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| A protester holds banner in front of a Biafra flag as he takes part in a demonstration in Durban, South Africa, on May 30, 2019. |
ABUJA — The Nigerian government has spent more than $670 million to stop the activities of the Indigenous People of Biafra (IPOB) in the United States and the United Kingdom, Report said on Saturday.
According to the report, the cost was incurred between 2021 and 2022.
The report stated that the money equivalent to 309,205,000,000.00 Nigerian Naira was used to lobby individuals and finance the campaign against the Biafra movement mainly in the United States.
"Funds made available to international media are not included in the said amount," according to the report posted on WhatsApp by a US-based blog purportedly owned by an investigative journalist.
Sources have also been cited as saying that some authorities of foreign embassies in Nigeria were paid since 2016 to ignore the separatist movement, illegal arrests and killing of “peaceful Biafra protesters” by government forces in the South-East and South-South.
“In Nigeria, the government had also paid some journalists, writers and influencers to counter genuine activities of IPOB, publish false contents, and carry out activities that seeks to criminalize the separatist group,” the report reads in part.
In relation to the “rendition” of IPOB leader Nnamdi Kanu, the report said “local authorities in Kenya were paid to monitor and kidnap the separatist leader who is still in prison in Nigeria after he was secretly extradited to Nigeria.”
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| Government forces in 2022 leads Mazi Nnamdi Kanu to federal high court in Nigeria |
“Kenyan authorities are complicit in Kanu's kidnapping," said the blog, which also disclosed that the Nigerian government continues to spend huge amounts of money to continue imprisoning the IPOB leader.