WHY THE TWELVE STATES WERE CREATED IN 1967 . 27TH MAY

Lt Col Ojukwu  & Lt Col Gowon 

 EASTERN REGION CONSULTATIVE ASSEMBLY 27th MAY 1967.

We, the chiefs, elders, and representatives of Eastern Nigeria on this day' 27th may 1967 now wish to make the following declarations.
We hereby mandate the governor of the Eastern region Col. Emeka "Odumegwu Ojukwu" to' in no distance time' declare Eastern Nigeria an independent sovereign state with the name/title REPUBLIC OF BIAFRA.
On that same day' Col Yakubu Gowon hurriedly invoked decree( dividing the four regions into 12 states.
You would recall that initially the 12 states Gowon created had no governors' it was on the 28th of May 1967 (24hrs later) that Governors were appointed to govern the various states, making it very obvious that it was clearly a plot to divide and rule the people of the East region.

The sole aim of state creation was to dispossess the Igbo of significant territories' and cause them to be landlocked.
How did Gowon got to know that the Eastern region had finally agreed to declare secession? (BIAFRA)
The traitors from the Eastern region are the reason why the Sultan of Sokoto has 23 oil blocks today while Anyanabos from the region have none.
~~Comr Tamuno-Belema Daniels

MY GALLANT BIAFRANS (history)

 A FORMER MERCENARY WHO FOUGHT ON THE BIAFRAN SIDE DURING THE CIVIL WAR GAVE THE FOLLOWING ACCOUNT OF HIS EXPERIENCE: 


"Nigeria's a typical West African mess of a country, only bigger and meaner. It's divided up the usual way: the coastal tribes are Christianized from sucking up to the European colonists. The further inland you go, the drier, hungrier and more Islamic it gets. The Brits grabbed the Nigerian coastline from the Portuguese when they realized there was money to be made, and turned the two big coastal tribes, the Ibo and the Yoruba, into their overseers on the Nigerian plantations. That left a lot of the inland Muslim tribes, the Hausa-Fulani people of the Sahel, permanently pissed off, sharpening their knives and biding their time.

"The Hausa-Fulani got their chance in 1963, when the last Brit in Nigeria hopped on a plane, yelling back to the Natives 'Congratulations, chaps! You're independent!' As soon as the Brits bugged out, the tribal massacres got going. Muslims in the north hacked to death every Ibo they could find. They hated these smartasses from the coast -- and now the Redcoats weren't there to stop them from taking revenge. 30,000 Ibos were killed in a few days. 

"The massacres kind of soured the Ibo on the idea of Nigeria as one big happy inter-tribal family. In 1967 an Ibo General in the Nigerian Army declared that the Ibo region was now an independent country, 'Biafra.' The Nigerian Army, a big, sleazy outfit, begged to differ and invaded the Ibo region in SE Nigeria. The Army had 250,000 men. The Biafra/Ibo army had maybe a tenth that many, but they were brave and smart -- the Ibo had always been the brains of Nigeria. 
"Every time it was a question of real battle on anything like equal terms, the Biafran rebels won. They stopped the government troops cold, then grabbed tactical surprise by staging a long-range raid into Western Nigeria. 
"A risky advance like that by untrained civilian recruits (which is what most of the Ibo fighters were) is really impressive. But sad to say, courage doesn't count for much in West African warfare. It's ruthlessness that wins these wars, and the Nigerian junta had it. 

"Instead of facing the Ibo army man to man, the Nigerian troops grabbed the coastline around the Niger River delta, this miserable maze of fever swamp was the supply route the Ibo needed. They stopped all food shipments heading for Ibo territory and sat back to let the Ibo starve. 

"The Biafrans were still winning every battle and losing the war like Lee in 1865 -- starved out, strangled from behind. They realized they needed to open the supply route and decided to take back the Niger delta. And they got some help from outside. 

"The best example, one of the few real heroes you'll get in this sleazy world, was a Swede, believe it or not. A Swedish aristocrat, no less. Count Carl Gustav von Rosen volunteered to do close air support for the Biafran army, hosing down government troops and raiding their bases, flying tiny civilian prop planes like little Swedish Cessnas. 

"Is that glorious or what? 

"The mismatch in the air war was total. The Nigerian AF had MiG-17 fighters and Il-28 bombers, DC 3 transports converted to bombers and a few choppers. Those Ilyushin and MiG designs were the high point of Soviet military aviation. Don't kid yourself -- the Soviets built some great planes. The Il-28 was a big, fast bomber with a bombload of 16,000 pounds and a three-man crew, including a tail gunner manning twin 23mm cannon. You wouldn't want to tailgate one of these. 

