The Nation Newspaper

Tag: Biafran

  • ‘I think even Ojukwu saw error of Biafran experiment’

    ‘I think even Ojukwu saw error of Biafran experiment’

    Alhaji Yahaya Ndu, a Muslim Igbo and the leader of Peoples Movement for a New Nigeria (PMNN), was a two-time Presidential Candidate of the defunct African Renaissance Party (ARP). In this interview with Precious Dikewoha, he described those drumming for war as jokers. He also said even Ojukwu had dumped the idea of Biafra before he died

    HOW do you describe Nigeria at the moment looking at hate speeches from one ethnic group to the other, especially the face-off between Arewa youths and Ndigbo living in the North?

    Clearly, our nation Nigeria is on the verge of something momentous. Its either we get it right and be stronger in greater unity or we get it wrong and everything falls to pieces.

    Nigeria is in trouble and anyone who thinks it’s an easy scenario must be deceiving him or herself. This nation, from all indications, is about to be shaken to its very foundation and everyone who wishes Nigeria well should better put on his or her think cap.

    The leader of IPOB and those handling Radio Biafra are accused of abuse and disrespect of the country and the President and Igbo people are accused of not condemning the act, is Biafra a disrespectful entity?

    Respect for elders is one quality prevalent in all African societies.  Did you not hear it said that the words of our elders are words of wisdom? Is that how you abuse your own fathers at home?

    And those of them who now say their religion is Judaism, is that what they think Judaism is all about? Do young people habitually insult elders in Israel? As a matter of fact, some of the so-called champions of Biafra are nothing but clever crooks and opportunists feeding fat on the ignorance and gullibility of suffering Igbo youths and the uninformed. I remember reading a piece where the one who believes he is the originator of the post war Biafran struggle was saying shamelessly that he picked the younger chap up from the streets of London where he was roaming joblessly and hopelessly and offered him employment to run the Radio Biafra and that it was to him that the former Biafran leader gave the Biafran franchise.

    Clearly, for a supposedly freedom fighter to refer to his struggle as a franchise shows without any shred of doubt that he sees the struggle not only as a business, but one which he believes he has the right to run as a monopoly. No wonder he and his collaborators are living in stupendous wealth.

    These set of Biafran freedom fighters, if you want to see them, don’t look in the jungle or ghettos where normal freedom fighters are to be found; look for them in five star hotels and palatial homes. They are being driven about in Rolls Royce cars.

    What have Biafra leaders, including the Ohanaeze, done for all those Biafran soldiers that lost limbs during the 1967-1970 civil war and have been begging for alms for survival since the end of the civil war at Oji River up till now, a full 37 years after? We all abandoned them to their fate from 1970 up till date. If there was another war tomorrow, God forbid, do you think their children would offer or agree to fight in that war, knowing that they would be abandoned like their fathers.

    I remember asking Chief Chukwuemeka Odumegwu Ojukwu a similar question one day, very many years ago while I was travelling in the same car with him to IfiteDunu in Anambra state from Enugu, for the commissioning of a multi-purpose farm built by the now late Chief (Dr.) Hyacinth Uzoewulu, the Owelle of Iffitedunu. I was sitting in the front seat of the car with Ojukwu’s driver while he, Ojukwu, was on the back seat with Col. Ike Nwosu the former military administrator of Abia State.

    By then, Ojukwu was the Chairman of the Board of Trustees of the Endowment Fund for the Center for Igbo Studies at the Abia State University, Uturu, while the late Chief (Dr.) Uzoewulu was the secretary. I was the Initiator as well as the Chairman of the Planning Committee and it was during the course of the project that opportunists now saw the possibility of a lucrative business in the name of a new Biafran struggle.

    If you ask me, in my opinion, even our most respected Dim Chukwuemeka Odumegwu Ojukwu himself had, while still alive, seen the error of the Biafran experiment as the great Zik of Africa did, which must be why he agreed for his wife, my dear sister, Bianca, to be an Ambassador of the Federal Republic of Nigeria to Spain.  I also believe that the so-called leaders of the post-civil war Biafra agitation during the tenure of the former President were frequenting the Aso Rock Villa and were not leaving empty handed in those days. But now, after the 2015 elections, the baton has changed hands, it has become fashionable to restart the Biafran business.

    Some people have alleged that some Igbo youths are preparing for war, is war the best option; can you tell us your experience of war?

    I am 60 of age now. I was born in Jos, the capital of Plateau State in April 1957. I was therefore 10 years of age when the Nigerian civil war stated. When the pogrom started, my father, the late Senator Igwe Ibrahim P.C. Ndu, the first Senator of Enugu Province and my mother took us out of Northern Nigeria to the East. We relocated from place to place in Eastern Nigeria until the war ended in 1970.

    I hated Nigeria and everything Nigeria was doing during the war and my greatest disappointment during the war.

    I hated Nigeria; I hated Northern Nigerians with all my heart. I hated the Yorubas and the Western Nigeria as well as parts of the Niger Delta. I hated all these groups because of the parts that I was told and believed they played in the pogrom and the subsequent civil war. But now I am older, and I have had good time to interrogate all that I was fed as a child and as an adolescent and to separate the lies from the truth; the wheat from the chaff.

    I even contested for the presidency of this country twice. In 2003 and in 2011 I was National Chairman of the African Renaissance Party [ARP] for ten years.

    It is said that experience is the best teacher. I know from firsthand experience that 99.9% of elites in Southern Nigeria, whether from the South-West, South-East or South- South are hypocrites at least as far as the issue of the so-called restructuring of Nigeria is concerned.

    Before Jonathan came to power, at a point the loudest voice for restructuring was the Niger Delta/South-South. I thought they were serious, but I was wrong.  When Jonathan came to power, I immediately called the leaders of the Ijaw National Congress [INC] and told them that the time was ripe for the restructuring but their answer to me was that we should let the young man [Jonathan] rest.

    I even went to Transcorp Hilton Hotel Abuja, where almost all the visible Niger-Delta activists had permanently relocated to. My business was to speak with a lady that was seen as the most vocal woman activist of the Niger Delta to complain to her that Jonathan was not doing the right things.  That the most important thing to be done was to achieve the restructuring that Nigeria has always needed but her answer to me was that it was immaterial whether Jonathan was governing well or not and that as far as she was concerned Jonathan must have a second term.

    To cut a long story short, at a conference organised in Uyo, the capital of Akwa Ibom State, which was organised by the Prof. Ben Nwabueze’s Nigeria Project Group on the issue of a National Conference at the Ibom Meridian Hotel, trouble started for which I was blamed when we saw that they had written the communiqué of the conference even before the commencement of the conference.

