Revelations have emerged on why the South East governors kept sealed lips on the killings of the Independent People of Biafra boys which occurred at Emene in Enugu last month. Even, the governors have not been defending Ndigbo before President Muhammadu Buhari and his APC ruling party.
Dr. Sam Amadi, an activist and former Chairman National Electricity Regulatory Commission, (NERC) made the revelation while speaking to News Echo in a telephone chat last weekend.
The excerpts of the chat are as follows.
”The silence is not unusual even though it is very painful and disappointing and in line with the psychology of leadership in Igbo land and that psychology is Oka mma na ama (better behaved outside). Igbo psychology since after the war has been not to accept the Igbonness as a strategy of acceptance by Igbo leaders who believe in the Nigerian project. Many Igbo leaders feel the pressure to deny their Igbonness as a strategy to being accepted by the larger Nigerian society.
”Second point is the quality of leaders in Igbo,rich, well educated but the process through which they emerge is such that there are persons whose psychology did not dispose them to activism like those in South West. Look at those from the South West eg Fayemi, he was with us in the trenches, civil society person, look at Aregbesola, they were what we could call street guy in Mushim who were organizing protest, Lai Mohammed another civil society person including Osinbajo,
”If you look at the pedigree of those who are governors and leading politicians they come through a process where they understand the directives and dynamics of politics of the grassroots, they are not just political operators who rig election, but persons who identify with the struggle and had strategies to deal with those issues. The South East governors are more of career politicians who bandy their money to create structure.
”Look at Amotekun for example and the way the South West governors have carried on and the South East governors who are always pulsating and looking over their shoulders. Again they accept this notion, blackmail that once some people are agitating for Biafra (whatever that means) they have become enemies of the state.
They are not.
”He reminded that a UNDP report rated South East as the least violent place in the whole of Nigeria, as against the Fulani Herdsmen classified as one of the terror groups in the world and the OPC that was violent in Lagos and killing people. He reminded that the IPOB were not in the streets and were not even protesting.
”The minimum we expect from the governor of Enugu State who should be held responsible is a judicial commission of inquiry. The structure of the federal police does not allow the police the power of the province. It is the state governor. By the structure we have the police cannot declare an action in the state illegal. It is policing work, it is the state laws. If the state has not made any laws they have no right to enforce anything. The intricacies of the constitutional arrangement are not clear to many of us.
”South East has had unfortunate situation where the governors who feel that their political prospects or projects does not require accountability or commitment to persons, so these leaders are very incompetent and lack the pedigree to stand like El Rufai or Fayose, who attacks the federal government and nothing happens. They have a beggarly spirit. The position of a governor is big. You can’t do anything to a stategovernor if he is accountable to his people, in control and if he is governing well. I think people’s hope have been betrayed classically by the quality of our governance in the state. How many times have you heard police kill people in the north in spite of the brigandage, banditry, violence up there? North is the epicenter of crimes and violence and extreme criminality today.
”The South East people are suffering under hostile policing and it is the responsibility of the South East governors to take up that challenge and go to the Inspector General of Police. The IG is not in charge of police in the state. The governor is the chief security officer of the state. The IG through the police is operationalising the laws in the state. The laws in the state are the state criminal code, laws. So there is a total abdication of responsibilities on the part of the South East governors. The Enugu State governor has not played the role he is supposed to play.
”We are going to court. I have already sent my lawyers to send him a pre-action notice. The law says 40 days notice. We are going to sue the state government and get the court to enforce them set up a judicial commission of enquiry. He is supposed to account for the life of every person, that is the premise of the Nigerian constitution. You cannot just kill people on the assumption of belief. Nigerian constitution protects opinion than belief. There is no offence called belief. If somebody says I believe in Biafra, I am a Biafran he has committed no crime..
“If IPOB is a banned organization how do you prove that the people who gather there are IPOB boys and that become a ruse to kill innocent young men? Biafra is not IPOB. There are many Biafran groups. Federal government has not banned the use of the word Biafra. In other parts of the world like Spain, America, there are still people who are fighting for their freedom in songs, literature, music, etc.”
