Ohanaeze Ndigbo has claimed that the long distance walked by its late President General, Chief Emmanuel Iwuanyanwu, to where the leader of the Indigenous People of Biafra (IPOB), Nnamdi Kanu, was held in custody culminated to his ill health.

The late Igbo leader who died recently in Abuja could be recalled to have paid a visit to Kanu in the custody of the Department of State Services, DSS, where he had an undisclosed conversation with him.

Also recalled that another prominent Igbo late elder statesman, Chief Mbazuluike Amaechi, had also called for the release of Kanu just like Iwuanyanwu.

Speaking to Sunday Sun while signing a condolence register in honour of Iwuanyanwu with other executive members at the Glass House, Owerri on Friday, President of Ohanaeze Imo State Chapter, Chidi Ihemedu, said the Igbo apex group was pained that its leader would be subjected to such treatment.

He said: “It was among his wishes that Nnamdi Kanu be released. He trekked over 500 meters to meet him where he was kept in a dungeon because they refused to bring him out, despite his weight and legs injured during the civil war.

“He managed to walk too long to get to where Nnamdi Kanu was and after speaking with him he had to walk back. You can imagine that kind of excruciating stress given to him by the DSS in Abuja. It was perhaps what exhausted him the more.

Ihemedu regretted that Iwuanyanwu’s dream of seeing Kanu freed from detention was not actualized before his death. However, he vowed that other vision he left behind would be fulfilled.

“None of his dreams would ever go down unrealised. He had too many visions apart from that of Nnamdi Kanu being freed, which I know the President of Nigeria would do something about it, because the greatest expectation of every Igbo person, whether in the Diaspora or here at home is for Nnamdi Kanu to be released.

“Nnamdi did not do up to 10 percent of what others had done. He had never carried or shot a gun against anybody for him to still be held in custody,” he said.

Also speaking, the Owerri/Mbaitoli Chairman of the group, Chief Uche Mbah, revealed that the various committees instituted by Iwuanyanwu for the development of the Southeast would still function as he had planned. (Sunday Sun: Text, Excluding Headline)

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