    A former AD Senator from the South-West, who right now is one of the leading voices for restructuring of Nigeria once again, presided over the convocation of the Jonathan Conference against the popular views expressed by generality of Nigerians.  The committee went round the nation to collect and collate views of generality of Nigerians on the matter. Today, after wasting the nation’s time and resources, he and his cohorts are at it

  • Re: The Biafran Ghost

    SIR: As I read last week’s article with the above title by Sam Omatseye, my heart bled and my thoughts ran rings of frustration. The write-up was a grand and veritable riposte to a betrayed, raped and vilified country I call my own.  Like a novel I read years ago by Dorren Wayne with the apt title “Love Is A Well-raped Word”, Nigeria has been serially abused, tormented and brutalized since Independence by its elite – political, economic and military – sans boundaries.  Meaning that when it comes to exploiting and despoiling Nigeria, our elite have no qualms about religion or ethnic configuration; they gang up in unified subversion of our common good.  I submit that the average Nigerian had no problems with his Nupe, Urhobo, Fulani or Yoruba compatriots until the politicians (Khaki or Agbada) came along with their incendiary and combustible rhetoric of religion and ethnic jingoisms.

    From the first military coup till date, our various rulers (no leaders, please) have perpetually played the ostrich game without shame or remorse. As he pointed out in that article, we, as a people have  imbibed a culture of lying through our problems while refusing to confront the usual demons that come with pragmatic nation-building. Beginning with the botched Nzeogwu coup to Aguiyi-Ironsi’s naïve alchemy in political engineering, culminating in his blunt refusal to try the January 1966 coup plotters, the beneficiaries of his policies saw nothing wrong with his agenda as it affected the sensibilities of other Nigerians.

    This, however, does not justify the horrendous massacre of southerners in their hundreds in the northern part of the country, majority of who were Igbo between May and September 1966. In a cynical play of role reversal, the “Swagger of the Igbo” in early 1966 gave way to the “Triumphalism of the North” later that same year.  The elites on both sides winked and connived at these despicable acts that were to be the harbinger to the civil war from 1967 – 1970.

    As a young man growing up in the then Eastern Region, I was a witness to the bloody orgy of mindless massacre and dehumanization of the Igbo. However, whether secession from Nigeria was the final solution remains debatable.

    Unfortunately, the aftermath of the post-civil war was not effectively handled as Nigeria suffered a deficit of quality leadership in the ruling military and its subservient and colluding civilian wing. I suspect that till today we are still caught up in an infernal contradiction between the “Igbo Swagger” and the “Northern Triumphalism”. Throw in the mix a burgeoning restive Niger Delta with their avowed Sense of Entitlement, and you have Shakespeare’s Macbeth’s “Cauldron of the Witches”. And as Omatseye pointed out, we are still to live down the “Biafran Ghost”.

    There is no doubt that a society, or nation makes no significant progress in the face of grave centripetal tendencies such as we have in ourpolity, no matter how well-meaning the intentions of its leadership. The time to sit back, reflect and chart a new course for our beloved nation is NOW.

    For a start, we, leaders and followers, must hearken to the rebuke of former U.S. President Bill Clinton to immediately begin the process of building strong institutions and jettison the jaded and anachronistic culture of entrenching the “African Big Man”. Nations are founded on institutions and not primordial values of religion, ethnicism and cronyism.

     

    • Victor H. Ikikhueme, 

    idiakevictor@yahoo.com

  • The Biafran ghost

    The Biafran ghost

    Like Banquo’s ghost, the past haunts us today, again. Forty nine years after the civil war, we are still fighting the war. Some think the war is over. They are wrong. The war is with us because we are a nation of self-deceit. We lie to and at ourselves. We say peace whereas tribulation lurks and detonates everywhere.

    That is why Boko Haram harangues us in the North. It explains the resurgence of the IPOB and MASSOB and the rumblings of the Niger Delta Avengers and the barbarous entitlement of herdsmen. Even before the past few years, when bombs were literally quiet, tongues exploded between tribes. Rhetoric rattled rhetoric. Tribes and tongues differed by saying tribes and tongues differed. The June 12 excitement was a rebirth of the divisions of the 1960’s.

    We did not solve the problem when it confronted us. When Gowon exploited his name as an acronym of unity, GO ON WITH ONE NIGERIA turned out to be an empty epithet, a feel-good delusion from a victor. Nothing concrete was resolved other than fell the enemy in battle.

    Did we resolve the issue of abandoned properties? Leading up to the war, pogrom lit up the North in incandescent murders. Not only Igbo were killed as many tendentious literature say. Even Adichie’s Half Of The Yellow Sun, for all its strengths, portrayed the single story that the author has campaigned against. The slaughter up North targeted anyone who was not Yoruba, and that included the sweep of minorities in the today’s Niger Delta. Urhobo, Itsekiri, Edo, Efik, Ogoni, etc were mincemeat in the cauldron of death.

    Now, did we have any enquiries into that sanguinary chapter? The northern elite, including political, feudal and military leaders, reportedly encouraged the barbarities. Has anyone been punished or even been officially reprimanded? We have not even officially investigated. We know too that Nzeogwu’s coup was seen as tendentious, and it inspired some Igbo to provoke northerners with their proprietary swagger, boasting that they had taken over the country. Have we looked at that, too? If the swagger was bad, the killings were never justified. But even at that, have we addressed them as a people? Ironsi enacted Decree 34, and some analysts said it was naïve because he did not intend to introduce a unitary system to impose Igbo hegemony. If that act was naïve, what of the second act? He did not want to try the coup plotters. That, according to critics, gave him away as an Igbo jingoist.

    Have we revisited the Aburi meeting, and its aftermath, and how that confab either ossified or laid bare the fissures of our inter-ethnic relations? Were there blames? Where there acts of overreach on both sides? Was the war avoidable? Did the pogrom make war inevitable? How come a region that knew it was tactically and materially inferior to its opponent take the plunge into war?

    So, we also had the war atrocities. We saw what Ojukwu’s army did in the Midwest when Biafra invaded, and the resentment overshadows conversation up till today. We know of the killings of the Igbo in Asaba and how Murtala’s Second Division teased out trusting locals to welcome them and killed them like animals. Gowon, who could not rein in his generals, only had an apology over 40 years after. The apology, however heartfelt, never brought closure.

    So, when hostilities ended, Gowon declared that there was no victor and no vanquished. We know that was as vacuous as GOWON. We just wanted to move on, like a child who walks into a party from a bathroom without cleaning up. The smell and mess linger.

    The ghost has followed us ever since. In education, over whether we should have catchment areas or not. In the Orkar coup. In Saro Wiwa’s murder. In the Matatsine imbroglio. In the meltdown of Fulani and indigenes relations in the plateau. In the June 12 logjam. In the choice of Jonathan as president. In the choice of Buhari as counter president. The list is endless.

