By Ochereome Nnanna

ON December 18,2021, I was travelling home to Abiriba with my family for the Christmas holidays. Just after Owerri enroute Umuahia, an announcement came on the radio that the Imo State Governor, Hope Uzodimma, would host a meeting of “stakeholders” on January 3,2022 and name the sponsors of insecurity in the state. According to him, 18 suspects arrested by the security agencies in the state had given “dependable” evidences of the culprits.

The Owerri Prisons were attacked on April 5, 2021 and almost 2,000 prisoners let loose. Imo has been an epicentre of the activities of the so-called “unknown gunmen”. Uzodimma’s country home in Omuma was attacked by suspected Indigenous People of Biafra, IPOB, gunmen. His security response team caught and extra-judicially murdered “Ikonso”, one of IPOB’s foremost vigilante operatives believed to have led the assault on his home.

Hundreds of policemen, soldiers, Independent National Electoral Commission, INEC, personnel and others have been selectively killed and their facilities razed. In response, the Nigerian Army, Air Force and Directorate of State Services, DSS, have been routinely mobilised for scorch operations that have killed thousands of youth and many communities invaded and destroyed.

Many of the youth were plucked from their homes, schools and off the streets and either extrajudicially murdered or hauled into detention in unknown places. Imo State, especially Uzodimma’s Orlu and Ideato areas, has been severally bombed by the Air Force. “Orlu Bleeds” trends regularly on Twitter.

To say that Imo State has been a war zone  is an understatement. Indeed, Uzodimma has moved in convoys protected by armoured military vehicles. And so, when he promised to name the sponsors of the Imo insecurity, I was particularly interested and waited with great anticipation.

But on the appointed day (January 3, 2022) what came out of the governor was a whimper, not a bang. He failed to name names as promised. He only said: “Let us allow the security agencies to finish their investigation and reveal the names of the sponsors of insecurity and they will be arrested”. Then he called on his predecessor, Rochas Okorocha, to allow him to “rule this state as the governor”. What transpired behind the scene?

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The war between Uzodimma and Rochas had started before the controversial 2019 election, and intensified when Uzodimma emerged and decided to recover the Imo people’s property allegedly looted by Rochas and his family members for which he is hounded by the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission, EFCC.

Who really is (or are) responsible for reducing Imo State to a war zone, and what game are they up to? The governor has been pointing in different directions and creating confusion. If there is a sinister game being perpetrated by enemies of the Igbo people, is he part of this game or a mere helpless passenger?

After the Owerri jailbreak, the Muhammadu Buhari government blamed it on the IPOB. Rag-tag Arewa groups on social media immediately took up the refrain. IPOB strongly denied involvement. Surprisingly, Uzodimma came out with a position that appeared to shift the klieg lights of suspicion from IPOB. On May 24, 2021, the governor revealed that over 70 per cent of the over 400 gunmen who attacked Imo were “not Igbo”.

The implication of this is that people were brought in from zones that have always harboured enemy sentiments towards the Igbo to attack Imo and blame IPOB. Who sponsored them, and from where? The attack on the Abia Cattle Market on Tuesday, February 16, 2022 in Omumauzo, Ukwa West LGA of Abia State which claimed the lives of some cattle dealers and cows was also quickly blamed on IPOB and its vigilante arm, the Eastern Security Network, ESN. Indeed, the Coalition of Northern Groups issued a statement threatening retaliation in the North.

However, a statement issued by the Human Rights Writers Association, HURIWA, and signed by its National Coordinator, Emmanuel Onwubiko and National Media Director, Zainab Yusuf, exculpated IPOB and ESN of the attack but instead blamed some elements in the “security forces” and foreign terrorists hired by Miyetti Allah. This grave direct accusation by a foremost human rights advocate has not been officially refuted.

Other incidents recorded under this Buhari dispensation also point to the fact that state security agencies have not hidden their ethnic bias in performing their constitutional functions. For instance, in April 2016, the DSS through its spokesman, Tony Opuiyo, claimed that they discovered a “mass grave” in a forest in Abia State. “Service has uncovered the heinous role played by members of the Indigenous Peoples of Biafra in the abduction/kidnap of five Hausa-Fulani residents, namely Mohammed Gainako, Ibrahim Mohammed, Idris Yakubu, and Isa Mohammed Rago at Isuikwuato LGA in Abia State.

“The abducted men were later discovered at the Umuanyi Forest, Abia State, where they were suspected to have been killed by their abductors and buried in shallow graves, amidst 50 other shallow graves of unidentified persons. Arrests and investigation conducted so far revealed that elements within the IPOB carried out this dastardly action.”

According to this statement, DSS was able to identify five “Hausa-Fulani” victims “killed by IPOB” but failed to disclose the identities of the other 50 (obviously Igbo victims) and who killed them. DSS considered four “Hausa-Fulani” corpses more important than 50 other bodies which they failed to identify!

From the above, there is more to the insecurity in the South-East (especially Imo and Anambra) than IPOB and its ESN. Some evil elements are bent on destroying the South-East with external terrorist hirelings and blame IPOB/ESN. They want an outbreak of bloodshed between Igbo and Arewa. But the truth will surely come out when Buhari leaves us. Happily, that moment is in sight!