Mutually Assured Disaster

It’s unbelievably ironic that some misguided youths allegedly fighting the injustices of discrimination and non-inclusion of Ndigbo in the Nigerian Project, should mete out the same or graver punishments on other innocents, but that’s what the Movement for the Actualization of the Sovereign State of Biafra, {MASSOB}, and its splinter secessionist sects, the Indigenous People of Biafra, {IPOB}, the Biafra Zionist Movement {BZM}, and the United Eastern Congress, {UEC}, are doing. Suddenly, Nigerians awoke in the past four months to find out that these semi-terror Igbo groups had eviscerated Abia, Anambra, Ebonyi, Enugu, Imo, Delta, Rivers, Cross River and Akwa Ibom states from Nigeria without a plebiscite, referendum, or parliamentary approval by anyone in the states concerned. Unilaterally, arbitrarily, high-handedly and arrogantly, these merchants of violence are trying to carve out their ephemeral empire by trampling on the rights, privileges, emotions and opportunities of others.

Canon folders of ambitious financial mischief makers, they are shun of any clear cut objectives and in place of articulated schemes of social mobilization, they rely on terror, blackmail, impunity, violent protests and offensive, indecorous verbal attacks on perceived enemies of Biafra. While President Muhammadu Buhari, GCFR, was in Delhi for the India-Africa summit, they threatened to burn our High Commission in that city.

Most notably, Nnamdi Kanu, the leader of IPOB voiced out some treasonable comments against Nigeria and Nigerians onYouTube, while the transmitter of his pirate Radio Biafra was illegally festered on the mast of a major telecommunications company in Anambra State. The Social Media was alight with some so-called resolutions of these Biafran zealots over their bewildered conquered subjects. Ralph Uwazurike, the leader of the leftover MASSOB allegedly got prepared to present a 2016 budget that will “actualize Biafra and liberate the people of former Eastern region.” It will be good to see his capital receipts and to know his sources of funding.

MY CASE AGAINST BIAFRA While industrialized Europe in a grand strategic thinking has been driving towards a one state destination from the formation of the 3-nation European Steel Community in 1966 to today’s 42-nation European Union, MASSOB and its inglorious co-travelers want to dismember Africa’s most populated nation and its largest economy into banana republics. Canada, the United States of Americans and Mexico out of the economic desire to compete favourably with the rest of the world, fused into the North American Free Trade Agreement, NAFTA. To keep Quebec from pulling out of Canada in the 1980s, the federal parliament granted the province language and cultural rights. The same thing happened in Spain when the Catalan language and culture was expanded to blunt the edge of the Basque Separatists in the 1990s. Germany absorbed its large migrant Turkish population as citizens in the 1980s and rebuilt dilapidated communist East Germany after the fall of the Berlin Wall in 1989. The British Parliament allowed devolution of powers when independence agitations erupted in Scotland, Northern Ireland and Wales during the administration of Prime Minister Tony Blair, a deft move that gave them language rights and cultural space while retaining their Britishness. China, in a long conceived strategic decision reclaimed Hong Kong from Great Britain in 1997. Now the world’s second largest economy, the Red Dragon insists that creative and innovative Taiwan remains an integral part of the mainland administration. Shocked beyond words at the loss of the Soviet Union, Russia under President Vladimir Putin, an ultranationalist ex-KGB officer, by steel and stealth seeks to re-build the old“Evil Empire that reserves the right to lie and to cheat,” apologies to ex-US President Ronald Reagan.

Because he goes about it without political and constitutional correctness, President Putin has caused terrible violence in Chechnya and Georgia with global consequences. He has frightened the former Soviet client states, who understandably ran into the arms of the western defence umbrella, the North Atlantic Treaty Organization, NATO, for cover. Turkey is in the same boat by its condemnable treatment of its unhappy Kurdish minority. After the death of Marshall Tito, ethnic and religious tensions ravaged Yugoslavia, a senior member of the Warsaw Pact nations of the ex-Soviet Empire and it disintegrated into four nations that are not making waves today. Eritreans complained of lack of breathing space when it was part of Ethiopia, but it is undemocratic, dictatorial and a failed state. South Sudan is heading the same way also. The only success story that came of dismembered nations is Singapore, which emerged from the old Malay Federation in 1963, but Biafra is currently being herded by parochial, archaic, outlandish and offensive characters. Deluded and uninformed MASSOB warlords and their co-travellers who lack any world view are bent on limiting the huge capacities of Ndigbo. If that happens, they will suffer the economic consequences more than any other nationality in Nigeria. What Ndigbo need is a borderless Africa to accommodate their legendary entrepreneurial suaveness. Save for the administrations of Dr Michael Okpara, Ajie Ukpabi Asika, Mazi Sam Mbakwe, Dr Nwabueze Ngige, now labour minister and Mr Peter Obi, the South East have been a sea of maladministration state and local government levels and this has ensured the continued subjection of these unfortunate, but very energetic people. The most laughable are the “autonomous communities” in Imo state that are enlarged conduit pipes to siphon scarce public fund.

