Biafra and the logic of Boko Haram -|- The agitation for Biafra

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• Biafra and the logic of Boko Haram
• The agitation for Biafra

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Biafra and the logic of Boko Haram

~TheGuardian, Nigeria. 

THERE is a new resurgence of Biafran sentiments in the southeast especially among youths born in the post-Civil War era. The arrow heads are youths, mostly Igbo, and they are mostly based outside the shores of Nigeria. They must have found the concept of Biafra romantic for they fill the social media with bellicose messages and propaganda. Lately, they have succeeded in attracting attention in the Igbo heartland of the southeast and even in Port Harcourt, the Garden-City named after the British colonial secretary of the late 19th Century. Such is the allure of Biafra that it wafts in the air like a recalcitrant scent. Who can banish this ghost?

The late Colonel Chukwuemeka Odumegwu-Ojukwu, who led the ill-fated Republic of Biafra for 30 gory months of war, hated being referred to as the former Biafran Warlord. "Was Gowon Nigerian Warlord," he queried. "What of Obasanjo, Murtala, Danjuma, are they warlords? Why is it only Ojukwu that is referred to as a warlord?" He blamed it on the bias of the media.

We had many interactions with Ojukwu especially in his house in Ikoyi, the famous Villaska Lodge which he inherited from his father, the millionaire transporter, Sir. Louis Odumegwu-Ojukwu. The young Ojukwu went to Kings College, Lagos and was dispatched to Oxford University by his rich father to have the best of British education. Then he joined the army and by 1966, when he was the commanding officer of the 4th Battalion of the Nigerian Army in Jos, he found himself at the epicenter of national politics.

On January 15, 1966, Alhaji Abubakar Tafawa-Balewa, the Prime Minister, was killed by coup makers along with the premiers of the North and the West. History had reached a turning point and the devil was preparing for a rich harvest.

Balewa was succeeded by Nigeria first military ruler, Major-General Johnson Aguiyi-Ironsi, a bully commander who appointed four military governors for Nigerian then four regions: David Ejoor for the Mid-West, Hassan Usman Katsina for the North, Adekunle Fajuyi for the West and Ojukwu for the East. When Lt. Colonel Yakubu Gowon became Nigerian military ruler August 1966 following the assassination of Ironsi, he retained the military governors. He posted Colonel Adeyinka Adebayo to the West to succeed Fajuyi who had been killed with Ironsi during the counter coup.

The mayhem and massacres in the North in 1966 especially of people of Eastern Nigerian origin, mostly Igbo, precipitated an exodus to the East. Attempt to negotiate peace, including a retreat to Aburi in Ghana by Nigerian military rulers, failed. A Leaders of Thoughts Conference called for Lagos failed when Ojukwu suddenly withdrew his delegation, headed by the respected Professor Eni Njoku, former vice-chancellor of the University of Lagos citing security concerns. When Gowon created 12 states in 1967, Ojukwu responded by announcing that the Eastern Region would now be known as the Republic of Biafra.

War was joined. In that conflict, it is estimated that almost one million Nigerians perished. For me, the war was a personal experience at the home front. Adeyinka, my eldest brother and my father's first son, went to war and was shot in the face during the battle of Onitsha in 1967. The bullet narrowly missed his right eye. He survived but carried the scar for the rest of his life. In 1969, Adeyinka, then a lieutenant, was company commander at the 131 Battalion, Iwo Road, Ibadan. The battalion commander was one Major Fagbure. We had two of our senior cousins who had just finished from Okemesi Grammar School. The songs of war were in the air and the siren was irresistible. What with the allure of heroism, the heady intoxication of youthful exuberance, the belief in reckless immortality and the pervasive romance with death. Despite the warning of our elder brother who had survived the horrors of war, one of our cousins fled to join the army at Mokola Barracks. They shaved his head and one day, he visited us in his private uniform. He was very happy and proud. Few days later, he was shipped along with his colleagues, to join the final onslaught on Biafra by the Third Marine Commando Division under the command of the methodical and thorough Colonel Olusegun Obasanjo. He never returned.

