• Ohanaeze urges Ndigbo to be patient

Acting President Yemi Osinbajo, will next week convene a joint meeting of leaders of the Northern  and their South-eastern counterparts.

     The proposed meeting is in continuation of ongoing ethnic parley to resolve the impasse and tension created by the recent quit notice on Igbo living in the north by Arewa youths.

President-General of Ohanaeze Ndigbo, Chief Nnia Nwodo, who made the disclosure, yesterday, appealed to Igbo to remain calm and patient in the face of the apprehension created by the October 1 ultimatum, as the acting president had assured that the Federal Government would be fair to all.

Nwodo was accompanied by Igbo leaders, including former governor of the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN), Prof. Charles Soludo and Bishop of the Catholic Diocese of Nsukka, Most Rev. Godfrey Onah, as they arrived the Akanu Ibiam International Airport, from Abuja after their meeting with Prof. Osinbajo.

He told reporters that the acting president offered explanations to Igbo leaders on the areas of concern they had raised, including their perceived feeling that Ndigbo were being marginalised and treated as second-class citizens in their own country.

“The meeting is still on; we would continue with it next week. We had the opportunity to present our problems, our apprehension about the safety of our people in Northern Nigeria, the grievances of Ndigbo as it were and the factors that culminated in this impasse that we have in the nation.

“He made copious explanations to us and he announced to us that he had met with the leaders of the North and that he was going to meet with the traditional rulers over the weekend and meet with us in a joint session next week.

“He gave assurance to all Igbo living in Northern Nigeria that the Federal Government is doing everything within its power to ensure that their lives were not under threat and that they should feel secured wherever they are doing their businesses and that the responsibility of the government is to ensure security of lives and property. We were very pleased with those assurances and look forward to another meeting with him next week.

“I want to say to our people that their problems are our problems. All the five governors of the South-eastern states  or their representatives were in the meeting, representatives of Ohanaeze national executives were there, religious leaders, including those you see with me here were there, and we are all concerned about the security imperative in the country,” Nwodo explained.

According to him, “the development following the announcement of the Arewa youths have triggered the state of insecurity in the country. It is the desire of all that this be managed properly so that we can return to normalcy without compromising the issues that gave rise to them.”

On the perceived pensive mood, especially among youths in the South-east, the Ohanaeze boss said: “I would like them to be patient, I will ask them to be confident that we, their fathers, will not abandon them and that their fears and misgivings about our marginalisation, our treatment as second-class citizens, we will put them in the front burner.

“We can’t talk to anybody less than the acting president and he is very apprehensive of the situation. He has allayed our fears that the Federal Government will be just and fair to all concerned,” he further stated.

     Arewa youths under the aegis of the Coalition of Northern Youths (CNY), after a meeting in Kaduna,

had issued a three-month ultimatum, which expires on October 1, to South-easterners to leave the 19 northern states, in apparent response to the May 30 sit-at-home order called by the Indigenous Peoples of Biafra (IPOB).

   The Arewa youths also said they were tired of the 1914 treaty, which amalgamated the northern and southern protectorates to give birth to Nigeria.