Mr Geoffrey Onyeama, Nigeria’s Minister of Foreign Affairs, says the country does not require any international help to curtail any threats posed by the Independent Peoples of Biafra (IPOB).
Onyeama, at a news conference at the UN headquarters in New York on Friday evening, said the threat from the self-agitation group would be handled.
“IPOB is as of now an internal threat and Nigeria does not need international assistance to resolve it,” the minister said.
According to him, IPOB is different from the Boko Harm terrorists which main aim was to capture territory and to kill innocent people.
“The President is prepared to tell world leaders that the ingredients for a happy, peaceful country are good governance and a strong economy.
“If we can get the economy right and we can get the good governance to our people, we believe that most of our problems would be taken care of.
“We are a country of young people; the majority of our population is under the age of 35 and a lot of them are restless.
“They are restless because of economic opportunities and that is why we have the migration issue.
“A lot of the youths are the product of very bad governance over the years and that has deprived the young people of educational opportunities and job opportunities.
“So Mr president is trying to restructure the country to put in place the bases for good governance.
“Because once you have good governance and your resources are being channeled to where they are supposed to be, which is on development, then you begin to address a lot of issues.”
He said unlike IPOB, Boko Haram was not an internal threat but international, pointing out its allegiance to the Islamic State in Iraq and Syria (ISIS).
The foreign affairs minister said the position of President Muhammadu Buhari was that the Constitution of the country should be respected.
He cautioned that the country’s democracy was still growing and needed to mature and become stronger to handle some of the democratic challenges.