Saturday, April 2, 2016
“The power of a bold idea uttered publicly in defiance of dominant
opinion cannot be easily measured. Those special people who speak out in
such a way as to shake up not only the self-assurance of their enemies,
but the complacency of their friends, are precious catalysts for
change”― Howard Zinn.
This is one of the most profound assertions that I have ever heard. We
must all learn from it regardless of the challenges that we may be
facing in our country today.
In a special message to the Congress on the Internal Security of the
United States on August 8, 1950, President Harry S. Truman said,
"Once a government is committed to the principle of silencing the voice
of opposition, it has only one way to go, and that is down the path of
increasingly repressive measures, until it becomes a source of terror to
all its citizens and creates a country where everyone lives in fear."
Permit me to begin this essay with an aside. I do not intend to incite
anyone against the government or the Nigerian state by making this
contribution and neither do I believe in an armed struggle.
If there was ever an elephant in the Nigerian room then it is Biafra.
Given that let us explore it together in this two part discourse and let
us bare our minds.
The Buhari administration cannot tolerate or brook any form of dissent
and neither are they comfortable with criticism or free speech.
They are desperately trying to establish a culture of silence in our
country. They are particularly uncomfortable with the subject matter of
this essay.
Their double standards are made all the more manifest by the fact that
they have acknowledged and recognized the right of self-determination
for the people of the Sahrawi Arab Democratic Republic in their quest
for independence from the Kingdom of Morocco whilst at the same time
they have denied those that believe in the establishment of Biafra and
the exercise of that very same right of self-determination here in
Nigeria.
As if that were not bad enough they went even further by describing
Biafra as a matter that is "dead and buried" which must not be discussed
under ANY circumstances.
The Buhari administration appears to have forgotten the fact that
charity begins at home. You cannot give those from outside your shores
what you are not prepared to offer your own people.
If the quest for independence is good enough for the people of Sahrawi
Arab Republic then surely it is good enough for the people of Biafra or
any other ethnic nationality in Nigeria if that is what they really
want.
The suggestion that we should not even mention let alone discuss the
idea of Biafra is simply absurd. Those that subscribe to that view often
argue that three million people were killed in order to ensure that
Nigeria was kept together and consequently there can be no going back.
This is a specious, self-serving and intellectually lazy argument. And
this is especially so given the fact that those that have put it
overlook the fact that the root causes of the civil war appear to be
back with us today.
If you don't cure the ailment and get rid of its root cause then you
cannot complain about the consequences of its continued existence or its
symptoms. If you don’t clean up the mess you cannot complain about its
stench. Air freshener alone cannot do it: forgive my crudity but if you
don’t flush the toilet after using it a terrible smell is bound to
linger.
The matter is simple and clear: as long as the Igbo people of eastern
Nigeria feel marginalized, persecuted, cheated, vilified and wronged the
spirit of Biafra will continue to flourish.
As long as Igbos are targeted and slaughtered like flies at the drop of
the hat in the northern part of our country, or indeed in any other
part, Biafra will continue to thrive and burn in the hearts of every
Igbo man, woman and child. Whether we like it or not that is a reality
and there is nothing anyone can do about it.
Quite apart from that I deeply resent the fact that our government has
got the nerve and has cultivated the temerity to venture to tell us what
we should and what we should not mention or discuss. Surely even the
madness of tyranny has its limits.
Those that are at the helm of affairs in our country today may have the
power to kill, torture, detain indefinitely or jail those that do not
share their views but they do not have the power to kill an idea. And an
idea whose time has come cannot be wished away or stopped by any force
from hell or on earth.
In this essay we shall defy the government, ignore the critics, shed the fear and share some inconvenient truths.
100 years ago, on what is known as the Easter Rising Day, the Republic
of Ireland began their struggle for independence from Great Britain when
a handful of brave men went to the center of Dublin, raised the new
Irish flag and openly declared the establishment of the Irish Republic.
The rebellion was crushed but it signaled the beginning of a prolonged armed struggle.
During the course of that struggle approximately thousands of Irish men,
women and children were killed by the British occupation forces over
the years but eventually the Republic of Ireland won their freedom and
became an independent sovereign state.
