The Unexplored Option For Handling The IPOB Situation -By Jeff Okoroafor

Jeff Okoroafor

The saying that two wrongs don’t make a right is golden and has more usefulness now than ever before. What President Muhammadu Buhari did and continue to do in the South East, his operation python dance 1 and 2, using the Nigerian military to intimidate, is wrong, condemnable and no one should even try to sit on the fence on this issue. We must all speak up. When you become the President of a country, your reach extends beyond your own backyard. What this mean is that your sense of fairness, of justice and of opportunity must cut across all regions. It is not a hidden fact that the Muhammadu Buhari-led government has been very unfair and outwardly unjust to the people of South East Nigeria, an act which many have pegged the agitation on.

In my previous article, before the army was deployed to the South East in commencement of their second phase of operation python dance, I did outlined the errors of Buhari’s judgment call and advised we review other tenable options that would help in consolidating the unity we seek. I guess my advise wasn’t at all considered. Here we are today. All hell almost letting loose.

My reason for writing this short piece today is to address a particular issue. As someone recently suggested, that every time when we get new information on an issue, we update our opinion. There is a video circulating of IPOB members searching buses and looking for Northerners. In it, they also burnt trucks known to be owned by Alhaji Aliko Dangote and the Northern transport establishment. I don’t know about you but for me, this is scary. Ethnic profiling is a whole new game and not the time we’d want to play at a time like this. Already Plateau State is on the edge because of this and if there are reprisals, the cycle definitely will be endless and body count will surpass our imagination.

I want to quickly draw the government’s attention to an option yet to be explored – dialogue. The government must get the right people to engage this group in a more civilized, “gun-less” discuss. IPOB wants referendum, good. At least that is an established purpose for their actions and the government can now be well equipped when discussing with them on the way forward. But they themselves must realize that this road is far and one that also requires patience.

Lastly, the group alleged that family members (mother and father) of their leader Nnamdi Kanu are missing, right after the raid by the Nigerian army. If this family members are in the custody of the Nigerian government, they should be returned and let the process of dialogue be activated. Because at this pace we are on, innocent souls will be consumed by the flame of heat this issue is generating.

What do you think?