The chairman of the Northern Elders Forum, NEF, Dr. Paul Unongo has explained why President Muhammadu Buhari’s marching order to security chiefs to crush the Indigenous People Biafra, IPOB, is perfect.
Unongo feared that if the Nnamdi Kanu-led IPOB was allowed to carry on with its activities, it would drag the nation back into another civil war.
President Buhari had earlier given the security chiefs marching orders to crush the IPOB, Boko Haram and other groups that pose threat to national unity.
The NEF chief told Sun, “I know Buhari very well. It was in my hometown, Gboko that Buhari and Ojukwu met for the first time after the war.
“I arranged for Buhari and Ojukwu to meet in Gboko. So I could feel Buhari’s pain. You feel pain when young men that were not even born when we went and suffered so much and inflicted so much suffering on our people are using such verbiage and such type of rhetoric.
“They cannot even talk in such a sophisticated and philosophical manner like Ojukwu. They cannot match Ojukwu in any way.
“Remember all the troubles that we went through to try and say look if we make ourselves to fight a war, we are going to come back to the same basic problems that we would sit down, talk about it and sort out.
“Ojukwu said let us go to Aburi and I would stand on Aburi and everybody said take Aburi; then something changed and he said give me confederation now or give me war.
“They were young people; both Ojukwu and Gowon were colonels. They told Ojukwu take federalism, let us dialogue and Ojukwu said no, let us fight and they now said, okay, if you fight, I would respond.
“And we saw these things for two years between 1967 through 1968. Then you have young persons who did not see what happened going around and matured people making the young boy feel that he is something special.
“They are using half the idioms that Ojukwu used. They speak half the English that Ojukwu spoke and they are delivering the message less than the way Ojukwu delivered it and people are saying let us go to war.
“So, I can understand Buhari, a man who was a commander in the warfront, fought against Ojukwu and three years they never talked nor greeted, and after the war, they refused to greet, until I arranged and brought them to Gboko; Ojukwu from Nnewi and Gen. Buhari from Daura and we met at St John’s Catholic Church, Gboko. I think it is annoying.
“What kind of country is this? What sort of human beings are we to now prove that man does not learn from history?
“Shall we, Nigerians, start all over again and not move forward. After 50 years, we come back to the same rhetoric to abuse people and heat up the polity with tribal feelings right to the pitch and we fight a war. Last time, we lost 3million people. If we go with Nnamdi Kanu now, how many millions are we ready to part with?
“Maybe 15 million and we wait for another 50 years and the cycle continues. I support the position of Professor Ben Nwabueze who is one of the constitutional lawyers in the world.
“The position is, please, let us come and sit down in a Sovereign National Conference; we are all very educated; even our children have become professors.
“Nigerians can sit down and talk over their differences very coolly. They can shout and abuse themselves if they want, but I do know one thing, the state of friendship, and love that was shown during the Nigerian civil war proves that Nigerians can reach agreement on every single thing, but the insensitivity of people who do not know the trauma of those who participated in the war are going through is the problem.
“They are talking as if there was never a Biafra. We fought a war for three years, very serious and devastating that you can’t imagine. People sought for food and anything.
“In fact, it got to a stage that people could have consumed human beings. The people out there who saw this horrific suffering, how are they allowing these young children to do what they are doing?
“We that are old have an obligation to tell the young people that we cannot go back to war. The issue of Biafra was sorted out on the battlefield and about 3million Nigerians died in the process. I understand when Buhari talked about it with a little bit of anger. I say it softly; I beg you my brother, Kanu. We do not want another Biafra. We settled the issue of staying together with 3million people. I am 100 per cent with Buhari on that.”
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