The Head of the Enugu Province of the Anglican Communion, Archbishop Emmanuel Chukwuma has sounded a note of warning to the leader of the Independent People of Biafra (IPOB), Nnamdi Kanu, over the statements he had made since he was released from detention on bail.
According to him, Kanu must watch his utterances.
In an interview with the SUN newspaper, Chukwuma advised the IPOB leader to seek the advice of elders so as not to derail even as he reviewed the the polity and declared that nobody should drag the country into another war.
He said: “IPOB should know that if they want to get the blessings of the elders and some of us, they should be cautioned in the way they act. Otherwise, if we back out from them, they will lose relevance.
“Since Kanu came out, has he come to see me? But we fought and talked about him. All he does is to be talking about Judaism. Where do we have Judaism in the East? He shouldn’t be a religious bastard. Has he come to see me?
“And many of us fought for him and he came out. Look, Kanu is not an Igbo leader. So he should cool down otherwise he will lose his relevance. He is not an Igbo leader.
“He did not see the civil war, so I’m not happy with him. I am bitter with Kanu because those who fought for him and those who spoke out on his behalf. He has not even visited some of us. Rather he is talking rubbish somewhere else.
“We don’t want anybody to put us into war. We must come to discuss and he must be cautioned to mind what he is saying sometimes. Because as far as I am concerned most of us are talking on his behalf but he has not come. Rather he is going to profess himself to be a Jew or whatever. Was it Judaism that saved him?
“We prayed for him. We talked about him. Many of us were given bad names but up till now he hasn’t even come to pay homage and for us to advise him.
“So whatever he is saying he is saying it on his own. It is his followers and all these people who are now listening to him, particularly even some of the Igbo in the Diaspora that may be sponsoring him. They should be careful and stop disrupting our peace here and giving us a bad name.
“These youths are becoming, somehow, very much unscrupulous. Our youths are also not controlling their own temper. And they are people of today.
“We don’t throw away what the youths are saying but we must caution them, because if you hear what the people on Radio Biafra are saying, they are insulting even the elders in the East, which is not good.
“They should control their statements and they should respect elders. I have said it before, even among our people that we have to respect ourselves.
“We must also have a political and economic base before we can begin to take off. Put our home in order and love ourselves; we should shun arrogance and pomposity among our people.
“The politicians must know that they also have a duty to perform to serve their constituencies.”
