Herbert Ekwe-Ekwe [1953-2019]

Herbert Ekwe-Ekwe. Image courtesy of Herbert Ekwe-Ekwe.


BY AMBROSE EHIRIM


I was only curious when I had noticed a piece that got my attention, and I had digested the contents thoroughly, which had to do with the Pogrom and massacre of the innocents, with concentration on the vandals and nihilists, the bloodthirsty Islamic Jihadists, and what they had done to the Igbo. I had been perturbed myself, sometimes with thoughts of what had poisoned their minds, to have plundered and demolished a people, including innocent children who had nothing to do with anything, and I had expressed my frustration, and was writing to near exhaustion on what the nihilists had done to my kin, in rounding up every Igbo on "Nigeria's" northern landscape, and the rest of a fabricated state, which is yet to be resolved, as troubling as it gets, until the right approach is reached in a conflict that has consumed an entrapment put together by the colonial administrators.

In wandering on a subject that had been beyond comprehension, I dabbled into like minds, Herbert Ekwe-Ekwe, on the very situation that is still disturbing, today, and glued myself to his work. We had known each other at this point, and he had seen I was equally disturbed about the wholesale slaughter and Yakubu Gowon's-led genocidal campaign to wipe out the Igbo from the face of the earth, which we discussed in many instances, and which he would make the points known in his compelling essays that was unquestionably embraced by the layman, the businessman, Igbo political junkies, the academic and of course, the Igbo intellectual in his wide range of informative work.

He never stopped in his extensive research on the facts and logic about what had eaten up a colonial fabrication in its entirety and the appalling nature of its aftermath as obvious, an intention mistakenly put into perspective when the colonists made whole separate nations and created its existing confusion of continuous chaos from its mandate to take advantage of its natural resources, and decimate its human capital, made apparent today, by way of the brain drain, leaving the victims permanently disabled.

We had exchanged correspondences upon encounter, which had to do with the Pogrom and how he committed his writings, full of interest, from the 1954 Igbo Massacre in the Islamic Jihad north to the 1966 September blood bath of the Igbos, and social ills of a fabricated state which points out a range of problems never addressed by what he had always described as a "genocidist Nigeria". It had been thoughts after thoughts and unanswered questions upon reading Ekwe-Ekwe in his monologue on genocide, extensive writings, speeches on campuses, related Igbo events, and academic seminars related to the Pogrom, in what the Hausa-Fulanis had been talked into by its British and Russian allies, supplying them arms to carry out from their conviction that mass murder of an ethnic group was justified, and starving some 2 million people, most of them children, to death, bears no consequences, even upon United Nations Charter that 'Never Again", after the Holocaust and anniversary of the tragedy in Auschwitz that there would be no more such atrocities, Ekwe-Ekwe notes that the Hausa-Fulanis and their Yoruba counterparts were similar to what had happened in the concentration camps despite a UN Charter of "Never Again.".

And while we seek answers on the premise Gowon's slogan of "reconstruction" was a consolation and understanding toward steps to formal apology, the military juntas took turn in their dictatorships until they reappeared in civilian outfits, disguising their uniforms to continue from where they left, keeping up with the political obstacles that had denied access to due application of commissions as part of hope to resolve a tragedy that had been beyond comprehension.

The moment Olusegun Obasanjo was picked to take over the affairs of state, throwing away his military outfits for good, and vow "there will be no sacred cows", and an ingrained military mentality, it didn't take long before the nihilists would strike again as the Sharia debacle erupted with Igbos all around the northern landscape, their victims. Another shocking realization, and Igbos had to flee despite the fact there was a sitting and valid civilian structure headed by Obasanjo in its new democratic fabric to have avoided or protected the Igbo and other "Nigerians" upon chaos.

Ekwe-Ekwe's commentary on the tragedy within the African continent can be felt and his never ending lamentation pinpointing the atrocities committed over time, citing events orchestrated by the "Arab-led state in the Sudan", the conflicts in East Africa through Kenya's Rift Valley, the Rwandan Genocide and the "1966-1970 Igbo genocide by the Nigerian state and its allies" indicating a troubled continent as it spreads all around the hemisphere with more ravaged wars and barbarian acts than any part of the world; and very disturbing, while African leaders sit idle and watch mayhem unfold in the continent on problems he blamed on the "principal arms exporter powers" that generated the conduit to supply all the deadly weapons to have nations engage in combat.

Ekwe-Ekwe was born in Jos. His parents migrated from today's Uburu axis of Obiozara in Ohaozara Local Government of Ebonyi State in Igboland, to the northern region, in the Middle-belt area, until the "federal Nigerian forces" fired the first shot to declare war on Biafra. He attended Boys High School, Gingiri, Plateau State from 1964-1970, and was admitted to the University of Ibadan where he majored in political science, then proceeded to the University of Lancaster, in England, on scholarship from 1974 to 1977, obtaining his Masters and Doctorate degrees before heading back to Nigeria. He taught at the University of Calabar, UNICAL.  He left UNICAL and joined the Guardian Editorial team on the invitation of Stanley Macebuh. He had been worried about the coming of the military juntas and clamp on the press, fleeing the draconian laws of a brutal regime during the Muhammadu Buhari-Tunde Idiagbon dictatorship and persecution of journalists.

He was visiting professor in graduate program of constitutional law at the University of Fortaleza, Brazil, and professor of history and politics, and director of the center for cross cultural studies in Dakar, Senegal. He authored many books which includes: "The Biafran War," "Does Chinua Achebe's Arrow of God Anticipate the Igbo Genocide?" "African Literature in Defense of History: An Essay on Chinua Achebe," "Nigeria and the Aftermath: Biafra Revisited," "Issues in Nigerian Politics since the Fall of the Second Republic," "Readings From Reading" and numerous articles and essays.

It was hard for Ekwe-Ekwe to forget Africans tragedy that was sponsored by what he called "principal arms exporter powers," especially the Pogrom in which over 2.1 million people perished, reminiscing what had been done to his kin: the rape of women, the starvation of children to death and stretches of wanton killings since fabrication of the republic, which he never stopped lamenting over a very painful, and troubled past.

Ekwe-Ekwe created a blog, "Rethinking Africa", out of "boredom" for his followers, readers and folks that admired his work, throwing in some political analyses and his other gifted passion, indicative of a radical intellectual, of his day and time, with postings of stuff from the Experimental Era in which I had followed as a jazz enthusiast. I had thought I was one of very few who had likened the musical test of the hippie years until Ekwe-Ekwe's conversations in the expression of Charles Mingus' teamwork with the "geniuses" that captured the time to pave way for what would create the legends in every category of instruments played in Jazz.

Ekwe-Ekwe's frequent expose of Mingus' 1950s and his sets before the experiments of the 1960s captured my eye when he analyzed Mingus' "Wednesday Night Prayer Meeting" the composer and bassist had joined Charlie "Bird" Parker Quintet in the line up with Bud Powell, piano; Dizzie Gillepsie, trumpet; and Max Roach on drums at the Massey Hall Theater Concert in Toronto, May 1953, from around which both of us agreed Roach remains the best that handled the sticks. What had generated the discourse was my trip to the Charles Mingus Youth Art Center in Los Angeles, touring the complex upon festivities commemorating the 34th Annual Simon Rodia Watts Jazz Festival in the summer of 2010. I was reading every of his analyses on the score and would argue on certain perspectives and perception like my pick on the choice of John Coltrane, Parker and Eric Dolphy on sax; Wes Montgomery and George Benson on guitar; Roach, Art Blakey and Tony Williams on drums which we already agreed Roach takes the lead; and the venerable Miles Davis who took his horns to a whole new heights when jazz music had evolved to define different kinds of beats to identify with the crossover years.

Music scholarship aside, what the nihilists and Islamic Jihadists did to my kin occupied most of our discourses in personal write-ups and reviews at any given time when he sends his essays into my mailbox for readings and publications. My intent to hold an exhibition of images with story lines and captions of starvation and refugee camps which I had first posted online drew the attention of Ekwe-Ekwe on starving Igbo children at makeshift convalescent centers the vandals had plundered, horrifying to anyone who had seen it, and compelled readers to comment, unbelievable the gruesome acts happened, some would say. Ekwe-Ekwe writes;

"The Igbo generation today, our generation, must ensure that this genocide never happens again. Nigeria murdered 3.1 million Igbo children, women and men people between 29 May 1966 and 12 January 1970. This figure represents one-quarter of the Igbo nation's population at the time, The Igbo genocide is the foundational genocide of post-(European)conquest Africa and the most devastating genocide of 20th century Africa. All those involved in the murder of the Igbo will be brought to trial. They can be sure of that. No one murders Igbo people and gets away with it. International law on the crime of genocide has no statute of limitation. This we know."