    So, when many, including the self-serving Atiku, called for restructuring, it was because the civil war and ghosts of the many dead are still with us, walking the Nigeria earth, apologies to Shakespeare’s Hamlet. Developed nations understand the merits of closure. Last week, Britain unveiled the Chilcot report and picked to pieces all the facts of that ignoble chapter of the Iraq War. Tony Blair was exposed, as well as some of the intelligence community and the parliament. The nation looked itself in the mirror, and mea culpa replaced a sense of righteousness.

    On the Iraq war, the New York Times issued a lengthy apology for allowing the emotion of the day sway its professional duties. Next time, both England and United States will think deeper before throwing innocents at the teeth of battle. The crisis of the Balkans is still lapping up its culprits today. Enquiries have dredged up the bad guys and they are subjected to the rule of law. The Hutus and Tutsis have also had theirs and those who inflamed the land to butchery have been exposed and punished. Apartheid in South Africa had its Truth and Reconciliation Commission.

    The Second World War could not be concluded without a clear resolution through the Nuremberg trials. The First World War was concluded without such an enquiry. The victors simply punished Germany and isolated it. The result: a resurgent Germany with the Hitler of hate.

    A people must always learn not to take its injustice for granted. During the Peloponnesian War, Athens fell because it merely slaughtered its best generals who did not pick up its dead at sea as was the custom. The parliament did not reason. The absence of its best brood of soldiers allowed Sparta to crush it.

    So, when Buhari stands accused as nepotist and regionalist in his appointments, it is because he has not transcended the hubris of the civil war. He invokes GOWON but he denies it when his pen signs an appointment. When does a chief of staff to a president become a board member of Nigeria’s choicest corporation? How do we call a truce with the Avengers when the NNPC board is lopsided and has only one name from the oil producing areas?

    The civil war haunts because the hostilities have never really ended. Unnerved on his throne, Macbeth could not exorcise Banquo’s ghost. He said, “Avaunt and quit my sight. Let the earth hide thee, thy bone is marrowless and thy blood is cold.”

    The Biafran ghost still spills cold blood. We may deny it and say our nation is not negotiable, but the past keeps growling and badgering. The more we claim we are together, the more apart we get.

  • Illusion of Biafran secessionist agenda

    The perception of uniting diverse political communities to form a national government is a primordial one, patented from the era of ancient Greeks, assembles to fortify national security and common objectives. In a federal political arrangement, multi-layered governance model becomes imperative to allow each level of government perform its statutory political functions in accordance with the constitutional provisions. Each level of government is empowered to design suitable political technique, depending on the nature of political environment; to incorporate diverse ethnic groups in the political structure while maintaining their socio-political identity. Federalism through regional distribution of economic and political power has been adopted to accelerate sustainable peace in a multi-ethnic society. Numerous countries of the world have espoused it as a magic wand to reconcile ethnic chauvinism in the political organism. Paradoxically, there are many challenges associated with the federal political arrangement. These include ethnic agitation for resource control, minority campaign for secession, political rivalry among others. In Nigeria, federalism has been hoodwinked and contrived by the political bourgeoisies. Thus, enlivening secession by the Biafran nation which is gaining momentum, animated towards addressing ethnic, religious, economic and political quandaries that permeated Nigerian political architecture in the tempestuous epoch of Nigerian burgeoning democracy. Conversely, a challenge associated with this type of political system is the pluralistic socio-political rhetoric that enforces ethnic agitation for political control at the centre. The ethnic hegemonic peculiarity to rule the centre and excessive fragmentation of convoluted political system usually threatening the corporate existence of the political union; the operationalization and synchronization of the political system enthrall unending rivalry among the diverse ethnic groups, which endangers the security, development and peace of the nation.

    True federalism cannot be measured on a platform of the current political arrangement in Nigeria. This is because the system has not been properly entrenched. It can be noted that federalism has been manipulated by the various successive regimes including autocratic and civilians; exploiting the system to foster ethnic and religious tension as well as personal gains.  The existing structure has been manipulated to centralize resources while starving the components units. Corroboratively, the endemic corruption that encircles Nigeria’s political system has destabilized a supposed functional federal political arrangement; thereby paving way for ethnic altercation to control the national government so as to be safe and secured within the political structure.

    The primacy of Biafra’s secessionists’ movement in Nigeria’s political history cannot be disregarded. The abortive secessionists’ struggle between 1967 and 1970 formed a crucial account of Nigeria’s political record. The then military President, General Yakubu Gowon described the war as a “tragic and painful conflict” and highlights that his objectives were to “crush the rebellion, maintain the territorial integrity of our nation, to assert the ability of the black man to build a strong, progressive and prosperous modern state and to ensure respect, dignity and equality in the comity of nations for our posterity”.

    However, despite all efforts to sign the peace treaty and bring back all the ethnic groups affected by the war into the political fold, the chronicles of the war are still lingering in the memories of the people of Biafran nation. Evidently, the resurgence of Biafra’s agitation under the democratic regime of President Muhammadu Buhari substantiates the perpetual reminiscences of the Biafra’s heroes who have fought to liberate their people under the rubric of self-determination. Nevertheless, the new paradigm of these secessionists is detrimental to the political good of the country especially for Nigerian nascent democracy. The cacophony of secession move is as a result of a shift in presidential power from the South to the North, ascribed in the 2015 electoral faceoff between former President Goodluck Jonathan and General Muhammadu Buhari. To avoid the resuscitation of another civil war in Nigeria, I therefore advocate for true federalism through a regional autonomous political configuration as an alternative strategy to quench the yearning and aspiration of secessionists in order to ensure sustainable peace in Nigeria. The rationale behind this system is to allow each region composed of homogenous ethnic group to exploit their resources for sustainable development. This opportunity will provide alternative political template to extinguish the ember of secession in Nigeria’s polity. The existing 36 states should be jettisoned by replacing the six geo-political zones to form regional governments by conceding autonomy to allow each region valve from their unexploited natural resources and reimburse the necessary approved revenue formulae to the national government.

    Over concentration on crude oil has been a major imbroglio while abandoning other untapped natural resources such as cocoa, palm-oil, groundnut, rubber and other agricultural products that are wasting away in other regions with no serious attention by the federal government contributes to the current economic predicament of the nation. It is important to note that there are many states that cannot survive to pay their staff salaries under the existing federal arrangement.

    Under the new arrangement, each regional government or geo-political zone should be allowed to manage its resources to foster development for the benefit of its people. To achieve regional breakthrough, total overhauling of Nigerian 1999 Constitution through a legitimate and genuine Sovereign National Conference is a sine-qua-non.

