Yesterday, the Ipob members took to the streets to protest following the refusal of security agents to release Mr Kanu despite the fact that he has been granted bail by two courts. On October 14 last year, Mr Kanu was arrested upon arriving from the UK and charged with running the pirate station Radio Biafra among other things.
Eyewitnesses said that yesterday's casualties were suffered when soldiers opened fire on the protesters along Milverton Road and St Michaels’s Road in Aba, the commercial city in Abia State. When the smoke cleared, two lifeless bodies lay on Milverton Road while one was found on St Michael’s Road.
Although the identities of the three victims were not immediately available, it was gathered that an apprentice Chidozie Okafor, was among those felled by bullets. Unlike the soldiers, the police were said to have used teargas in their efforts to disperse the protesters but the army was apparently more ruthless.
Udeviotu Onyeke, the spokesman for the Abia State Police Command, said he was not aware of any casualties suffered during the protests, stating that no report about the deaths has reached him. However he confirmed that the pro-Biafra agitators staged their usual protest, adding that they had trooped out in large numbers and attempted to block the ever-busy Enugu-Port Harcourt Expressway but a combined team of police and soldiers dispersed them.
He vowed that the police would no longer stand by and watch pro-Biafra protesters disrupt peace in the state. Mr Onyeke revealed that 26 members of Ipob including three women were arrested by the security agents during the operation to quell the protest march.
Mr Onyeke added: "It’s either they stop or we stop them. Ipob members and other Biafra agitators should remain calm as the agitation has gone beyond the stage of violence.
"The ranks of those involved in the agitation suggest that they are not gainfully employed. They are miscreants.”
Bonnie Iwuoha, the Abia State commissioner for information and strategy, said the state government expressed regret that the protesters had defied the ban on public protests and demonstrations which have been in force in the last two weeks. He added that miscreants were instigated by the opposition to disturb the peace in Aba forcing schools and markets to close.
Godwin Adindu the chief press secretary to the governor, also debunked reports that the state government unleashed troops on the pro-Biafra protesters, describing it as blatant lies. He said that the protest was ostensibly inspired by the opposition in Abia State, noting that Governor Okezie Ikpeazu does not have the powers to order or mobilise the armed forces to shoot at any group and the army takes its orders directly from the military high command and the federal government.
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