By the time Ojukwu returned from exile in 1981, he was a changed man. The then ruling party, the National Party of Nigeria, NPN, saw him as an instrument of offence against the Nigerian Peoples Party, NPP, that was dominating the politics of the Igbo heartland of Imo and Anambra states because of the enduring charisma of its leader, the legendary journalist and nationalist, Dr. Nnamdi Azikiwe. Ojukwu could not resist the temptation of partisan politics. He joined the NPN and was roundly defeated at the polls when he attempted to go to the Senate. He ended up in prison, along with many other politicians, when Major-General Muhammadu Buhari came to power December 31, 1983, and attempted to clean the Augean Stable created by the army of irascible politicians.

Ojukwu's faith in the democratic process never left him. He contested for other elections thereafter, including for the Presidency, and lost all, except one under General Sani Abacha. For him, Biafra as a political goal, ended with the Civil War.

However, as a philosophy against injustice, it lives on. He said anywhere there are oppression, injustice, impunity and violence, it is the duty of those who believe in the philosophy of Biafra to fight those evils. He said that he would wage war again if it was necessary to fight those evils. In the twilight days of the Abacha Administration, he did not see any serious contradictions in campaigning for the military ruler who was determined to perpetuate himself in power.

Those who are hoisting the flag of Biafra now have not made their position clear. What is Biafra in their reckoning? Are they including the non-Igbo speaking states of the former Eastern Region which are now the states of Cross River, Akwa-Ibom, Rivers and Bayelsa? Unlike Ojukwu, they seem not to have faith in the democratic process and institutions. They are not in tune with what is happening in the contemporary world which is moving away from war and into an era where war would become an obsolete instrument of national and international relations. The world has seen the futility of war and most statesmen are working to create a world without war.

Not this new Biafran brigade. Apart from occasional filibustering on the social media, they have not articulated their position. What do they really want? Are they asking for a new state of Biafra? Do they want war without even giving Nigeria the benefit of a dialogue? My suspicion is that some people may have decided to turn the whole Biafran sentiment into a business. If militancy had paid off in the Niger Delta and Oodua Peoples Congress, OPC, could get oil pipeline security contracts, why not try something that bring a big harvest. When hostage taking was a form of agitation in the oil rich Delta Region, some smart Alecs in the southeast simply formed their own Kidnapping Plc. Today, it is the biggest business in the region.

It is not in the interest of Nigerians, especially the Igbo, to turn Biafran sentiment into business. Nigeria may be imperfect, but we have learnt the hard way to know that dialogue and the democratic process is better than the eloquence of violence. If they are serious, let them articulate their points and how it can be accommodated and realised within the current democratic dispensation. The people they claim to represent have the right to decide through the democratic process including elections, whether they are willing to follow them. This means they should articulate their points and let their members contest for elections on the basis of their programme. Otherwise, President Muhammadu Buhari has a duty to treat them as the southeast equivalent of Boko Haram.

However, the Biafran wind is a wakeup call for us. Our Republic is good, but not perfect. We should be ready to always discuss the state of the union. This would make the union better and stronger. It was our unwillingness to jaw-jaw that led to the Civil War in the first place. Anyone who is advocating war as the only solution to the problems of the Republic should be treated as an enemy of the state. Whatever the future holds for the Nigerian Commonwealth, we should always ensure it is a future without war.
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The agitation for Biafra
~TheGuardian, Nigeria. 

A FACT of Nigeria's democratic experience in the last 16 years is that every new political administration springs forth a new uprising from disenchanted interest groups. Such seems to be the case of the Muhammadu Buhari administration and the recent series of protests by youths of South eastern extraction seeking secession from Nigeria and demanding the unconditional release of Nnamdi Kalu, the detained director of the pirate Radio Biafra.

But contrary to the position of some informed commentaries denouncing the ongoing agitation for secession or self-determination as a rally of miscreants, the obviously expanding Biafran factions are gradually crystallising into a global clamour for the actualisation of the Sovereign State of Biafra. Whatever the motives of this agitation, it must not be taken lightly.

Whilst, at face value, the wave of protests dotting south eastern cities and Port Harcourt, Rivers State, may be construed as another activity of unscrupulous, business-minded men exploiting gullible youths, the motivations for such uprising rest on the skewed nature of the Nigerian society.

For many years, successive administrations have maintained a portentous imbalance and inequitable structure that disfavours meritocracy. They have glossed over the continuous capitulation of the political class in a progressive fashion to a point of disaffection. And by so doing they have fostered a forced unanimity.