While one sits to imagine these atrocities performed by a collective of bigotry and hatred, the Islamic Jihad and their allies of genocidal campaigns, the international community in some of the instances toyed with political plays and expectations of  totality of an entire ethnic group. But the question had asked if it would ever happen again. Of course, it has happened over and over again and humankind is still not alert, and Ekwe-Ekwe never stopped lamenting.

A Man of Integrity, a Biafran War Researcher, Essayist, Literary Critique, Historian, Political Scientist, Academic, Author of Many Books, Musicologist, Jazz Enthusiast, a Thinker and Public Intellectual. Glad to have known him. Ekwe-Ekwe died Thursday, October 17, 2019 in London. He was 66.

BIAFRA: President Charles De Gaulle Press Conference

President Charles de Gaulle Press Conference September 9, 1968 i  Paris. Image: Reporters Associe/Gamma-Rapho

Comments made by the President of France in Paris on September 9, 1968, at a press conference answering a reporter's question on Africa's most blood soaked event, The Pogrom:

What is his view of the situation in Biafra?
What does he think should happen there?
What action does he refuse to take with regard to Biafra? Why?

President De Gaulle's exchange with a reporter:

Question:

The drama taking place in Biafra seems to grow more tragic every day. You have alluded several times to the Biafran problem. Mr. President, could you give us your point of view on this problem ?

De Gaulle:

I am not sure that the system of federation, which sometimes, in certain parts and from a certain angle replaces that of colonization, is always a very good and very practical system, particularly in Africa. But not only in Africa, for in fact it consists in arbitrarily joining together peoples who are sometimes very different or even opposed to each other and who, therefore, have no desire whatever to be joined. We see this in Canada, in Rhodesia, in Malaysia, in Cyprus, and we see it in Nigeria. Indeed, why should the Ibos, who are generally Christians, who live in the south in a certain way, who have their own language, why should they depend on another ethnic fraction of the Federation ? Since this is what one ends up with once the colonizer has withdrawn his authority. In an artificial federation, one ethnic element imposes its authority on the others.

Even before the present drama in Biafra, one could wonder how Nigeria would be able to live, in view of all the crises the Federation was experiencing. And now that this appalling, enormous drama has occurred, now that Biafra has proclaimed its independence and that, to subdue it, the Federation is resorting to war, blockade, extermination and famine, how can it be imagined that the peoples of the Federation, Igbos included, can resume life together?

France, in this affair, has done what was possible to help Biafra. She has not performed the act which, to her, would be decisive, of recognizing the Biafran Republic, because she regards the gestation of Africa as a matter for the Africans first and foremost. Already, in fact, some States of Eastern and Western Africa have recognized Biafra. Others appear to be moving in that direction. This means that, where France is concerned, the decision which has not been taken is not ruled out for the future. And indeed, one can imagine that the Federation itself, recognizing the impossibility of keeping on its present organization, may turn itself into some kind of union or confederation that would reconcile Biafra's right to self-determination with continuing ties between it and the whole of Nigeria.

Text courtesy of French Embassy in London via Kirk Green

Biafra: This Country Never Learns

Desperately starved Biafra children from the Obafemi Awolowo orchestrated economic blockade and Yakubu Gowon's-led genocidal campaign against the Igbo Nation. Image: Hulton Deitsch Collection, January 1970.

BY OZIOMA NWADIKE

I wanted to start this article about a dead body but I dithered. Let me tell you another story. Until 3 years ago, I used to work for a corporate law firm in Lagos. It was my first job after the National Youth Service and it taught me how to be a man. I met a man Ganiyu Tam (name withheld), he was one of the finest lawyers I have ever met. He was brilliant and affable, and spoke the best English I ever heard anyone speak.

He was best mates with one of the founding partners of my firm and our paths crossed when his firm collaborated with my former employees in a Federal government debt recovery matter against an indigenous construction company. I thought Ganiyu was the greatest lawyer alive and I was always pumped whenever he had to travel down from Jos to Lagos for our court hearings. After court he would tap me on the shoulder and tell me about morality and the law and why the other lawyer’s technical submissions were unconscionable. He was a technical lawyer too but he would also tell me to look beyond technicality to the spirit of the law.

On one of those days after court, I asked him if he was from Plateau state and he said yes and for a second, his surname triggered a memory.

‘Tam Sir? Are you related to Colonel Tam from the Nzeogwu coup story?’. And he said ‘ Yes, I was barely 5 when they came to take my father away’.

Ganiyu was a child of a Nigerian Military commander who lost his life during the first coup in January 15 1966. He told me about his siblings. One of his sisters was now a judge in the Court of Appeal. I then told him that my grandfather during the last days of the Biafran war was Acting Provost Marshall of Biafra. Ganiyu said his mother had recently met with the Igbo Nigerian officer (a man who, at that time, was a regular visitor to their family home in Ikoyi), who abducted and murdered his father, and that she prayed for him and forgave him.

This is a story of love, blood, betrayal, and forgiveness. Ganiyu had no hate in his heart, though there was pain. Driving out of Ikoyi to Victoria Island, and seated side by side was the son of a murdered Northern Military Colonel and the grandson of a Biafran Provost Marshall. It was surreal. In the throes of depression and disillusionment I left the corporate law firm in Lagos and set up a criminal appellate defense law firm in Owerri, but I still always remember Ganiyu in my prayers.

Big Al and Chikezie

My grandfather Captain Alphonsus Nwadike (real name) was a Nigerian military officer who later fought on the Biafran side during the civil war. Big Al was over 6’3 tall, and remarkably handsome, and also saw action in Congo as part of the United Nations peacekeeping mission in the 60s. He was tipped off, a night before the counter coup, by his best friend Captain Usman Biu, who overheard some of the Northern soldiers saying ‘Tomorrow, Nwadike wey like to play draft, I go use dagger tear that him belly’.

Big Al left Kaduna late in the night on the eve of the counter coup. Of the military police and trained in military intelligence, he made the journey by bush paths from Kaduna to Makurdi, for days, before boarding the train to Enugu. It was later he heard that Igbo people who went to board the train from Kaduna were all murdered in cold blood at the train station and at different stops along the way.

When the Biafran war ended and Big Al returned to the village, his family and kinsmen all gathered and were throwing sand on him to make sure he wasn’t a ghost. They hadn’t seen him in months. Barely months after the war ended, Captain Usman made the trip from Jos to Owerri in a military truck filled with food and cloths. The villagers on seeing the military truck took to their heels. They didn’t want to fight another war. Big Al came out in the middle of the town’s square, thinking he was going to be rearrested again, having been detained in Enugu at the end of the war and released after a few months. Big Al looked and saw his best friend Usman Biu with a truck of food and cloths, and they held each other and cried and cried until there was no more tears.

Big Al died in 1996, he had diabetes and couldn’t afford insulin injections regularly. He trained 2 of his sons to become university graduates, but he didn’t live long enough to see his favorite son my father, Chief Batos Chikezie Nwadike fiercely oppose Biafran separatists and be on the ballot and poll over 50,000 votes as a candidate in the 2011 Nigerian Presidential elections. I wonder what he would have thought about his son’s 3 decade activism for a Nigerian President of Igbo extraction (what he calls Igbo Presidency) and fuller inclusion of the Igbo in the Nigerian political process.

Big Al lost everything but he didn’t teach his children to hate and I have never for a single day heard my father utter a word of tribal hate. In 2003, my father as a political adviser to the late Chuba Okadigbo crisscrossed the entire nation campaigning with Muhammadu Buhari in the hope that it will one day pave the way for an Igbo President. He scoffs sometimes at my Marxist interpretation of Nigerian politics. My father believes in the Nigerian dream and wants Igbos to be a part of that tapestry.

Bruce Mayrock

About a month ago, I was driving back home in the dead of the night. On Wetheral road, Owerri, I saw a dead body. A car sped in front of me. I slowed down a bit. I almost stopped. I thought about so many things. This is Nigeria. I sped off too. Human life means nothing in Nigeria. You can get mass murdered for throwing stones. Seeing dead bodies or hearing reports of violent deaths has become routine. We are now tuned out of death. Hundreds of people die violently and only a whimper by crazed un-woke people on Twitter, disrupting more important conversations on celebrity gossips and culture wars.

Bruce Mayrock was a 20 year old American student. He saw pictures of dead bodies and kwashiorkor Biafran children and he was thoroughly repulsed. Bruce reportedly wrote articles to the United States president and other leading government figures advocating for an end to the genocide and the Biafran blockade. He thought nobody was listening. So he went to the United Nations office in New York and set himself on fire. He died from the burns on May 30, 1969. He wanted people to listen.

