…Says Igboho, Kanu arrest not enough
The Coalition of Northern Groups, (CNG), said the arrest of Nnamdi Kanu and Sunday Igboho is not the solution to separatist agitations insisting that referendum is the way to go.
The Coalition, in a press statement issued by the spokesperson, Abdul-Azeez Suleiman, said, “ From the outset, we wish to be categoric that the arrest of Igboho and Kanu should not be mistaken as bringing about the end to the uprisings and disturbances over self-determination perpetrated by southern Nigerian elites and governments who use thugs like Igboho and Kanu.
“We insist that rather than seeing the arrest as an end in itself, it should be the beginning of the processes for self-determination by any unit that wants to go. Therefore, we insist on a peaceful referendum for separation from a people who would at the slightest of pretexts, attack, kill and destroy people of other regions and their properties, especially those from the North”.
The CNG said the arrest of Igboho is government business so long as it conforms with the principle of rule of law and international criminal justice procedures, stressing that “We are not yet sure what he is going to be charged with; but expectedly, incitement to violence against northerners would be one of them”.
The CNG said the arrest of Igboho, if considered along with that of Kanu, should serve as a lesson to “those blind followers who are instigated into setting fire to their own backyards whereas the instigators of such lawlessness and violence almost all the time have a fallback option that includes escaping abroad”.
“The two arrests also attest to the level of cross-regional cooperation that is working across Africa”, the CNG stated.