    Therefore, the outcomes of the conference should engender a people’s constitution for the sustenance of true federal political construction in Nigeria. The subterfuge behind this proposition is to make the centre unappealing to ethnic cronies, political elites and resolving incessant Biafra’s secessionists’ movement.

     

    • John is a student of School of Politics and International Studies, University of Leeds, UK
  • The Biafran bogey

    The Biafran bogey

    In the last few weeks, the country has been under severe threat by those agitating for the sovereign state of Biafra. For years, the arrowhead of the agitation has been the Movement for the Actualisation of the Sovereign State of Biafra otherwise known as MASSOB. This current struggle is, however, being amplified by the Indigenous Peoples of Biafra, IPOB, led by one Nnamdi Kanu, the founder of the propaganda Radio Biafra. The group keyed into the various paraphernalia and insignia which MASSOB had already put in place for the Biafran course. These include, vehicle plate number bearing United States of Biafra, drivers and vehicle licenses, tax receipt, international passport and currency, which they claim, to have deposited at the World Bank. Obviously, as these items are things that make a people a nation, it shows the people’s desire to stay on their own.

    There is no doubt that MASSOB and IPOB form a secessionist movement with the aim of securing the resurgence of the defunct state of Biafra from Nigeria. This is underscored by the sight of thousands of able-bodied young men and women marching endlessly on the streets in Asaba, Delta State and other parts of the South-east geo-political region of the country in recent time. Their zealousness and display of enthusiasm under the scorching sun, is a signal that the MASSOB/IPOB message is fast gaining ground.

    Of course, the story of Biafra did not start today. It has a long history behind it. The entrance of the military into the nation’s political space through the instrumentality of the bloody coup d’etat of January 15, 1966, greatly distorted Nigeria’s political equilibrium. That coup, which was led by Major Chukwuma Kaduna Nzeogwu and his group of three or four other comrades-in-arms who were also Majors, overthrew the legitimate government of the late Sir Abubakar Tafawa Balewa, the then Prime Minister of Nigeria. That episode also threw up the late General Johnson Thomas Umunakwe Aguiyi–Ironsi as Nigeria’s Head of State and Commander-in–Chief of the Armed Forces of the Federation.  As soon as he assumed power, Ironsi sent all the politicians scampering for safety when he abolished the federal structure and regional governments through the promulgation of the Unification Decree 34 of May 1966.

    But the events of January 1966 did not go down well with another group of middle-level army officers who read meanings to the massacre that attended the coup. Their main grudge was that the coup appeared to be sectional in that it was mostly senior political figures from a section of the country that were victims.  So, like a movie scene, barely six months later, there was a counter–coup which was more or less, a reprisal for the earlier bloodbath witnessed in the country. That counter-coup ushered in Yakubu Gowon, then a young, good-looking army officer of the rank of a Lieutenant – Colonel.

    The emerging military regimes provoked agitations for a national dialogue. Prominent among the demands of the agitators were the creation of additional states borne out of perceived abnormal imbalance in the federal structure; the nature and form of association among the country’s diverse ethnic groups; the composition of the leadership at the centre as well as the issue of secession which was gaining currency at that time. There were also such issues as the need for an acceptable formula for equitable revenue allocation, resource control and many others.

    These problems, which still exist today, have been a serious threat to the continued existence of Nigeria. To douse the raging controversy then, the government of Gowon repealed Decree 34, reverted to the federal system of government and restored the regional governments. Furthermore, on September 12, 1966, an ad hoc conference aimed at arresting the agitations and preserving the sanctity of the country as a nation opened in Lagos. The conference revealed that the country had drifted apart and was on the brink of total disintegration. However, renewed killings in the northern part of the country as well as retaliatory actions in the southern part later threw a spanner in the works of finding amicable solution to the problems plaguing the nation. In other words, even though the four existing regions had made submissions to the conference, the escalation of the crisis prevented the leaders from arriving at an acceptable strategy to keep Nigeria together.

    By this time, the animosity between Gowon, the Head of State and Chukwuemeka Odumegu-Ojukwu, a Lieutenant-Colonel and governor of the Eastern Region, became more pronounced. This surely affected the relationship between the Federal Government and the government of the Eastern Region as the two leaders vehemently disagreed on the real issues that threw spanners in the outcome of the September 1966 Constitutional Conference. The simmering crisis led to the attempt of the late General Joe Ankrah, who was then Ghana’s Head of State, to reconcile the two leaders at a conference held at the Botanical Gardens’ town of Aburi, in the Eastern Region of south Ghana, between January 4 and 5, 1967. Even at that, the Aburi Accord reached by the two leaders was only observed in its breach. This eventually snowballed into the 30-month Civil War when the Eastern Regional Consultative Assembly mandated Ojukwu to declare the “Republic of Biafra”.

    It is true that when the war finally ended on January 12, 1970, the Gowon regime immediately declared that there was no victor, no vanquished. This was followed by a programme styled RRR – Rehabilitation, Reconstruction and Reconciliation – as a way of rebuilding the nation. But the problems have refused to go away. Today, protagonists of Biafra have traced the killings of Igbo people, whom they refer to as the indigenous people of Biafra in the northern part of the country to the lopsided development and federal superstructure that tended to reward mediocrity to the conspiracy against Igbo. They claim that, “injustice makes life unbearable to our people.” For instance, according to them, “49 years after the war, war veterans from the Biafran side had not been paid their allowances like their colleagues – the Yorubas and the Hausa/Fulani. It is an injustice that must be addressed and it is part of the reason why we are doing what we are doing because in the new Biafra, we would not have this level of injustice”.

    Far too many issues are involved in the perennial agitation for Biafra. The outcome of the last general election during which the opposition Peoples’ Democratic Party, PDP, garnered block votes from the South-east, was a definitive statement by that geo-political region. It is confounding that politicians from that part of the country may have employed the renewed agitation for Biafra as a façade to ventilate their displeasure over the outcome of the last election in which the All Progressives’ Congress, APC, gained the upper hand. Besides, quite a good number of people across the political spectrum in the country may equally not be at ease with the way the new government is running the affairs of the country with iron fist.

    Above all, central to the seemingly insurmountable problems confronting the country is the issue of endemic poverty now ravaging everywhere. Nigerians are suffering and dying of hunger and diseases. Yet, all the people have been treated to over the years are empty promises of a better tomorrow, the illusory and elusive tomorrow that has refused to come all these years. But secession is not the answer and cannot be the answer. Let us revisit the report of the 2014 National Conference and see how we can move forward. It will serve us no good if we continue to think that only Buhari and his government can proffer solutions to the weighty problems confronting this country. After all, we all have a stake in the Nigerian project.

