Ralph Uwazuruike’s MASSOB Rebrands to BIM

Ralph Uwazuruike, Founder of the Movement for the Actualization of the Sovereign State of Biafra (MASSOB) has announced the rebranding of the group to Biafra Independent Movement (BIM).

Uwazuruike’s announcement came on Sunday in an interview at the Ikemba Ojukwu Memorial library in Owerri.

“The change in name became absolutely necessary because of the sad introduction of violence by the disgruntled dissidents and this is at variance with the non-violence stance of MASSOB over the years,

“MASSOB was not in any way involved in that demonstration but the only difference was that the former MASSOB Director of Information Uchenna Madu who had been expelled was their spokesman and we sincerely sympathize with the families of those who lost their lives and who were in one way or the other affected in that exercise.

It is our obligation to offer this unreserved apology because we were the first to speak of Biafra in Nigeria in 1999,” he said.

He explained to MASSOB supporters that the change in name became necessary following the strange introduction of violence in the struggle to actualize the Sovereign State of Biafra by a faction allegedly sympathetic to Nnamdi Kanu of Radio Biafra, London.

He pleaded with the federal government to urgently release Nnamdi Kanu and his colleagues, stressing that he doesn’t want to see Kanu and others experience what he (Uwazuruike) had gone through over the years in the quest for the realization of the sovereign state of Biafra.

“If you block roads, impede free flow of traffic and force traders to close markets, you are violent and all these are against the non-violence principle of MASSOB”, he stated.

He went further to clearly state that actualization of Biafra can’t be realized through violence and that the South- East is land-locked with no neighboring countries for possible assistance when it matters most, stressing that anybody preaching violence to realize Biafra is a day dreamer.