The Campaign for Equal Rights and Opportunities for all Nigerians, CERON, has appealed to President Bola Tinubu to release the leader of the Indigenous People of Biafra, IPOB, Mazi Nnamdi Kanu to ensure the restoration of peace in the South East.
CERON made the appeal Thursday in a statement by its Secretary, Francis Odiir who said the call became necessary following the growing earnest demands by people of goodwill that the separatist leader be released to stem the insecurity in that part of the country.
Odiir noted that the continued detention of the Mazi Kanu was in no small measure fueling the insecurity in the South East.
He noted that “a free Nnamdi Kanu holds the key to the restoration of peace in the South East where all manner of individuals have been issuing orders and pronouncements destabilising the East with claims that they were doing it for and in the interest of the IPOB leader.
“These orders including the sit-at-home which has been used to cripple socio-economic activities in the South East and to other parts of the country, by extention, cannot be allowed to continue because what affects the South Easts affects all parts of the country.
“If these groups or individuals who are behind these acts claim they are doing it for the sake of Kanu, we believe that the activities of these set of groups and individuals can be effectively checked if the man they claim they are agitating for is released from detention.
“Moreover many Nigerians believe that if he is released he should be able to calm his followers and call them to order and by so doing ensure the return of peace in that part of the country.
“The Federal Government can achieve this by handing the IPOB leader over to a notable personality from the South East who should be held responsible and accountable for his whereabout and his activities.
“That should not be too much for the Federal Government to do in order to rescue the South East from the grip of those behind the heinous crimes recorded almost on a daily basis in that part of the country, in the name of agitating for Kanu.”
