Politics
THE Sydney, Australia-based Institute for Economics and Peace has removed the Indigenous People of Biafra, IPOB, from its list of 10 deadly terrorists organisations published in its Global Terrorism Index, GTI. The removal came barely 11 days after it the Buhari Media Organisation, celebrated the inclusion through a press release circulated through the News Agency of Nigeria. But the Institute, in a statement, published on its website on Monday, March 27, entitled: “Statement Regarding the Indigenous People of the Biafra, IPOB, and the Global Terrorism Index” described IPOB as a peaceful organization, which has not claimed responsibility for any violence attributed to it, adding that: “The Indigenous People of Biafra (IPOB) is a pro-Biafra secessionist movement based in Southeast Nigeria that aims to establish an independent state of Biafra.”
The Institute noted that “IPOB was proscribed as a terrorist group by the Nigerian government in 2017. In recent years, IPOB has been linked to several attacks, which have been attributed to its paramilitary wing, the Eastern Security Network (IPOB-ESN). The group has not claimed responsibility for any of these attacks.”
“It is important therefore to differentiate between the peaceful activities of the group and its alleged involvement in violent activity. We have today updated the Global Terrorism Index 2023 to reflect this necessary clarification,” it stated.
However, the GTI in its latest update entitled: “Global Terrorism Index 2022” listed Nigeria as number eight in the list of 10 countries most impacted by terrorism.
A PDF document containing the information on the Institute’s website reiterated that: “the Indigenous People of Biafra (IPOB) is a pro-Biafra secessionist movement based in Southeast Nigeria. Its aim is to establish an independent state of Biafra. In 2017, the Nigerian government proscribed the group as a terrorist organisation.
“In recent years, IPOB has been linked to several attacks, which have been attributed to its paramilitary wing, the Eastern Security Network (IPOB-ESN). In 2022, IPOB-ESN were suspected of 40 attacks and 57 deaths. This is an increase from the 26 attacks and 34 deaths attributed to the group in the previous year. IPOB has not claimed responsibility for any of these attacks.
“Despite the proscription of the group, since its emergence in 2012, IPOB has had a focus carrying out peaceful actions towards achieving its aim of a sovereign state in Nigeria’s southeast. Today, many IPOB members, supporters, and followers continue to work peacefully towards this goal. Boko Haram’s attacks almost halved within the last year, while deaths attributed to the group increased slightly from 69 in 2021 to 72 in 2022. This is the lowest number of attacks by the group for over a decade.”
However, the Institute still retained IPOB as number 10 in the list of “20 groups with the largest number of deaths attributed in 2022”.
Prior to this, Realnews recalls that the Buhari Media Organisation, BMO, which has not reacted to the removal of IPOB from the terrorist list as of press time, had issued a press release on March 16, stating that President Muhammadu Buhari administration has been proved right with the listing of IPOB in the latest GTI.
The statement signed by Niyi Akinsiju, chairman of BMO, said the listing of IPOB among the top 10 terrorist groups in the world shows that Federal Government’s 2017 decision to designate it as a terror organization was right. “If there is any report on terrorism that is viewed as credible across the word, it is the annual Global Terrorism Index (GTI) published by the Institute of Economics and Peace. This is one report that tracks terrorist activities and also systematically ranks countries according to the frequency of attacks on an annual basis.
“So while like many Nigerians, we are justified to hail the country’s continuous improvement on the GTI as a result of the success of government’s anti-terrorism initiatives, the downside, for us, is that three groups operating in Nigeria were listed among the top 20 terror groups in the world.
“Incidentally all three, Boko Haram, ISWAP, and IPOB, have been designated as terror groups but it is that of IPOB that has been contentious since 2017 when a Federal High Court proscribed it and described its activities as acts of terrorism. We invite Nigerians to note that while the Buhari administration has continued to treat IPOB as a terror group, some individuals and groups from south-eastern Nigeria have a different view,” the group said.
BMO added: “So now that GTI has listed it among the 10 deadliest groups in the world, alongside IS, Boko Haram, and AlQaeda, as well as outlined some of its recent activities that qualify as terrorism acts, we see it as a justification of the position of the Buhari administration.
“We also believe that it will go a long way in getting the international community to see things from the government’s perspective and enable it to collaborate with Nigeria to check the group’s activities.
“We believe this is the time for Nigeria’s partners to heed President Buhari’s appeal, proscribe IPOB as a terrorist organisation and prevent its leadership from using the Western world as a haven to freely use international financial networks to arm its armed wing, the Eastern Security Network (ESN).”