"The MiG-17 was even better. It might have been the best fighter in the world when it went into service in 1953, and even in the mid-sixties it was good enough to win against our Phantom F-4s in dogfights over North Vietnam. US pilots were way more scared of the MiG-17 than the follow-on model, the MiG-21. The slick moves and big cannon of the MiG-17 were one big reason the USAF stopped thinking of fighters as manned SAMs -- all speed and no finesse -- and went back to planes with nose cannon, maneuverability and started teaching air combat at Top Gun schools. 

"Up against all this big international hardware, the Biafrans had...nothing. 

"Then this crazy Swede von Rosen came up with the kind of idea that would only work in Africa. Since he couldn't get the Biafrans any jet aircraft, he'd just buy some prop-driven trainers and refit them for combat. Von Rosen is such a great character he almost makes me reconsider hating Swedes. He was a throwback to when the Swedish pikemen turned the tide of the Thirty Years War. 

"Von Rosen specialized in noble lost causes. Way back in 1938, when he was just a kid, he volunteered to fly for the Finns in their ultra-cool, hopeless fight against the Red Army. The Finns had no bombers so von Rosen just grabbed a civilian airliner, loaded it up with bombs and dropped them on the Reds from the passenger doors. 

 " 'Welcome, Comrade passengers! Coffee, tea or 500 pounds of HE?' 
"Thirty years later, in August 1968, von Rosen was working as a civilian pilot delivering aircraft to Africa. He ran into some priests who were trying to find somebody brave enough to fly medical supplies past the blockade into Biafra. The mercs they'd hired called it off as too dangerous. 

"Von Rosen volunteered to fly a DC 7 into Biafra with the supplies. The Biafrans were so grateful, and were fighting so bravely against all the odds, that von Rosen warmed to them like he had to the Finns. The Biafrans needed help to deal with the Nigerian AF, which was fighting a nasty war even by African standards. In the whole war, there's not one case of the Nigerian AF attacking a military target. 

"That would've been dangerous -- and not nearly as much fun as bombing refugee camps, strafing hospitals, and napalming fleeing civilians. 

"Von Rosen tried to find the Ibo some modern military jets, but nobody wanted to sell to the Biafrans for fear of upsetting the Nigerian government, a much bigger customer. So von Rosen started thinking about small prop-driven aircraft. There's a long history of using slow prop planes in bush warfare. Even the USAF, which has a major hard-on for afterburners and chrome, was forced to adopt a slow, armored CAS plane, the A-10. They hated it at first but it proved itself in both Gulf Wars, when fancy toys like the Army's dog of an AH, the Apache, left the field with its tail between its legs. In Nam, the classic jungle air war, we used two planes that were slow as molasses but did the job. One of the best and ugliest was the A-1 Skyraider, a chunky WW II style plugger. The USAF hated it and was always trying to twist combat reports to make the F-4 look good and the Skyraider look bad, but pilots agreed: you were better off going in low and slow in a Skyraider than zooming by in an F-4. 

"Even the Skyraider was like an SR-71 compared to the little putt-putt plane von Rosen built his force around: the MFI-9, a tiny prop-driven Swedish trainer that looks like those ultralights people build in their garages. This plane could park in subcompact spaces at the Stockholm mall. It had a maximum payload of 500 pounds -- me plus a couple of medium sized dogs. Lucky those Swedes are so skinny. 

"Von Rosen bought five of these little 'Fleas' down the coast in Gabon, slapped on a coat of green VW paint to make them look military, and installed wing pods for unguided 68mm unguided anti-armor rockets. Then he and his pilots -- three Swedes and three Ibo -- flew them back to Biafra and into combat. 

"They blew the Hell out of the Nigerian AF and army. These little Fleas were impossible to bring down. Not a single one was knocked out of the sky, although they'd buzz home riddled with holes. They flew three missions a day and their list of targets destroyed included Nigerian airfields, power plants, and troop concentrations. 

"The Fleas turned their weaknesses into advantages in true guerrilla style. They were so slow that they had to fly real low -- which made them almost impossible to hit in the jungle, since you never saw them till they were on top of you. The low speed made for better aim: almost half the 400 68mm rockets they fired hit their targets, which is an amazing score for unguided AS munitions. (There used to be a joke in the USAF that if it wasn't for the law of gravity, unguided AS rockets couldn't even hit the ground.) 