He was carrying a cardboard sign which he wrote ‘ You must stop the genocide… Please save 9 million Biafrans’. Bruce Mayrock is interred at a grave in Mount Ararat Cemetery, Sulfolk county, New York.

The Biafran Genocide

2 million people died in the Biafran Genocide, the overwhelming majority were children and women and not combatants. They died mostly from Nigerian war planes flying low and intently strafing civilian populations and starvation from a total blockade, the Nigerian government preventing aid organizations from bringing in food and medicine to civilians. Most people didn’t die fighting, they died trying to live.

In Nigeria, the death of 2 million people is a controversial issue. People start their arguments with ‘No matter how you feel about the Biafran war…’ How in the world do you feel about 2 million deaths? How do you feel about a genocide? We have become a nation of cowards, afraid of a dark brooding past. The effrontery to sweep a genocide under the carpet.

When Biyi Bandele’s movie adaptation of Chimamanda Adichie’s Half of Yellow Sun was due to open, the government censored it and kept delaying its release. There was some talk about an airport scene in the movie which the government wanted cut. What happened at the airport in Kano is a historical fact and was documented by the Times of London of 7th October, 1966. It was a massacre in Northern Nigeria and at the end of the Pogrom, 30 thousand people had been murdered in cold blood by civilian and military mobs.

I also recall the outrage that greeted Chinua Achebe’s release of his book — ’There was a Country’. It was unprecedented and I have never seen a thing like that. In his book, the late Bard had harsh words for the misguided Colonel Emeka Ojukwu, the quixotic January coup plotters, and the charismatic Chief Obafemi Awolowo, among others. Chief Awolowo is on record to have owned up to orchestrating the starvation policy. In view of the genocidal outcomes of the policy, there wasn’t really much to argue about. To my greatest surprise, intellectuals were falling over themselves to defend Chief Awolowo, a man of their tribe and to disparage Achebe as an Igbo ethnic jingoist. I never regained my respect for so called Nigerian intellectuals but a few. I had read ‘The Man Died’ and I knew Wole Soyinka was a witness of truth and that was enough for me.

For another insidious group, discussing the civil war is a chance to remind everyone of the atrocities committed by Biafra against other ethnic minorities within its enclave. ‘Both sides committed atrocities so can’t you see they both cancel each other.’ I remember my days in the University of Lagos and how a beautiful UK trained lecturer in discussing the Nigerian civil war, sought to wrap it up around this narrative of equal blame and atrocities on both sides.

This is not suggest that ethnic minorities did not suffer acts of discrimination, violence and deaths at the hands of renegade Biafran soldiers. But I am yet to read any serious evidence of authorized mass killings of ethnic minorities by the then Biafran government. There is often talk of forced conscription and relocations but none of that was unique to ethnic minorities in Biafra, it was equally applicable to Igbos. The real story rather is that, during the war, in Asaba, in the then Mid-Western Region, a Nigerian Military Commander, Murtala Muhammad called all the male indigenes of the town for a meeting and shot every single one of them in cold blood. And that all over Rivers, Akwa Ibom, Delta and Cross River, there are Biafran veterans, men who fought for what was their country at that time. Okokon Idem and Phillip Effiong.

I have no right to say my pain is bigger than yours. But in the Nigerian context, the atrocities on both sides talking point is often a pretext to justify and downplay the Biafran genocide. I agree though that this view is debatable.

This Country Never Learns

Following Nigerian politics in recent times, one feels like we are right back to where we started from. I have never seen this level of polarization. We have a president who in words and deeds has shown himself incapable of unifying. However, now we have even bigger problems than regurgitating gruesome tales of millions of Igbo killed over 50 years ago. We are faced with a deadly Islamic insurgency and general insecurity all across the country. The truth is that this country never learns. We never learnt from the Civil War and we are not going to learn from this Boko Haram uprising. The civil war was about an elite power tussle, disinformation, ethnic rivalry, a lack of national identity and government misrule. Boko Haram is about poverty, public distrust in government and religious extremism.

In a country that survived a genocide, hundreds of Shitte Muslims, Nigerian citizens, were murdered in cold blood for the crime of blocking the army chief from using a public road and we had a vigorous debate on whether the deaths were justified. A foolish debate. We merely replaced the Igbos with the Shittes. And the standard had fallen from murdering the head of the regional government and his family to merely blocking a public road.

How much will a national apology from the Federal government about the infanticidal turn the civil war took and a national Biafran war memorial day, go in healing old wounds. My guess is that it will aid rather than exacerbate. The sweeping under the carpet is what has allowed Nnamdi Kanu to continue to wear designer suits, living lavishly in Tel Alviv, while aligning himself with the racist right wing government of Benjamin Netanyahu, who gets a kick from murdering Palestinian children and enforcing a total blockade and an open air prison in Gaza. An irony lost on the lily levered Kanu.

Maybe we can begin to have a conversation about true federalism and government accountability rather than using prebendalism and sectionalism as an over arching governing policy. How about a conversation about how we can create and promote a national identity and eradicate poverty. These are tough issues but in Nigeria we like easy answers. The intellectuals and urban class are complicit. My guess is that things will remain the same. Sorrow, tears and blood, dem regular trademark.

SOURCE: THE CABLE

How Ojukwu, Gowon’s Personality Clash Caused Biafra War

Dr. Sherman Nagel, 53, a former Los Angeles, Calif., physician, checks the lungs of a malnourished girl brought by her mother to Dr. Nagel's Northern Anwa County hospital in Biafra, Aug. 2, 1968. The girl died a few hours later from starvation. Dr. Nagel is a member of the Seventh Day Adventist church and has been living in West Africa for 24 years. He gets medicine and food by paying high prices to smugglers who bring it to Biafra through the front lines. Image: Dennis Lee Royle/Associated Press

SUN NEWS INTERVIEW WITH MBAZULUIKE AMAECHI

Chief Mbazulike Amaechi, first republic Minister of Aviation is about the last of the titans. The only surviving nationalist in this exclusive interview with Saturday Sun’s team of MAGNUS EZE, GEOFFREY ANYANWU and DAVID ONWUCHEKWA, expressed sadness over the parlous state of Nigeria. He talked about the collapse of national cohesion, the 1966 coup, agitation for Biafra, restructuring, 2023 Presidency and other issues.

How do you feel about the current state of Nigeria?

I feel sad about Nigeria because this was not the Nigeria we founded; this was not the Nigeria in which we spilled our blood, in which we lost our lives, in which we lost our freedom; went to prison, went to detention on many occasions, which we founded on patriotism and nationalism and wanted to serve, nurturing to become a big country in Africa and the world because God has given Nigeria the potential to be the biggest and richest country in Africa and to compete in the world. This is no longer that Nigeria we dreamt of. So, I am sad with the Nigeria I see now.

Where did we miss it as a country?