BMO also said that Nigeria’s improvement on the Terrorism Index from 3rd in 2015 to 8th in 2023, was an affirmation of President Buhari’s assurances of improved security on his watch.
Realnews reports that the Institute of Economics and Peace could have acted based on the petition by Nathaniel Okwunzuzo, who described himself as one of the millions of Biafrans entitled: “Petition against Nazi-style Defamation of the Indigenous People of Biafra (IPOB)”.
In the petition, Okwunzuzo, stated that Ivan Sheen and Global Terrorism Index (2023) seek to destroy IPOB, in collusion with the government of Nigeria, the University of Baltimore, and the Washington Times Newspaper via a defamatory publication by Washington Times, and Global Terrorism Index by imploring the US State Department to declare the indigenous people of Biafra (IPOB)—which encompasses all Biafrans worldwide— a Foreign Terrorist Organization (FTO), to stifle our ability to interact with other IPOB freedom fighters worldwide, and for maliciously including IPOB as the 10th most deadly terror organization on the current FTO list even as the Fulani led government of Nigeria and her band of terrorists intensifies the marginalization and genocide of Biafrans.
Okwunzuzo said: “If Dr. Sheehan and his coconspirators succeed, I would be tagged a ‘terrorist’ for no other reason but being born Biafran and seeking independence from a British contraption that is wholly and utterly fatal to the survival, human rights, and wellbeing of Biafrans, the world over. A country that relies solely on intimidation, genocide, election rigging, and terrorism instead of dialog to perpetuate the similitude of a nation.”
According to Okwunzuzo, “This petition is warranted because:
“On October 4, 2021, the Washington Times published an article titled “U.S. ignores small African terrorist group IPOB at its peril” authored by Dr. Ivan Sascha Sheehan, a professor of international affairs, to bamboozle policymakers and the public alike that the “State Department needs to designate Indigenous People of Biafra as a foreign terrorist organization,” and that “Tagging the group with a terror label would hit IPOB’s wallet hard.”
“Thus, Dr. Sheehan usurped his position as the executive director of the School of public and international affairs of the University of Baltimore to mask his calumny.
“If Dr. Sheehan’s impulse were not identical to the murderous Nazi manifesto of mass criminalization and the subsequent Holocaust of Jews, coupled with the insanely bloodthirsty and terrorist impulse of the Fulani-led government of Nigeria, nobody would bother to dignify it with a response.
“But because the current president of Nigeria, not unlike the Nazis, participated in the British masterminded genocide of 3.5 to 5 million Biafrans yet remains adamant in his implacable rage and the quest to Islamize the genocide survivors and their children, it is therefore imperative that Dr. Sheehan be held accountable for his libelous statements.
“We’re impelled to seek redress not only because Mr. Sheehan has defamed and stigmatized people who are beleaguered and facing existential threats in Nigeria; and not only because he’s conspiring with a foreign government with enormous financial backing to destroy fellow Americans who also are Biafrans, but because the contemporary world has lived through the gruesome slaughter of Jews culminating from such horrific racist propaganda such that both international and national laws have punished such conducts as are premeditated to victimize racial and ethnic groups.
“Recognizing the dangers of fomenting racial hatred or defaming targeted ethnic groups, national and international law provide no safety net for those who wish to hide under freedom of speech. “Article 4 of the International Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Racial Discrimination” treats group defamation as extrinsic to the freedom of expression.
“It is a known fact that the Nazis used ethnic and racial stigmatization to sway public opinion to accept the mass imprisonment and murder of Jews as necessary. Such stereotyping had lingered for generations long before the Nazi party came on the scene and drove it to its logical conclusion. Unchallenged defamatory stereotyping, therefore, is potent to destroy an indigenous group.
“Also, such libelous propagandas are the staple of the Nigerian media echo chamber, which has almost successfully pathologized the entire society with persistent gaslighting as they slaughter the indigenous people of Biafra, Christians, as well as other indigenous Nigerians.
“Because of the relentless assault on the truth by the government media bureaucracy, the masses are senselessly manipulated, pitched against each other, and unable to hold their leaders accountable. Thus, the natural revulsion that horrendous acts should elicit, such as the frequent deployment of the army to massacre peaceful protesters, is thereby quenched with lies.
“For example, the former arrest of the leader of IPOB, Mr. Nnamdi Kanu, in 2015; as he awaited trial for ‘treason’ scheduled for October, 14th 2017, the Nigerian army suddenly invaded his family compound with armored tanks and warplanes on a mission code-named “Operation Python Dance” one month before his trial on September 14, 2017.
