Southeast murders: CNG threatens fire against hate campaigns, skewed media coverage
Coalition of Northern Groups (CNG) said yesterday that it had taken stock of events unfolding in Nigeria, noting especially, the unrelenting disturbances created by certain interest groups in the South East, in the form of violent attacks on people of other sections, particularly the North.
Spokesman of the group, Abdul-Azeez Suleiman, said in a statement that unprovoked evictions, attacks, killings, destructions of properties and other forms of violations against northerners in various parts of the South East had resulted from the hate campaigns and propaganda being conducted by regional and ethnic agitators.
“We are particularly disturbed by the reports of the brutal murder of a mother and her four children for the only sin of being northerners.
“These killings followed other coordinated attacks on northern traders and haulage trucks, killing some people and destroying millions worth of properties including the truck.
“We have watched and studied these events carefully and with considerable restraint and maturity, to the point of condoning and accommodating several unreasonable and unacceptable actions that have been perpetrated against Nigerians collectively, and northerners in particular.
“Everyone can see that the diabolical scheme planned and exhibited in the actions and clamours of IPOB/ESN terror groups are supported morally and politically by the vast majority of the pliant Igbo elites, politicians, traditional rulers, business persons, and the larger population of this ethnic group.
“It is also a situation that feeds on the docility of the affrighted section of those who pose as northern leaders today.
“The recent attacks have pushed matters to a point whereby silence has become complicit and inaction is no longer an option, making it impossible for us to remain indifferent or silent in the face of such extreme provocations.
“As the representatives of various interest groups from northern Nigeria, the CNG today declares enough is enough. The North will no longer remain passive under such deliberate and sustained attacks on its people and interests and will henceforth be forced to react to every provocation and unwarranted violation,” he said.
The group also cautioned media operators to be more restrained and balanced in their reporting of all situations in the country particularly when matters coming from or affecting northerners were reported or commented on.
“We caution them to desist from and to eschew the slanted reporting of events with greater bias against a particular religious and ethnic group as is witnessed in the reporting of security situations recently.
“We warn that editorial policies and restraints imposed by ordinary decency and sanity must not be abandoned by the media establishment for sensational and often biased reporting that only inflame tensions in the country,” the northern group said.