First of all, Britain started ruling against the will of the people they found in those places; they said they were protecting some part of the country, and colonising some part. In 1914, they said for administrative convenience, they merged Northern and Southern Protectorates. The south had richer resources and more money than the north, so, they understood that administering the north alone was no longer a solvent proposition. So, Lord Lugard dreamt of merging the north and the south and gave effect to it so that he can use the resources of the south to run the whole country since the north was not solvent on its own. They kept running this until the ‘40s when nationalists sprang up in the country and started demanding that Nigeria should be allowed to rule herself; that Nigerians should be allowed to rule their country. This agitation was led by first of all Sir Herbert Macaulay and people like Dr. Nnamdi Azikiwe, Dr. Akiola Maja, S.O. Gbadamosi, all these people came together and formed the Nigerian Youth Movement and later Nigerian National Democratic Party. From there, some people thought that confining the democratic struggle to Lagos alone would not solve the problem in the country. From there, it was decided to form a national political party, so, in 1944, the National Council of Nigeria and Cameroons (NCNC) was formed. This was because southern Cameroons was part of Nigeria at that time, and also some part of northern Cameroons. Herbert Macaulay was the National President while Dr. Azikiwe was the National Secretary. Then in 1947, they decided to tour the country to collect mandate from the people of the country; north, south, east and west, to go and tell the British Government that Nigerians wanted independence. While on this tour, Herbert Macaulay became sick; he had a little accident at Kano, he was aged between 80 and 90 then. He was returned to Lagos where he died, but before his death, he said many significant things. First, he said in his dying bed, tell the NCNC to stop for four days for Herbert Macaulay before they carry on. He also said again; tell Oged, to keep the flag flying. Oged was his very beloved son, Ogedengbe, who was part of the radical Zikist Movement at the time. Finally, before he breathed his last, if the younger ones had seen his picture, he was always in bow tie with his thick moustache; he gave an illustration with himself. He said ‘as my bow tie and moustache are parallel and inseparable, so shall the unity between the north and the south be indestructible.’ Having said that, he gave up the ghost after a few minutes; the NCNC gave him a week and continued. At a meeting, the NCNC decided that Dr. Nnamdi Azikiwe who was at the time the National Secretary should assume the position of National President and another person from the north became the National Secretary. Later on, the National Secretary died and Kola Balogun became the National Secretary, Zik continued as National President so the essence intensified the agitation of liberation of Nigeria from the clutches of imperial British Government. He sent a delegation to London to demand the Nigerian independence, to demand abrogation of the constitution which Governor Richard imposed on the country they called it then obnoxious Richard Constitution 1946. So, eventually that constitution was abrogated because Governor Richard was recalled and another governor, John Macpherson sent to Nigeria; in 1951-52 the new constitution created northern, eastern and western region and proposed a federation. It was at this stage that following the agitation which had been joined by the trade union movement; by other political parties, so two political parties sprang up Northern Peoples Congress (NPC) led by Ahmadu Bello, and Action Group led by Obafemi Awolowo of the Western region. Zik continued to lead the NCNC and in 1946, the youths in NCNC thought that the speed or progress in agitation for independence was slow, so they formed radical youth movement which was called Zikist Movement, the movement believed in revolutionalising for independence but the NCNC, the parent body believed that we should take it easy, go by negotiation etc. So, this brought at times conflict, indoor and occasionally open door conflicts between the Zikist movement and NCNC but the struggle went on. The Zikist movement at foundation was chaired by MCK Ajuluchukwu and secretary was Kola Balogun. In 1949 the NCNC decided to make a call for revolution and so it was to take the form of doing things not criminal but not in conformity with the laws like telling people not to pay taxes to a foreign government, by telling the policemen not to arrest or molest brother Nigerians when the white police officers urged them, because up to that time no Nigerian was allowed to reach the rank of superintendent or assistant superintendent of police; the highest rank a Nigerian would obtain in police was inspector and sergeant major; no Nigerian reached the rank of commissioned officer. It was decided that a lecture would be delivered and Zikist Osita Agwuna undertook to deliver the lecture at Tom Jones memorial hall in Idumota Lagos. And he delivered the lecture in October 1949 and promptly Brutish police and British Government in Nigeria went into action they quickly rounded up the Zikists who attended the lecture; Ostia Agwuna was arrested, Fred Anyia, Anthony Enahoro was arrested etc and charged to court; in the court they adhered to the policy of the Zikist Movement not to make plea in any court presided over by the white man or any court of the imperial Government in Nigeria. They maintained it, some of them like Mallam Raji Abdallah told the court if you’re satisfied that my struggle to win freedom for my country is a crime, I ask you to give me the maximum sentence prescribed by law, so they were sentenced to various terms of imprisonment- Mokwugo Okoye in Lagos three years imprisonment with hard labour; Ostia Agwuna, three years imprisonment with hard labour, Mallam Raji Abdallah 2-3 years imprisonment with hard labour; Fred Anyiam and others were all sentenced to various terms of imprisonment. I was then the secretary of Zikist Movement at Benin; I was picked up and thrown into Benin prison; at Onitsha, Ikenna Nzimiro was Chairman of Zikist Movement and one young man from Asaba were sent to prison; at enugu, J.C.J. Anakwe, at Jos, Bob Ogbuagu and so on all over the country. But, then we didn’t lose hope when we came out of prison; the struggle continued. The older members of the NCNC received theirs as a matter of fact in those days if you came out of political imprisonment; you’re given a public reception usually a big rally reception and so forth and then you are awarded the PG cap to wear. PG cap means prison graduate, if you wore a PG cap and come to the motor park they don’t charge you, enter a bus wearing the PG cap, the bus conductor will not charge you. Everywhere, nationalism was the in thing, so this continued until series of conferences in 1956 -57 until Nigeria became independent sovereign nation on October 1, 1960, and the people of the country said in many areas these people who fought for our independence, we’ll elect you; you go and run our country for us now with the nationalism in you, we trust you. So, it wasn’t money; people won elections without spending money, without bribing any electoral officer, electoral officers in those days were civil servants. We formed the first government and in 1961, we said no, this constitution which British Government gave us and which the Queen of England signed our independence, we were going to give ourselves our own constitution, not one signed by the Queen of England and so parliament set up a committee; brought people from within and without the parliament and met 1961 into 1962 and came up with the republican constitution and so in 1963, Nigeria was declared a republic and now made it Federal Republic of Nigeria. We elected a President; in fact, it was written in the constitution that the first president of the country will be Nnamdi Azikiwe and remained president in 1964, there was no single party that ushered in independence- the NCNC scored a total of 2. 6 million votes throughout the country to secure 94 seats in the House of Representatives, the Action Group scored 1. 59 million votes to score 74 seats, NPC scored 1.56 million votes to score 144 seats in Parliament. Note that NCNC scored 2.6 million votes for 94 seats but the party that had 1.56 million votes got 144 seats in parliament, so that’s British gerrymander. So, know that all the troubles in Nigeria all along are caused by Britain; they would not want to see someone from southern Nigeria to lead this country. It’s their plan. That’s the gerrymander in carving out the constituencies. So, NCNC scored almost all the eastern seats, more than half of seats in the west and some parts of the north and with the total 2.6 votes. This continued in 1964, there was an internal friction in the Action Group because at independence, the NCNC-NPC formed a coalition government at the centre. The Action Group led by Awolowo became the official opposition, so, in 1964, Akintola, the deputy leader of the AG who became premier of the western region when Awolowo moved to House of Representatives as leader of opposition went behind Awolowo to form alliance with the north. This brought a very sharp division in the Action Group; it also affected the position of NCNC and NPC, so eventually it led to some troubles in the west. In the western region, the crises continued and led to what is called Operation Wetie and the Western House of Assembly was dissolved; the election wasn’t true election, there were constituencies where Action Group and NCNC candidates were not allowed to register so these continued until January 1966, when the military took over the country.

As a key player in Government then, was it really an Igbo coup or were there actually some form of support or sympathy from Igbo politicians for the masterminds of the coup?

The Igbo politicians didn’t even know the coup was plotted if Mbazulike Amaechi didn’t know then, nobody knew. I’m aware that the Igbo, NCNC politicians didn’t know that there was a plot about that. What happened, those who’re involved were mainly Captains and a few Majors and there were many Igbo Captains in the army that time, everything was on merit; for example, in 1961 when we wanted to establish Nigerian Air Force, about 12 people were recruited to go to Germany to learn how to operate military aircraft; when they went there they’re first of all taken on altitude test to know whether you have attitude, and they’ll take you up and tumble the aircraft many times; when they did that and came down, even though the Minister of Defence was a northerner and he selected more of northern boys to do that, of the 12-13 people that were sent eight were northerners. After the altitude test, six of the northerners packed their things and returned to Nigeria. None of the Igbo came back, other people from other tribes continued. Don’t forget at the time of independence, the whole northern Nigeria had produced only one Doctor Diko from Kaduna state; they produced only one lawyer in the whole northern Nigeria; Barrister Abdurasak from Kwara state. This was the level of education there then.

But where did we miss the track?
Where we missed it then was when the military took over the government of the country and then there was crisis within the military itself. Emeka Ojukwu was appointed the military governor of old eastern region, David Ejoor military governor of Midwest as it was known then, Adekunle Fajuyi in the west, and Usman Kastina for the north. Kastina was the only major; others were Lt. Colonels because there was no Lt. Colonel from the north. When they killed Aguiyi Ironsi in the reprisal coup of July 1966, the headship of the federal government became void; Yakubu Gowon was promoted to headship, Ojukwu said Gowon cannot command him, Gowon said if you’re senior to me come and occupy this seat. So, it was ego and pride that led to the civil war; personality clash between Ojukwu and Gowon. I describe that war as avoidable civil war because it could have been negotiated out; there was a mistake on our own part. So, the military incursion in politics as a result of ego and personality clash between Gowon and Ojukwu, the whole situation was mishandled into a civil war in which lives were lost on both sides; in which lives were lost on the Nigerian side, small number of people but on the Biafran side, millions but that’s not the painful thing. The most painful thing there is that government has stopped being government in Nigeria because the military came into government and they started changing; from Gowon to Murtala Mohammed; from Murtala Mohammed to Obasanjo; from Obasanjo to Buhari to Babangida; from Babangida to Abacha and from Abacha to Abdusallami Abubakar and these people stayed for 38 years in government. The military stayed for 38 years of our independence in government and in the process, they were doing what the military were trained to do. The military is trained to act rough, to fight, to conquer, to destroy, to loot, to steal, to vandalise; that is what the military is trained to do. All targeted at the appropriate enemy and so for 38 good years, Nigeria was ruled by the military and but for two years of the 38 years, the other 36 years were the military from one side of the country only. Because apart from Obasanjo’s two years, the other 36 years were military from northern Nigeria and so, they don’t see the country again as a country. They see the country as a colony of the north; a colony of a part of the country and in order to kill the proper understanding of the country and how the country came about and how things came about, they abolished the teaching of history in schools. The military abolished the teaching of history in schools, because if you teach history in schools, people must learn that Azikiwe was at a time the President, that this person was Premier of the West at a time, that this ruler came up at a time or that this happened. So, they knew that if they allowed history to be taught, the growing generation will be made to know the true story about their past and who was who and who is who. So, they abolished the teaching of history in the country and then, introduced what they knew best; looting and stealing. This started with small, small stealing and then the thing developed into massive looting. So, that’s where the country derailed.

