By Wisdom Nwedene
The Chief Whip of the Senate, Senator Orji Kalu, has urged President Muhammadu Buhari to grant amnesty to the leader of the Indigenous People Of Biafra, IPOB, Mazi Nnamdi Kanu and other detained members of the group including Yoruba Nation agitators.
In a chat with our correspondent, Senator Orji Uzor Kalu said that he has gone beyond what people see today to lobby and push for the release of the IPOB leader, Mazi Nnamdi Kanu. He said that he is sure that the move which also involved the American diplomats will rapidly enhance the release of Mazi Nnamdi Kanu in no distant future.
Recall that on Wednesday, September 15th 2021, the South-East Caucus of the National Assembly had issued a press statement resolving to intervene in issues and detention of the IPOB leader, Mazi Nnamdi Kanu.
Nnamdi Kanu who is currently in the custody of the Department of State Service (DSS) after he was abducted and extraordinarily renditioned to Nigeria with some other IPOB members has suddenly attracted campaigns from various camps calling on the Nigerian Government to grant the IPOB leader an unconditional release from detention. The call was heightened by recent wanton killings and destruction of properties by some hoodlums and IPOB followers who were taking laws into their hands to enforce the Sit-At-Home order ostensibly issued by the IPOB.
In a statement personally signed by Orji Uzor Kalu on Tuesday, the Senator representing Abia North Senatorial District in the National Assembly demanded that all arrested agitators should be released.
Orji Uzor Kalu added that granting all detained agitators amnesty will show that the federal government is fair and that will improve unity in the country.
Senator Kalu, however, asked the government to give all detained IPOB members and Yoruba Nationa agitators the same treatment as repentant Boko Haram insurgents and bandits.
He said: “I pleaded with most of our elders in the north and in the south-west; we cannot continue to fight at all times,” he said.
“I am still pleading with them and the federal government to intervene so that we can have a peaceful country. A lot of insurgents and bandits have been granted amnesty.
“I believe in the unity of this country, and I believe this country is better off being in unity, so the best way we can get it is to make sure that IPOB and followers of Sunday Igboho are granted amnesty.
“There is a need to call a roundtable, even without the federal government. This is what the elders can do and give the federal government endorsement, so we can have peace in our country.
“If we continue this rancour, it wouldn’t augur well, because people are purchasing arms and they are not only being used for this struggle, they are used for kidnapping, banditry and other things, we don’t deserve this.”
Speaking further, the former Abia governor condemned the continued adherence to the sit-at-home order of IPOB in the South East.
According to the lawmaker, the sit-at-home order is detrimental to the economic survival of the region which has resulted in pervasive hardship and the loss of billions of naira.
Meanwhile, a professional group, fashioned with the brand 2023 Igbo Presidency Push, had in a meeting adopted the request by the Senate Chief Whip Orji Kalu to the Federal government.
In a statement made available to our correspondent through the secretary-general Amb. Francis Ejovwokoghene, the group vehemently said that bandits in the north should also be included in this amnesty request.
As contained in the statements that read in parts, the group admits that this plea on the Federal government is coming at this time, the nation needed quick solutions and interventions from the government in readdressing the nations’ unity and putting an end to the causes of these much calls, for division.
The group called on Mr President Mohammadu Buhari, to look into Amnesty as a first-aid national human project that will tune down tensions and reinstall the Unity, Peace and Progress deserving of the nation.
The group expressed their displeasure on the disturbing sit at home solidarity to Nnamdi Kanu by the IPOB as they cautioned destructive elements to desist from crippling the south-east regions economic values and future, saying that they should learn their lessons from cities like Warri in Delta State, where destructive actions drove away companies and industries and are today, living in regret to these losses of industries and decline of infrastructural developments that would have given livelihoods to citizens.
Also in this statements, the group maintained that this premeditated and requested “first-aid” approach of senator Orji Kalu, indicates his heartfelt love, with the nation’s peace and unity interest at heart, while they blamed the errors of the nation on abandoned governmental projects that would have sustainably match the growth of our present population progressions, as it reads.
