Human Rights Writers Association of Nigeria (HURIWA) has told the Deputy Speaker of the House of Representatives, Benjamin Kalu, to stop creating the impression that the Igbo people are beggars who line up around government houses to collect bags of rice and remnants of foodstuffs.

The rights group admonished him to stop insulting Ndigbo by informing the world that hunger instigated the extensive and heightened state of insecurity in the South East.

HURIWA emphasised that the root causes of the worrisome insecurity and seeming instability in the once economically flourishing and peaceful South East is not because the people are lazy and, therefore, hungry, stressing that Kalu’s Peace in South East East Project (PISE-P) has attempted to recreate false narratives by distributing bags of rice to some people in Abia State.

The group said: “Kalu needs to know that most Igbo youths are either in their shops working hard to make a decent living, or farming and engaging in other productive enterprises even in the information technology sectors.”

“The Igbo youths, who are well educated and highly skilled, are busy working as medical experts and academics in the different reputable faculties in the advanced societies of Canada, U.S.A, Australia, France, Italy, Germany. So, the Deputy Speaker should stop distracting Ndigbo because we will never reduce ourselves to the pathetic position of beggars. Begging is antithetical to our culture and is, indeed, a cultural heresy.”

HURIWA recalled that the Deputy Speaker flagged off his initiative in Bende Council of Abia State under the agriculture and food security pillar of PISE-P, titled, ‘A Hungry Man is An Angry Man’ in recognition of the importance of food in the drive for peace in the region.

According to reports, the launch witnessed the distribution of food items across the 17 local councils of the state and other areas in the region.