Ohanaeze Ndigbo, a socio-cultural organisation representing the Igbo people, has denied that a Canada-based Nigerian woman, Amaka Patience Sunnberger, who called for the mass killing of Yoruba and Benin people, is Igbo.
Gatekeepers News reports that Sunnberger made the inciting comments during a virtual meeting on TikTok, vowing to poison individuals from the targeted ethnic groups at her workplace in Ontario, Canada.
In her words, “Record me very well; it’s time to start poisoning the Yoruba and the Benin. Put poison for all una food for work. Put poison for una water, make una dey kpai one by one.”
She also addressed other participants, saying, “Enough is enough! If you have any means of kpaing them, kpai them commot for road.”
Chairman of the Nigerians in Diaspora Commission (NiDCOM), Abike Dabiri-Erewa, has condemned Sunnberger’s actions and shared her photo on social media, confirming that a group of Nigerians in Canada are reporting her to the relevant authorities.
Ohanaeze Ndigbo stated that there is no sufficient evidence to prove Sunnberger’s Igbo heritage, adding that her actions do not reflect the Igbo values of thoughtfulness, discretion, self-censure, and equanimity.
In a statement on Wednesday, Alex Ogbonnia, the Ohanaeze’s spokesperson described the woman as a “miscreant”.
Ogbonnia said Ohanaeze have received calls from prominent Nigerians who expressed fears on the possibility of some persons carrying out the threats.
“It therefore becomes imperative for Ohanaeze to respond, especially when the National Publicity Secretary of the Afenifere, Mr Jare Ajayi, forwarded the clip and requested for prompt action.
“There is no Igbo man or woman that will contemplate throwing a stone in a full market for fear of who shall be the victim as the Igbo travel more than any ethnic group in Africa.
“They also create homes away from home wherever they are found. They mix up or integrate with the local community and contribute to developing every community they find themselves.
“Based on the foregoing, two major derivatives emerge: if one should poison food in Lagos or Ibadan or Benin, is there any guarantee that the first victim will not be Igbo?” Mr Ogbonnia said.
The Ohanaeze’s spokesperson said the woman in the video must be a “depressed drowning ethnic bigot, obsessed by the negative side of history and unflinching satanic in orchestration”.
He disclosed that the Secretary-General of Ohanaeze Ndigbo, Okey Emuchay, has condemned the video.
According to him, Mr Emuchay vehemently condemned both the video content and the perpetrator as a mischief-maker.
“They are the merchant of woes who deploy despicable and incendiary rhetoric to create ethnic mistrust and conflicts where none exists.
“Ohanaeze seizes this opportunity to enlighten the younger generations that the Igbo, Edo and Yoruba share a lot in common. We share in cultural affinity, cosmology, morphology, and hospitality.
“The age-long inter-marriages between the Igbo, Yoruba and Edo have produced well accomplished great-grandchildren,” he said.
He, therefore, assured the Afenifere, the entire Yoruba and Edo “brothers” that the threat from the depraved mind should be ignored as “idiotic, meaningless and vacuous”.
“We add that, throughout history, proposals by the maladjusted are always dead on arrival.
“We use this opportunity to call on the security agencies in Nigeria to trace the perpetrators of this macabre dance to face the full weight of the law,” he said.