“The epicentre of the nation’s wary are the resultants from abandoned projects. These projects are Infrastructural, Human, Nations’ Unity and many more useful but neglected projects. Citizens can’t rise against governments if the government is moving in the right direction, and carrying all along.
“Responsibility Neglects, coupled with the rise in population of successive years, can manipulate negatively against any government and That is what is facing us today in our society.
“How empowered and engaged are the youths in the north? Would banditry persist if youths in the North are engaged? The age brackets, engaged in this banditry are youths, probably they’ve seen it as a means of raising funds to live on. How well, were they engaged by the government? They need reorientation, which only the government can do through programs. These are issues for urgent rescue. We read the Arewa youth leader’s public statements about the standard and rating of youths in the north compared to other youths in other regions of the country.
“How long had the Yoruba’s, cried for solutions, that the neglect by those at the helm of affairs to profound solutions had resulted to the Yoruba son, Sunday Igboho’s motives against the government?
“What are the differences between the farmers and the Fulani herders, other than livestock’s eating up farm produce?
“Why shouldn’t we adopt modern farm practices, create ranches for livestock’s, in order words creating job opportunities to people, fetching foods for these ranched animals to earn a living, since grazing routes holds conflictions among citizens as it’s not constituted in the Nigeria road map nor gazette? To have made these crises linger from one administration to another, of successive tenures does not tell good of the nation’s leadership.
“The Igbo’s pains, of been politically marginalized in a nation that should promote national unity is a possible reason for this IPOB agitations, inherited from their ages pass, that had made Mazi Nnamdi Kanu to be ardent, following his episodes with the federal government. What efforts are been made to see that all are looked upon as one, undermining the strength of a region, at the helm of affairs of a United Nigeria? Where are our values for the federal character?
“Should a country of diverse tribes and cultures be politically monopolized to one region of the nation because they’re more populated geographically? How well had the SS/SE deprived other regions of the country from partaking of the huge resources generated so far from these South-south / South-East regions, in developments and building of infrastructures in our United Nigeria Nation?
“our greatest disappointment with the IPOB however is the Sit-At-Home; Of what benefit is the sit at home when it’s directly affecting the IPOBs themselves? In their recent activities, stopping students from writing their WAEC is a big setback to their very own, among every other West African community. WAEC will not have to reset questions for those students, deprived of writing their exams, which is practically an “F” for every indigene that was to sit for that exam from that region. What would happen to those that struggled to register for that examination? Big set back indeed for our own, among other peers of the nation. Who’s at lost here? The truth is, these actions are not constructive nor helping issues rather, these actions are compounding issues for their leader, Mazi Nnamdi Kanu and those, willing to step in for solutions. You don’t oppress those you told to pray for you else the prayers be turned against you!
“The plurality of our nation’s Borden can not in anyways be solved in a year, anyone saying that, won’t be telling us the truth. However, we must begin and the first solution we must search and reach for is the willingness of our leaders to do the needful.
“President Umaru Musa Yar’Adua, gave amnesty to the South-south Militants when Goodluck Jonathan was his vice, from the said region. We witnessed how relatively, peace got restored to those communities of the Niger Delta. Why can’t the government see reasons behind this banditry’s to be idleness becoming the devil’s workshop, as they’re unable to fish out bandits’ sponsors as it’s seemed to be sabotaging the system?
“All these reactions emerging in the system are that of citizens, who had been pushed to the wall in one way or the other, by successive administrations. The solution is not to kill them nor allow them to kill us all, for the more the government do the aforementioned, without engaging the youths usefully, the more stronger and ardent they become, drawing sympathy from other institutions.
“The Misunderstood Compatriot, Gen. Ibrahim Badamasi Babangida’s (IBB) GCFR, mention of Sen. Orji Kalu among others for the nation’s future, is not far from this premeditated sort of profound first-aid solutions to the nation’s worries.
“The forthrightness of the Chief whip Sen. Orji Kalu’s subscription to peaceful resolve for our nation Nigeria should be looked into by the Federal government.
“Mr President, Muhammadu Buhari, have that constitutional muscle to make this request feasible, owing to his love for the peace, unity and progress of the nation under his custody by votes of Nigerians. The statements concluded.
