Why North is against Biafra agitation – NEF chief Paul Unongo

Paul Unongo, chairman of the Northern Elders Forum, NEF, has stated that the region is against Biafra because the civil war was a bitter experience that should not be witnessed again.

The Minister of Steel Development in the Second Republic said this in a chat with Vanguard.

Answering a question on why Nigeria has yet to decide on desirable constitution after many years, Unogo said some people were playing politics with the issue.

“People are just playing politics. I know precisely what is worrying the people of the South-East. You have a Constitution that somehow stopped an Igbo man from becoming the President.

“The Igbo is a majority tribe. Even my tribe, Tiv, is not a minority tribe. We are the majority tribe in Taraba, in Nasarawa and in Benue. And when Nigeria chose to discuss, we were not represented”, he said.

“I know what is behind the agitation for Biafra. But you don’t go out and say, ‘give us Biafra.’ Biafra is a bitter experience. Biafra is a war we fought for three years, and two or three million people were killed. I don’t understand these young men trying to break us up.

“If you talk about injustice, I understand what injustice is. In 1978/1979, I was a leader of a political party known as the NPP. I wrote the Constitution of the NPP, and it was because I respected Azikiwe as the father of the nation. I was determined to work with Azikiwe, but the Igbo let me down.

“We have Nigerians who are committed to this country. But the potentials of this country are being delayed by the people who want Nigeria’s structure to remain unitary system and the people who want Nigeria to be a federation failing to dialogue that will allow the people of Nigeria to talk to themselves.

“We have been wasting money on conferences that are not representative of the people. Let us call the real people of Nigeria, let us call a sovereign national conference; that is what will move Nigeria forward. Nigerians would produce a Constitution that would be representative of the people, not a ‘paddy-paddy’ conference that will take us nowhere. We should do away with a unitary structure.”