A few days ago on Easter day the Irish Government and people celebrated
the 100th anniversary of Easter Rising Day with great pride, joy, pomp
and style. The celebrations were attended by delegations from the Basque
separatist movement and officials of the Catalan regional government of
Spain.
Both of these courageous political movements have been attempting to
exercise their right of self-determination, break off from Spain and
establish their own independent nations for many years and as each year
passes they are getting closer to achieving their objective.
Those that believe in the right of self-determination of the ethnic
nationalities in Nigeria and particularly those that are fighting for
the creation of the sovereign state of Biafra have so much to learn from
the history and struggles of the people of Ireland.
The Irish suffered immeasurably under British occupation for hundreds of
years and literally millions of them were enslaved and killed over that
period of time.
Yet in the end they managed to break the yoke and secure their
liberation and triumph over the cruel subjugation and tyranny of British
rule.
It is my belief that by God's grace those that are being oppressed,
butchered and murdered by the Nigerian state today in an attempt to
forcefully keep our country one and those that wish to break off to form
their own country on the basis of the principle of self-determination
shall also eventually prevail.
This is particularly so for the Igbo people of the south-eastern region
of our country who have suffered more than any other ethnic group in
Nigeria. Permit me to remind those that doubt this assertion that it was
the Igbo that were slaughtered in their hundreds of thousands in the
core north during the pogroms of 1966.
Igbo men, women and children were butchered on sight all over the north
simply because they were Igbo and for no other reason. Even pregnant
women were not spared. This led directly to our civil war in which no
less than three million Igbos were killed including one million Igbo
children who were starved to death.
After the war they were deprived of all their properties outside Igbo
land except for in Lagos and the south west where they were treated with
some level of decency and allowed to have their properties back.
Everywhere else in the country they could not reclaim the properties
that they owned before the war and such properties were declared
"abandoned property", confiscated by the various regional and state
governments and handed over to the local indigenous people.
As if that were not bad enough after the civil war every igbo man and
woman, no matter how much they had in the bank before the war, was given
only twenty pounds from their respective banks to begin a new life.
Millions of pounds and many fortunes were lost in this way and the truth
is that the Igbo suffered immeasurably as a consequence of this unjust
policy.
It is a testimony to their resilience and nothing else that they were
able to get back on their feet and within a period of ten years after
the civil war an Igbo man was elected Vice President of our country.
They also thrived in the private sector due to their diligence and hard
work.
Yet in spite of that the systemic persecution and marginalization of the
Igbo people did not stop within the Federal Government, the public
sector, the civil service, the security and intelligence agencies and
the Armed Forces.
They were prevented from reaching the top in virtually all these sectors
right up until President Olusegun Obasanjo was elected in 1999.
It was President Olusegun Obasanjo that began the effective post-war
rehabilitation of the Igbo in the public sector when he started to
appoint them into sensitive and strategic positions within his
government and within the security agencies and Armed Forces.
A good example of that is Lt-General Chidabikia Isaac Obiokor who was
the first Igbo man to he appointed as GOC in the Nigerian Army since the
civil war. Another is Mr. Ogbonna Okechukwu Onovo who was the first
Igbo man to be appointed Deputy Inspector General of Police since the
civil war and who was later appointed Inspector General of Police two
years after Obasanjo left office.
Then came the Ojo Maduekwes, the Andy Ubas, the Ngozie Okonjo-Iwealas,
the Charles Soludos, the Emeka Chikelus, the Frank Nwekes, the George
Obiozors and so many other bright and promising stars from the east who
all wielded far more influence and power than their political offices
had to offer in President Obasanjo’s government and who were all his
protégées and appointees.
Without Obasanjo's premeditated and conscious policy of wanting to
rehabilitate the Igbo and bring them back into the main stream none of
these people would have achieved the great success that they have
achieved today and none would have been brought into the national
limelight.
Yet despite Obasanjo's efforts the truth is that, between 1970 when the
war ended right up until today, whenever there are attacks against
people in the northern part of Nigeria the Igbo are singled out for more
slaughter, more ethnic cleansing and more mass murder than anyone else.
(TO BE CONTINUED).
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