“Consequently, twenty-eight of Kanu’s relatives and associates were murdered. His parents later died because of the trauma suffered during the invasion. Kanu narrowly escaped death and went into exile.
“Rather than report this, the Nigerian media saturated the airwaves with claims that Kanu ‘jumped bail.’ At no time was the attempt to assassinate him reported in the public sphere. The consensus shortly became that he ‘jumped bail!’ BBC and other worldwide networks continue to echo this falsehood to date.
“The trial judge arbitrarily revoked the bail granted to Kanu and issued a bench warrant for his [re]arrest on March 28, 2019.
“In contrast, the unlawful murder of any American citizen provokes a natural reaction and demand for accountability by the public. While the slaughter of hundreds of Nigerians in one fell swoop is business as usual in the public eye, with minimal capacity to hold anyone accountable.
“But seeing that Dr. Sheehan is the latest spokesman of the Nigerian government’s international policy of suborning foreign governments, agents, Ngo’s, and businesses to not only whitewash her ongoing Jihad and extensive record of crimes against humanity; but to lobby for more sophisticated military weapons in the pretext of fighting Boko Haram, and to block all uproars as she uses such weapons to slaughter and dispossess indigenous Nigerians of their heritages makes it incumbent on the relevant authorities to hold Dr. Sheehan et al. liable.
“Dr. Sheehan maliciously labels the Indigenous People of Biafra (IPOB) “[a] violent secessionist group…” which the US State Department ought long to have declared a Foreign Terrorist Organization (FTO) “despite repeated pleas to do so by longstanding U.S. ally Nigeria, where IPOB is based and carries out its murderous activities.”
“Two things are clear: Dr. Sheehan knew nothing about Fulani or IPOB before he was induced to write the hit piece. And two, he prostitutes his office as the executive director of the School of public and international affairs of the University of Baltimore, a public institution.
“For the right price, Dr. Sheehan would drench a national newspaper page with Nazi-style propaganda and lies. And the Washington Times, inebriated with Nigeria’s blood money, publishes it with reckless disregard for the truth.
“It is irrefutable that the indigenous people of Biafra are the largest and the most peaceful mass movement in the contemporary world. If IPOB were, in fact, terrorists, as Dr. Sheehan alleges, the British government, with her implacable hatred and disdain for the idea of a free Biafra, would have long rounded them up.
“It is only the terrorist government of Nigeria that desperately stamps IPOB ‘terrorists’ to slaughter them. The rest of the world where they’re domiciled can testify to their deportment.
“IPOB is not a localized organization. Its parent station is in London, UK, while its headquarters is in Langenfeld, Germany. It operates peaceably and legally in over 100 countries and is known for peaceful demonstrations to agitate for true independence from British Nigeria via a referendum. Suffice it to say that all Biafrans living within and outside Nigeria are the Indigenous people of Biafra.
“But since Nigeria, masquerading as Dr. Sheehan et al., gloats to sink her bloody claws into IPOB finances through asinine fabrications, we must unmask them.
“Sheehan claims that the leader of IPOB, Mazi Nnamdi Kanu, “feels no need to even disguise his support of terrorism…”
“Nnamdi Kanu is the de facto leader and director of the Indigenous People of Biafra (IPOB), Radio Biafra, Biafra TV, and countless freedom-seeking Biafrans worldwide. Many non-Biafrans recognize his leadership.
“Before being lawlessly renditioned and detained by Nigerian operatives, Mr. Kanu traveled freely around the world to pursue Biafra’s independence from British Nigeria. He realizes that British Nigeria portends not peace but genocide of the indigenous peoples and religions forcibly lumped into a criminal contraption by the British colonial adventurism.
“Through the utility of radio and social media, Kanu educates, interacts, informs and organizes the beleaguered people of Biafra at home and in the diaspora—in over 100 countries—about the progressive genocide of Biafrans and all Christians by British-Nigeria and their partners in crime such as Britain, BBC, United Nations, US State Department, Multinational Oil Cartels, as well as their numerous proxy terrorist organizations which include but not limited to:
“Boko Haram, Islamic State of West African Province (ISWAP), Al-Qaida of the Maghreb, Fulani Herdsmen, Fulani Nationality Movement (FUNAM), Foreign Jihadi Fulani terrorist (a.k.a Bandits), and Miyetti Allah Cattle Breeders Association of Nigeria (MACBAN)—of which President Buhari, a Fulani herdsman, a war criminal, a coup plotter, an ex-soldier, and an Islamic fundamentalist is their Grand Patron.”
“All the above terrorist organizations are composed primarily of the Fulani tribe. These are facts and by no means intended to stereotype anyone. We do not think or suggest that all Fulani people are terrorists.
