By Chimaobi Nwaiwu

NNEWI — The Indigenous People of Biafra (IPoB) has alleged that Northern truck drivers were sponsored to blackmail it through a protest staged in Jos, Plateau State, over claims that its members attacked truck drivers in the South East.

In a statement on Monday titled “Northern Truck Drivers Sponsored to Blackmail IPoB”, IPoB’s Media and Publicity Secretary, Emma Powerful, dismissed the allegations, stating that IPoB had no reason to attack truck drivers transporting goods to the South East.

The statement read: “The attention of the global family and movement of the Indigenous People of Biafra (IPoB) has been drawn to the fallacious and sponsored protest staged in the Northern city of Jos, Plateau State, claiming that IPoB attacked truck drivers in the South East.”

“The Nigerian government and its sponsored terrorist drivers have accused IPoB of killing truck drivers from Northern Nigeria who were transporting goods to the South East.”

“The false accusations by the so-called National Union of Road Transport Workers (NURTW) truck drivers in Jos, Plateau State, are another calculated blackmail and fallacious propaganda against IPoB.”

IPoB questioned the logic behind attacking those bringing goods to the people it has defended over the years, stating:

“For a decade since IPoB started, we have been confronted with various state-sponsored blackmail and media propaganda aimed at portraying IPoB as a violent movement. As God lives on His throne, IPoB has surmounted all accusations and lies against it by the government and blackmailers.”

“We have been accused of kidnapping, extrajudicial murders, and political assassinations, all falsely tagged on IPoB. What exactly is our crime against the Nigerian government and other state actors?”

“IPoB’s only crime against the Nigerian state is our demand for self-determination via a referendum. Instead of dialoguing with IPoB and our leader, Mazi Nnamdi Okwu Kanu, the Nigerian state deployed various covert measures, including sponsoring insecurity and violent crimes in the South East to blackmail and demonize us.”

The group further insisted that neither IPoB nor its security wing, the Eastern Security Network (ESN), engages in violence against truck drivers or anyone else:



“IPoB and ESN members are not violent and do not engage in attacking or killing people. We cannot confirm any attack or killing of truck drivers in the South East Region. We assume that such a claim by the sponsored protesting drivers in Plateau State is unfounded.”

“Even if such an incident happened, why would IPoB members or ESN operatives attack innocent truck drivers conveying goods to our region?”

“Do the so-called attacked truck drivers pose any threat to IPoB’s movement? IPoB members have not attacked those who pose threats to the Biafra struggle in the South East Region. Why, then, would we attack innocent truck drivers supplying goods to our region?”

IPoB accused those behind the protest in Jos of being the same people sponsoring insecurity in the South East.

“Those that sponsored the touts they called truck drivers in Plateau State to falsely accuse IPoB of attacking and killing their members in the South East are the same people sponsoring insecurity in the region.”


https://www.vanguardngr.com/2025/03/ipob-members-are-not-stupid-to-attack-truck-drivers-bringing-goods-to-people-it-defends/