Iwuanyanwu canvasses for restructuring of Nigeria
From Chinedu Nwafor, Abakaliki
The President General of Ohanaeze Ndigbo, Dr Emmanuel Chukwuemeka Iwuanyanwu has added his voice to call for restructuring of Nigeria, saying it’s for the collective interest of the people
Dr Iwuanyanwu stated this while addressing a world press conference in Enugu on Monday.
According to him, Nigeria is not properly structured hence the need for Nigeria to be restructured
He said: “Are we being denied of restructuring because of civil war?. I was close to Ojukwu and I want to state that Ojukwu was not interested in secession.
“As we know what happened was that military carried out a coup, the coup was not an Igbo coup , the coup was carried out and they decided to say, it was an Igbo coup because Igbo officers were there and unfortunately the coup plotters killed many prominent Nigerians
“Igbo’s were sad because no Igbo man was happy to hear that Ahmadu Bello and Tafawa Balewa was killed because these are people who showed love to Igbo’s and maintained good relationship with Igbo’s, we are not happy but these people were killed by soldiers, we didn’t know anything, even this coup failed. But Many young people in the north believe that the coup was an Igbo coup but it wasn’t the igbo’s as the coup didn’t succeed and the people were jailed and release after Biafra war
“The man who stoped the coup was Aguyi Ironsi. Ironsi mobilized warriors and stoped the coup because the political class was in confusion. Ironsi didn’t take part in the coup but stoped the coup. If the coup plotters succeeded , Nigeria history would have been different but they didn’t succeed because of an Igbo man stoped the coup, yet people are profiling it to be an Igbo coup and now want to think it is the reason why we should be handicap in Nigeria
“Even when Ironsi eventually become a head of state, people went and killed him because he is an Igbo man and after killing him there was Aburi conference, and Ofumegwu Ojukwu went to Aburi not to ask for secession , what Ojukwu was asking for was restructuring of Nigeria as there was nothing like Biafra then , we went to Aburi for restructuring of Nigeria, to make it possible for Igbo’s to pursue their business in peace and happiness and they agreed but at a point that agreement was changed and that changed was what created problem.
“So the Igbo question must be addressed as we are not fighting anybody, we love Nigeria, we are working to develop Nigeria so the issue of restructuring is still very important and that is why Ohanaeze is talking about restructuring Nigeria,” he said
Iwuanyanwu further lamented the injustice that had been meted on the Igbo race in Nigeria, saying,“Nothing can be so glaring to point out the injustice that we suffer in this country for the fact that every region have got 6 states and we have 5. This state is a means of sharing resources. Money is shared according to local government and today we have the least of local government and that is why it makes it difficult for an Igbo man to win primary to run election. So, we are going to address this issue it with this council
“I have attended so many national conferences where some approval was given , even when we agreed that we should have additional state but I must regretfully point out that the biggest obstacle we have is internal wrangling in Igbo land as the people know our weakness and they throw it to us to go and sort ourselves but we must sort it out for ourselves and make sure additional state is created.
“We need to have 6 states so that when we share political powers, we will not be marginalized because ministers and revenues are shared according to state. We wil do it and I believe Nigerians will support us and when Nigerians support us, Igbo’s should also help us.”
He also called on President Muhammadu Buhari to release Nnamdi Kanu
“We must do everything to appeal to the goverment to release Nnamdi Kanu because we believe that the release of Nnamdi Kanu is going to accelerate peace in Igbo land.
“We will have peace summit in Igbo land that will also involve Igbos in South South region and in that peace summit is very important that Nnamdi Kanu is free so that he can contribute to what will bring peace in Igbo land and we will be able to sit him down and tell him our opinion,” he said
Highlight of the conference was the presentation of certificate of return to Dr Iwuanyanwu by the Secretary-General of Ohanaeze Ndigbo, Ambassador Okey Emuchay.
