The Anambra State governorship candidate of the United Progressive Party (UPP), Chief Osita Chidoka has called on President Muhammadu Buhari to lift the proscription order on the Indigenous Peoples of Biafra (IPOB), describing the government's action as "presumptuous and unnecessary."

At the flag-off of his governorship campaign at Amoka in Ihiala Local Government Area of the state, Chidoka said the Igbo had no trace of terrorism in their history, emphasising that self determination is a fundamental right.

While condemning street protests as means of achieving self-determination, Chidoka, a former Minister of Aviation, observed that intelligence and critical reasoning should guide in such struggles.

He said: “While we salute all those who through one legitimate way or the other had pursued the struggle, we state today that we are stepping into a new frontier. The Igbo voice against marginalisation and injustice will not be achieved on the streets.

“It will rather be won with a determined engagement of our institutions of government and with other Nigerians who feel aggrieved to redefine the meaning of Nigeria and remove the inequalities that have fanned the embers of discord and restructure our nation along the lines of justice, equality and fairness.

“How can Igbos be terrorists? We have always actively participated in the Nigerian project, yet in this country, we have suffered since June 1945 British inspired ethnic violence, 19 incidents of pogroms, wanton killings, and violence against our people living across the country.

“In March 2015, our country went to an election that divided us greatly. Today the nation is still greatly divided, and almost back to her primordial lines. Our country is troubled; our people are afraid; our future is uncertain.

“We cannot build a great nation without unity at home. We cannot be a nation where people are hated, branded and then hounded and ostracised.

“We stand here to declare that there are no terrorists in our state; there are no terrorists in our region and we do not feel terrorised as a people.”

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