Sit-at-Home: IPOB Warns Police Commissioners in South-east against Interference

By David-Chyddy Eleke in Awka


The Indigenous People of Biafra (IPOB) has warned police bosses in the South-east not to interfere in the proposed sit-at-home protest fixed for Wednesday, saying they have no right to determine how Igbos choose to honour their fallen hero.

IPOB was reacting to a statement by the Anambra State Commissioner of Police, Mr. Umar Garba, in which he called on residents of Anambra State to disregard the order, adding that the group was outlawed and had not powers to order a sit at home protest.
The group through its Media and Publicity Secretary, Emma Powerful, acknowledged that police bosses in all the states that make up the South-east were mostly from the North and had no powers to determine how the Igbos honoured their departed brothers.

He said: “All Fulani police commissioners that litter South-east must desist from commenting about this solemn occasion. Some of them have offered comments that we deem insulting to the memory of the dead.
“We don’t have a say about how they honour their victims of Boko Haram violence in core North and those killed by their fellow Fulani terrorists. We have chosen sit-at-home as the best way to say thank you to all our brave soldiers for what they did for us between 1967 to 1970.
“It will be crass insensitivity of the highest order for any Fulani police or army officer in the South-east to intrude upon our grief.”
The group insisted that the South-east and South-south, including other states marked out for the exercise would be locked down on May 30, and that nothing can stop it.

They urged every family, kindred, village, clan, towns across the length and breadth of Eastern region, Mid-West and Middle Belt to remain indoors from 6p.m. on Tuesday, May 29 to 6p.m on May 30.
It said it was expected that local and international observers would be on ground to monitor compliance and interview people of the region.

“All over the world in over 100 countries and territories, IPOB family meetings will gather to rally and offer prayers in memory of our heroes that sacrificed their lives that we may live.
“We owe our Biafran soldiers that fell in battle an eternal debt of gratitude which our annual sit-at-home is only but a minor but significant contribution this generation can make in acknowledgement and honour of their supreme sacrifice.”