"The Biafran AF managed to destroy three MiG-17s and an Il-28 on the ground. Killing enemy planes on the ground may not be as glorious as shooting them down in a dogfight, but they're just as destroyed. The Fleas also took out a couple of helicopters, an airport tower, a Canberra bomber and a half-dozen supply trucks. And they blew away at least 500 Nigerian troops. It was one of the few really glorious exploits you get in war these days. Why they haven't made a movie of it, I don't know. Guess they think we'd rather see tennis pros fall in love or some shit like that. 

"Von Rosen's Fleas weren't enough to turn the tide of the war. The rest of the world turned their backs on the Ibo, let the Nigerians starve them into submission. The USSR sold the Nigerians every plane, tank and gun they could cram into their shopping cart, and the British loaned their pilots to fly as Nigerian AF mercs, bombing Biafran civvies and blowing up convoys bringing food and meds to the Ibo villages. 

"The famine in Biafra was the first time we saw pictures of African kids with skeleton arms and legs and big balloon bellies looking up at the camera. It was easy to get shots like that in Biafra, because the whole country was starving. 

"A year into the war, the Ibo had nothing left. No food, no ammo, not even fuel, which is ironic when they were sitting on the big Niger delta oilfields. 

"Even the bravest troops can't fight when they're dying of starvation. So in 1969 the Nigerian Army sent 120,000 men pushing through the center of Biafra, dividing the Ibo zone in half. It was like Sherman's march to the sea -- it broke the Biafrans' backs. Early in 1970 Biafra surrendered. Nobody knows how many people died. The low guess is a million, the high ones maybe three millions. Almost all were Ibo civilians. 

"The Nigerians punished the Ibo for their uppity behavior by freezing them out of the loot they got from oil revenues and other graft, the one industry in Nigeria. For 30 years the Ibo have been watching the oil pumped out of their land to buy more Mercedes for a bunch of sleazy generals and politicians. They've got a right to be pissed off -- but the Biafra war showed them that in Africa, right ain't got much to do with it. Like the greatest Swede of 'em all used to say, 'God is on the side of the big battalions.' "

SOURCE

WHATEVER YOU SOW.......

Gen. John Shagaya, the same "lance corporal John Shagaya" who pulled the first trigger that killed his garrison commander LT Col. Okonweze, Major Obienu, Major Orok, and many innocent Igbo officers in the early hours of July 29th 1966 at Abeokuta garrison.
And from there they marched unchallenged to the government house in Ibadan where they kidnapped a very "stupid" visiting head of state Gen.Ironsi, his ADC, Captain Nwankwo, and his host, Lt Col Fajuyi, took them to Iwo village about 10km outskirt of Ibadan where Ironsi and Fajuyi were brutally murdered while captain Nwankwo miraclously escaped through the rare brave help of his trusted northern officer friend Lt. Sani Bello.
After killing Ironsi and Fajuyi, the death squad marched to Agodi prison in Ibadan where Major Don Okafor, one of the five Majors in Nzeogwu's coup of January 15 1966 was being held, violently took him out of his prison room to the nearby bush where he was buried alive.


Now 51 years later after participating in that horrific and brutal massacre of innocent people who happened to belong to the wrong tribe at the time, the same Gen. John Shagaya left his village near Jos travelling to Jos with 4 other occupants and their prado jeep suddenly somersaulted and hit a tree resulting in his death at 75 years of age while 3 other occupants of the same vehicle survived. 
What a strange world we live in?
What do we call this? Is it the dreaded law of karma at work here.
May his soul rest in peace if at all there will be peace for him.
source

THE NIGERIAN GOVERNMENT HUNGRY FOR WAR

BIAFRA: THE NIGERIAN GOVERNMENT HUNGRY FOR WAR

 06:21:00 -  0 Comments

By Victoria. O.C. Agangan | Biafra Writers

September 17, 2017

Without the hand beating the drum, it would not produce any sound. The Nigerian government abandoned the Boko Haram terrain to come down to terrorize, intimidate and murder by bullets and arrows peaceful, innocent, law-abiding Biafran civilians in the Eastern region because they felt safer here and will be rewarded for annihilating Biafrans.

What Biafrans are asking for, is within the ambit of the laws, both nationally and internationally. We are surrounded with heavy arms and armory, professional killers of sorts in national uniforms, who only derives pleasure in murdering helpless and defenseless citizens with gunshots, yet they chant, "One Nigeria." Let them declare their real interest in the East, the oil, yet they claim to be saints when their greed surpasses their being.

