The National Population Commission (NPC) has pleaded with Biafra separatist groups in Nigeria not to disrupt the 2023 population census in the South East geopolitical zone.
POLITICS NIGERIA recalls that in the 2006 census, the Movement for the Actualization of the Sovereign State of Biafra (MASSOB) scuttled the exercise in the zone.
NPC Federal Commissioner in charge of Abia State, Jonny Nwabuisi, who made the plea at a press conference on Monday in Umuahia, decried the adverse effect of the MASSOB antagonism of the census in South East which accounted for the low figures ascribed to states in the zone.
According to him, a successful population census would be in the interest of everybody including those pushing for referendum, arguing that the mandate must be based on population.
“In 2006, it was MASSOB; today it’s IPOB. But I say that it’s in the interest of IPOB to allow the census. If they talk of referendum ,they cannot do it in a vacuum.
“Referendum is based on population and IPOB has no population of its own that is recognized by any international body that can conduct referendum. They only rely on the population of Nigeria.
“So, it’s imperative and necessary for the Indigenous People of Biafra (IPOB) members to help in propagating the advocacy on census so that the South East will have a successful census. Otherwise, whatever thing they are doing will be a failure,” Nwabuisi said.
FG should first of all release MNK unconditionally. This would bring unity in the SE region.