State governors in Igboland have been enslaved by fear, which consequently makes it impossible for them to exercise their full powers as guaranteed by the Nigerian Constitution. This is the view of the International Society for Civil Liberties and Rule of Law (Intersociety) as contained in a statement issued in Enugu on Sunday, November 2, 2025. This, according to the leading rights group, applies especially to “those of the South-East states including Governors Peter Mbah of Enugu (Catholic), Charles Soludo of Anambra (Catholic), Francis Nwaifuru of Ebonyi (Catholic), Hope Uzodimma of Imo (Catholic) and Alex Otti of Abia (Seventh Day Adventist).

Intersociety berated the governors in the statement signed by its Head, Emeka Umeagbalasi; Human Rights Lawyer/Head, Dept. of Civil Liberties and Rule of Law, Obianuju Joy Igboeli, Esquire; and Human Rights Lawyer/Head, Dept. of Campaign and Publicity, Chidinma Udegbunam, Esquire.

The statement reads in part: “Granted that the referenced Governors are adequately protected by Nigeria’s 1999 Constitution, which allocates more 60 executive powers to each of them as against more than 100 allocated to the President; but our statistical reports arising from the facts on the ground strongly indicate that these Governors are too afraid to assert their independence and govern their people and territories in manners used in the past by three former Governors Nyesom Wike of Rivers State (“when Wike was Wike”), Peter Fayose of Ekiti State and Peter Gregory (De Rock) Obi of Anambra State. This is more so when their States can be governed and adequately protected using the principles of “Religious Freedom, Neutrality and Tolerance”, in accordance with Sections 38 (rights to freedom of Thought, Conscience and Religion) and 10 (no imposition of any Religion as State Religion); complemented by Article 18 of the Int’l Covenant on Civil and Political Rights of 1976) and Article 8 of the African Charter on Human and People’s Rights of 1981-signed and ratified by Nigeria in 1993 and 1983, respectively. It is very important to remind that Intersociety has severally documented reports showing that the South-East and the South-West regions, Nigeria’s largest Trado-Judeo-Christian regions have been laid under siege by Jihadist Fulani Militants and allied others (armed with illicit or prohibited small arms and light weapons-SALWs) using the influence of Government and security forces to invade and occupy thousands of forests, bushes and farmlands across the two regions since 2016 through unchecked and untracked late night movements.

“According to a 2024 declassified statistics by Nigerian Government, there are about 11,129 mapped forests in the country, majority of which are located in rainforest regions including forests of South-West, South-South, North-Central and other parts of the Old Middle-Belt; out of which, not less than 1,000 are presently occupied by Islamic Jihadists and various violent entities across the South-East and the South-South. The patterns and trends of such Jihadist incursions further indicated that their number was about 48 locations as of 2018 and increased to 139 as of August 2019 and not less than 1000 as of Dec 2024. As if the above was not enough, the Government of Nigeria has reportedly gone ahead to foist the establishment of artificial “Fulani Livestock (cattle) Ranching Communities” in the across indigenous communities in the two regions, done in connivance with many or most of the Governors of the affected States who turned around and misled such communities into compliance using different pretexts and disguises to escape or ward off backlash.

“Till the present day, several bushes, forests and farmlands in Enugu State especially in Udi, Nsukka, Awgu, Nkanu and Oji River areas have become no-go areas for travellers, indigenous farmers and other natives of the affected areas; same goes to Ebonyi, Imo, Abia and Anambra States, out of which, Anambra has, for now, become the lowest hit. By our recent collected statistics, the issue is no longer publicly hidden and as a matter of fact, the present Government of Anambra State had some months ago through its Ministry of Information publicly admitted having been approached by Federal Government for a large forest-land donation for “Cattle Ranching”, during which the Government expressed its readiness once others are ready. Also, from our collected statistics, there is a whopping N60b attached, for every State that agrees. Former Governor Samuel Ortom of Benue State recently disclosed in a media interest that “his government was offered a sum of N75b by Federal Government to abrogate the Benue anti-open grazing law and allowed Ranching; out of which N35b was for infrastructural development and N40b for non-interest loan”. See the links below for more details:(https://punchng.com/pastoral-crisis-11-states-embrace-fg-ranching-plan-as-killings-surge/,https://dailypost.ng/2025/07/10/benue-i-rejected-n75bn-loan-offer-tied-to-repeal-of-anti-open-grazing-law-ortom/). According to our recently collected statistics, some, if not many of these Governors have been forced to dishonestly procure or annex several communal lands located in forests, bushes and farmlands and have them transferred to Federal Government to be permanently used and occupied by the referenced enablers of the incoming Sultanate; hiding under “the nationalization and enhancement of cattle livestock economy”; a deceitful policy that also promotes equality and equation of the lives of Jihadist cows with the lives of human-Nigerians especially those fourth-classed as “people of impurity”. We have also documented and gathered several data about communities that have been forced to cede their ancestral lands to Governments of their States; from Enugu to Anambra, Ebonyi to Imo, Abia to Rivers, and Cross River to Igbo-Delta.

“Further found was the fact that the enablers of Religious Persecution, especially Christian Persecution or “Nigerian Christian Genocide” are among Christian public offices and their political office holders and among Christian clergies including the likes of the Catholic Bishops Conference of Nigeria and the Pentecostal Fellowship of Nigeria; other than the current presidency of the Christian Association of Nigeria (CAN). Therefore, to avoid being listed in “International List of Bootlickers in the Hallowed Chambers of Public Office and Christendom”, the Five Governors of the South-East are strongly advised to make hay while the sun shines, by reversing all the communal lands already seized or ceded to external interlopers and have them returned to their indigenous communal owners.”