  • ‘How FG can stop Biafran agitation’

    ‘How FG can stop Biafran agitation’

    Federal Government’s recent  stance against the activities of the Movement for the Sovereign State of Biafra (MASSOB) has brought the activities of the group to public inquiry once again. In this brief chat with Sam Egburonu, the Deputy Secretary of Professor Ben Nwabueze-led Igbo Leaders of Thought (ILT) and Founder/Leader of Igbo Youth Movement (IYM), Evangelist Elliot Uko, explains what must be done to stop the agitation

    Why is the Biafran breeze blowing across the South-East many years after the civil war?

    It has always been there. Young people all over the world, all through history have always been adventurous and daring. The idea of re-enacting Biafran Republic has always been in the hearts and minds of young people, especially those who seem not to believe that Ndigbo will ever get justice in Nigeria. Igbo youths find Biafra a very attractive option. It is not new, it has always been there. I grew up in Enugu in the 70s; I went to boarding school in Enugu at Nike Grammar School. I know the usual discussions in the dormitory amongst students. They believe Nigeria is pulling Ndigbo backwards, they believe Ndigbo are better off in a separate state. I have been organising seminars and workshops for Igbo youths for decades, I know their mindset. I know that the Biafran option is very attractive to them. It is not new. Nigerians know there is great need to restructure the polity urgently and give all sections a sense of belonging. Nigeria does not want to do that. The feeling of alienation encourages thought of secession. Those opposing restructuring Nigeria are the ones fueling the Biafran agitation.

    The anger and bitterness of the Igbo condition in Nigeria politics fuels a discontent which Uwazurike, Kanu and co, chose to exploit. Whereas the older Igbo tread cautiously, the younger ones, like young people all over the world, want action, now, now; it could only get worse because the Federal Government chooses to pretend it is not a serious issue. It could also get out of hand because there are Nigerians who are determined never to give Ndigbo justice. So, the Biafran breeze is blowing simply because Nigeria has chosen to pretend that it does not know that the structure of Nigeria is not working.

    But why are Igbo leaders silent?     

    Igbo leaders have been shouting themselves hoarse on the need to create a level playing field for all in Nigeria. Nobody seems to listen. Four out of six zones, wants Nigeria restructured urgently. Some people remain adamant. Nigeria, as presently constituted is not working. States cannot pay salaries; 40 million young men remain jobless, mutual suspicion and hatred fill the land. The people, who want Biafra, do not have faith in Nigeria any more. Instead of Nigeria, reaching out to allay their fears and frustration, like legendary Stevie Wonder captures almost 40 years ago in his ever green song, “we are all busy spending our lives, living in past time paradise. It is a pity.

    What’s your advice?

    Some people believe Nigeria is their property. They designed the country. They created states and local governments according to their whims. It does not matter to them that the Nigeria they shaped is not working. They want it to remain that way till thy kingdom comes, whether it is working or not. Over two dozen studies by reputable scholars across the world in the last two decades point to the possibility of Nigeria failing. We only abused them without trying to find out why they all predict doom. We are sitting on a keg of gun powder.

    Leaders, who know the truth, should stop trying to deceive the world. One of them called the pro-Biafran boys fraudsters. He knows he was being hypocritical. Another said Biafra is finished. Probably finished in his own mind, not in the minds of millions of Igbo youths who believe they have no future in Nigeria. An article by one Mathew Page in the Washington post last week advised President Buhari on how to move Nigeria forward. Regrettably, the writer carefully and deliberately avoided the crux of the matter, which is the unresolved national question. The tragedy of the situation is that those who want Nigeria to remain the way they created it have sold a lie to the international community that corruption and Boko Haram are our main problems. That Nigerian leaders chose to shy away from the truth by going round in circle while dodging the real issue, does not in any way mean that solution could be found by cutting corners. There is no other way to move Nigeria forward in peace and unity without addressing the national question. Our political structure, the 1999 militarily inspired constitution are some of the reasons why millions of our country men do not believe in Nigeria. That is the most urgent task facing any government. When we revert to true federalism, all our problems will be reduced including corruption, unemployment, secession, etc.

    Most of Nigeria’s problem flows from the refusal to address the national question. We are only deceiving ourselves.

    Do Igbo leaders sanction secession then?

    No, but these angry boys are exploiting the vacuum created by lack of firm respectable leadership in Igbo land. Apart from the Igbo Leaders of Thought (ILT) led by Prof. Ben Nwabueze, no group commands respect in Igboland. The Ohanaeze that should have been the apex and umbrella association of Ndigbo is enmeshed and embroiled in a lot of sordid and not so honourable scandals that makes it difficult for Ndigbo to listen to them anymore. The present leaders are seen as sit tight businessmen who trade with Ndigbo for their personal gain and are better known for endorsing presidential candidates than for anything else. I have not seen or spoken to any of their leaders in three years. They lost credibility in the eyes of the people. The youth do not see in them, leaders they could trust. In fact, the youths believe that those people are the problem we have in Igbo land. Pecuniary pursuits have eroded their legitimacy in the eyes of the people. It has been long since the youths chose to take their destiny into their hands which makes the situation a time bomb.

     The Igbo Youth Movement, which you lead, honoured some select leaders a fortnight ago. What is the idea behind it?

    The event was the 16th Annual Convention of the IYM, an annual ritual; the Lord has consistently given us the grace to mark each year since 1999. This year, we tried to enlighten our people on the need not to let the Igbo language die. We also honoured the best in Igboland: Prof. Ben Nwabueze for his commitment to the good of the people and visionary leadership; Dr. Alex Ekwueme for his dedication to truth and the good of the land; Prof. Vincent Ike, as a great role model, one of the national leaders of the APC, and Minister designate, Dr. Ogbonnaya Onu for decency in politics and being honourable in perseverance. We also honoured veteran actor, John Okafor (Mr. Ibu) for his dedication to the arts and contributions to the industry. We thank God for the grace upon the IYM and pledge to remain steadfast. It is important to highlight to our people who the real heroes are. We are very proud of them.

     

  • Biafran group urges elections boycott

    The Biafra Zionists Movement (BZM) has urged Ndigbo to boycott the elections.

    It said the action became necessary, following the refusal of a Federal High Court in Enugu to grant bail to 11 pro-Biafra activists standing treason trial.

    Addressing reporters in Enugu yesterday, the BZF National Chairman, Comrade Onyia Cyril, said any harm done to the detained members was a harm on Ndigbo.

    He enjoined the Igbo not to participate in the polls as a show of solidarity with the activists.

    According to him, “they have been in custody not because they are pursuing a selfish cause, but for demanding the liberation of Ndigbo.

    “We urge the Igbo not to participate in the elections. This is the only honour they can do to these great patriots.”