“Dr. Sheehan’s sentiments resemble Nigeria’s grossly incompetent and murderous president. The Nigeria “Brown-paper journalism” syndrome has found its foot at the University of Baltimore in the form of “Brown-Paper scholarship.”
“A ‘Brown-paper-bag journalist’ is what Nigerians commonly call journalists who willfully accept cash wrapped in brown paper bags to whitewash, fabricate, or kill stories that they do not like.
“Dr. Sheehan writes, “The December revelation of IPOB’s 50,000 strong-armed paramilitary wing, the Eastern Security Network (ESN), complete with a Swastika-style flag, marked the end to all pretenses of being a peaceful movement.”
“Frankly, where does Dr. Sheehan get off turning reality on its head? His groundless diatribe is tantamount to labeling the survivors of the Holocaust Nazis. The marginalization and hounding of Biafrans are not in dispute. Prominent figures from all regions of Nigeria acknowledge this fact. However, accepting any statements from the perpetrators and their benefactors is as good as ingesting snake poison for clear vision.
“The one question that Dr. Sheehan wouldn’t ask is: Why is terrorism thriving since Buhari became president? When he came into office, only Boko haram was active, but today, there are no less than six known terrorist groups, including a legion of foreign Fulani Jihadist herders and bandits outfitted with sophisticated military rifles, whom the current regime imported to wrest power violently before the 2015 election.
“To douse the tension, former President Goodluck Jonathan bowed out of office, thereby rendering the foreign Fulani Jihadist herdsmen whom Fulani leaders imported to unseat him useless. Armed to the teeth with nobody to kill, they quickly switched gear to the decimation of Northern Christians, many of whom are of Igbo (Biafran) extraction, and the indigenous non-Fulani populations of the north.
“According to the Genocide Watch report, 2020, “Jihadist Fulani Herdsmen are allowed by the Nigerian Government to bear and possess modern assault rifles like AK-47s, while the same Government police and army arrests and prosecutes farmers found in possession of ancient ‘hunters’ guns.”
“For her part, the Fulani-led government distorts all the attacks and the number of casualties to confound the world that farmers and herders are clashing and propagating that many of the casualties are Muslims to conceal the ongoing Islamic jihad.
“It is no secret that northern borders are left wide open for foreign Fulani wanderers from Africa, especially the Sahel region, to troop into the local forests from whence they execute unprovoked pogroms.
“Further, the Fulani regime seized the long window of the 2020 COVID-19 lockdown to transport deadly Jihadist Fulani herdsmen to the neighboring forests across the country.
“These backgrounds are necessary to appreciate the extent of Dr. Sheehan’s ill will, collusion, and calumny.
“Today, they are freely cavorting all parts of the colony and slaughtering non-Fulani citizens with the government’s tacit support.
“Is it any wonder that the government rejects all calls from state governors and high-ranking politicians to correctly identify this horde of warring Jihadists Fulani herdsmen falsely called ‘bandits’ as terrorists due to the degree of their ethnic cleansing raids?
“To be clear, they are ‘bandits,’ but something more insidious is lurking under the concept. When you have a myriad of government-sponsored foreigners trooping into your forests, wielding sophisticated military rifles, and terrorizing a vast population of Nigeria, then what you have is a full-blown terrorist jihad.
“I beg to digress; Mohammadu Buhari is employing, among others, the tactics of using cattle to infiltrate every corner of Nigeria as was done by the Arab Janjaweed of Sudan, leading to the Darfur genocide in western Sudan under Omar Al Bashir.
“A 77-page report by Human Rights Watch in 2004 titled “Darfur Destroyed: Ethnic Cleansing by Government and Militia Forces in Western Sudan” concluded that “There can be no doubt about the Sudanese government’s culpability in crimes against humanity in Darfur,” just as Nigeria.
“The Janjaweed warriors are reportedly notorious for ethnic cleansing and genocidal rape of women and children. According to the late former secretary-general of the UN, Kofi Annan, “In Darfur, we see whole populations displaced, and their homes destroyed, while rape is used as a deliberate strategy.”
“Is this different from what has been happening in Nigeria but hidden from the world?
“Consistent with the above, the Human Rights Watch report of 2021 on Nigeria states that “[there’s been] Widespread sexual violence against women and girls, including an attack that led to the death of a student in May, spurred a national outcry and prompted the authorities to declare a national emergency over rape and sexual violence.”