Would you say the Igbo are really marginalised?

Not that they are just marginalized, they are being treated as not equal partners in the country. The Igbo are not treated as a part of the federation. No. They are being treated as a conquered race, as a colony. That is the truth.

There’s a central body that should fight for the Igbo, Ohanaeze Ndigbo; what will be your assessment of Ohanaeze Ndigbo?
I know Ohanaeze as an organization until they introduced rotation into the constitution; that is, this state will now produce the leader and at the end of this, this state will produce. The leadership shifted from what would be given to where you come from and the thing started deteriorating. It started going down. When it will go up, I don’t know but it will not be easy for the man who will raise it up to do so because it’s easier to destroy than to build. The destruction has been so much. So, the Igbo now don’t have leadership. Nobody leads them. Like in the olden days, Dr. Azikiwe was in charge of the political leadership; Chief Z. C. Obi was the leader of the Igbo culturally and non-politically. So, wherever there was a problem of common interest to Ndigbo, whether you belong to the Action Group of those days or the NCNC of those days or the Mbadiwe’s Democratic Party of those days; what will happen is that Z.C. Obi will summon a meeting, special meeting and all these leaders will come together and solve the Igbo problem and everybody goes back to his political party. There is no leadership in Igbo land. There’s no leadership for Igbo now.

What can you say about the renewed agitation for Biafra?

Well, I would have advised the government of the day to give the agitators for Biafra what they want. They said they want plebiscite, if you go to plebiscite, they will lose. In Abuja for example, apart from government buildings, 70 percent of the private buildings in Abuja is owned by Ndigbo. Go to Lagos, Ndigbo own 40 percent of the buildings. In every town in Nigeria, if you take away the population of the indigenous people of such place, the next people in population are the Igbo and so, if Buhari and his people were good politicians, they will just say, okay; we give you plebiscite. Go and conduct your plebiscite. INEC will conduct the plebiscite because the Igbo in Abuja will not say that they are going back to Biafra. The Igbo in Kano will not vote for plebiscite, neither will Igbo in Lagos, neither will Igbo anywhere. There are more Igbo abroad than at home and if by any crises, they are forced to come back home, you will see real crises at home. There will be no peace. The place geographically cannot even accommodate them. Administratively, it will be difficult to govern them. Who will govern them if we get plebiscite; that Kanu, or Okorocha or all these people? They are the people that will govern you when you get Biafra? I don’t like what is being done to Ndigbo now in Nigeria but I don’t believe that the solution is in Biafra.

There are two major schools of thought today, particularly in the south east; those who want a restructured Nigeria and those who want the Igbo to produce president in 2023. What are your views about these two issues?

I’ve always spoken for and in support of those agitating for restructuring; restructuring in writing a constitution for Nigeria because there is no constitution. Nigeria is being ruled without the people’s constitution, without a constitution written and owned by the people of Nigeria. The only constitution that was people’s constitution was the one of 1963; the Republican Constitution of 1963 which the military overthrew in 1966 and said we abrogated it, we cancel it. Then in 1977, 1978, 1979, Obasanjo organised a Constituent Assembly headed by Rotimi Williams. Rotimi Williams and his men wrote a constitution for Nigeria, passed it onto the military; the military instead of sending the draft then to plebiscite for Nigerian people to see, the military removed some of the things they didn’t like and put what they wanted into the constitution and then one man signed it; one man who’s occupying the seat of the government illegally by treasonable act of overthrowing a democratically elected government. The same man signed this constitution as an order-in- council. So, it’s not a constitution of the people of Nigeria. Then the military continued to rule with this; one military after the other until 1998; when Abacha died; so they set up another Constituent Assembly. They drafted a constitution again instead of putting the constitution as it is or even as amended by the military for the public to vote and say this is our constitution, they did not do that. The military removed what they did not like, what the North did not like and signed approval; ‘I hereby approve that this is the constitution’. Constitution signed by one man. So, all along till today, Nigeria is being run as an illegality. Nigeria is an illegality. There is no legal constitution, there is no constitution. Nigeria is not being run under a constitution now. It’s being run by the illegal imposition of the military from one side of the country and so, my advocacy is that the people of Nigeria should meet, write down their own constitution, not like some people saying, we will go to the House of Representatives, we will go to Senate, secure amendment, if you amend a building that is built on a wrong foundation, you are still building on a wrong foundation and the building is bound to collapse at the time it should collapse. There can only be one final solution. Let the people of Nigeria meet, work out a basis for being together. The wealth of the country is being produced from one side of the country; the South South, the South East and part of the South West. The wealth of the country now is on oil and gas and that is the only source of revenue of the country and yet the imperial Fulani Government that is ruling the rest of the country as a colony will not permit the people who produce the wealth to gain from the wealth; to have a say in the control and the management of the wealth that accrues from their place. Even in the management of the production that creates the wealth, they have eliminated people from the area completely.

What about the second leg; issue of Presidency for the Igbo?

I’ve always heard Ndigbo talk of Igbo presidency, I don’t talk about Igbo presidency but I’ll understand when you talk of a Nigerian president of the Igbo extraction or of Igbo origin. There is nothing like Igbo presidency but if you are talking of a Nigerian president of Igbo extraction, one; nobody will ever come and offer it to you on a platter of gold. It has never been done anywhere in the world. If you want to be president of the country, you have to work for it, you have to plan for it, you have to strategise for it and you have to mobilise for it and capture it, not being given, no. You have to capture it. So, if anybody is talking about Ndigbo must be president in 2023, yes, okay. If you want to be, work for it, organise for it and if I may say this, I was NCNC’s final authority in party organisation and political party strategy. Being the principal organising secretary of the NCNC and being in everything in the NCNC as a party; this is my field, this is my specialisation. If Ndigbo wants to be president, let them come to me for advice. I have the key. Let them come to me to tell them what to do because you don’t get president by merely wishing to be president.

Nigerian Writers Compare Genocide Of Igbos To The Holocaust

BY CHIGBO ARTHUR ANYADUBA

THE CONVERSATION, FEB. 13, 2019

During the massacre of Igbos in Nigeria between 1966 and 1970, one to three million people died. In the decades since, writers have worked to make sense of the immense human tragedy.

These literary representations of the massacres use the Holocaust as an important point of reference.

The war in Nigeria, with its associated mass atrocities, is arguably one of the first major moments in postcolonial Africa when accusations of genocide were made. Following military coups in Nigeria in 1966, the military and ethnic extremists systematically targeted and killed Igbos across the then Northern and Western regions of Nigeria.

Massacres of Igbos and other Easterners across the country led to thousands of deaths and the displacement of millions.

The massacres led the Eastern Region of Nigeria to declare its secession from Nigeria. The region was renamed the republic of Biafra. Nigeria invaded Biafra in July 1967, leading to a protracted war. The federal government used starvation tactics which led to upwards of three million civilian deaths in Biafra. Biafra officially surrendered to Nigeria in January 1970.

After its genocidal war, the Nigerian government proceeded to engineer a culture of denial.

To counter that propaganda, writers reflecting on that past have often framed the war as genocide. A common feature in the writings is the comparison of Igbo experiences of atrocities to Jewish ones during the Holocaust.

The Holocaust as cultural icon of genocide

During the Biafran War, U.S.-based Igbo poet, Onwuchekwa Jemie, compared the murder of Igbos in Nigeria to the Nazi German murder of Jews during the Second World War. His poem, “Requiem” (from his 1970 poetry collection, Biafra: Requiem for the Dead in War) reflects this: 

Once in 53

 Three times in 66 

 Nigerians shoot civilians

 through the ears 

rehearsing all known tortures

 murdering all males

 and raping old women

 forcing teenage girls in leper clinics

 hundreds butchered… 

the 30,000 innocents

 mowed down Nazi fashion

 a final solution

 that failed again.

In “Requiem,” Jemie catalogues the systematic persecutions and murders of Igbo civilians, which he considers similar to the Nazis’ “final solution.”

