The leader of a pro-Biafran group, Biafra Zionists Federation, Benjamin Onwuka, has dismissed the agitation by the Nnamdi Kanu-led Indigenous People of Biafra as a “waste of time.”
Speaking in Enugu on Tuesday, Onwuka said Biafra would not be actualised by IPOB. He said Biafra would be actualised once the United States recognised his ‘Biafran government.’
A lawyer, Onwuka had on July 25, 2017, named himself interim President of Biafra while announcing a ‘Biafran government’ which included the Prof. Pat Utomi, Prof. Chukwuma Soludo, Labaran Maku, Prof. Jerry Gana, Prof. Barth Nnaji, and Chief Nnia Nwodo, among others.
He said, “We are hopeful that Biafra is going to be approved in December by the US because this problem of Biafra is not about IPOB or Nnamdi Kanu, it is about America’s support.
“We are now waiting for Trump’s endorsement before Christmas. Whatever we are doing is based on America’s diplomatic engagement.
“Biafra issue is a diplomatic matter, if America does not support us, it will not work. So, IPOB or Nnamdi Kanu cannot get Biafra, what the IPOB is doing is a waste of time.”
The secessionist declared that Biafra would be formally declared in Lokoja, the capital of Kogi State, which he said was an Igbo territory.
Announcing plans for the independence of Biafra, Onwuka disclosed that a former Finance Minister, Dr Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala, had been appointed the Biafran ambassador to the US.
Onwuka condemned the recent visit of some South-East leaders to President Muhammadu Buhari in the Presidential Villa.
Reacting to Onwuka’s declaration that the Igbo leaders’ meeting with Buhari was futile, Ohanaeze Ndigbo said the pro-Biafran activists talked in that manner because they lacked experience.
Speaking with a Punch correspondent, National Publicity Secretary of Ohanaeze, Prince Uche Okpaga, said, “There is this Igbo adage that says ‘what an elder sees while lying down, the youth cannot see it even while on top of a tree.’
“The experience of the elders, the Igbo leaders, cannot be wished away.
“Many of the agitators are youths who did not see the war, that is why they talk the way they do but we as elders, we don’t want them to pass through the same experience we had.
“We don’t blame him (Onwuka) because he was speaking according to his level of understanding but those of us in Ohanaeze see things differently and we know what we are trying to protect and project.
“The work Ohanaeze is doing is not quantifiable, but we believe that posterity will remember us.”
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