A human rights advocate, Mikar Ojokoro, has condemned alleged threats and defamatory comments against Ifeanyi Ejiofor, a legal counsel to the leader of Indigenous People of Biafra, IPOB, Mazi Nnamdi Kanu, by Simon Ekpa, describing it as offensive and unacceptable.
In a statement by Ojokoro which was made available to Vanguard, he accused Ekpa of "dishing out tissues of lies on social media through his blog about Ejiofor and the IPOB leader for the purpose of maligning Kanu and his legal team.
According to him, Ekpa was quoted to have said on his YouTube channel that "We have sacked DOS; Ejiofor and the legal team have compromised. Both Ejiofor and DOS are working for the Nigerian Government. We don't take orders from anyone in the DSS dungeon, referring to Kanu and mocking Kanu's orders to stop the sit at home."
While describing Ejiofor as a brilliant and courageous lawyer, who has been endangering his own life defending Kanu and thousands of Igbo young men and women, the activist noted that a few defamation suits would soon be "filed in the courts against Ekpa and his co-traducers."
The statement read: "Sir Ifeanyi Ejiofor and his team of lawyers have been defending Mazi Kanu and thousands of others identified as Biafrans in cases which most lawyers in Nigeria would not want to touch for fear of being targeted by the Nigerian government forces.
"There are video evidence and court judgments to show that Ejiofor and many of his clients who have been identified as indigenous persons of Biafra have been victims of police brutality on many occasions. The most recent lethal invasion of Ejiofor's residence at night time shortly before Kanu was kidnapped left many with the conclusion that the attack was meant to scare away other lawyers from defending Kanu if Ejiofor is out of the way.
"With all these, I find the action of some gullible Igbo who are clapping over the threat against Ejiofor as very offensive and unacceptable. Are some Igbo persons this fickle-minded and capricious with no emotional intelligence to decode a series of inconsistent lies and deceptions being sold to them by Ekpa?"
Ojokoro also stated that Ekpa has been planning to displace Mazi Nnamdi Kanu and take over the leadership of IPOB. According to him, he has been launching vitriolic attacks on Kanu to achieve this singular purpose but lamented that only the gullible would not see the deceit and lies in the information he has been dishing out.
"Simon Ekpa has been laying the foundation to attack Mazi Nnamdi Kanu and he is already doing so in such a constructive reversed psychology by a number of his broadcast on his YouTube platform, where he said that Kanu was going to end up like Raph Uwazurike and that he is the better anointed David than Kanu, whom he labelled as Saul. He also boasted that he has done what Kanu has never done and that Kanu needs him more than he needs him."
He recalled how Ekpa insulted the Catholic Bishop of Enugu Diocese, Rev Dr Enoja who had, through his spokesperson, tried to call Ekpa to order over the senseless and criminal enforcement of the sit-at-home which Kanu had ordered from the DSS detention that it should stop.
According to him, instead of Ekpa listening to the wise counsel from the bishop, he boasted that he would not take orders from anyone in DSS custody and that his own version of IPOB called Autopilot was the original one.
He lamented that Ekpa has been cashing in on Kanu's ordeal to spew unfounded lies against the IPOB leader, even as anybody that tried to call him to order was labelled as a traitor.
Ojokoro, also, warned agitators of Oduduwa Republic, like Prof Banji Akintoye and Dr Sunday Adeyemo, to be very careful in dealing with some persons that parade themselves as autopilots and Biafra spokesmen, adding that "such ectoparasitic names and positions only exist in the criminal world but non-existent in the actual Biafra independence restoration movement led by Kanu."
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Accusing Ekpa of deceiving the teeming Igbo population that believes in the realization of Biafra, the rights advocate dismissed the comment by the self-acclaimed autopilot leader that Biafra would come in 122 days' time or less.
"I will be a fool if I don't have the inherent responsibility to ask the person how that would happen, the strategy, and the process. This does not mean that we don't believe in miracles or understand the things of the spirit; yes, we do but that is not the issue here. Ekpa cannot be claiming that he would bring Biafra to reality in 122 days, and at the same time calling for a conference to teach the Biafrans how to seek asylum in a foreign land; that is insanity," he submitted.
