Ohanaeze tackles Oba Akanbi over allegations against Ndigbo

There are plots to instigate genocide against Igbo, HURIWA alleges

Apex Igbo socio-cultural organisation, Ohanaeze Ndigbo, yesterday, dismissed, as unsubstantiated, allegations by the Oluwo of Iwo, Oba Abdulrosheed Adewale Akanbi, that Ndigbo cannot be trusted with the presidency.

Ohanaeze also noted that it was inconceivable that a group that has a presence in all parts of the country and beyond could prevent other ethnic groups from residing in Igboland.

Oba Akanbi, in a statement released by his Chief Press Secretary, Alli Ibraheem, was quoted as saying that “no Nigerian will feel secure in the hands of a leader whose ethnic attachment deprived other Nigerians of their rights.”

While acknowledging the damage done to the Igbo by the Nigerian civil war, he slammed the Igbo for the sit-at-home order issued by the Eastern Security Network (ESN), and accused the Igbo of “preventing people from other parts of the country from acquiring properties in their domain.”

Reacting to the development, Ohanaeze described the vilification of the entire Igbo by the royal father as most unfortunate, stressing that it was akin to sowing a seed of disunity and hate in the country.

A statement signed by the National Publicity Secretary, Chief Alex Ogbonnia, cautioned the royal father to desist from issues that could further create divisions in the country and portray him as projecting rivalry.

SIMILARLY, the Rights Writers Association of Nigeria (HURIWA), has raised the alarm that there is credible evidence of well-funded plots by some Igbophobic forces in both the political, media and civil society spaces to engineer genocidal killings of Igbo to stop one of them from getting the nod to become the presidential candidate of any of the two dominant political parties, APC and PDP, in the 2023 polls.

The group also asked the Igbo leaders, including the global leaders of Ohanaeze Ndigbo, the world council of Igbo, the governors of the Igbo speaking states, to elect and appointed political stakeholders, religious, traditional and civil rights advocacy groups in the South East of Nigeria, to take measures to stem the tide.

The Rights group said those championing the anti-Igbo campaigns are already funded by one of the leading aspirants for the Presidency, who is considered influential in the South West of Nigeria.

HURIWA, in a statement issued yesterday, in Abuja, by its National Coordinator, Emmanuel Onwubiko, accused the ethnic irredentists masquerading as politicians and religious leaders, of working to generate enough hatred that could spark off ethnic genocide against Igbo.