    Onyia, who faulted the reasons given by the court, noted: “It is surprising that the court refused them bail on the grounds that they may cause security breach during this period. It is surprising because the BZF does not believe in violence, neither does it associate with any violent body. We can never disrupt any election, although we shall abstain from voting.

    “We advise the Federal Government to intervene and ensure that these harmless freedom fighters are released.

    “In our fight for freedom, we have never and will never take up arms against the state. Everything we are doing is within the ambit of international laws and treaties.”

    He urged the Amnesty International and the United Nations to intervene in what he called “the use of federal might and power against lawful Biafrans”.

    A Federal High Court in Enugu last Thursday refused to grant the bail application filed on behalf of the BZF leader, Benjamin Onwuka, a lawyer and 10 others.

  • On the grave of Biafra

    As anyone perchance feeding on the grave of ex-Biafran soldiers? In a clime where nothing is sacrosanct anymore, would some morbid fellows in government exhume the better-forgotten Biafran debacle and profit by it? Hardball fears so. Why? The Nigerian civil war, also known as the Biafran war, ended about 44 years ago with the war generation aging and passing away, while some scars of battle remain visible and in some cases unhealed. Many compatriots from the Biafran side still feel hard done that as not much reconstruction and rehabilitation have been achieved over these years.

    In fact, most must have moved on with their lives, knowing that Nigeria is a wayward entity where government is apt to provoke its citizenry to strive and contestation. Explains why government keep poking stick in the eye of the Biafran wound. If it refused to attend to the wound, dress it and in fact find out the anatomy of the wound, why rake it up after more than four decades? Yes, the recent story that the federal government is paying pension to ex-Biafran soldiers reads like a hoax.

    According to the report, government has started paying pension to soldiers of the Nigerian Army who fought on the side of the secessionist Biafran army during the Nigerian civil war of 1967 to 1970. The freshly appointed chairman of the Military Pension Board (MPB), Air Commodore Mohammed Dabo, told his visiting boss, Musiliu Obanikoro, who is the minister of state for Defence, that the MPB had enrolled 160 ex-Biafran soldiers for the payment of monthly pensions.

    Strange things happen daily in Nigeria and desperate things stranger than fiction would happen when big elections are nigh. This scheme seems so strange even a rat would smell a rat. Now the civil war ended 44 years ago; no one remembered the ex-Biafran soldiers till the year 2000 when the government of the day deigned to have pardoned the soldiers. But between then and now, nothing was heard of the hapless soldiers anymore. Then out of the blue, a very ‘magnanimous’ Goodluck Jonathan administration is suddenly paying pensions to some unknown and forgotten soldiers?

    Hardball would wager that the Nigeria Army does not have proper data of its current soldiers, not to speak of those who fought in the civil war in what must be like dark ages now. A few weeks ago, Nigeria Army retirees protested in Kano, Ibadan, Taraba and Abuja over 39 months of an unpaid 20 per cent of their pension. The protest was carried out under the aegis of the Retired Army, Navy and Airforce Officers’ Association. They had protested to the president in 2013, who promised to see that their outstanding was captured in the budget of 2014. Now the year is more than half way gone yet, nobody cares. As you read this, those soldiers are still being owed.

    Nothing can be fishier than this ex-Biafran soldiers’ pension story. It would be nice to see the remnants of the Biafrans. It would be salutary to publish their names, addresses, local government areas, hometowns and states of origin. It would be wonderful if MPB could give Nigerians more information, including the sum paid to these ex-soldiers so far. This is the only way to prove that some soulless people are not feeding on dead Biafran soldiers.

     

  • New Biafran leadership emerges

    A new Biafran leadership emerged, at the weekend, with the Director of Radio Biafra, Nnamdi Kanu, at the head.

    Scores of Biafran war veterans, who attended the event, vowed that they would not rest  until the republic was invented.

    A multi-million naira cenotaph was unveiled in memory of those it called its fallen heroes during the Nigeria/Biafra civil war.

    It said its agitation for freedom from Nigeria would continue until the Biafra Republic was invented.

    Kanu spoke at Ngwo in Udi Local Government Area of Enugu State, during the maiden commemoration of Biafra Day on May 30, the day the late Dim Chukwuemeka Odumegwu-Ojukwu declared the Republic of Biafra in I967.

    Kanu said it was regrettable that despite the declaration of the “No victor, no vanquished” after the civil war in 1970, successive governments including the Goodluck Jonathan administration had marginalised and made life unbearable for the Igbo.

    He urged the Igbo across the globe to join the crusade of putting in place the Biafran Republic, adding that it was time the Igbo pulled out of Nigeria, which he described as a failed nation.

    Kanu said it was painful that 47 years after the civil war ended, Federal Government had refused to pay soldiers who fought on the side of Biafra their benefits and entitlements, whereas their counterparts in the North and West had been paid.

    The Radio Biafra boss said despite the odds, they remained grateful to the late Ojukwu and others who laid down their lives for the struggle.

    He warned the Federal Government not to hinder the proposed republic, saying  it should allow the will of God to be done by letting the Igbo go.

    Kanu wondered how any right thinking fellow would want to remain in a nation where he or she had no stake or recognition, stressing that the Igbo would soon move from bondage to the promised land where God had prepared for them.

    He said 47 years after Ojukwu declared the Republic of Biafra, the reasons that led to his decision were still evident in Nigeria.

    Kanu decried the sufferings of Nigerians, following corrupt and bad governance.

    He said as long as the intention of the amalgamation of the North and South was designed to cheat the latter, the nation would never move forward, because any country that made injustice its watchword would never prosper.

    According to him, no amount of National Conference can solve Nigeria’s problems because the leaders are not sincere and there is deep-rooted hatred among the citizens.

    Kanu said the only panacea for Nigeria’s problems was to split it into regions, enjoining the Igbo to embrace and keep faith with Biafra, which he assured would come to reality.

  • Genocide; ‘Biafran’ culpability and Achebe’s impressions

    Genocide; ‘Biafran’ culpability and Achebe’s impressions

    IN the maelstrom of reactions to Chinua Achebe’s new book, amongst is a noteworthy opinion that Achebe’s book presents us with an opportunity, perhaps for rational enquiry into some of some of the events that led to the rise and fall of ‘Biafra’, and its aftermath. It seems that to further understand Achebe’s position; the viewpoints of other persons mostly of Igbo origin may be examined.

    ABC Nwosu has alleged there was pogrom, genocide and mass starvation of innocent children in Nigeria in 1966 and in ‘Biafra’ from 1967 to 1970. Undoubtedly and most regrettably, children suffered from the effects of the Nigerian Civil War while the blockade of ‘Biafran’ territory was a reality during the Nigerian Civil War, but it is grossly unfair and inaccurate for anybody to give the impression that the starvation of children was a deliberate policy of the General Yakubu Gowon led Nigerian Federal Government and for Achebe to have amplified his baseless and queer impression that Chief Obafemi Awolowo sought to exterminate Igbos in order to improve the fortunes of the Yoruba people.

