FG still at war with South-East – Ohanaeze affiliate group
Njiko Igbo Forum, an affiliate of apex Igbo socio-cultural organisation, Ohanaeze Ndigbo has claimed that the Federal Government is still at war with the Igbo in Nigeria.
President of the Forum, Rev Okechukwu Obioha said this in a
statement made available to DAILY POST Thursday night.
According to him, the people of the South-East region would
not be assuaged by the palliative being rolled out by the Federal Government to
cushion the effect of the petrol subsidy removal.
Obioha, who is also the Convener/Chairman, South-East Equity
Group, SEEP, said insensitive and discriminatory policies of successive
administrations remained a gross abuse on the psyche of the Igbo man in the
country.
He noted that several years after the civil war, the people
of the South-East were still being treated as the vanquished.
Obioha identified the abandonment of the Eastern rail
corridor as proof that the federal government was not ready to factor the Igbo
into its development plans.
“There is no equity, justice and fairness.No amount of the
so-called palliative from the Federal Government extended to the people of the
South-East zone can assuage or compensate them enough, as long as the Eastern
Corridors of the Railways remained recklessly abandoned.
“From the days of Sure-P of the Obasanjo administration to
the Buhari-led government, all other rail lines and even new ones, particularly
that of the Katsina to Niger (another country) were constructed and made
operational, except that of the Eastern Corridors running from Port-Harcourt to
Enugu and then Makurdi – Maiduguri,” he said.
The Ohanaeze chieftain said the situation became more
insulting when the federal government pulled off the rails/slippers all through
these corridors, leaving no sign or trace of a former rail line, except grasses
and trees that have grown thereby.”
“How else can this be explained except that the Federal
government, by this obnoxious brazen dichotomy, is still at war with the Igbo
of the South-East?” He queried.
Obioha added that “the war is still on and as far as the
average Igbo is concerned, the struggle to survive still continues unabated.
“There is nothing like palliative to the Vanquished Nigeria
Igbo, but to the Nigeria Victor.”
Obioha’s claim is coming amid protest from the people of the
region over the number of ministerial slots given to the zone by the President
Bola Ahmed Tinubu administration.
Whereas the North-East has 10 slots, South-West 9 slots, the
South-East trails behind with its statutory five slots.
However, in the list of portfolios released by the Tinubu
presidency, the zone got four main ministers and one junior minister.
They include: Doris Anite- Minister of Industry, Trade and
Investment, Uche Nnaji – Minister of Innovation Science and Technology, Nkiruka
Onyejeocha – Minister of State, Labour and Employment, Uju Kennedy – Minister
of Women Affairs, and David Umahi – Minister of Works.
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