In a statement by the Media and Publicity Secretary of IPOB, Emma
Powerful, the Indigenous People of Biafra (IPOB), warned the leadership
of Miyetti Allah Cattle Breeders Association of Nigeria (MACBAN) against
its alleged threat to South East geo-political zones following the
rejection of cattle ranches in the zone.
The group warned that one inevitable outcome of any premeditated
attack on Igbo people and easterners living in the north, ‘will mark the
beginning of the apocalyptic end of Nigeria’.
IPOB said the arrogant tone of the leader of Miyetti Allah’s threat
against Igbo and their businesses in the North points clearly to an
impending hostile response from them, which IPOB is both duty and honour
bound not to ignore.
“We must make it abundantly clear that any attack against Igbos
and their businesses in the North will be met with commensurate
response in the South.
“Threats and large scale invasions of territories in the
Middle-Belt may have had the effect of subduing indigenous Tiv
resistance to the Fulani hegemonic juggernauts in the Middle Belt and
total collapse of morale in the West, giving what happened at Ado-Ekiti
PDP rally on Wednesday, July 11, 2018.”
“Those northern voices who continually pressured Igbo leaders
and governors to mistakenly ban IPOB are today silent against the
murderous antecedents of their own kith and kin, the Fulani herdsmen.
“Had IPOB not been ill-advisedly banned by South East governors
and Igbo socio-cultural leaders, MACBAN would not have had the guts to
issue such an insulting statement against Igbo and their business
interests in the North.
“One inevitable outcome of any premeditated attack on Igbo
people and easterners living in the North will mark the beginning of the
apocalyptic end of Nigeria as we know it.
“The sensible decision of, hitherto, docile South East
governors to avoid wholesale breakdown of law and order in their region,
through the banning of herdsmen activities, should be applauded by
Arewa Consultative Forum, Sokoto Caliphate and all advocates of peaceful
coexistence in Nigeria, not derided through the mouthpiece of Fulani
herdsmen, the MACBAN.
“Giving that 70 percent of Nigeria’s land mass is in the North,
as we have been boastfully reminded by many government officials and
core northerners over the years, it stands to reason and common sense
that ranching activity is better sited at the North, not ‘tiny’
‘landlocked’ South-East.
“All South East and South South governors must be guided by a
popular proverb in Igboland that says, only an irrational man kills his
native doctor when those who wish to poison and harm him are still very
much around and multiplying.”