The Indigenous People of Biafra (IPOB) has warned youths of Enugu Ezike in Igboeze North Local Government Area of Enugu State not to be part of the criminal activities going on in their locality, urging them to help it identify criminal elements terrorising them and claiming to be IPOB and Eastern Security Network, ESN, operatives, saying that ESN does not maintain any camp in the area.
IPOB also said that the ESN stopped recruiting personnel since 2019 and, therefore, anybody parading himself, intimidating and harassing them claiming to have joined ESN is deceiving them.
A statement by IPOB’s Media and Publicity Secretary, Emma Powerful, entitled: ‘ESN has no camp in Enugu Ezike’, said that IPOB and ESN do not call on people to bring money to them; that people donate money for the good work they are doing, and do so willingly and voluntarily without any form of force or threat.”
IPOB’s statement read: “We, the global family and movement of the Indigenous People of Biafra, IPoB, ably led by our great leader, Mazi Nnamdi Kanu, wish to reiterate once again to the general public especially the people of Enugu Ezike in Igboeze North that the hoodlums in their community and other parts terrorising them are not IPOB volunteers or ESN operatives.
“The Eastern Security Network,, ESN, stopped recruiting personnel since two years ago, and is not recruiting now, and we are therefore, informing the public that anybody parading himself, intimidating and harassing them, deceiving them that he has joined ESN recently is a criminal and part of the hoodlums enforcing sit-at-home that IPOB has long cancelled since August last year.
“ESN operatives under IPOB knew from time that Nigerian Government and its security agencies are our enemies and we have mastered the strategies of handling these enemies, and because of that, ESN doesn’t have any operational camp at Enugu Ezike Igbo-Eze North or anywhere.
“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 wishes 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 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 are 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 insecurity going on in Enugu Ezike and other communities in the area 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 a notorious hoodlum from the area.
They relocated to Enugu to continue their criminal activities in the affected villages.
IPOB and ESN gathered that they deceitfully recruited some of the hoodlums in the affected communities who thought they were joining ESN without knowing that IPOB is not an organisation for criminals and therefore never recruited criminals into ESN.
“The hoodlums have ended up using same youths for criminal activities instead of fighting insecurity and Fulani bandits masquerading as herdsmen and terrorizing the Aguibeje bush and forests which is a border between Enugu State and 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 through snatching of cars, bikes, kidnapping for ransom and calling some notable clergymen on phone threatening them to pay some amount of cash to them raging from N50 to N100 million or risk their church auditorium being burnt to ashes.