“While Al Bashir Omar is facing ICC for war crimes and crimes against humanity, “Buhari is quietly receiving more arms from those that invaded Libya for “humanitarian reasons.” The bottom line here, without going too far off, is that all the events that preceded the Darfur genocide are happening today by the same Janjaweed militia that is now freely roaming about in Nigeria.
“Like Darfur, Nigeria has Internally Displaced Persons (IDP) and Refugee camps with similar background stories. The only difference is that Nigeria covers its terrorism by lying to itself and the whole world. At the same time, her neo-colonial beneficiaries shield the criminal contraption from accountability so that their “economic interests” are not disturbed.
“All these are made possible because the British-Nigerian Army, Police, Navy, Airforce, Customs, Ports Authority, Border patrol, Senate, EFCC, NNPC, DSS, Chief Justice of Nigeria, Attorney General and minister of justice, and almost if not all other strategic and security parastatals have been hijacked and now controlled by Muslims most of whom are Fulani.
“Because of the Fulani-laced government, terrorism and kidnapping are thriving industries in British Nigeria. There’s hardly any record of the police intercepting, interrupting, or engaging the Jihadist Fulani herdsmen as they slaughter, pillage, and set entire communities ablaze.
“For example, Agatu, Enugu, and Nimbo pogroms were executed smoothly without any interference from the supposed security forces;
“Also, Onitsha, Aba, Mkpo, Obigbo, Orlu, and Asaba massacres show British-Nigerian forces raiding civilians like Fulani herdsmen terrorists and Boko Haram.
“In most of these, the victims have no recourse to justice: no official investigations, no arrests, no explanations, no courts, no justice, and no comments from the president.
“There is hardly any record of the wandering terrorists (a.k.a bandits)—who are brainwashed by their importers that Nigeria belongs to them, based on the wishes of their Jihadist forebears, fueled by the economic interests of their puppeteers—being arrested, tried, and deported for acts of terrorism or banditry.
“Additionally, the Nigerian media echo chamber is coopted to refrain from reporting the incessant attacks and invasions of indigenous peoples of Nigeria as acts of terrorism. And above all, “to stop pointing fingers.”
“The so-called “captured” Boko Haram terrorists who have slaughtered scores of human beings are quickly declared “repented,” “forgiven,” “rehabilitated,” and reintegrated into society. Many of them have infiltrated the army and police. Is it any wonder that there’s no difference between the army, police, Boko Haram, and Jihadist Fulani herdsmen raids?
“A violent group widely believed to be secret government killers who embark on brazen terrorist activities such as high-profile killings are dismissed as “Unknown Gunmen.” Prominent critics of the government, youth leaders, and top political figures who are insignificant in the IPOB movement are being eliminated by the “unknown gunmen.” So, for convenience, they mendaciously tag the “Unknown Gunmen” operations on IPOB and ESN without evidence.
“Therefore, the Nigerian army and police are hitherto full of and often indistinguishable from Jihadist Fulani terrorists.
“But as soon as the victims dare defend themselves, the government quickly pursues them for carrying “illegal arms” and “causing insecurity.”
“In other words, those that organize their communities to defend themselves against the marauding Fulani Herdsmen terrorists, such as Nnamdi Kanu and Sunday Igboho—who also agitate for a separate Yoruba Nation and organize his people to repel Fulani bandits who are terrorizing Yorubaland from nearby forests — are demonized, extrajudicially executed, falsely labeled terrorists, and, or forcibly disappeared without trial in consonance with Dr. Sheehan’s insinuations.
“So, the widespread killing of Christians and absence of security forces during Jihadist Fulani herdsmen raids, systematic destruction of indigenous farms with cattle, raping and slaughtering of farmers, roadblocks to separate travelers according to their religion before killing, burning of more than 2000 churches, slaughtering of more than 100,000 innocent citizens, displacing more than 6 million victims, and rampant midnight massacres by Fulani Herdsmen terrorists led to the establishment of Eastern Security Network (ESN) by Nnamdi Kanu.
“The ESN came a little too late because tens of thousands of innocent Biafrans have been senselessly massacred by Nigerian forces and Jihadist Fulani terrorists, rendering the masses fearful. But now, many farmers in the southeast are gradually returning to their farms again and are avidly supportive of ESN because nobody else cared to protect them whenever Jihadist Fulani herdsmen struck.
“Shortly after the Lekki Toll Gate massacre of EndSARS protesters in October 2020, the Nigerian forces went door to door in peaceful communities of Obigbo (Oyigbo), Rivers State, abducting, killing, and disappearing no less than 300 innocent Igbo youths accused without evidence of participating in the EndSARS skirmishes. Different accounts abound, ranging from 100 to 500 victims.