The lines “a final solution / that failed again” encapsulate the poet’s defiant view that Biafra will survive the genocidal onslaught from Nigeria.

Global history scholar Lasse Heerten has explained in his work on Biafra, that such comparisons of Igbo suffering to the Nazi genocide of Jews reveal the growing awareness of the Holocaust in African conflict zones at the time.

The comparison of Igbo suffering to the Holocaust offers a way for the writers to internationalize Igbo experience in Nigeria. In so doing, they are sharing a moral message about the universal condition of human cruelty.

The cruel human condition

Similarly, the 1971 poem “Vultures” by Chinua Achebe reflects on the troubling realization that humans possess simultaneously a capacity for human care and a vulture’s inhumane savagery. The poet imagines a Nigerian military commander as a vulture and compares him to the Commandant of the Nazis’ death camp at Belsen:

Thus the Commandant at Belsen

 Camp going home for 

 the day with fumes of 

 human roast clinging 

 rebelliously to his hairy 

 nostrils will stop

 at the wayside sweet shop

 and pick up a chocolate

 for his tender offspring 

 waiting at home

 for Daddy’s return…

Achebe’s reference to the Holocaust evokes the Nazi death camps as a site of savagery: “fumes of / human roast.” He seems to be alluding to Paul Celan’s 1948 poem, “Death Fugue,” which describes the cremation of Jewish victims in the Nazi camps as a “grave in the sky.”

Reference to the Holocaust in Achebe’s poem provides a way to meditate on the ironic condition of human cruelty.

Another writer who used the Holocaust as a metaphor for moralizing about the human condition is Nobel laureate Wole Soyinka, who was jailed for his attempts to mediate between Biafra and Nigeria. His 1972 prison memoir The Man Died expresses his frustration over the unending cycles of brutality and the pattern of genocidal murders taking place in Nigeria. Soyinka’s other books, plays and poems on the 1966-1970 crisis equally draw on the Holocaust as a way to comment on cruelty.

‘And the World Has Remained Silent’

Such comparison between Igbo suffering and the Holocaust intending to convey a moral message on human condition can be found in several other writings, including Flora Nwapa’s Never Again, Chris Abani’s Graceland (2004), Nnedi Okorafor’s fantasy novels, Who Fears Death (2010) and The Book of Phoenix (2015), and notably too in Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie’s novel, Half of a Yellow Sun (2006).

In Half of a Yellow Sun, there are several instances comparing the experiences of Igbos to those of Jews under the Nazis.

For example, the title of the character Ugwu’s story, ‘The World Was Silent When We Died,’ echoes the original Yiddish title of Elie Wiesel’s Holocaust memoir, Un di Velt Hot Geshvign, (“And the World Has Remained Silent”).

Universalize can also mean generalize

I believe these literary analogies between Jewish and Igbo experiences have helped to make the atrocities public and known. However, these analogies can also overwhelm the particulars of the Nigerian context of the crisis.

Because the political contexts of such historical mass atrocities being compared vary significantly, these comparisons may come at the cost of our understanding of genocide in African states. Both African and European historical contexts within which these atrocities occurred may become de-territorialized and depoliticized.

In the meantime, local suppression of political questions of Igbo self-determination and justice in the war’s aftermath remain unaddressed.

BOOK REVIEW: Faith, Commitment And Hard Work

BY AMBROSE EHIRIM

A Worthy Risk
By Pastor Harold Ozioma Ikewueze
Freedom Press, Ibadan; 416 pp.,
Paperback

(FILE PHOTO)--Pastor Harold stands behind the Indian Ocean at the Beach Hotel in Dar es Salaam, Tanzania. Image courtesy of Harold Ikewueze

I can visualize every image of his narratives around the enclaves where I partly grew up; though, I don't recall encountering him during the years he had written about, in what had gone down in the books as the most blood soaked event in the history of a national state and, what had led to its Balkanized process, a subject and theme I had written extensively, to near exhaustion in the past. He had written a biography, but his faith, courage, hard work and missionary engagements generated said publication with the choices that he had made.

He talked about his origin--his birth in a country his parents had adopted and a journey that had landed him inside his ancestral home, and would be overwhelmed by an ongoing pogrom and war that was intended from a 'diabolical and premeditated' act by Yakubu Gowon's-led vandals and genocidal campaign against the Igbo nation--to wipe an entire tribe out from the face of the planet.

But he had endured, learned and precocious, feeding from ants and things like that, and malnourished, suffering the ominous consequences of a brutal war he knew nothing about, of a tragedy that continues to haunt the nation on the infants and children that had perished from the Obafemi Awolowo orchestrated 'Economic Blockade,' which denied access to food and medicine to the Igbo children who had been desperately starved to death.

He also talked about his own personal experiences during the pogrom, about food on a ration, in some cases, nothing at all but ants, rats and other strange creatures that crawled around the neighborhood, consumed in their delicacies and served in their meals, a development never seen before in the entire land until the Nigerian vandals whose minds had been poisoned by hate and bigotry invaded the land to wreck havoc and cause all sorts of damage beyond comprehension.

He had mentioned his ordeal  as if  he was in combat, stories told the same way a child and any victim of the pogrom would have it, vividly recounted.

Not anyone could fathom what had unfolded, a shocking realization to any witness on the intention of the vandals and why they had harbored such a gruesome act and had thought the Igbo was the nation's lingering problems, therefore justifying the acts of genocide.

At his age, when war had erupted, he remembers and describes every detail of what had gone wrong and why the Igbo had been target for elimination as a murdering spree continued apace.

He talked about his dad being whisked away for battle, to defend the sovereignty of the Biafran Republic; and the hiding spots upon the vandals' arrival on a rampage, plundering and demolishing structures, and raping the women, and the men, murdered in the most brutal of circumstances.

He talked at length how ugly war was based on his own very experience, and how terrible the vandals had taken to murdering every Igbo including every creature in its surroundings in reference to the beast, Benjamin Adekunle (my emphasis), and a command on his orders to shoot at every creature, whether they moved or not.

The vandals were shooting at every creature and pillaging the land.

Mothers carried their dying children and belongings as they flee the advancing vandals.

Desperately starved children were seen housed in disused and abandoned dispensaries and maternity homes, most of them dead on arrival.

Food distribution centers were overwhelmed with sick and dying children.

All in all, over 90 percent of schools in the war affected areas were totally destroyed.

He had survived the pogrom after the body counts in an estimated 2 million Biafrans that had perished, on a case of sad reality and tragic in scope, over a thirty month period--the pogrom and the Biafra-Nigeria war.

Despite all the sensations in life and the misfortunes that came along with it, and while God's assignments waited for the chosen ones, he did not hesitate to talk about his love life, the days in college and the rascals he had to confront during ongoing fraternities, the bragging rights of boyhood and growing up, his teaching capabilities on a variety of subjects and the leader that he had been meant to be; he did not fail, he was equal to the task and now accomplished.

Harold Ikewueze puts into perspective, his thoughts, and personal accounts, reflecting the fate of the Igbo during the pogrom and what had led to the Biafra-Nigeria war. His book "A Worthy Risk," is immense and does not only cover his pastoral work, it's thoroughly examined from projects that begun his parents' sojourn, and making of the writer himself, to his amazing journey through life.

Ikewueze was born in Takoradi, Ghana, on October 27, 1965 during the administrative regime of Kwame Nkrumah. As a toddler, his parents left the shores of Ghana during the years of uncertainties in Nkrumah's government, arriving to his native and ancestral home of  Amazano, the Orlu axis, now Njaba, in the Igbo landscape, where he grew up in the midst of stubborn and corrupt, customary beliefs and rituals--the gods of the ancestors, Agwuishi na Amadioha--witchcraft, animism, paganism and series of Christian denominations. And, despite all that, Ikewueze did not blink; he would make a choice. He had been aware and ready to face the challenges in his choice of a career, the determination to propel outreach programs and preaching the Gospel, the word of God, the ultimate that Jesus is Lord.

Ikewueze attended the Abia State University, Uturu, majoring in Banking and Finance and had looked forward to becoming a banker or a money manager. On April 5, 1986, the night Ikewueze saw himself as the Prophet Isaiah whom God had revealed to, the Message, spoken by the man he had adored, Dr. Uma Ukpai when the blood of Jesus Christ descended. It was the year he would earn his diploma in chemical engineering at the College of Technology, Owerri and won't be long before becoming president in Fellowship of the Students Christian Movement, the SCM. He would also serve as scribe to the SCM between 2012 and 2016.