    Achebe has consistently had kind words for Aminu Kano in both The Trouble with Nigeria and in his biography authored by Ezenwa-Ohaeto, where at page 138, Achebe recollects an encounter with the Nigerian delegation at a conference he attended in Kampala, Uganda, as roving ambassador of ‘Biafra’. He states “I remember very well seeing Aminu Kano on the Nigerian delegation sitting in front and looking so distressed. This is one of the strongest impressions the man made on me, compared to people like Chief Enahoro who was leader of the delegation swaggering as conquerors, and even Asika. Aminu Kano seemed to be so different; in fact, he seemed to be looking out of the window. While his colleagues were speaking arrogantly and bent on our surrender, Aminu Kano was calm and in pain”.

    The well-orchestrated pogroms in the North in 1966 during which thousands of Igbos and other southerners were slaughtered were, to say the very least, indefensible, and deserved redress. Chuks Iloegunam in the very well researched book, Ironside [the biography of Major General Aguiyi-Ironsi] details in pages 172 to 183 the pogroms in Northern Nigeria. He states on page 175 that “People have been hard to convince that Mallam Aminu Kano played a principal role in organising the genocide perpetrated against Ndigbo in 1966, simply because of his position as a politician of the talakawa or common folk. And these doubters include those who readily believe the complicity of politicians such as Adamu Ciroma, Umaru Dikko, Suleman Takuma, Mamman Daura, Inuwa Wada and others. But [Iyorchia] Ayu is right in mentioning him, as a notable party to the bloody conspiracy. This fact was confirmed by Hajia Gambo Sawaba, one of the foremost women politicians in Nigeria and a member of Mallam Aminu’s defunct Northern Elements Progressive Union [NEPU]….”   Perhaps Achebe, who is only human after all, has a major problem with his impressions and is better suited to writing fiction and fantasy rather than analysing reality.

    A well, publicised statement that ‘’It would appear that the God of Africa has created the Igbo nation to lead the children of Africa from the bondage of ages by  Dr Nnamdi Azikiwe, President of the Pan-Igbo Federal Union. (The West African Pilot of July 8, 1949) and another that ‘’Igbo domination of Nigeria is only a matter of time’’- Charles Dadi Onyeama, a prominent Igbo lawyer [later jurist] and member of the Central Legislative Council, 1945. (Pg. 204 ‘’Ethnic Politics In Kenya and Nigeria’’ by Godfrey Mwakikagile),  together with the flawed execution of the Five Majors’ coup, the perceived triumphant attitude of Igbos after the coup, the alleged ‘Ibonisation’ policies of Ironsi,  and the notorious Decree 34 certainly created suspicion but cannot justify the unrestrained and calibrated violence unleashed in reaction against Igbos and other southerners.

    But given the regional sensibilities and ethnic fraught politics of Nigeria, it is important to note the opinion Bernard Odogwu [Head of Intelligence, Biafra] expressed before the ‘return match’ coup of July 1966 and later published in “No Place to Hide – Crises and Conflicts inside Biafra”; “First I ask myself this question, ‘What will be the position as soon as the present mass euphoria in welcoming the ‘revolution’ in the country fades away?’ There is already some rumour here within diplomatic circles that January 15 was a grand Igbo design to liquidate all opposition in order to make way for Igbo domination of the whole country. What then is the Igbo man’s defence to this allegation in light of the sectional and selective method adopted by the coup plotters?

    “Although, sitting here alone as I write this, I am tempted to say that there was no such Igbo grand design, yet the inescapable fact is that the Igbos are already as a group being condemned by the rest for the activities of a handful of ambitious Igbo army officers; for here I am, with the rest of my Igbo colleagues, some thousands of miles away from home, yet being put on the defensive for such actions that we were neither consulted about, nor approved of. Our Northern colleagues and friends now look on us Igbos here as strangers and potential enemies. They are now more isolated than ever before. Their pride is hurt; and who would blame them?

    “Secondly, I ask myself the questions posed to me this afternoon by my colleague: What would I do if I were placed in the position of the Northerner? What do I do? How do I react to the situation? Do I just deplore and condemn those atrocities or do I plan a revenge? I do not blame the Northern chaps for feeling so sore since the events of the last few days. They definitely have my sympathy, for it must have been shocking to say the least, for one to wake up one fine morning to find nearly all one’s revered leaders gone overnight. But they were not only Northern leaders as such, and I am as much aggrieved at their loss as any other Nigerian, Northern or otherwise. I am particularly shocked at the news that Major Ifeajuna personally shot and killed his mentor, Brigadier Maimalari. My God! That must have been Caesar and Brutus come alive, with the Brigadier definitely saying ‘Et tu Emma’ before collapsing………

    “…….As for the new man at the helm of affairs, Major General Aguiyi-Ironsi, he too like the majority of the Majors is an Igbo, and that has not helped matters either.…..

    “Granted that he is such a good soldier as he is reputed to be, the question is: ‘Are all good soldiers necessarily good statesmen? Again how well prepared is he for the task he has just inherited?’ I do hope that he is also as wise as he is reputed to be bold, because if you ask me, I think the General is sitting on a time bomb, with the fuse almost burnt out. We shall wait and see what happens next, but from my observations, I know the present state of affairs will not last long. A northern counter-action is definitely around the corner, and God save us all when it explodes.”

    Major General’ Alexander Madiebo, the Commander of the Biafran Army, in the informative and comprehensively detailed book; the Nigerian Revolution and the Biafran War, at pages 46 to 50, relates how he obtained advance information about the planned pogroms of 1966 and accordingly briefed Aguiyi-Ironsi in the presence of Mobolaji-Johnson [then Governor of Lagos State], to no avail. Aguiyi-Ironsi labeled Madiebo a rumour monger. Ironically, the February 1966 coup had been widely celebrated, even in the North, but after the selective execution came to light, together with the failure to try the coupists, and unsuitability of Aguiyi-Ironsi’s policy decisions, especially Decree 34, were noted, Northern reaction became, in the Nigerian context, inevitable, inasmuch as the actual fighting troops of the Nigerian Army were predominantly northerners.