With this groundswell of protests, the unity of Nigeria, for want of a suitable metaphor, seems to be held at gunpoint. Perhaps, this agitation points to issues that have not been resolved. It is noteworthy that while these protests persist, a section of the Igbo elite have either only dismissed the agitation in the fashion of President Muhammadu Buhari and former President Olusegun Obasanjo, or continually recycled the narratives of Nigeria's skewed political economic structuring. What they should do instead is that, they, with well-meaning Nigerians, should find a midway and a basis for which the nation's diversity can be respected, and a sense of belonging maintained. Standards have to be respected and established constitutional rights must be protected without making others feel any loss of their identities.

While the unity of Nigeria should be discussed, the agitators must be strongly cautioned to channel their grievances without perpetrating acts that could be interpreted as an attempt to enthrone instability and dismember the country.

Concerning the substance of the agitation, the veracity of a unified Biafran agenda is already being called to question by the absence of a clear-cut philosophy or any articulated strategy of effective social mobilisation; the result of which is the emergence of various factions in the Biafra cause. Following allegations of sabotage, intimidation, pecuniary conflicts, the Movement for the Actualisation of the Sovereign State of Biafra (MASSOB) is said to have broken into Biafra Zionist Movement (BZM), led by one Benjamin Onwuka, the Indigenous People of Biafra (IPOB), led by Nnamdi Kanu, and the United Eastern Congress led by Sam Ike, all of which work at cross-purposes.

The disorganised manner of this agitation, the indecorous, offensive, and irreverent verbiage coming from their spokespersons make a mockery of any claim they may lay to a legitimate cause. It should be borne in mind also that every part of the country has one thing or another to agitate for. If every aggrieved company were to carry on the way these aspiring Biafrans are going, the chaos the nation would face can only be imagined. This is a bad signal to the dissatisfied others. It is for this reason the secessionist tendencies of the leader of MASSOB, Ralph Uwazuruike, who is set to present an alleged 2016 budget "to actualise Biafra and liberate the people of former Eastern region," is condemnable.

Those in the streets, whose only political education comes from misguided verbiage of clannish role models, should be cautious not to become cannon fodders for mischief-making. Whilst it is part of democracy that people should air their views, however jaundiced, they should, all the same, not translate grievances into violence and bloodshed.

Just as it is true for the agitating pro-Biafra demonstrators, the army should not be provoked into violence-inciting utterances as the response of the Deputy-Director, Army Public Realtions, 82 Division, Enugu, Col. Hamza Gambo, portrayed the other day. It is not the business of the army to tell Nigerians what to say or what not to say in a democracy. The role of advising the presidency on when to use force in its reaction to the Biafran protests rests on the National Assembly.

Notwithstanding, it is simplistic to view the agitation for Biafra as an event orchestrated by disgruntled elements reliving a frightful reverie from the Civil War, or some business experiment. Although it may seem like exuberant Igbo youths excitedly seeking avenues to vent, the deeper import of the Biafra agitation transcends its narrow-minded Igbo agenda. It is as one commentator suggested, a living philosophy of justice that appears wherever and whenever oppression, impunity, injustice and structural violence rear their heads. What is going on is symbolic of the discontent experienced by many ethno-political interests for whom the Nigeria question remains unanswered. Nigeria tends to be living a lie. It wants to be a prosperous and politically stable country, yet it is holding down this potential for prosperity and stability by maintaining a supercilious unitary government, whilst paying lip service to federalism.

In the event, any government carrying on this way should not feel that all is well with the national political configuration. For too long, successive governments have undermined the essential differences in the various interests of the Nigerian people; and so unresolved matters about the aspirations of Nigeria's heterogeneous interests have become an ongoing concern. To assume that these do not exist, or to gloss over them even when we are aware of them, is to play the ostrich.

So, rather than shout down at agitators and wish them away with a wave of the hand, this government should find answers to the thorny issues that created this monstrosity in the first place. Fortunately, the answers to many of these problems are contained in the report of the National Conference. It was with patient expectation of good fortunes that Nigerians committed themselves to the National Conference convened by former President Goodluck Jonathan. True to Nigerians' expectations, the report of the Conference made recommendations that should augur well for this country's future.

The Muhammadu Buhari government should look into the report if it is to make any headway in addressing the renewed agitations across the nation. Nigerians must press for the implementation of the National Conference Report as an answer to the renewed agitation for Biafra.