"I have carried a lot of blame for Biafra. And before you ask me, I will tell you plainly that if Nigeria is not better, then Biafra is a worthy alternative," - Chief Emeka Odimegwu Ojukwu, January 15, 2001.

55 years ago Biafra went silent. Even before the sounds of guns dissipated into the air, as the sun set in the lands of the East, the victors of the fratricidal war declared sanctimoniously to the hypocritical accolades of their colonial masters, ensconced in Whitehall, that there are “no victors, and no vanquished” . . . before quickly rushing off to divide the spoils of war.

But since January 15, 1970, the region that hosts both victor and the vanquished has turned into a nightmare in which the over 250 diverse ethnic groups that populate it still struggle to find a common sense of identity and nationhood. Here they are demarcated by ever widening fault lines, patched up with failed promises with those that dare challenge the status quo shouted down by monotonous crazed chants of “one Naijeriya . . . one Naijeriya”, singing hollow anthems and pledges of servitude as Muslim fundamentalists in the North East continue on their unrelenting crusade to establish a Caliphate, while marauders pretending to be cattle herders decimate minority ethnic groups in the regions around the plateau; and the polluted lands of the exploited peoples of the Niger Delta of once thriving fishing communities are poisoned daily, with their means of livelihood destroyed forever, while their promised liberators grow obscenely silent, perversely satisfied by crumbs falling from the tables of their inheritance. Is it a wonder that the Igbos of the South East and parts of the South South, some of whom still nurse scars that have refused to heal, embrace the spirit of Biafra?

Senator Ahmed Sani ignorantly states that the agitation for Biafra is because Jonathan lost in the recent elections in which his tribesman Buhari ascended Aso Rock. https://www.nairaland.com/2708220/pro-jonathan-elements-behind-renewed-agitation. I ask, how ignorant can one be about the plight of the people he shares a country with?! This is what his Fulani brother and current emir of Kano, Lamido Sanusi said in September 1999 in his speech during the “National Conference on the 1999 Constitution”, regarding the plight of the Igbo within the Nigerian polity:

“. . . this nation must realise that Igbos have more than paid for their foolishness. They have been defeated in war, rendered paupers by monetary policy fiat, their properties declared abandoned and confiscated, kept out of strategic public sector appointments and deprived of public services. The rest of the country forced them to remain in Nigeria and has continued to deny them equity.

The Northern Bourgeoisie and the Yoruba Bourgeoisie have conspired to keep the Igbo out of the scheme of things. In the recent transition when the Igbo solidly supported the PDP in the hope of an Ekwueme presidency, the North and South-West treated this as a Biafra agenda. Every rule set for the primaries, every gentleman´s agreement was set aside to ensure that Obasanjo, not Ekwueme emerged as the candidate. Things went as far as getting the Federal Government to hurriedly gazette a pardon. Now, with this government, the marginalistion of the Igbo is more complete than ever before. The Igbos have taken all these quietly because, they reason, they brought it upon themselves. But the nation is sitting on a time-bomb”.

For those who genuinely want to know what gives rise to the cry for Biafra and why now, my response would be; "why not now"? Is there a perfect time to ask for justice and to be treated with respect and dignity? If Nigeria is not working and things are heading in the wrong direction, why not allow those that want to, chose something different than the status quo?

During an interview to mark the Armed Forces Remembrance Anniversary on 15 January 2001, Ojukwu declared; “if Nigeria is not better, then Biafra is a worthy alternative". So who decides for us when we should ask for something better?

Biafra is not about Jonathan. For a growing number of us, it represents a nationalistic ideal, the essence of which was captured in the Ahiara declaration, written by the National Guidance Committee of Biafra and delivered by Ojukwu on 1st June 1969. In that declaration Ojukwu stated that the struggle for the realisation of Biafra; “is the latest recrudescence in our time of the age-old struggle of the black man for his full stature as man. We are the latest victims of a wicked collusion between the three traditional scourges of the black man - racism, Arab-Muslim expansionism and white economic imperialism. Playing a subsidiary role is Bolshevik Russia seeking for a place in the African sun. Our struggle is a total and vehement rejection of all those evils which blighted Nigeria, evils which were bound to lead to the disintegration of that ill-fated federation. Our struggle is not a mere resistance - that would be purely negative. It is a positive commitment to build a healthy, dynamic and progressive state, such as would be the pride of black men the world over...

...Since in the thinking of many white powers a good, progressive and efficient government is good only for whites, our view was considered dangerous and pernicious: a point of view which explains but does not justify the blind support which these powers have given to uphold the Nigerian ideal of a corrupt, decadent and putrefying society. To them genocide is an appropriate answer to any group of black people who have the temerity to attempt to evolve their own social system. When the Nigerians violated our basic human rights and liberties, we decided reluctantly but bravely to found our own state, to exercise our inalienable right to self-determination as our only remaining hope for survival as a people. Yet, because we are black, we are denied by the white powers the exercise of this right which they themselves have proclaimed inalienable. In our struggle we have learnt that the right of self-determination is inalienable, but only to the white man”. This here is the spirit that feeds our agitation. It is a spirit that wants to define its own destiny and be shed of the last vestiges of colonialism and slavery.

Hear Sanusi again, regarding the Igbo:

“There is a new Igbo man, who was not born in 1966 and neither knows nor cares about Nzeogwu and Ojukwu. There are Igbo men on the street who were never Biafrans. They were born Nigerians, are Nigerians, but suffer because of actions of earlier generations. They will soon decide that it is better to fight their own war, and may be find an honourable peace, than to remain in this contemptible state in perpetuity . . .”

This is hard to chew!

Sanusi said those things in an article title "yorubas are the problem of Nigeria". Since then, yorubas hv not disputed anything he said

krusdamax:
This is hard to chew!

Ok.

The gist of wetin I write be say there was a victor and a vanquished in the civil war of 67 - 70 in spite of wetin Gowon tell the whole world.
Since then the so called one Naijeriya don Pafuka finish and this affect both victor and vanquished!!
I come talk how Oga Sanusi, highlight the problems wey Igbos still dey face for Naija and the reason why some people still dry agitate for Biafra.

People like me see Biafra as an ideal worth fighting for.

The rest of the things wey I write na quotations and colourful language!!

basilo101:
Sanusi said those things in an article title "yorubas are the problem of Nigeria". Since then, yorubas hv not disputed anything he said

I prefer to focus on what he said about the Igbos. Let every man carry his cross!

Ngwaukwu1:


Ok.

The gist of wetin I write be say there was a victor and a vanquished in the civil war of 67 - 70 in spite of wetin Gowon tell the whole world.
Since then the so called one Naijeriya don Pafuka finish and this affect both victor and vanquished!!
I come talk how Oga Sanusi, highlight the problems wey Igbos still dry face for Naija and the reason why some people still dry agitate for Biafra.

People like me see Biafra as an ideal worth fighting for.

The rest of the things wey I write na quotations and colourful language!!

I now understand better that Grammar no be our papa language.

By hard to chew I don't imply you interpret your epistle into mother tongue.

No offense intended.

So you are saying this agitation is not about GEJ's loss at the presidential elections ??

DaBullIT:
So you are saying this agitation is not about GEJ's loss at the presidential elections ??

Yes.

krusdamax:


I now understand better that Grammar no be our papa language.

By hard to chew I don't imply you interpret your epistle into mother tongue.

No offense intended.

No offence taken