Buratai’s emergency declaration threat in South-East not welcomed – Ohanaeze

The apex Igbo socio-cultural organisation, Ohanaeze Ndigbo, on Wednesday, condemned alleged threat by the Chief of Army Staff, Lt. Gen. Tukur Buratai, to impose a state of emergency in the South-East if security forces were attacked again.

Ohanaeze, in statement by its acting Secretary General and National Publicity Secretary, Prince Uche Achi-Okpaga, described the threat as provocative and a glaring example of the reckless impunity of public officers.

While it queried Buratai’s source of power to issue such an open threat to the South-East governors, Ohanaeze said it was a manifestation of the vacuum in governance at the federal level.

The statement read, “While Ohanaeze Ndigbo decries violence in any form in the states, it takes particular exception to an open threat and warning to South-East governors who by the country’s constitution are chief security officers of their states but are lame ducks in practice as all security commands come from Abuja.

“Ohanaeze Ndigbo finds it particularly provocative for General Buratai to issue such a warning to governors of the South-East where relative peace prevails while he has not done the same in the North-Central, North-West and North-East which have become theatres of war and where army posts and bases have been subjected to incessant attacks by the Boko Haram, ISWA/ISIS, bandits and Fulani herdsmen, killing and maiming Nigerian soldiers.”