By Uche Anagwa
From Owerri to Abakaliki, Umuahia to Awka to Enugu, the five state capitals of the South East, economic life has practically been snuffed out. Those who can afford it have moved their businesses out of the zone. Social life is near zero. Owerri that prided itself as the Las Vegas of Nigeria is now a ghost town. Hoteliers now celebrate when they record 20 per cent occupancy rate. All, courtesy of the weekly sit-at-home in the South East geopolitical zone.
Today, Igbo in the diaspora have resorted to giving out their daughter in marriage outside their ancestral homes because of insecurity in the zone. In the same vein, burials and other social activities have been grounded or held in very low key manner to avoid collateral damage, all because of the insecurity that has accompanied the sit-at-home order.
By next month, it would have been two years that economic activities in the southeastern part of Nigeria began a gradual but steady shutdown following the sit-at-home as declared by the Indigenous People of Biafra (IPOB). IPOB, a self-actualization group, is agitating for separation from Nigeria as presently constituted
IPOB, while declaring the sit-at-home in August 2021, said it was in protest against the continued incarceration of its leader, Mazi Nnamdi Kanu, whom the Federal High Court and the Court of Appeal had earlier discharged and acquitted of charges levelled against him by the Federal Government of Nigeria, including terrorism charges.
Ever since the declaration of the sit-at-home order, life has not been the same in the five south eastern states of Imo, Abia, Anambra, Enugu and Ebonyi. Attempts to export the sit-at-home order to the two neighbouring states of Delta, Rivers that have significant indigenous Igbo-speaking populations have met a brick wall.
So, in essence, it has been the five core Igbo states that make up the South East geopolitical zone that have borne and continued to bear the brunt of the order that has crippled economic and social activities in the zone.
Ironically, the five South East states are known for their comparative advantage in commerce and industry as the economy of these five states revolve around them with a generous sprinkle of manufacturing and the hospitality sector.
A few months into the declaration, following public outcry on the damage the order was negatively impacting on the economic activities of the once vibrant zone, IPOB came out to announce that the order had been suspended, a declaration that made the people of the region to heave a sigh of relief.
However, the Simon Ekpa-led faction of IPOB has continued to insist that the sit-at-home order continues until its leader is released from custody. Apart from the usual Monday sit-at-home, most of the time, the people are ordered to sit at home on other days of the week.
Only recently, anxiety was created in the SouthEast when gunmen, suspected to be enforcing a one-week sit-at-home order declared by the Ekpa-led faction of the IPOB, threw residents of the region into panic and confusion. In the process, lives were lost and goods worth millions of naira were destroyed.
Moves by the governors of Anambra and Enugu, Professor Chukwuma Soludo and Peter Mbah, respectively to declare the sit-at-home order as over have only met with more death and destruction. At the last count, the sit-at-home has cost the South East over N5 trillion in the last two years.
It is time for the leaders of the South East, cutting across political, business, religious and traditional lines, to come together and put their heads together to find a lasting solution to the menace. The time to play the ostrich is over, as everyone is now directly or indirectly involved and affected by the negative effects of the sit-at-home order.
First, the leaders of the zone should as a matter of urgency constitute a high-powered delegation to visit President Bola Tinubu and press for the immediate release of Mazi Nnamdi Kanu. The release of Kanu will not only douse the tension in the region but also point a finger at those who hide under the continued detention of the IPOB leader to engage in criminal and violent activities.
This visit should be followed up with an intense security approach. It is unheard of anywhere in history that non-state actors are stronger than the state itself. Adequate intelligence should be deployed to fish out the criminal elements who hide under the IPOB agitation to visit violence on the people. Or how can one justify the killing of people and destruction of people’s means of survival in the guise that you are fighting for their “liberation”?
Thirdly, the political leaders should rise from their comfort zones in Abuja, Lagos and elsewhere to identify with the people. For now, there seem to be no practical moves by elected representatives of the people to put an end to the debacle. Rising one day and speaking out against the continued sit-at-home in their region and frowning at the seemingly indifference by the leadership across the three tiers of government will send the right signals.
It is on record that the Nigerian government has not reached out to the government of Finland to register their displeasure that the activities of Ekpa, who as a Finnish citizen, are causing so much economic and social havoc in the southeastern part of Nigeria, while sitting pretty cool in Finland.
Ala Igbo is bleeding. The pain and terror endured by the common man in the region is heart-rendering. The time has come for all, irrespective of political and religious and business interests, to come together and lift the masses out of the misery. The time is now.
•Anagwa, a social commentator, writes from Abakaliki