President Muhammadu Buhari has pleaded with the United States to ban the Indigenous People of Biafra, IPOB.
Buhari said that the U.S stands to lose nothing if it designates IPOB as a terrorist group.
Responding to questions from Bloomberg, an American newspaper, Buhari also accused the group of engaging in oil bunkering.
He said: “In 2015, Boko Haram held territory the size of Belgium within the borders of Nigeria. Today they are close to extinct as a military force. The leader of ISWAP was eliminated by a Nigerian Airforce airstrike in March. The jets acquired from the US and intelligence shared by the British were not provided to previous administrations and stand as a testament to renewed trust re-built between Nigeria and our traditional western allies under my government.
“We urge those same international partners to take additional steps costing them nothing, by proscribing another group – IPOB – as a terrorist organization. Their leadership enjoys safe haven in the West, broadcasting hate speech into Nigeria from London, spending millions lobbying members of the US Congress, and freely using international financial networks to arm agitators on the ground. This must stop.
On why the country’s crude production has been slumping, with Nigeria unable to meet its OPEC quota for almost a year despite elevated prices, Buhari said: “Criminality and terrorism in oil-producing regions hamper production, and it would help if our western allies designated IPOB as a terrorist group, given their complicity in damage to pipelines and infrastructure”