“The EndSARS movement is a series of countrywide and international protests to expose and end police brutality and criminality in Nigeria. The slogan is the rallying or clarion call to end the Special Anti-Robbery Squad of the Nigerian Police, notorious for rampant human rights abuses, armed robbery, kidnapping, and extra-judicial killings, as well as to protest the tyrannical government of Nigeria.
“But according to the International Society for Civil Liberties and Rule of Law, whose independent investigations corroborates the Premium Times Special Investigative report on the Obigbo massacre, “over 60 defenseless citizens mostly belonging to Igbo Ethnic Nationality were shot and killed by soldiers of the heavily Muslim dominated Nigerian Army and that between 90 and 100 others were shot and deadly injured. While scores have been permanently disappeared, between 200 and 300 others are still being held captive in secret or undisclosed military facilities within and outside Rivers State.”
“By the way, Obigbo is only one of many such Gestapo operations in the southeast.
“The reports can be found here: Intersociety: http://intersociety-ng.org/component/k2/item/579-nigeria.
“Thousands of peaceful IPOB protesters are repeatedly massacred, abducted, forcibly disappeared, and held in detention without trial by Nigerian forces. Yet, whenever confronted, bizarre pathological lying and denying ensues. But no reasonable person believes their fairytales immediately after slaughtering human beings.
“Most importantly, Nigerian forces waylay and senselessly kill civilians on the presumption that only they and their band of terrorists should have the monopoly of killing until ESN Security decided to test their theory. Now you see why the terrorists themselves label ESN ‘terrorists.’ To confound the feeble and animate the likes of Dr. Sheehan!
“Amnesty International, the United Nations, and many human rights advocates, including the US State Department—which is very hostile to the plight of Biafra and serially ignores Nigeria’s crimes against humanity—know about the extra-judicial killings and human rights abuses in Nigeria. The internet is inundated with Nigerian soldiers’ and Fulani killings which Dr. Sheehan and his cohorts ought not to be defending.
“Dr. Sheehan falsely accuses IPOB of “[enforcing] a sit-at-home day every Monday, intended to economically cripple the region, through acts like the torching of passenger buses.”
“IPOB has ended the periodic sit-at-home protest and left it up to individuals. Although, if needs be, it declares certain days as such in solidarity with Nnamdi Kanu, who was criminally renditioned and tortured in Kenya en route from London, UK, and flown blindfolded to Nigeria, detained and facing trumped-up charges in the kangaroo court.
“But as seen from the above account, the sit-at-home protest did not emerge from a vacuum.
“Due to the menace of slaughtering protesters and the mind-boggling silence of the world powers, the idea of sitting at home was adopted to mitigate the bloodbaths that follow harmless, peaceable IPOB protesters since Buhari became president.
“The economic impact is simply incidental to that option. The alternative is to exercise the right to protest and risk having Nigerian forces unleash weapons obtained from foreign governments via the pretext of fighting Boko Haram on innocent youths yearning for freedom.
“Numerous IPOB groups are seen via social media demonstrating in Germany, Russia, the UK, the USA, Israel, and every other country free from molestation except Nigeria.
“Why are the so-called “FREE WORLD” leaders silent as genocide is committed against an indigenous population of more than sixty million people for wanting freedom? When Biafrans demand a referendum to choose whom they wish to be and where they wish to belong since Nigeria kills them, the Fulani terrorist government trumpets the 1967-70 genocidal war!
“Sixty-one years later, Biafra is still shackled with the chains of neo-colonization, marginalization, injustice, economic blockade, and terrorism.
“No matter how imperfect, most Biafrans share Nnamdi Kanu’s sentiments wholeheartedly. Nigeria is unbearable, unsustainable, and irredeemable. It gives Fulani unhindered access to kill innocent Christians and serve foreign interests at the expense of the Indigenous peoples. It has no legitimacy or moral justification to be. It is a British estate addicted to pillaging, mass killing, and mass graves.
“The government forces of Nigeria have already slaughtered more than 30,000 unarmed Biafran protesters for exercising their lawful national and international rights of association, speech, and self-determination.
“As seen from the preceding, the ESN, which Dr. Sheehan falsely labels IPOB, was formed out of innate survival instincts and raw necessity because the security forces, forest-prowling Jihadist Fulani predators, and Jihadist Fulani herdsmen were on a rampage, spilling blood and terrorizing the southeastern region and the rest of the country with impunity.
