Biafra Day: IPOB storms Onitsha, orders sit-at-home
No fewer than 2, 000 members of the Indigenous People of Biafra (IPOB), yesterday took to the streets and roads of Onitsha, Anambra State, on peaceful march to sensitise the public on the sit-at-home order it declared on May 30, to honour fallen heroes of Biafra.
The group, comprising Lion Squad, a security outfit of the organisation and other members, held Biafran flags and chanted freedom and solidarity songs such as “IPOB purported proscription arrant nonsense; “Nigerian Federal Government has no power to brand IPOB terrorist group; “Biafrans, Igbo we must be proud of our own and “IPOB and genuine Biafra agitating group cannot be intimidated out with Army and Police, among others.
They marched through Awka Road, Old Market Road, Main Market, Sokoto Road, Haruna Street, Williams Street to Creek Road and Zik Avenue, Port Harcourt Road, all in Fegge, to Upper Iweka and terminated at Owerri Road, insisting that the people should remain indoors on Wednesday or stand to be blamed in case of any eventuality.
The group distributed handbills and flyers with the inscription: “May 30, 2018, is Biafra Day, celebrating 51 Biafra anniversary, we remember the fallen heroes of 1967-70, including victims of Asaba massacre, all slain freedom fighters of Biafra IPOB, MASSOB and all victims of Fulani herdsmen and all other state-sponsored killings in Nigeria.”
Some flyers and handbills they distributed bore pictures of fallen heroes such former Biafra leader, Dim Chukwuemeka Odumegwu Ojukwu, Col. Joe Achuzia, Major-General Philip Effiong and Timothy Onwuatuegwu, among others, as well as corpses of those who died during some of their rallies and protests.
Though, they did not stop anywhere to talk to anybody, one of them who did not mention his name was shouting, no market, no movement, no school, no business, no church, no vehicle on Wednesday, as directed by its leadership as an annual ritual to honour those who fought and died for Biafra and those who died in the struggle.” (Daily Sun)
