Quite recently, President Muhamadu Buhari made an ethnically biggoted statement about the Igbo speaking Biafrans in the South-Eastern part of Nigeria. Leaders of thought from the South-South geo-political zone, have sharpely berated the President for referring to Ndigbo (Igbos), as a “dot in the circle” and his assertion that South-South leaders have assured him they would not let Ndigbo access the sea.
Notable South-South leaders including Annkio Briggs, Dr. Don Pedro Obaseki, Tony Nnadi, Colonel Tony Nyiam (rtd) and Rear Admiral Geoffrey Yanga (rtd), jointly decried the statement in a virtual conference organised by Njenje Media TV titled: “Addressing ‘The dot in the circle’ in Buhari’s interview, A return to 1966?”
Annkio Briggs, popularly called the ‘Amazon of the Niger Delta’, said
“It does not matter if the Igbo, Ijaw or the Itsekiri, are only ten (10) or one hundred thousand (100,000) people. You do not refer to a people as a dot in the circle. That already shows very clearly, the mindset of the person of President Buhari". She said it was offensive for the President to refer to a people that have an identity as ‘a dot in the circle’. Annkio Briggs maintained that those who told him such, cannot represent the region and therefore spoke to give him pleasure because he (Buhari), is attempting to divide and rule both the South-South and the South-East.
She further stated that the Indigenous People of Biafra (IPOB) and Ndigbo are not the same, affirming that the ties between the Niger Delta and the Igbo remains ever strong.
A former Managing Director of DAAR Communications Plc, Dr. Don Pedro Obaseki, said the South-South and the South-East regions are united in the struggle for survival against the existential threat of the Buhari-led Fulani administration. “The President himself has posed as an existential threat to the Nigerian nation and ethnic nationalities that populate the space". “There are sixty five (65) ethnic nationalities as defined by some of our leaders in the entire South-South and the man comes on public television and says he speaks to two elders, and some youths. It is laughable,” he stated.
Written by Onyemachi Eme
Edited by
Chukwunyere E. Emenogu
For Family Writers Press International
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