This story was printed from TODAYonline 
Tuesday • December 6, 2005
ONITSHA (Nigeria) — Millions of Nigerians deserted the normally bustling streets and markets of cities in the south-east of the country yesterday as police cracked down violently on a protest called to demand independence for the 40-million-strong Igbo people.
Riot police fired tear gas and live rounds to disperse gangs of youths who blocked the roads of Onitsha with burning barricades in a bid to enforce a total business shutdown called by a separatist group which dreams of resurrecting the breakaway Biafran Republic.
A police spokesman was uncompromising in his message to demonstrators, saying: "All troublemakers will be crushed."
The banned Movement for the Actualisation of a Sovereign State of Biafra alleged that police had shot dead three people: A 15-year-old boy, a schoolgirl and a demonstrator.
Police Commissioner Felix Ogbaudu called the claim "a blasted lie" and demanded the separatists produce bodies to prove there had been killings.
Meanwhile, shops, banks and petrol stations in the southern cities of Onitsha, Owerri and Awka were shuttered and the streets deserted.
In 1967 General Emeka Ojukwu led south-east Nigeria in a revolt against federal rule, declaring Igbo lands to be an independent "Republic of Biafra". He fought and lost a bitter three-year civil war with government forces. — AFP