Bad roads, massive erosion, decayed schools, lack of electricity and government presence, large scale looting of public treasury and shameful tolerance of official malfeasance has constrained the great strength of this most vibrant race and their economic development while their terribly corrupt leaders maintain stupendous lifestyles. This is firstly and fully, the fault and problem of Ndigbo. It’s noteworthy that the agitation was most worrisome in Imo and Abia states, the two most misgoverned Igbo states today.

The agitators of Biafra are only opportunistic new oppressors waiting to inherit the wealth of this mobile race. On June 5, 2014, Benjamin Igwe Onwuka, the leader of BZM attempted to take control of the Enugu State Broadcasting Service, ESBS in order to announce the birth of Biafra, but the government of President Buhari is not the government of President Jonathan, GCFR. The leaders of these abrasive groups are bent to sink billions of dollars of Ndigbo investments by their vile campaign against other Nigerians. Non-citizenship will collapse billions of Igbo Diaspora assets in Nigeria overnight. Though Nnamdi Kanu degenerate the nation as an artificial creation and as the “zoological republic of Nigeria,” the Biafra of his dream will not be an idyllic Eden, but an artificial creation and a “zoological republic.” While ethnic discontent about marginalization in any part of Nigeria should be constitutionally expressed, no nationality must hold Nigerians at gunpoint in the quest to realize their secessionist dreams. One of the reasons why Chukwuemeka Odumegwu-Ojukwu’s Biafra disintegrated was the vile treatment by Ndigbo of the other nationalities in the former Eastern Region. And the war drums of MASSOB and company is not reassuring symphony to these nationalities afraid of nascent Ndigbo neo-colonialism in the 21^st century.

Ms Chioma Amaryllis, an ex-girlfriend of Nnamdi Kanu and ex-PR co-coordinator of Radio Biafra in America has a video trending on the Internet. She calls her former heartthrob a conman, playboy, scammer, spinner and liar. In America, the married Mr Kanu warmed his way into her heart and bed by claiming to be a bachelor. She alleged that Kanu solicited and got top dollars from Ndigbo Diaspora to build a cenotaph for the late Igbo leader, Dim Ojukwu, but the funds went into voice mail. She came to Nigeria believing that the South South geopolitical zone was Biafra country, according to the propaganda of Radio Biafra, but met extreme hostility to the concept of Biafra there. This deception by IPOB {or Kanu} jarred her tender frame. Dim Ojukwu’s Biafra had three leaders according to Alexander Madiebo, ex-commander of the Biafran Armed Forces. They were Chukwuemeka, Odumegwu and Ojukwu! According to Ms Chioma Amaryllis, IPOB has two leaders: Nnamdi and Kanu! The lady advised all Ndigbo without dual citizenship not to follow Kanu into treasonable acts against the Nigerian state because he will leave them high and dry. She told of some zealous IPOB members who ran foul of the law and were left to bear the consequences without the intervention of IPOB.

THE NEEDS OF NDIGBO IN A FEDERAL NIGERIA The Right Honourable Dr Benjamin Nnamdi Azikiwe, the late Owelle of Onitsha and the first {ceremonial} President of Nigeria {1960-1966} is rightly deemed to be the cerebral champion of Nigeria’s independence struggle. A charismatic, handsome, charming, multi-lingual American educated orator, the great Zik of Africa was a nationalist par excellence still respected for his huge contributions to the political development of this nation. Dr Nnamdi Azikiwe was an African; a Nigerian and an Igbo respectively, in his life and struggles. Ab initio, the non-monarchical Igbo race began life as the purest republicans with the motto “Igbo enwe eze”: Igbos have no king! Though they have since imbibed the concept of kingship in a comical way, the notion of not having a supreme political ruler is still germane in their relationships and it still counts against them vis a vis the Hausa/Fulanis and the Yorubas, the other two competing legs of the Nigerian federation who have hundreds of years of political kingship, command and control. Traditional and political leaders in Igbo land don’t pack the punch of their counterparts in Hausa and Yoruba lands.