“So then, ESN is not a terrorist organization, as Dr. Sheehan maliciously alleges. The Fulani terrorist president of Nigeria is simply seeking the expansion of the marginalization of Biafrans in the West and the rest of the world by buying the likes of Dr. Sheehan using revenue generated from the oil and gas fields of Biafra.
“In his morbid fear and pillage-driven hatred of the Igbos, the Islamic fundamentalist president has deployed a sizeable portion of the army that should be fighting real terrorists to the southeast—while al Qaeda and ISIS-affiliated terrorists besiege the northern Christians —to foment conflict and “shoot-at-sight” Biafran youths and tag them ESN or IPOB as if they were terrorists.
“ESN stands for Eastern Security Network and lives up to its name. Only homicidal maniacs push to restrain victims from defending themselves. The rights to life and Self-defense are not crimes under the international conventions on human rights. They are inalienable rights!
“While Boko Haram and Fulani herdsmen—recognized by the Global Terrorism Index as the second and fourth deadliest terrorist organizations on earth—are in constant dialogue with the Nigerian government, leading to their exponential growth on the one hand and magical repentance cum forgiveness of thousands of Boko Haram and ISWAP terrorists on the other, the ESN members have a standing Shoot-at-Sight order by the president and hounded for daring to provide security in the southeast.
“The attempt by Nnamdi Kanu to expose and resist the legion of forest Jihadi Fulani Herdsmen in collusion with the terror-infested army and police is what Dr. Sheehan, like the ‘brown-paper-bag journalists’ of Nigeria, calls ‘terrorism.’
“In further pursuit of her national and foreign policy of “brown-paper journalism” and whitewashing schemes, Nigeria banned Twitter because it has no control over the platform. But not before President Buhari’s account was suspended for “violating [Twitter] community guidelines.” The Twitter fiasco occurred against the backdrop of President Mohammadu Buhari’s June 1, 2020 tweet making genocidal threats that the masses of IPOB, whom he falsely labeled ‘insurrectionists,’ were in for a “rude shock.”
“Many of those misbehaving today are too young to be aware of the destruction and loss of lives that occurred during the Nigerian Civil War, and those of us in the fields for 30 months, who went through the war, will treat them in the language they understand” President Buhari tweeted.
“The lying continues… “Since [2021], violent IPOB attacks on security personnel and civilians have surged by a terrifying 59%; deaths by 344%.”
“How did Dr. Sheehan arrive at these numbers, albeit meaningless and bogus? Remember that he is the executive director of the School of Public and International Affairs at the University of Baltimore!
“Nobody would believe it came from such an essential institution if this were not printed.
“He further claims, “More than 20 attacks were carried out in the first three months of this year alone” and that “In one recent attack on a Fulani community, six young children were butchered with machetes – one, a baby, was burned alive. Their bodies were discarded in mass graves.”
“And that “In addition to attacks on the state, much of [IPOB] violence is directed towards the Fulani people, a nomadic tribe of herders that roam across West Africa.
“In this galling irony and elaborate fabrication, Dr. Sheehan deliberately projects the typical barbaric acts of Fulani terrorists and Nigerian armed forces on IPOB to confound the gullible and inspire hatred of Biafrans. Sheehan knows the Fulani are not an innocent nomadic tribe merely roaming about.
“He must therefore be ready to furnish the public with the location of the alleged attacks, the victims’ identities, the mass grave’s site, and the proof that IPOB did it.
“The Fulani wanderers are known across West Africa for their endless feverish orgy of violence, the savagery of raping underaged girls, burning churches, massacring Christians, slaughtering children and babies, disemboweling pregnant women in broad daylight, destroying farm crops with cattle, and amputating limbs or decapitating their victims with machetes.
“The Fulani mayhems are innumerable. Nobody will ever be able to fully record the atrocities of Fulani and the Nigerian government because they are simultaneously occurring in every region, every day of every year. Most Nigerians have become numb to the rampancy of senseless deaths.
“For a glimpse, google images of Fulani killings in Nigeria, then Fulani massacres in Nigeria, and then Google the list of killings in Nigeria. But beware of gory images.
“The Nigerian government has been corrupting the international community, tech industry, and social media with the menace of brown-paper journalism as it seeks to whitewash and scrub the internet of her blood rivers.
“To be clear, when Biafrans speak of Fulani, it is not as a function of hate but of the well-documented and extensive history of Fulani violence and reckless disregard for life, liberty, and justice, and of the necessity to speak the truth and mainly because of their penchant for bloodcurdling.
“We are not unmindful of the appearance of bigotry. The dilemma here is to be politically correct or speak for the hapless tens of thousands daily being slaughtered by the Fulani elite predatory culture of lying, bigotry, banditry, and terrorism.
