Chairman, Senate Committee on
Education, Senator Uche Chukwumerije, has
described the recent Supreme Court ruling on the
leader of Movement for the Actualisation of the
Sovereign State of Biafra, MASSOB, Chief Ralph
Uwazuruike, and six others as a reprimand against
anyone who took the part of non-violence approach
to issues.
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He also linked the difficulty at tackling the Boko Haram crisis to the absence of a patriotic civil society.
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Chukwumerije, who said this in Lagos, regretted that other groups that took up arms against the state were granted amnesty, while MASSOB leadership was being tried for treason, despite being non-violent.
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His words: ''Let me first concede to the Supreme Court because in the wisdom of law, I am not supposed to comment on it, but I will see that judgment as a supreme irony on what is happening in the country today. I see it as a supreme reprimand of any protester who takes the part of peace and peace resolution.
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''MASSOB had all its life been against the use of violence. And what it is getting in reward is to be charged for treason and other organisations from OPC, to the Niger Delta militants to the present Boko Haram are now being lionised and given amnesty and rewarded for taking up arms against the country.''
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''I now see what is happening to MASSOB as a continuation of the civil war and discrimination against the Igbo, but I just want to state that when you continue cheating on people like this because you think they are down and out, you are creating a cesspool which would explode one day. It happened at the end of the first World War among the Germans."
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''When you talk about Boko Haram or any other terrorist organisation, they don't come from the moon. They live among people, so everybody knows everybody. Therefore, if you have a highly patriotic and civil society, you will be able to say that it is Mr A or Mr B that is behind it. But that population has been alienated and it is because of