The recent announcement by the Defence Headquarters, DHQ, that the Nigerian Government was engaging the European Union (EU) towards extraditing the self-acclaimed Biafra Prime Minister, Simon Ekpa, must have come as a relief to many Nigerians who had wondered at the aloofness of the Nigerian Government at the destructive activities of this ruffian based in Finland.
According to a newspaper report, Daily Post, the Director of Defence Media Operations, Major General Edward Buba, spoke in response to Ekpa’s announcement of December 2 this year as the date for the map presentation and official declaration of Ekpa’s phantom Biafra Republic.
The report quoted Buba as saying that the Nigerian Government would respond appropriately through the EU.
His words, ‘The FG would respond appropriately to the Finnish Government through the EU. On the part of the military, troops would sustain operations against IPOB/ESN.’
The Nigerian Government’s move came in the wake of Ekpa’s unveiling of what he called a map of the 40 United States of Biafra, following which he had announced that his Biafra Republic would be declared on December 2, 2024.
Ekpa said the move was aimed at expediting the actualization of Biafra’s Independence.
‘The Biafra Government is preparing to present the complete map of Biafra on December 2, 2024,’ Ekpa reportedly claimed.
While we hail the Nigerian Government’s move to bring back Ekpa to Nigeria to face criminal charges, we also quickly wish to express our big disappointment that this sordid business had been allowed to go on for a long time, leading to loss of lives and resources in the South East of Nigeria. Ekpa had severally ordered the goons working for him in Nigeria to go up in arms against constituted authorities, including the governments of the South East Zone where he hails from, and the armed forces personnel, many of who had been killed by those working for Ekpa.
Ekpa has hinged his activities on the continued detention of the leader of the Indigenous People of Biafra, IPOB, Nnamdi Kanu, but Kanu himself had severally come out to deny Ekpa and his claims, urging people to discountenance Ekpa’s claims and to shun his directives for them to sit at home. Yet, Ekpa has continued to claim he is fighting for Kanu.
For long, it seemed as though there was no government in Nigeria as to warrant such a long silence to Ekpa’s criminal activities. There’s no denying that Ekpa has been instigating the series of kidnappings, attacks on government property and killing of armed forces personnel and civilians. He has also been crippling the economy of the South East through his forceful enforcement of illegal sit at home directives. That he had been left for long to be carrying on with his activities by government despite knowing where he is based is, to say the least, most atrocious, given the great toll on human life and resources by Ekpa’s directives.
We therefore, fully welcome the Federal Government’s latest move to extradite Ekpa and hope that the government will walk its talk. Everything must be done to bring Ekpa to justice. He has done incalculable harm to his people and the worst of all is that he does so without remorse.
Recently, a video of Ekpa which went viral had him dancing in his sitting room and gloating over his inglorious activities through his gullible supporters back home.
His murderous activities have gone on long enough and the government must explore every option to get him extradited. The souls he has wasted are crying out for justice and what the government owes those souls is to arrest Ekpa and make him to pay for his crimes. Nothing more, nothing less.