I had met Ikewueze on social media platforms, taking note of his presence while he read my works, especially on the pogrom. I approached him and asked for his contribution to a symposium I was then organizing which he did, sending in a well written essay on the subject-matter. I had collected the pieces from remarkable Nigerians from all walks of life and all professions on the Public Square, I had thought their input and counsel on solutions to a troubled state like Nigeria would be helpful and had hoped the leaders would pay attention upon publication of the symposium. The subject was on the Sovereign National Conference the Goodluck Jonathan administration had once again opened up from the Olusegun Obasanjo era, which was deadlocked and discarded after the Justice Chukwudifu Oputa-led Human Rights Violation and Investigation Commission, and the possibilities of a national conference, henceforth. However, many such  cases of a national dialogue had been held in the past; and while some have been in favor of  sitting down and talk about it, some had argued it would make no difference to the ones previously held. That symposium is now a blueprint on related national discourses.

Ikewueze has taken a worthy risk knowing the outcome. The journey upon the vision. The extensive and tiring missionary work. The peoples servant and the ideal that hard work pays off in every aspect of life, eventually. Crusades and conventions all around the country with revelations of upbringing that entailed reading all sorts of literature, obedience and diligence, the attraction of Karl Marx, knowledge in editing and publications, numerous engagements on the pastoral order, and as the list goes on and on, concludes his fascinating story-telling brilliant biography with verses of the Biblical principles and citations--Mathew 22:37-40, Daniel 12:3, Isaiah 52:7, Hebrew 11, Colossians 3:13, Corinthians 12: 12-14, and others, to which he upholds.

IPOB Declares General Strike On September 14 Over Biafra

Image via The Guardian

BY LAWRENCE NJOKU

ENUGU (THE GUARDIAN)--Pro-Biafra agitators, the Indigenous People of Biafra (IPOB) have declared general strike across the South-east and South-South geo political zones and other areas where Biafrans resides on September 14 to mourn those killed in the struggle for the restoration of Biafra Independence since 2015.

The group stated that inhabitants of the two geo-political zones and other conscientious Biafrans living in other parts of the country and the world over were required to stay indoors on that day and away from work or other daily business activities throughout the day.

They stated that it would be a protest to register their anger regarding men and women killed at Afaraukwu in Umuahia during Operation Python Dance II on September 14, last year, as well as those killed in Ngwa, Aba, Igweocha (Portharcourt) and buried in unmarked mass graves as a result of the military invasion of Biafraland by the Nigerian Army.

It stated that all businesses, offices, markets, schools and road transportation will be shut down for 24 hours from midnight of the 13th of September.

In a statement yesterday by its Media and Publicity Secretary, Emma Powerful, IPOB further gave reasons for the exercise: “As a result of ongoing campaign of ethnic and religious persecution, genocide and humiliation of the people of Biafra in general and Igbo people in particular by this Buhari regime, culminating in the abominable
incarceration of innocent mothers, grandmothers and great grandmothers in Owerri prisons, we the Indigenous People of Biafra (IPOB) do hereby declare 14 September 2018 a day of general strike, mourning and
resistance across Biafraland.”

“Inhabitants of South East/South South and all conscientious Biafrans living in other parts of Nigeria and the world are required to stay indoors away from work or daily business activities throughout the day of the 14th of September 2018 to register our anger and protest regarding the men and women killed at Afaraukwu in Umuahia during
Operation Python Dance II on September 14 last year, those killed in Ngwa, Aba, Igweocha (Port Harcourt) and buried in unmarked mass graves as a result of unprovoked military invasion of Biafraland by the Nigerian Army.

“We shall also remember all those killed in the struggle for the restoration of Biafra independence since August 2015 when the army shot dead Mr Okafor in Onitsha on a peaceful march from Nkpor to Onitsha main town. Their sacrifice will neither be forgotten nor will it be in vain, because come what may, this generation of IPOB must and
will restore Biafra.”

The statement continued: “The sacrilegious and disgraceful humiliation of Igbo women, some of them great grand-mothers, ranks as one of the most abominable act of desecration ever visited upon the land of Biafra in recorded history. It will mark the defining event that completed the shame and humiliation of the Igbo race.”

“The cowardice and impotency of Igbo socio-political and cultural leadership in the face of such humiliation by a single Fulani police officer in Owerri is confirmation, if one is needed, that South East and South South regions are conquered territories and vassal colonies of the Sokoto caliphate.

“Nationwide general strike observed as a sit-at-home across Biafraland on the 14th of September 2018, is the only way we Biafrans can honour our fallen brethren and legitimately remind our northern oppressors and their collaborators in our midst that enough is enough!

“We do not want another Operation Python Dance or another mass murder of Biafra agitators and humiliation of our mothers in our land. Biafraland we state categorically must emerge a free nation under God, whether our enemies like it or not.

“What happened at Afaraukwu; the desecration of house of a traditional ruler, the slaughter of innocent men and women: the wholesale massacre along the Ngwa segment of Enugu-Igweocha (Port Harcourt) Expresswa, countless number of mass graves across Biafraland, is repulsive, inhumane, barbaric and worthy of total condemnation by all right thinking people. We wait the day United Nations and other world bodies will give the issue of Biafra the same level of prominence it is giving Rhohingya”.

Owerri Women: IPOB Declares Sept 14 Sit At Home In the S/East, Other Places

Image via Oracle News

OWERRI (THE ORACLE)--The Indigenous People of Biafra (IPOB) has declared September 14, 2018 as a day of total sits at home in the southeast geopolitical zone and other places where Igbo people reside in Nigeria and the world over. This was contained in a statement issued by IPOB Director of Media and Publicity.

The Sit at Home order according to Powerful is a result of ongoing campaign of ethnic and religious persecution, genocide and humiliation of the people of Biafra in general and Igbo people in particular by this Buhari regime, culminating in the abominable incarceration of innocent mothers, grandmothers and great grandmothers in Owerri prisons.

“Following the incarceration of innocent mothers, grandmothers and great grandmothers in Owerri prisons among other reasons
we the do hereby declare 14 September 2018 a day of general strike, mourning and resistance across Biafraland” he said

He noted that the inhabitants of South East/South South and all conscientious Biafrans living in other parts of Nigeria and the world are required to stay indoors away from work or daily business activities throughout the day of the 14th of September 2018 to register our anger and protest regarding the men and women killed at Afaraukwu in Umuahia during Operation Python Dance II on September 14 last year, those killed in Ngwa, Aba, Igweocha (Port Harcourt) and buried in unmarked mass graves as a result of unprovoked military invasion of Biafraland by the Nigerian Army.

He continued, “We shall also remember all those killed in the struggle for the restoration of Biafra independence since August 2015 when the army shot dead Mr Okafor in Onitsha on a peaceful march from Nkpor to Onitsha main town. Their sacrifice will neither be forgotten nor will it be in vain, because come what may, this generation of IPOB must and will restore Biafra.

“The sacrilegious and disgraceful humiliation of Igbo women, some of them great grand-mothers, ranks as one of the most abominable act of desecration ever visited upon the land of Biafra in recorded history. It will mark the defining event that completed the shame and humiliation of the Igbo race. The cowardice and impotency of Igbo socio-political and cultural leadership in the face of such humiliation by a single Fulani police officer in Owerri is confirmation, if one is needed, that South East and South South regions are conquered territories and vassal colonies of the Sokoto caliphate.

“Nationwide general strike observed as a sit-at-home across Biafraland on the 14th of September 2018, is the only way we Biafrans can honour our fallen brethren and legitimately remind our northern oppressors and their collaborators in our midst that enough is enough! We do not want another Operation Python Dance or another mass murder of Biafra agitators and humiliation of our mothers in our land. Biafraland we state categorically must emerge a free nation under God, whether our enemies like it or not.

“What happened at Afaraukwu; the desecration of house of a traditional ruler, the slaughter of innocent men and women: the wholesale massacre along the Ngwa segment of Enugu-Igweocha (Port Harcourt) Expresswa, countless number of mass graves across Biafraland, is repulsive, inhumane, barbaric and worthy of total condemnation by all right thinking people. We wait the day United Nations and other world bodies will give the issue of Biafra the same level of prominence it is giving Rhohingya.

“All businesses, offices, markets, schools and road transportation will be shut down for 24 hours from midnight of the 13th of September. There will be no human or vehicular movement across Biafraland. People are expected to stay at home to pray for the soul of the brave and reflect upon the bondage our land is under.

“Any person or persons seen outside on the 14th of September 2018 will be classed as an enemy of the people because only collaborators in Ohaneze and South East Governors Forum that instigated Operation Python Dance and encouraged the army to kill unarmed innocent IPOB agitators will dare challenge this directive.

“As well as honouring our heroes that died in Afaraukwu a year ago and other places in Biafraland, 14 September 2018 shall expose who the saboteurs undermining the freedom of Biafra truly are.

