The war veterans threatened to embark on a street-wide protest in Abuja “in the next couple of weeks” if government refused to heed to their demand within a reasonable time.
Hundreds of the ex-soldiers, who took the decision in Enugu on Wednesday, lamented than more than forty years after the war, they had been abandoned despite repeated promises by government.
They, therefore, vowed that having endured this long, they would take their destiny in their hands by literally halting government and commercial activities in Abuja by the time they embark on the street protest in order to alert the international community on their plight.
“While several promises have been made on paper, nothing is on ground to show that the government is concerned about their existence”, they observed.
They expressed dismay that most of their members have lost their lives because of the absence of reasonable sources of livelihood.
Rising from an emergency meeting, the ex-soldiers led by Rt. Col Victor Onah and Barrister Ibe Nwachukwunta as National Coordinator and Attorney respectively condemned the nonchalance of the federal government towards their plight in spite of their contributions to the nation.
Apart from demanding that urgent attention, rehabilitation, settlement, payment of their emoluments/entitlements and any other money be given to them, the veterans also asked for their reintegration and assimilation into the nation’s armed forces in order to facilitate the payment of their pensions.
According to them, “having surrendered to the federal government, we are entitled to be treated as citizens. We should not be relegated and abandoned since 1970 and continuously remain abused and our human rights violated by the federal government.
"We are dying everyday of hunger, poverty, disease, frustration and abandonment and we have their resolved and refused to accept the government’s further abuse of our human rights, abandonment and non-payment of our entitlements”.
They further recalled that since the end of the civil war, it was the late President Umaru Yar’Adua that accepted to respond to their plights before he passed on, noting that since President Goodluck Jonathan came on board, nothing has been done to activate the promises of the late former president.
The group noted that “President Jonathan needs to be reminded of the war veterans’ demands. We have made several efforts to get across to the president. It is unimaginable that most of us still live in rented houses since 1970. Our coordinator is even facing an ejection court case at the Magistrate court in Enugu”.
The ex-soldiers called on governors of the South-East and South-South states as well as other prominent political office holders from the two zones to prevail on the president to respond to their plight.
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