcome address, Chairman of Governing Council of the National Development Summit of Traditional Rulers, His Royal Majesty, Dr. Emmanuel Sideso Abe called for more roles for traditional rulers by the government.

    The monarch said it was disheartening that the constitutional review embarked upon by the National Assembly had remained inclusive for over a decade, while resolutions at the recent national conference, have not been considered for adoption in the interest of national survival and progress.

    Dr. Abe who is the Ovie of Uvwie Kingdom of Delta State, said the country needs a good leader that will create jobs and build bridges, adding that as a result of the security challenges in the country, most traditional rulers were unable to attend the summit that started with over 400 members when it was inaugurated by the late President Umaru Musa Yar’Adua ten years ago.

    He said that the country was born with incredible potentials neither uncommon ideals that could make it soar into greatness, adding that Nigeria was not meant to crawl or stagnate.

    He said “Here is a country born with incredible potentials, established on goodness and trust, with uncommon ideals and dreams that could make her soar into high altitudes of greatness. Like the eagles, Nigeria was born with powerful wings, in the form of enormous natural endowments. Nigeria was never meant to crawl or stagnate.

    “Whatever we may say or do the fact remains that our foundation as a nation as designed by our founding fathers has been visibly deficient and threatening. Administrations come and go but none has been courageous enough to address conclusively the issue of structural flaws.

    “We cannot do anything against the truth. The only way the eagle will fly is for it to realize that it is gifted with better wings than other birds and make a decision to use the wings effectively.

    “We must resolve to build a new nation on a foundation of equity, justice, fairness, labour and high moral standards. This is what makes the United States of America and other advanced economies to tick.

    “It is amazing how constitutional review has remained inclusive for over a decade at the National Assembly in spite of the exigency of the matter. It is equally disheartening that the resolutions of all recent national conferences were never considered for adoption in the interest of national survival and progress, the huge funds sunk in these projects notwithstanding,” he said.