Rabiu Musa Kwankwaso, a former governor of Kano and the senator representing Kano Central, on Wednesday, June 21, 2017, said Igbo in the North cannot leave the region because of their numerous investments.
He also said the size of the land Igbo presently occupy in the North is more than the entire South East geopolitical zone.
Speaking in an interview on the agitation for secession by Igbo groups and the quit notice by some northern groups, he said none of the millions of Igbo in the North would support breakup of Nigeria.
“Igbo have nowhere to go. They have more assets in the North more than 80 percent or so of what the northerners have in the East. The land Igbo are holding in the North is more than the whole South East,” he said.
Kwankwaso, who chairs the Senate Committee on National Planning and Economic Affairs, said the agitation at both sides does not portray the country in good light among the comity of nations.
He said there was urgent need for all stakeholders in the country to put hands on deck to make peace saying, “The unity and development of the country is key to all other things, therefore we will continue to stand by it. Therefore, I call on all to join hands in ensuring that there is peace. We should use our resources to ensure that nobody raise hands to destroy the unity of the country. Talking of secession is going too far.
“Some people doing it because of their personal interest. I wouldn’t be surprised that the young man (Nnamdi Kanu) will contest for an election in the next general elections. They started agitation to galvanize support and at the end, they would contest for an election.”
Kwankwaso said during his tenure as governor, a layout known as ‘New Enugu’ was carved out in Kano for the Igbo, saying the Igbo are more comfortable there than their states of origin.
On the quit notice by some northern youths, he said the general consensus in the North was that the country is better as one family.
Leave The North By October 1 – Arewa Groups Warn Igbos
A coalition of prominent groups in Northern Nigeria on Tuesday, June 6, 2017 issued an ultimatum to Igbos living in the north to return home by October 1, 2017 or else they will face a situation similar to the pre-civil war pogroms visited on their kin in the 1960s.
The order was contained in an error-ridden statement, obtained by The Trent, issued after a meeting in Kaduna State. The groups, Arewa Citizens Action for Change, Arewa Youth Consultative Forum, Arewa Youth Development Foundation, Arewa Students Forum, and the Northern Emancipation Network, asked the Igbo residing in the region to “start making plans to leave.”
The chilling statement condemned the renewed call for the independent republic of Biafra and also expressed disdain for the Igbos and their culture saying that “the Igbo people of the South-East, not repentant of the carnage it wrought on the nation in 1966, is today boldly reliving those sinister intentions connoted by the Biafran agitation that led to the very first bloody insurrection in Nigeria’s history”.
In 1966, the Igbos were the victims of the largest genocide in Nigeria’s history with over 100,000 of them killed in Northern Nigeria by northern mobs. This pogrom led to the declaration of the Republic of Biafra which led to the Nigerian civil war in which over 3 million Igbos died.
The northern groups’ threat to Igbos is now widely referred to as the Kaduna Declaration and has been widely condemned by public officials and political groups. However, it has also received wide support from northern elements like Professor Abdullahi.
Additional reports at Daily Trust.