Powerful Rhetoric Gives Insight Into Biafran Independence Narratives

BY JOHN CAMPBELL

Uboha Damia, a 75-year-old veteran of Nigeria’s 1967 civil war, holds a flag of the separatist Biafra movement during an event in Umuahia, Nigeria on May 28, 2017. (Lekan Oyekanmi/AP)

BIAFRA NIGERIA WORLD (COUNCIL ON FOREIGN RELATIONS) -- The still unknown whereabouts of Namdi Kanu, a leader of the Indigenous People of Biafra (IPOB), has led to public exchanges that provide insight into the mindset of at least some of Biafra's supporters. The IPOB is one of a number of organizations that are calling for the secession from Nigeria of the predominately Igbo and Christian states in southeast Nigeria, and the federal government has labeled it a terrorist organization. Following a security service raid on his house, Kanu has gone missing, either into hiding or, as his lawyer speculates, he has been killed by the security services. He is due in court to face treason charges on October 17. As he is a British subject as well as a Nigerian citizen, the British government has asked the Buhari administration for Kanu’s whereabouts, but it denied any knowledge of them.

Former Abia state governor Orji Kalu is claiming that Kanu fled to the United Kingdom via Malaysia, but this is strenuously denied by IPOB spokespersons. Mr. Emma Powerful, the IPOB’s media and publicity secretary, characterized the United Kingdom as being better organized and less corrupt than Nigeria. Further, it is “an island nation surrounded by water and it is near impossible to enter without being documented.” Accordingly, Mr. Powerful continued, the British government would know whether Kanu was in the country. The fact that the British government is asking the Nigerian government for Kanu’s where about is “proof” that he is not in Britain.

Perhaps more central to the IPOB’s outlook are Emma Powerful‘s comments about the threat posed by the “Fulani caliphate.” He accuses Kalu and other Igbo political figures who criticize Kanu as “Hausa-Fulani errand boys.” Among the Igbo errand boys, there is “an ongoing battle as to who will emerge the anointed son of the Fulani caliphate.” Fear of northern, Muslim domination of Nigeria is a long-standing theme in Igboland and other parts of the south. Some current Biafra supporters characterize the 1967-70 Nigerian civil war as a struggle between Christians and Muslims, in which the latter were victorious because of the “betrayal” of Yorubaland (a western, religiously mixed region of Nigeria), which allied with the Muslims of the north to destroy Biafra. The fact that the current president, Muhammadu Buhari, is a Fulani Muslim encourages this way of thinking. If fear of Fulani domination is one of Emma Powerful’s themes, another is bad governance. He states, “Our leader, Mazi Nnamdi Kanu before his abduction by Nigerian Army has brought an end to the era of cash and carry politics of subservience to Hausa-Fulani to the detriment of Biafra.”

Other pro-Biafra organizations are expressing support for Kanu. Uchenna Madu, the leader of the Movement for the Actualization of the Sovereign State of Biafra (MASSOB), issued a statement that Kanu is a “true hero of Biafra either dead or alive.” Madu’s statement also raises the northern specter, if perhaps with more subtlety than Mr. Powerful: “This artificial entity called Nigeria will never be united or exist as one nation as long as these [sic] established mentality of a section of the country seeing themselves as the lords of Nigeria.” His statement denounced a military operation underway in the southeast called Operation Python Dance II, as well as government opposition to the fundamental restructuring of the Nigerian state. He criticized the “acceptance of deadly Fulani herdsmen as common criminals" by the Buhari administration, arguing that, in total, these actions have prompted the “eastern, western, and Middle Belt regions of Nigeria towards self-determination for survival.”

It is to be hoped that the Nigerian federal government will respond to the upsurge of Biafra sentiment with subtlety and political skill. Southeastern leaders are in fact meeting with Buhari today, reportedly to discuss the “alleged marginalization” of the region. It is also to be hoped that Kanu is alive and well. Were he to be made a martyr, it could very well lead to further unrest and the possibility of violence.

June 12: Afenifere Laments Anti-Igbo Threat, Insists On Restructuring

BY BOLA BADMUS

NIGERIAN TRIBUNE

LAGOS, NIGERIA (NIGERIAN TRIBUNE, JUNE 12, 2017) - Pan-Yoruba socio-political group, Afenifere, has lamented that it is sad that Nigeria is now marking another June 12, 24 years after the annulment of the freest and fairest presidential poll won by late Chief MKO Abiola, amidst an October 1 quit order to Ndigbo by Arewa youths, who have also secured endorsement from the Northern Elders Forum (NEF) and Arewa Consultative Forum (ACF).

This was just as the group declared that the country had fumbled and wobbled through 18 years of pretending that its unity was settled, restating the Yoruba nation’s belief that the only way that Nigeria would be able to fulfill its destiny as one country was for all Nigerian nationalities to run their lives according to their civilisations in a restructured polity that practices federalism in its truest form.

Afenifere said this on Sunday in a release entitled: “24 Years After June 12:Whither Nigeria?” signed and made available to newsmen by its National Publicity Secretary, Mr. Yinka Odumakin, just as it further lamented that the country is marking this year’s June 12 still labouring under intense strain because it has failed to learn the lessons of history.

“Nigeria marks today, the 24th anniversary of the cleanest election ever held in its history. Unhappily, Nigeria marks this day still labouring under intense strain, palpable uncertainty and extreme apprehension, because Nigeria has failed to learn the lessons of history. And this has confirmed the wisdom of Confucius that, A man who has committed a mistake and does not correct it is making another mistake,” Afenifere said.

Afenifere, while recalling the sad fallout of the annulment of the June 12 election by the General Ibrahim Babangida’s junta, which propelled a five-year resistance during which Abiola and Kudirat, his wife, were assassinated alongside many prominent pro-democracy activists, said Nigeria was faced with another June episode in the making with the anti- Igbo agitation in the North.

“We now mark another June 12 amid an October 1 quit order to Ndigbo by Arewa youths who have also secured endorsement from the Northern Elders Forum, with the Arewa Consultative Forum conceding what they called ‘the frustrations of the youth’ with Ndigbo.

“While the primary targets of the Arewa youths’ quit order are the Ndigbo residents in the North, we are not deceived that when the rubber hits the road, the Almajaris and the Mujaheedin would pick and choose among all Southerners in the North in the baying for blood,’’ the group added.

It said: “This is why the Yoruba nation is warning that this is a déjà vu and that no country has ever survived two civil wars. We recall how events cascaded in the 1960s from the moment emergency rule was imposed on the Western Region until war broke out in 1967.The same arrogance of power, insensitivity and atrocious impunity that were at play then are still very much at play today. The same section of Nigeria that rejected the outcome of Aburi is still shouting down the strident calls of most peoples of Nigeria for restructuring today, because command and control is more important to them than equity, justice, fairness, peaceful coexistence, harmony and a progressing country.

“A climate of fear, apprehension and anxiety now pervades the country as no one knows what can happen, with the absence of a leadership that can rise up to the occasion to save the republic.”

Afenifere pointed out: “Not one member of the group of ‘youth’ organisations who had unfettered access to Arewa House to threaten the unity of Nigeria has been arrested is a clear signal that the butterfly that is dancing on the surface of the Arewa river is dancing to some drummer beneath the water surface.

“When we attained independence in 1960, Nigeria’s pot was standing on a tripod. Two legs out of the three are now in a near-war face-off. It would be an illusion of grandeur to think that this pot can continue to stand in this way!

“To this end, we, Afenifere, restate the Yoruba belief that the only way Nigeria would be able to fulfill its destiny as one country is that all Nigerian nationalities should be able to run their lives according to their civilisation in a restructured polity that practices federalism in its truest form. That remains the unchangeable preference of the Yoruba nation.

“If, however, our compatriots from the North and East are not averse to the continuation of Nigeria as a country, the only acceptable path towards this end is political restructuring. Fortunately, we have a road map in the recommendations of the last confab, which must now be pursued and implemented.

“But in the event that our co-citizens do absolutely insist that we the peoples of Nigeria can no longer live together, we Yoruba nation will not want a violent termination such as happened in Yugoslavia. Even though our Yoruba nation boasts a history of great wars, gallant warrior leaders and warlike people who fear no war, we nevertheless abhor war and bloodshed.

“We are sure that the Nigerian situation can be resolved in whatever direction through a peacefully negotiated settlement. In due recognition of the right to self-determination of all nationalities, we believe in the Czechoslovakia kind of peaceful resolution, so that the various nationalities in Nigeria may peacefully determine their status and their future.

“In accordance with the character of our nation, we Yoruba do not, and cannot, discount the fact that we nations that are members of the Nigerian state today were peacefully interacting peoples for millennia before the coming of Nigeria, and that we need to create the conditions for our being peacefully interacting peoples in all our future.”