    The conduct of some Federal troops during the Civil War certainly was not all wholesome. The Asaba massacre was a major disgrace. The  indiscriminate bombing by hired Egyptian pilots, which was similar to but not on the same scale as Nazi Germany air blitz of London, Allied forces carpet bombing of German cities and USA destruction of Nagasaki and Hiroshima with atomic bombs, all during the Second World War, USA large scale napalm bombing during the Viet Nam war, etc, was unfortunate. But only very few Igbo persons, Achebe and ABC Nwosu inclusive, have ever addressed the problems faced by ‘minorities’ in ‘Biafra’. Arthur Nwankwo in the excellent book, Nigeria: The Challenge of Biafra frankly states on page 71 that “Suspicion of collaboration with the Federal troops made the Biafran non-Ibos victims of molestation and even torture and death from over-zealous Ibos. Understandably, these unhappy events turned these people against the Biafran state which they identified as an Ibo state. It must, however, be placed on record that among the Biafran scientists, leaders, propagandists and soldiers were many Efiks, Ibibios, Ijaws, and Ogojas who excelled in their work, and who received Biafran state honours for their services”.

    It is quite understandable that ‘Biafran’ die-hards harbor grudges against Chief Obafemi Awolowo, SAN. From all indications, the erudite, learned, sagacious, versatile and eminent Chief, a practical economist of note, was responsible for the change of Nigerian currency during the civil war. The effect of this change was of ruinous and catastrophic effect to ‘Biafra’. According to Alexander Madiebo [in the Nigerian Revolution and the Biafran War, pages 381-382] “The Biafran financial disaster, if not a total collapse of the change in currency by Nigeria in January, 1968, was the most important single reason why we lost the war. At the end of the financial chaos which followed in Biafra, we had lost over 50 million pounds which would have made a world of a difference in our favour if properly utilised for the execution of the war’.  By this currency change, amongst other reasons, Awolowo’s greatness as a national leader in his commitment to the unity and progress of Nigeria above and beyond ethnic boundaries and loyalties is manifest, despite Achebe’s insistence to the contrary, immediately after Awolowo’s demise.

    Another excellent novelist, Cyprian Ekwensi, in The Nigerian Civil War 1967-1970, History and Reminiscences [edited by General HB Momoh], states at page 508 that “ Now, another thing which helped Biafran propaganda which I have talked about was credibility. If I tell you now that I contested for Senator in my village and I had 300,000 votes-the whole population of my village is about 30,000-I had 300,000 against my opponent who had 500,000, now how do you prove it? Don’t you see? When you are telling someone something which is unprovable, he has two choices. One, to believe you, and two, not to believe you. If he believes you it will be on your past record of truth. If he doesn’t believe you it will be on your lack of credibility. Now, Nigeria committed a lot of lack-of-credibility acts. They would say there would be a conference for peace tomorrow and they would be bombing the town in which the peace conference would be held tonight. So as the outside world saw them as people who were showing us their might rather than bringing back a strayed part of the Federation into the fold again. We gave the number of children dying per day as 1,000. Can you prove that? Can you disprove it? But can you believe it? That is propaganda. And we said 2 million Biafrans were killed in the war in 30 months. So, when we started returning to Lagos one of my friends saw me and said, “Ah! I thought you’ve died. Okoko Ndem you are alive-they said all of you died-2 1/2 million people died.” Now Nigeria couldn’t disprove that thing. So that is part of the secret of propaganda. That is, working with probable facts rather than convincing facts”.

    He also confirms, at page 509, that relief flights were utilised to smuggle arms into Biafra; “What a risk we were taking! If that thing blows up everybody goes. Arms, part of this way; milk and corn flower (sic) part of the other way; rice and all those other things”.  He also reveals that Uli Airport, at a point in time, handled 40 flights per night, bearing ‘relief materials with arms built into them”.

    When asked the question, “Most of the information going out of Biafra was exaggerated. Why was this so?” Ekwensi replied: “Have you ever heard of the statement, ‘All is fair in love and war?’ Is that wrong? Are you saying it is wrong?” [Page 510].

    On malnutrition of children, he states: “It was there. I had a friend named Charles Ogonna who had seven children. The children’s colour changed to gold because of malnutrition and their bellies became very big. You see a child with a fat belly and yet he is hungry. Don’t you see-what is in that belly? So it did affect; there were no regular meals. In every situation in Nigeria or Africa somebody will take advantage of it. The relief materials were being sold in the market. They were not given to the relief centres and refugee centres. We had our refugees too. So people were selling the relief”.

    He confirms that “People were stealing and selling the food. You could buy it in the market but you couldn’t get it in the relief centres”. [Page 510.] And yet, the main targets of the relief efforts; children, were dying from starvation, while some Biafrans profited from the theft and sale of relief food.

    The irresponsible and refusal of ‘Biafran’ authorities to agree in very good time to land corridors for day time supplies of relief materials, especially food, to be administered and distributed by international aid agencies manifest in ABC Nwosu’s  reference to ‘human pride and human freedom’ as the reason for “Biafran’ stubbornness in not compromising in food and relief allied negotiations and rampant theft of relief materials are fundamental and callous ‘Biafra at all costs’contributive factors to the unfortunate starvation of innocent children, a fact that ‘Biafran’ die-hards pathetically refuse to countenance. To utilize Nwosu’s words, ‘these sick and twisted minds’ are those ‘Biafrans’ that sacrificed ‘Biafran’ children to starvation due to overweening and foolish pride, and those that stole and sold relief materials for gain.

    In the foreword to thought provoking book, Reflections on the Nigerian Civil War; Facing the future [1969], by the courageous Ralph Uwechue, Dr. Nnamdi Azikiwe  states that “I commend this book to those who are interested in resolving the Nigerian crisis with realism”,  but the likes of Ojukwu, Nwokedi, Achebe and Nwosu, defiant hardliners, definitely were obviously not interested. Uwechue at page 139 states; “It is here perhaps that the question of the responsibility of a timid Ibo elite comes in. The Biafran masses, enslaved by an extremely efficient propaganda network and cowed by the iron grip of a ruthless military machine, had neither the facts nor the liberty to form an independent opinion. The case of the elite was different. Biafra’s choice was clear after the double losses of (a) territory, with the fall of Biafra’s major towns, Enugu, Port-Harcourt, Calabar, Onitsha, Aba and Umuahia and, (b) war funds, with the exhaustion of Biafra’s treasury in February 1968 caused by Nigeria’s switch to a new currency which suddenly rendered practically valueless some thirty million pounds in Biafran hands. Those who had access to the facts knew that the time had come to seek a realistic way to end the war and save millions of defenseless Ibos and innocent children from disaster. In private they expressed this view but proved too cowardly to take a stand and tell Ojukwu the truth. On the contrary, they allowed themselves to be used for the public denunciation of those who took the risk of calling for a halt. Yet, when their cherished handiwork was threatened with collapse, these front-line advocates of ‘fighting to the last man’ were the first men to flee”. It is not unreasonable to suspect that Achebe and Nwosu remain defiant ‘Biafran’ propagandists who also believe their inaccurate and often times fictional handiwork.