Insecurity: Igbo flee North en-masse

IGBOS living in some Northern states where many Christians had been attacked by members of the Boko Haram sect are now returning en-masse to their home-states, abandoning most of their belongings.

The returnees, who have been trooping home since the past few weeks, said they were residing in Plateau, Kaduna, Nasarawa, Niger and Borno states where they had lived and conducted their businesses for decades.

They added that they were forced to return to their native-states because of incessant violent attacks on their businesses and families by the Boko Haram sect.

Vanguard encountered some of the returnees, mostly women and children, at the Ninth Mile Corner Motor park, yesterday, while trying to board vehicles to their respective homes.

A native of Umuoji in Anambra State, Mr. Lawrence Okeke, who had resided in Lafia, Nasarawa State capital, where he sold vehicle spare parts for several years, said he decided to evacuate his family to his home-state following the state of insecurity in Lafia.

He said having suffered huge losses in the last sectarian violence, which he was yet to recover from, it would be fool- hardy for him to remain there, hence his decision to evacuate his family to his home-town.

He said: ”I have been a trader in Lafia for several years and we have lived peacefully in the town until the last sectarian violence which rendered many of us homeless. We decided to stay back, but threats of fresh violence have continued.

”Most Igbo in that town have been evacuating their families back home. Some with strong investments there decided to stay back but having lost my trade, it will be unwise for me to remain in the North,” Okeke said.

Another returnee from Jos, Chief Ikechukwu Obalum, from Aguleri, Anambra State, told Vanguard that he brought his wife and four children home because of increasing insecurity in the city.

Obalum said: ”I will return to Jos to continue with my business there, but my family members will never return to the North.”

He  added that although he was aware of the risk involved in doing business in the northern states, he could not start life afresh in his home state.

A mother of four from Nkanu area of Enugu State, Mrs. Kate Ejiofor, who left her Suleja residence recently for Enugu following serial   bomb blasts in the town, said  many easterners in Nasarawa State have been moving back to their native-states because of insecurity of life and property.

An elderly man, from Imo State, Chief Boniface Nwosu, said he returned from Borno State after selling his building at a low price to enable him evacuate his family from the state he had lived for over 40 years because, the Boko Haram sect members had made life unbearable for residents of the state.

Nwosu said: ’’We have lived in constant fear for the last two years because of insecurity of life and property.

‘’These people burn down our churches at the slightest provocation, kill and main people at will.

’’Sometimes, one would even be thinking that this is no longer the Nigeria we knew before. The police are helpless in this matter because police stations are also bombed and their officers and men killed.

’’I have come home permanently and will never go back to the North to do business and develop the place again. Things cannot continue that way. It is hell living there,’’ he added.

Vanguard Nigeria