By JOY ANIGBOGU, Lagos

Dr. Chukwuemeka Ezeife, former governor of Anambra State has said that those perpetuating insecurity in the South East region of the country are not Igbo people, rather those who are against 2023 presidential election.

He stressed that the perpetrators want a state of emergency declared in the region to frustrate the next general elections, maintaining that no Eastern person is involved in the mayhem.

Ezeife in a chat with DAILY INDEPENDENT said that all those involved in perpetuating the insecurity and their sponsors are from outside the region, maintaining that Nigerians should pray for a new Nigeria, where people will live in any part of the country and go about their businesses without any form of molestation.

Speaking about the effort of the leaders in the zone in curbing the mayhem, the former governor said that there was a meeting two weeks ago at the residence of Mbazulike Amaechi, first Minister of Aviation, where they agreed that there was need to set up a regional security force to be incorporated into the Eastern Security Network (ESN).

He stressed that the decision reached at the meeting is too important for anyone to want to delay it, as peace is needed in the region urgently.

While reacting to speculations that the youths in the region do not trust the five governors in SouthEast, the former governor said, “I guess it has to do with the inability of the governors to match other regions like the South West with establishing a regional security outfit that wll take care of insecurity in the region, but eventually they have created “Ebube Agu” though it is only on paper. I hope that gradually they wull6 have to start full implementation.

Answering questions as to the efforts of the federal government at ensuring that peace returns to the region, Ezeife said, “We are not accusing the federal government of doing any of those things but we don’t know where it stands at the moment.” (Sunday Independent)

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