The banned Indigenous People of Biafra (IPOB) has reacted to the threats by the Anambra State Governor, Charles Soludo, to sanction civil servants in the state who fail to come to work as a result of the Monday sit-at-home order in the South-East.
Gov. Soludo had warned that civil servants who fail to report to work on Mondays will lose their salaries.
However, in a statement on Sunday by its spokesman, Emma Powerful, IPOB dismissed Gov. Soludo’s threat, insisting that the sit-at-home is a legal, peaceful civil protest embarked on by the people to show solidarity with Nnamdi Kanu.
IPOB reminded Gov. Soludo that the state is not a military barracks, and that the people of the state are not tenants in their own land.
It insisted that no governor has the power to compel citizens to open their businesses or move about against their will, especially when their action is a peaceful, non-violent expression of conscience.
The Monday sit-at-home, the IPOB statement added, is civil disobedience, and not terrorism, noting that Gov. Soludo should recognise the elementary democratic principle called civil disobedience, which is “a peaceful refusal to cooperate with policies and conditions viewed as unjust”.
It warned that a government that turns peaceful protest into punishable misconduct is simply declaring war on the people’s dignity.
The pro-Biafra group further urged Gov. Soludo to “stop fighting his own people to impress Abuja. Governor Soludo must not pretend he does not understand what is happening. Nobody is deceived.
“The frustration in Igboland is deep. The anger is justified. The pain is historic. And the Monday sit-at-home is a token expression of that collective burden.
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“But instead of confronting the injustice that fuels agitation, the governor has chosen the weak and disgraceful route of harassing his own people—to be seen as loyal by Abuja power brokers who have shown nothing but contempt for Igbo lives and Igbo dignity.
“When criminal violence is tolerated elsewhere, and killers are pampered, negotiated with, and incentivised under rehabilitation, it is a tragedy that an Igbo governor would devote his energy to threatening traders, punishing youths, and blackmailing citizens for choosing to stay in their homes peacefully.”
IPOB warned Gov.. Soludo that any task force set up against the people would be viewed as a provocation.
“If Governor Soludo, in his desperation for applause, proceeds to establish any task force, enforcement squad, or vigilante-style unit to coerce citizens into opening shops through threats, extortion, harassment, arrests, or intimidation, then he has crossed a red line. That will not be governance.
That will be provocation. That will be oppression.
“And the people will treat it for what it is: an open declaration of hostility against the spirit of Biafra and the collective resolve of Ndị Igbo.”