The great Zik, credited with making the most “expensive compromises” for the unity of Nigeria, only received a grudging acceptance among Ndigbo after Chief Obafemi Awolowo, the competent champion of Yoruba nationalism robbed his party of a well deserved political victory in Yoruba land. But Zik fled Biafra back to Nigeria because the dictatorial Chukwuemeka Odumegu-Ojukwu, the bearded and dreaded Biafran head of state ignored him in the scheme of things. The acts of Ojukwu’s military Biafra defeats the argument for MASSOB and company’s political Biafra. After Zik, Ndigbo have been in a leadership vacuum. They have suffered and still suffer verbal attacks, discriminations, oppressions, rejections, destruction of their livelihood, pogroms and gross injustices in Nigeria as a result of lack of a united voice to contend with their tribal competitors. Regrettably, they did not engage the political process to achieve their goals by pressing ex-President Goodluck Jonathan to release the report of the National Conference convened by him. And the government of President Jonathan was an Igbo triumph!

Even now, the Buhari administration is not being politically stretched to make known the National Confab report either. Today,Ndigbo are the admired, but envied mercurial merchants of Nigeria and a non-violent atmosphere is what is needed to protect their admirable investments all over the nation. The Igbo states must urgently integrate their security apparatuses to deal with kidnapping and rapacious, rampaging Fulani herdsmen. Prominent Igbo sons and daughters in Diaspora now stay clear of their homeland because of merciless kidnappers. The necessity to industrialize and diversify into the New Economy byNdigbo cannot be more urgent than now. With state governments looking more towards IGR to meet their revenue, the contributions of Igbo businesses to states’ income will rise and they ought to harness the political and electoral power that it presents. This fact played out in Lagos State in the May 2015 governorship election. Ndigbo should politically fight for their constitutional rights in a united Nigeria. They stand to gain of the abundant political, academic, business and economic opportunities in our nation. Unbelievably, the semi-violent Biafran ultranationalists have not sensed that lack of access to the sea in the East by trade saturated Ndigbo counts against their entrepreneurial capabilities. A deep sea port and the new Niger Bridge are vital economic arteries that they must squeeze out of the Nigerian state in non-violent ways.

Outside their homeland, NDIGBO need a functional database to collate every area of economic activity they engage in. Igbo potentials won’t be truly realized until they evolve a bond of true brotherhood with their South South neighbours particularly and other nationalities in general. Before and after independence, Alhaji Ahmadu Bello, governor of the Northern Region and its political leader wanted to exit the Nigerian federation, but was advised by the British about the rash economic and commercial consequences that the North will suffer. Violent agitations at various times by Middle Belt zealots headed by late Senator Joseph Tarka, by Ogoni activists under the leadership of the playwright Ken Saro-Wiwa who lost his life in the struggle, by June 12 advocates using the National Democratic Coalition {NADECO}, by Yoruba irredentists under the umbrella of Odua People’s Congress {OPC} and by the Niger Delta militants did not materialize their quests. But by signing the amnesty programme of late President Musa Yar Adua, the leaders of the militancy became multi billionaires during the administration of President Jonathan. And pipelines began to burst after a prominent ex-warlord named Chief Government Ekwumokpolo, aka Tompolo, refused the invitation of the EFCC over some alleged land deal worth billions of naira. After he bluntly dishonoured a court warrant for his arrest, the Nigerian military began to comb his Niger Delta homeland to arrest him.

Niger Delta militants only got a sweet deal during the The nation is up in arms against Boko Haram, the Islamist murderous brigade. The heinous terrorists who carved out a so-called Islamic Caliphate from Borno, Adamawa and Yobe states under the inept government of President Jonathan are now on the run, evicted by a determined Buhari administration. If Biafra zealots use political and constitutional windows adroitly, they may one day realize their aspirations without bloodshed. But that will only come about if Igbo academic, political, business, traditional, religious, media and opinion leaders reclaim the market place of Igbo ideas and discourse from some deluded youths. In the words of Professor Chidi Odinkalu, chairman, National Human Rights Commission, the Biafran agitators don’t “deserve any oxygen of support.” The two million Igbos who died in the Nigeria/Biafra war is an unmitigated disaster and this loss should not have part two.

On January 21, 2016, Honourable Yakubu Dogara, the Speaker of the House of Representatives inaugurated a 50-man committee to continue the work of the 7^th House on the review of our constitution. Ex-President Goodluck Jonathan, GCFR, famously friendly with Ndigbo, unfortunately frustrated this exercise that would have been used to put the South East on the same pedestal with other geopolitical zones. Again, this second chance should not elude Ndigbo. I expect this great nation to be proactive and get cracking on how to actualize Igbo aspirations politically. That is the right way to go about giving Ndigboa sense of inclusion in the Nigerian Project.

I hugely celebrate my Igbo identity, but for now, I remain a most determined foe of the realization of any sovereign state of Biafra in the way the violent secessionists go about it!

Ndigbo kwenu!
A pastor, historian, and writer, Joseph Emeka Anumbor is the author of THE INTERCOURSE OF TROUBLED THOUGHTS,a critically acclaimed discourse on homosexuality published by AuthorHouse Inc, Indiana, USA.