This is the News Analysis Segment of the Voice of Biafra International Broadcasts.
For November 23rd, 2002
You have heard the news, now, the analysis…
Fellow Biafrans:
We start this week by calling on Nigeria and her leader, General Obasanjo, to release all MASSOB members currently being held in detention or imprisonment anywhere in Nigeria : release them right now! We also take this opportunity to vow before God and before man that we shall bring to the court of law and court of justice any person or persons who is / are associated in anyway with the wrongful deaths of MASSOB members; it may not be today or tomorrow or next month, but as long as they are alive, we shall ultimately bring charges against them. Neither time nor old age shall protect them, any more than it protected the likes of Augusto Pinochet or Slobodan Milosevic, from being charged in court.
Here is a roll call of fellow Biafrans—members of MASSOB—who were recently arrested for no other reason than that they are expressing their Biafranism—their right to be Biafrans, what they naturally are. The Hausa-Fulani head of the Nigerian Police occupying Biafra claims that he has the power to arrest militants and he was exercising such power in Biafraland when he arrested MASSOB members. If he wasn’t so stupid, he would have noticed that MASSOB members are not militant. He would have noticed that the militants are his own fellow Muslims and Northern Nigerians who only recently threatened to forcefully disrupt the Miss World contest going on in Nigeria now, a credible and unstoppable threat that forced the venue of the event to be changed. (Is it not ironic that the venue was moved to Biafraland?). How many of these Muslim and his fellow Northern Nigerians has he arrested? It is his fellow Muslims and Northerners that have turned Nigeria into a hot bed of militant Islamism, and they make no secret of it, as they go after Biafrans and other Christians and non-Muslims in the North, now threatening anywhere at all in Nigeria. How many of them has he arrested? If he had any conscience at all, we would commend him to his own conscience, but alas, like his fellow tormentors and murderers of Biafrans, he has no conscience.
Here are the names of the members of the Anambra State branch of the Movement for the Actualization of the Sovereign State of Biafra, (MASSOB), arrested at Onitsha during a raid by the Nigeria Police Force on the 2nd of November, 2002 and transferred to the State Police Command in Awka and have since been remanded in prison without any charges brought up against them.
James Abakpolor, (m), 22 years old.
Vincent Nwaka, (m), 26 years old.
Tchidi Oguguo Nwafor, (m), 26 years old
Chinedu U. Ejiofor, (m), 27 years old
Emmanuel Obilor, (m), 25 years old
Makuochi Ndubuisi Onyeche, (m), 35 years old
Ikechukwu Charles Nnaji, (m), 36 years old
Hilary U. Ekenna, (m), 33 years old
Onyema NwaGod Goodhope, (m), 30 years old
George Chukwudi Eke, (m), 32 years old
John Uchenna Ekekwe, (m), 32 years old
Ezenwa Chukwuemeka Chimaobi, (m), 32 years old
Ekeoma E. Akpala, (m), 31 years old
Christian Okwudili Ofili, (m), 30 years old
Christian Obi Nkpa, (m), 31 years old
Benjamin Ude Agwu, (m), 32 years old
Robert Chukwurah, (m), 27 years old
Chukwuka Ilo, (m), 32 years old
Chima Ikenna Onwuegbulam, (m), 34 years old
Nkemakolam Nnaemeka Nnodi, (m), 33 years old
Dr. Livinus Ngeh, another MASSOB member, has been in detention since July 7, 2002
Nigeria must release them now. Nigeria has no excuse to hold these MASSOB members; all that is obvious is the hypocrisy of Nigeria .
Meanwhile, the prayers of all Biafrans and our thoughts are with our brothers so wrongfully and so wickedly put in jail by Nigerian authorities.
General Obasanjo responding to a State governor in Biafraland said that the State governor shall not be allowed to replace the Northern-Yoruba dominated police in Biafraland with trained state security agents. His reason was that the state-trained and maintained agents could be used for political ends or could form a militia. For a man who always claims piety, the General is such a hypocrite. General Obasanjo failed to address the reason why that State would want to have its own indigenous agents. General Obasanjo has kept quiet while the Federal police—which is dominated by Hausa/Fulani and Yoruba—has continued to kill Biafrans in Biafra without justification, without accountability, and without cause, and with extreme prejudice. The General failed to comment on the immediate antecedent event where the Nigerian Police, bloodthirsty for Biafran blood, shot, killed and wounded innocent Biafrans, whose only crime is that they, the Biafrans, could not offer enough bribe-money to the Police at a checkpoint in Biafraland, a common practice of the Nigerian Police who have effectively been an occupation force in Biafraland. Can the General tell us how many Biafran Policemen or officers are allowed or deployed in Northern Nigeria, never mind allowed to make a legal arrest of a Northerner, anywhere in Nigeria? In fact, when General Obasanjo himself witnessed the state-sponsored massacre of persons of Biafran origin, a crime which was aided by the Northern Police in Kaduna and Kano , one or 2 years ago, did he do anything to protect the Biafrans? And, when Nigeria appointed Acting Inspector Generals of Police within the past year, and failed to include even one Biafran out of 16 appointees, where was the General? Does he pretend that there is no deliberate policy to leave Biafrans not just unprotected by the Police, but actually pretend that there is no deliberate effort to deny Biafrans any say and any protest and challenge of calculated Nigerian Police brutality against Biafrans? At least, now, some Biafrans in positions of authority in the Nigerian Structure will not stand by and watch murderers in Nigerian Police uniforms and ranks kill and maim Biafrans in Biafraland. We say bravo to that governor, and we encourage other officials in Biafraland to take notice and refuse to sit idly by while Biafrans are being slaughtered like chicken.
About 2 weeks ago, Ohaneze spoke of Sovereign National Conference as the way forward for Nigeria . Even the likes of Generals Obasanjo and Gowon, and many other prominent persons living in and outside of Nigeria , have come to the same conclusion. We applaud Ohaneze’s wisdom. We ask them now to make a commitment and to follow through with this vision, bearing in mind the real meaning of Sovereign National Conference: a meeting of Independent and Sovereign Nations who used to make up Nigeria, but who now are pursuing their own national interests and national destiny. Biafra is one such nation.
Biafra lives! We believe in the mechanism of a Sovereign National Conference to liberate the Nations living in Nigeria and do so without violence.
That’s the news analysis for the week. Thank you.
God bless and keep Biafra ; and you, until our next broadcast. Voice of Biafra International Broadcast continues (go to http://www,biafraland.com; follow “Voice of Biafra” link for the web version).