“Are all Fulani, therefore, killers? Of course not. It would be absurd to make such a generalization. But ask any honest Nigerian who the people wandering about all regions of the country are, lurking in forests, establishing harems in the forest regions near you, carrying out senseless midnight raids, displacing indigenous communities, destroying indigenous farms, industrial-scale kidnapping for ransom, savagely raping women as if at war, forming various terrorist organizations, massacring entire communities, valuing cattle over humans, serially Kidnapping and raping school children, concealing their activities, and threatening other Nigerians?
“Ask also who their sponsors are. If the answer is not resoundingly and factually Fulani, then nothing should be spared to indict us.
“So, for the sake of those that think that the Indigenous People of Biafra seek independence out of hate for anyone, or primordial tribal instincts, or to keep the richly endowed land, including the oil and gas fields of Biafra to themselves, then you have been lied to by Britain, BBC, Nigeria, and the other beneficiaries of the criminal contraption.
“Biafrans wish that Fulani, having already ideologically seceded from Nigeria by instituting the Sharia law in the twelve core Muslim states, should have their own country and stop trying to impose Sharia law on more than 120 million Christians.
“The 1999 Constitution covers all Nigeria regions but has long been dumped for the Sharia. Sharia is an affront to the constitution of Nigeria. The dangers are unfolding daily as two separate legal systems are now standing face to face in one country.
“The truth is that Biafrans have never been at ease in Nigeria. We have been at the receiving end of the British-orchestrated Fulani Nazi-style stereotyping, propaganda, genocide, blockade, electoral fraud, census fraud, marginalization, mediocrity, looting, and progressive genocide of our parents, brothers, sisters, children, relations, and Christians.
“If you’re wondering how this came about, Britain deliberately lumped disparate peoples into one country to produce a monstrous contraption to serve her sadistic, insatiable, and implacable “economic interest.” The imperialists prefer to empower the Fulani, who are not indigenous to Nigeria, to protect their interests in exchange for power, support, and protection. That’s why the world is eerily silent on all the killings in Nigeria.
“At the very least, we must agree that it is not a crime under international law to defend ourselves or seek independence from a genocidal country that does not share our values or aspirations.
“All of Dr. Sheehan’s arguments were such barefaced lies with no iota of evidence. But because he seeks to endanger millions of Biafrans the world over, failing to hold him accountable will not only keep the lies circulating until they become true but make those who refuse to hold him accountable, especially the University of Baltimore, accessories after the fact.
“So why hasn’t the U.S. [declared IPOB an FTO]? Sheehan asks…
“This question deserves no answer, but for the benefit of those uninformed about IPOB worldwide, it’s because the group is not and has never been a terrorist organization, and the US State Department Knows that! Dr. Sheehan surprisingly knows nothing about either Nigeria or Fulani, so what compelled him to write? And what gave him the impetus to recklessly project the crimes, tactics, and tendencies of the government of Nigeria on the victims whose only crime at any given point is daring to defend their communities and themselves.
“More: “that a small terrorist organization can bully senior U.S. officials in American courts and leverage the influence of foreign agents to challenge an ally’s security would be laughable were it not so alarming.” And that “Washington must not ignore Nigeria’s terrorists any longer.”
“The last quotation is the only truth in the entire piece. It’s genuinely high time Washington investigated how the Buhari government came to power on the pretext of fighting terrorism while killing Biafrans and proliferating terrorism. At Buhari’s inauguration in 2015, there was only one terrorist group: Boko Haram, but today, terrorism has spread to every region of Nigeria and is ostensibly carried out by his tribesmen.
“Finally, the people suing the US State Department are not “[African] terrorists.” They’re American citizens unless Dr. Sheehan does not believe that all Americans, including Blacks, have the right to seek remedy when aggrieved.
“There’s nothing laughable when the ally you speak for is worse than the Nazi. The British Nigerian state slaughters her citizens en masse. It sponsors ethnic terrorists who are recognized on their own merits by human rights organizations and the World Terror Index as human rights abusers and as dangerous terrorist organizations.
“In sum, to label peace-loving people “terrorists” because they wish to end the ongoing genocide of their loved ones, and extricate themselves from the stranglehold of death, the manacles of economic slavery, the horror of Islamic fundamentalism, and the legion of Fulani terrorists is the height of calumny and wickedness.
“Ivan Sascha Sheehan is the School of Public and International Affairs executive director at the University of Baltimore. Dr. Sheehan, GTI, and their coconspirators must be held accountable.”
KN
Tags: Buhari Media Organisation IPOB IPOB-ESN
