Biafran warlord, a former Secetary-General of the Igbo apex sociocultural organization, Ohaneze Ndigbo and now the Secretary-General of the Supreme Council of Elders of the Indigenous People of Biafra, world-wide, Col Joe Achuzia, retd, has said that the governor of Anambra state, Chief Willie Obiano was not a party to the gruesome murder of unarmed members of the Indigenous People of Biafra (IPOB) at Nkpor and other locations in Anambra state on the 30th of May, 2016.
The Amnesty International had in its November, 2016 report accused Nigerian security forces of killing unarmed IPOB activists. Makmid Kamara, the Interim Director of Amnesty International Nigeria was quoted as saying: "By far the largest number of pro-Biafra activists were killed on Biafra Remembrance Day on 30 May 2016 when an estimated 1,000 IPOB members and supporters gathered for a rally in Onitsha, Anambra State.
The night before the rally, the security forces raided homes and a church where IPOB members were sleeping. On Remembrance Day itself, the security forces shot people in several locations. Amnesty International has not been able to verify the exact number of extrajudicial executions, but estimates that at least
60 people were killed and 70 injured in these two days. The real number is likely to be higher."
Absolving the governor of Anambra state, Chief Willie Obiano of any involvement in the said killings, Col. Joe Achuzia said that he held meeting with the then Anambra state Commissioner of Police, Hosea-Hassan Karma, now Assistant Inspector General of Police in-charge of Zone 9, Umuahia, on the 29th of May 2016 where they agreed on police non-interference with the event of the following day, May 30th.
And stressed that in that meeting, that Mr. Hassan Karma had assured him that the police would stay away from the Biafra Remembrance Day event of May 30th; but that while himself and others had secured police consent and understanding for a hitch free Biafra Remembrance Day celebration that they forgot that there was the army too.
The Biafan war legend famed my his heroic feat that gave him the name "Air Raid" during the 30 months civil war, revealed that the bulk of IPOB members that moved from Asaba assembled and took off from his house in Asaba to cross the Niger bridge into Onitsha and regretted that Gov. Willie Obiano's name was being wrongly associated with the May 30th killings.
He however blamed the misinformation on people who believe in "hear say", "people who were far from the scene but chose to believe anything their ear hears. People who were not in the know of what actually happened preferring to absorb unfathomable lies for truth," he said. Maintaining that Gov. Willie Obiano was not a party to what the army did and should be left alone.
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