Concentrate On Boko Haram Now, Not MASSOB -- Monarch Tells Buhari

President Muhammadu Buhari has been urged to stop the clamp down on
members of the Movement for the Actualization of the Sovereign State
of Biafra (MASSOB), but should concentrate on how to end Boko Haram
insurgence in the country.

The traditional ruler of Emede Ibeku Autonomous Community in Umuahia
North Local Government Area, Eze Henry Ezekwem, made the call in
Umuahia, and described the clamp down on MASSOB as a misplacement of
priority by the federal government.

Ezekwem was of the view that the government should concentrate on how
to stop the killings, destruction of life and properties of innocent
and law-abiding citizens of the country, which is perpetrated by the
armed Boko Haram group, instead of beaming its search light on the
MASSOB group, which, he said, were agitating peacefully for a cause.

While pointing out that the country was running a democratic system of
government, where citizens had the right to express their opinions,
the traditional ruler noted that unlike the deadly Boko Haram group,
the MASSOB does not pose any threat to human lives as they do not
carry arms to agitate their cause.

"In the North there is Arewa, in the South there is Oduduwa, in the
Niger Delta, we have the militants while in the South East, there is
MASSOB, all crusading for a cause. MASSOB does not pose any threat to
human lives.

"The Federal Government should stop the killing of members of this
group as they are demonstrating peacefully without weapons and
concentrate on ending Boko Haram in Nigeria. If God says he will not
approve Biafra, nobody will question Him".

Meanwhile MASSOB has declared that no amount of intimidation, arrests
and killings would deter NdiIgbo from aspiring for their separate
homeland in the face marginalisation and a concerted effort to
decimate the Igbo people.

Spokesman of the group, Uchenna Madu, said the recent memo dispatched
from the office of the Inspector General of Police (IGP) to all
commissioners of Police in the south-east to the effect that members
of MASSOB be apprehended wherever they were found would not hold
water, maintaining that all efforts to suppress the group would amount
to a waste of time and resources of the government.