The Movement for the Actualisation of the Sovereign State of Biafra (MASSOB) and the Biafra Independent Movement (BIM)yesterday started the Biafran Independence celebration in Lagos as members of the group converged at the headquarters of the organisation in the Surulere area of Lagos to sing solidarity song and listen to messages of hope from their  leader Comrade Calistus Eze.

Speaking with Daily Sun, Comrade Eze urged all members of MASSOB and indigenes of the Southeastern part of the country to celebrate thanksgiving services in their various churches to mark the independence of  Biafra.

He explained that on a later day, before May 30, 2017, the group would hold a thanksgiving services at a church that will be disclosed later.

He said there was no need for the group to continue with a sit-at-home protest as it was not mourning since the state of Biafra has been achieved, especially with the structures already in place. He decried the call to sit-at-home by the Indigenous People of Biafra (IPOB) lead by Nnamdi Kanu, explaining that MASSOB stands by its principle of non violence, adding that it is upon that principle that Biafra would be achieved.

Earlier in his address to the people, Comrade Eze said: “This is a glorious day, it is an occasion for us to rejoice because it reminds us that now is the beginning of the end of our political servitude; it also reminds us that we are free from religious and political killings and Fulani Herdsmen attacks.

“We are free from perpetual discrimination against our people; the dawn of freedom is no longer a dream but a reality.

We are happy because MASSOB-BIM stands on the truth and it has made us free.”

He said the principle of non-violence was the course that founding fathers of MASSOB stood for, adding that the Biafra course was what “our fathers and mothers put their lives on the line for; this is a course our heroes and heroines battled for three years, it is the same course that took the lives of millions or our people.”