NORTHERN ELDERS FORUM URGES BUHARI TO LET NDIGBO GO.

ICHEOKU says Nigeria's Northern Elders Forum has advised Muhammadu Buhari not to impede the Igbo people of Nigeria from seeking their own independent homeland. They arrived at this decision following an emergency summit which they held to address the intractable security challenges facing Nigeria. The group issued a statement through its spokesman Hakeem Baba-Ahmed as follows:- 

"The Forum has arrived at the difficult conclusion that if support for secession among the Igbo is as widely spread as it is being made to look, and Igbo leadership appears to be in support of it, then the country should be advised not to stand in their way. It will not be the best choice for the Igbo or any other Nigerians to leave a country which we have all toiled to build and to which we all have responsibility to fix. But it will not help a country already burdened with failures and on currently on its knees, to fight another war in an attempt to keep the Igbo people in Nigeria.” - Hakeem Baba-Ahmed, Spokesman, Northern Elders Forum.

But responding to the advise, the government of Muhammadu Buhari rejected the advise calling the organization irrelevant and its opinion on matters of Nigeria, a non issue. According to the government, Northern Elders Forum boasts of no credible membership and its leader Ango Abdullahi is a mere general without troops. The government also added that the group is waving a flag at half mast. It is also instructive that this is the second Northern group that has urged Muhammadu Buhari to avoid getting into another civil war which Nigeria cannot afford now. A group of Northern Women Association have previously made their position quite clear that Muhammadu Buhari should allow Biafra to secede peacefully and not plunge Nigeria into another civil war.

ICHEOKU says although some wise words from a group of wise men with old age bequeathed wisdom, but will Muhammadu Buhari listen? It is apparent that Muhammadu Buhari has become deafened by the wickedness of his heart and like the Pharaoh of Egypt, does not listen to anymore any more and will not let the Igbo people go. Possibly, he is waiting until something very devastating happens to Nigeria, such as will make him beg for mercy before he will act responsibly by doing the needful. Marriages do collapse irretrievably and the clobbered nations of Nigeria are no longer comfortable staying the course as one entity. As with divorce, devolution is the best option now for Nigeria in order to avoid an assured coming bloody conflict to forcibly achieve the same outcome which a peaceful division would have ordinarily accomplished. 

The other troubling issue is the indifference of the United Nations Organizations and other major world powers to the unfolding tragic situation in Nigeria. They are pretending as if the dark cloud gathering over Nigeria has not accumulated enough to prod them into action. It is also possible that they are waiting for the real shooting conflict to assume a hellish proportion and then make as much money as they could make through weapons and logistics supplies before intervening. But they could easily step in now and solve the problem facing Nigeria now that it will cost less both in human and material resources and in so doing prevent an impending conflagration and the worse refugee crisis the world will ever know should push come to shove. #NigeriaFacingExistentialCrisis.