Former Abia state governor and All Progressives Party chieftain, Dr Orji Uzor Kalu has bared his mind on the activities of the leader of the Indigenous People of Biafra (IPOB), Mazi Nnamdi Kanu.
In an interview with the Sun newspaper, the ex-governor spoke of his efforts to see Kanu drop the agitation fight while castigating him for allowing himself to be used by certain people for political reasons.
He further stated that Kanu should purge himself of needless biases against the other components of the nation and come to terms with realities of today that Biafra would remain a dream as far as the Nigerian constitution is concerned.
According to him. he said “I started looking for Kanu himself to talk to him. So somebody told me he went to a hotel and I sent people to the hotel and I called one of his relations who came to my house and I asked him where Kanu was, that I really want to talk to him. He said that I should not bother myself and I told The Punch all that transpired including the fact that I was not sure whether the fellow was telling me lies or truth. I said it and it’s in the paper. I didn’t say I discussed with Kanu and he told me he had left for London. His relation told me I should not bother about his safety because I told him that what matters to me is the safety of the man. I wanted to bring the man to my house in Igbere and make arrangements with the federal authorities and persuade them for us to find a common ground.
I never wanted the security agents to bundle him and rough handle him, I only wanted to bring him to my house and wade into the matter, which was what I did when he was in prison. I am surprised at the attitude of Kanu because he knew all the things we discussed; he neglected them because he wanted to play politics. Let me ask you; is it fair on the court that gave him bail? Is it fair on the federal government of Nigeria that the orders of court were being disobeyed? That order was not that of Justice Nyako at all, it was the law of Nigeria. These are things I reminded him that he must obey our laws.
Nnamdi Kanu calls for Dialogue with the Federal Government
In 2007 the same court gave me a condition to gain my freedom, it’s not a criminal case but I accepted those conditions and if I wanted to challenge those conditions I would move to an appellate court where justices of the court of appeal will look at and review the conditions.
So I will continue to blame our elders, our friends and my people who are saying his human rights have been tampered with, I disagree because the court is of competent jurisdiction that order was not that of Buhari, it was not that of chief of army staff, neither was it of the director of the SSS or anybody it was the order of a court of competent jurisdiction. So he could have mellowed down and obeyed that order and allow his members to continue carrying their flag rather than disobeying that order.
But when you set off to molest people on the road, people are afraid to say the truth I’m not afraid of death or ask anybody who knows me from my university days I’m still the same person, I don’t care what anybody says what matters most to me is justice being applied where it is supposed to be applied . If Kanu had gone ahead to obey that court order-he was asked not to appear in a public of more than10 persons and the 2nd in command would be the one carrying their Biafra flag nobody would touch him because he was not given any order by the court. If Kanu wanted to see people then they should come to his house and see him but what he did which you saw all over social media was mounting a Guard of Honour, insulting everybody, he insulted The Sun newspapers, he insulted the owner of Sun newspapers, he insulted me personally that some were writing against him and that they were been bought over by Hausa/Fulani people and Yoruba people. How can you run a republic when you are not in good terms with the Yoruba? You’re not in good terms with Hausa, the Ijaws and other tribes, so who will you be in good terms with? The issue is that he should purge himself of those needless biases and come to terms with the realities of today.