By Sonia Odigie
The indigenous people of Biafra (IPOB) on Tuesday said it has no operational camp at Enugu-Ezike,
Igbo-Eze Local Government Area (LGA) of Enugu State, blaming the killings and ongoing kidnapping for ransom in the area on fake members of the group masquerading as ‘Autopilots’.
For some time now, the people of Enugu-Ezike community have been terrorised by people parading themselves as Eastern security Network (ESN).
IPOB blamed the leader of the self-proclaimed ‘Autopilots’ faction of the group, Simon Ekpa, accusing them of destroying “innocent citizens and residents of the area by snatching of cars, bikes, kidnapping for ransom and calling some notable clergymen on phone such as Pastors and Reverend Fathers, threatening them to pay some amount of cash to them raging from #50M to 100M or risk their church auditorium burnt to ashes. Some of these clergymen out of fear are complying and paying money to these criminals.”
IPOB Spokesperson, Comrade Emma Powerful, said in a statement that the perpetrators of the insecurity in the area were Unknown Gunmen displaced from the security operations in Anambra and Imo States.
Dismissing their claims that they were recently recruited ESN operatives, IPOB said “the Eastern Security Network (ESN) stopped recruiting personnel since two years ago. Therefore, anybody deceiving and parading himself or herself as joined ESN recently is working with infiltrators and will die in the hands of Nigeria Government and its security Agencies.”
“ESN operatives under IPOB-DOS knew from the time immemorial that Nigeria Government and its security Agencies are our enemies and we have mastered strategies of handling these enemies.
“ESN don’t have any operational camp at Enugu-Ezike Igbo-Eze Enugu North. Those terrorizing men and women of God including traditional rulers are not ESN Operatives or IPOB volunteers. IPOB and ESN do not call our people to bring money to them. Anybody who wish to support ESN Operatives do that willingly and voluntarily without any form of force or threat. The youths of the affected communities must come out and identify these criminals because IPOB is coming out to deal with them.
“Those claiming to be Autopilots without Aeroplanes are not IPOB family members and we cannot allow them to destroy IPOB’s image. Autopiloters are free to do anything in their names but not impersonating IPOB . We are not against anyone or group fighting for Biafra so long as you’re not impersonating IPOB, ESN, M-Branch and Mazi Nnamdi Kanu and with the sole objective of destroying the hard earned good image and reputation of IPOB and ESN.
“We discovered that those responsible for the recent insecurities going on in Enugu-Ezike and other communities are hoodlums that were recruited by Autopiloters who were driven out of Anambra and Imo States. These hoodlums found their way to Enugu-Ezike through their henchmen called Chocho and Ejiofor. These guys relocated to Enugu to continue their criminalities in these villages. Though they deceitfully recruited some of the bad guys of those communities who thought they were joining ESN. But what they don’t know is that IPOB is not organisation for criminals and we never recruited criminals into ESN.
“But these criminals has ended up using same youths for criminalities instead of fighting insecurities and Fulani bandits masquerading as herdsmen and terrorizing that Aguibeje bush and forests which has a border with Akpanya Community in Kogi State which IPOB-ESN is protecting.
“They have recruited lots of criminals terrorizing their own people, Innocent citizens and residents of the area by snatching of cars, bikes, kidnapping for ransom and calling some notable clergymen on phone such as Pastors and Rev Fathers threatening them to pay some amount of cash to them raging from #50M to 100M or risk their church auditorium burnt to ashes. Some of these clergymen out of fear are complying and paying money to these criminals.
“Simon Ekpa in one of his recent broadcast confirmed that the boys in that fake ESN camp are working for him. He claimed that ESN has camp in Enugu-Ezike but we are sure he’s referring to the fake ESN camp under him. The activities of these criminals has drawn the attention of Nigeria military in that peaceful community, which is now worsening the security situation in that village. Nigeria terrorist military from 82 division Enugu with hatred against Igbo citizens, instead of facing the criminals and hoodlums terrorizing the communities has turned to abduct and kill innocent villagers at random tagging them unknown gunmen and ESN.”