Confab: Group Rejects Ike Nwachukwu’s Leadership

A group, the Lower Niger Congress, LNC, has declared its opposition to nomination of Gen. Ike Nwachukwu (rtd) as the leader of delegates from the South East geo-political zone to the National Conference.

South East governors, at their meeting in Enugu last week, had nominated the former military governor of old Imo State and a former foreign minister to be the leader of South East delegates to the confab being inaugurated today in Abuja. 

But speaking in Aba, Abia State, over the weekend during a town hall meeting organised by LNC, its secretary general, Tony Nnadi, said his group was opposed to the retired general’snomination due to the ‘fact’ that during the Nigerian Civil War of 1967- 1970, Nwachukwu fought on the Nigerian side against the Igbo. 

Nnadi said since the confab was an opportunity for the Ndigbo to ‘wriggle out of the enslavement’ they had found themselves since the amalgamation of Nigeria in 1914, it would be difficult to achieve that with a delegate led by somebody that was not on their side during the war.

“What the Igbo need now is to firmly grab the opportunity presented by the National Conference to discuss about the union. Our being in Nigeria which since 1914 has put us in enslavement,” the group stated, adding that the Igbo do not want to be continuously enslaved.
“But from the way things are, with the South East delegates being led by someone who fought against us during our war of emancipation, we are afraid if we are going to make headway at the confab,” the LNC stated. 

Nnadi warned against Ndigbo misusing the opportunity presented by the National Conference, for according to him, “since the Aburi Accord of 1967, everybody knew there had been an unfinished business in the project called Nigeria, hence the confab and we should make the mistake of sending people who would not represent the interest of Igbos there. 

“Nigeria, which was structured to enslave the Igbo, has gone to a point where it needs to be reconstructed, and the best opportunity has been presented by the confab. That is why we are saying that Ndigbo should not toy with it. 

“LNC is of this opinion that, because the amalgamation of Northern and Southern Protectorates by Lord Lugard was a treaty; and all treaties have a lifespan of 100 years. That being the case, Nigeria, as a union, is dead and its burial ceremony will be conducted in 2014. If there will be a new union, it would be worked out by all,” the group said.