Uzuakoli To Be Taken Over By Fulani, Courtesy Of Georgina Ehuriah & Okechukwu Nwokoro

Uzuakoli To Be Taken Over By Fulani, Courtesy Of Georgina Ehuriah & Okechukwu Nwokoro

By Okezie Iheonunekwu | For Biafra Writers

January 18, 2021

Historically, Uzuakoli originated from Ezera in the present day Isukwuato Local Government Area, all in Abia State. Uzuakoli first settled in Akoli, migrating from there to their present settlement now called Uzuakoli. 

Originally known as “Ozu,"  Uzuakoli had five children – Mba, now called Amamba; Oma, now Eluoma, Nkwo, now known as Amankwo; Agbo, now called Agbozu; and the last child, Ugwuanyim, now called Ngwu. These five children of his gave rise to the five villages of Uzuakoli. 

Uzuakoli houses the famous Leprosy Settlement founded by the Methodist Missionary Society and the Local Authorities of Owerri Province in August, 1932. Uzuakoli also houses one of the best secondary schools in Nigeria, Methodist College Uzuakoli, founded in 1923. The town also boasts of a famous market – Eke Uzuakoli. 

During the colonial era, Uzuakoli was popular for a notorious clandestine slave trade market.  The town is so historically strategic that it became infused in a popular Biafra song making waves till date – “Agawalam ikwa ngbo na Uzuakoli, Baby isim gbalaga.”

During the Biafra war, the Nigerian army of 82nd Battalion commandeered by Major Ibrahim Babangida, attacked and captured Uzuakoli. In that fierce battle, Major Babangida was wounded by a Biafran Ogbunigwe shell and was evacuated. When Uzuakoli launched their electricity project in the 80s, IBB came to commission it, recalling the battle.  Of course Uzuakoli and Abagana stand out as the toughest war fronts during the Biafra incursion. 

Today sadly, the five traditional rulers of Uzuakoli, oppressively lured by two shameless Fulani slaves in the town, are on the brink of handing the town over to the Fulani Islamic caliphate.

Today sadly, the five traditional rulers of Uzuakoli, oppressively lured by two shameless Fulani slaves in the town, are on the brink of handing the town over to the Fulani Islamic caliphate.

 In the disguise of building a federal prison for rehabilitation of repented Boko haram members, the two self-serving Fulani slaves – Okechukwu Nwokoro, president of Uzuakoli Development Association (UDA), and Barrister Georgina Ehuriah, retired permanent secretary of Ministry of Interior – are pressurizing the traditional rulers to surrender Uzuakoli ancestral lands to the caliphate. The said prison project, we have gathered, is a decoy to grab lands for Fulani settlements. 

It’s unfortunate that many respected people of Uzuakoli are still blind to the mission of Georgina Ehuriah and her puppet APC agent, Okechukwu Nwokoro. A couple of years ago Georgina Ehuriah was given an assignment to secure lands in Uzuakoli for the Fulanis. To fool the people, she constructed a few kilometers road in Uzuakoli, tagging it federal project. She then brought Minister of Interior, Ogbeni Rauf Aregbesola, to Uzuakoli and persuaded Ozo of Uzuakoli to confer the title of Enyioha 1 of Uzuakoli (friend of Uzuakoli people) on him.

 

The unsuspecting people of Uzuakoli did not realize that Georgina Ehuriah and her crew were on a mission but were gradually watering the ground. Georgina and her crew had their first try through request for land for agricultural project. IPOB called their bluff, revealing that the said agricultural project is RUGA Settlement. Quickly they re-strategized, presenting to us now the prison project. 

It should be noted that there is a federal prison in Umuahia, and there is yet another one in Arochukwu. These towns are close to Uzuakoli. What then is the essence of citing another federal prison in Uzuakoli? Glaring then is the fact that everything is fishy about the project. Come to think of it, of what benefit is a federal prisons in a peaceful  town like Uzuakoli?

Presently, the people of Uzuakoli are developing their town by themselves, erecting luxury homes and chains of business. The prison project is a ploy to grab land and schematically deploy the so-called repented Boko Haram members to Uzuakoli and the neighbouring communities. The specific land being demanded – 50acres of forest land – connects Uzuakoli to Igbere , Alayi, Osuitem ,Itunbuzo ,Bende, and Ihechiowa  down to Ebonyi state. 

Uzuakoli, we should remember, is one of the towns that offered the Nigerian state the fiercest resistance. Trying to take it over is thus understandable. IBB was injured there, and the Fulani man doesn’t forget it hurry.

 

The good people of Uzuakoli should therefore rise up now against this unhealthy plot of the Fulani and their stooges. Uzuakoli needs banks, federal polytechnics, Hospitals, medical schools, and modern markets, not Fulani settlement in the guise of a federal prison.

Edited by Nelson Ofokar Yagazie

Published by Charles Opanwa