The handwriting on the wall of Nigeria was clear when Buhari returned and made a-less-than ten minute national address, fully loaded with threats for IPOB. He almost spoke of nothing else.

Read Also: BIAFRA: IPOB IS LEGITIMATE, AND THE MOST IRENIC MASS-MOVEMENT OF BIAFRANS AROUND THE GLOBE

Then, was the meeting where military chiefs from the northern region gathered but exempted some regions. They sat to plan the elimination of a particular boil(Nnamdi Kanu) in the scrotum sac of Nigeria but God exposed their plans, then here came the conniving slave governors from the East seeking for hypocrisy laden talks, having arranged for the assassination of a great Hero whose commands were obeyed willingly and without gunpowder by millions.

The Lion of Biafra who has proved many critics wrong in his resolve for Biafra. They knew he would say "No," so they planned to meet with him and ensnare him for the slab, Chukwu Okike Abiama, revealed their plans beforehand, so they stylishly brought in military pythons to dance in his State of origin, stylishly towards his abode, to finish him off, but they forgot that BIAFRA owns Kanu and not the other way round.

The strategic curfew declared by the Abia State government which accorded the murderous Nigerian army more liberty to soak our lands with innocent blood, including the torture and killing of our youths at Isialangwa junction, resulting in the sporadic shooting of armless residents without provocation, were all part of the python dance?

Testing armory as claimed in their initial attempt to kill Mazi Nnamdi Kanu, depicts their evil intent as parades of such nature are not conducted in residential premises.

Read Also: Biafra: Police Raids Kanu's Home, Loot Properties To Erase Evidences Of Military Invasion

The deafening silence of the so-called political leaders who desperately want our votes to continue eating the crumbs from the so-called national cake, attest to that. While they concurred to slay their own like Judas Iscariot, the northern agenda rode high walls.

Mr planner president, master for nobody but all the north/Arewa, exchanged NNPC management with his kinsmen. Now their mission fully accomplished and power as desired fully returned to the north in all podiums, they came in for suppression and destruction.

Genocide has been committed on us, this is sacrilege in our lands. Now, who will agree to be in this contraption willingly or dying? I'm sure not a Biafran!

Who will come to spread in the sun as washed clothes to cast a vote again in Biafra land? I am sure not a real Biafran! In as much as, they have failed to kill us all, both at home and diaspora, they have woefully failed.

Nigeria is a mockery of a nation! She has failed to quench the Biafran ideology but has made her gloss appear!

I see Biafra striding in majestically and there is nothing anyone can do about it. All hail Biafra!


Edited By Chukwuemeka Chimerue

Publisher: Charles Opanwa
The Biafra Times

Nigeria must take a decision on the Igbo

 Azuka Onwuka         Punch Newspapers /

Before August 9, 1965, the Singaporeans were seen as an irritation in Malaysia. Then Singapore was one of the 14 states of Malaysia. Singaporeans were viewed as arrogant, stubborn, and domineering. While the United Malays National Organisation wanted affirmative action or “quota system” for the Malays, the People’s Action Party of the Singaporeans insisted that the best thing for the country was a merit-based policy on all issues, so as to bring out the best in the nation and create a spirit of excellence.

This constant disagreement and tension resulted in race riots. It got to a point where the Malays could take it no more. So on August 9, 1965 they convened the parliament, with no Singaporean parliamentarian present. At that sitting, the legislators voted unanimously (126 – 0) to expel Singapore from Malaysia.


When the Singaporeans heard that they had been expelled from the nation, at first they were devastated. But they took their fate in their hands and started building a new nation. And, indeed, by applying merit and the pursuit of excellence, Singaporeans built a country that moved from the Third World to First World in record time, overtaking Malaysia in all ramifications.

Interestingly, despite this sad way of parting, Malaysia and Singapore have remained good neighbours. In spite of the success that the latter has recorded, it has not made Malaysia not to record its own success.

There are many similarities between the story of Singapore and Malaysia and the Igbo and Nigeria. The Igbo are not happy with the quota system policy used in the admission into federal schools and federal positions. They want competitiveness in every sector, which will lead to the best being selected, for the sake of excellence.

The Igbo are seen as arrogant, noisy, domineering, greedy, over-ambitious, to mention but a few. Many Nigerians see them as irritants. They get killed frequently, especially in the North, at the least misunderstanding. Sometimes the cause of the provocation is someone from Denmark, Cameroon or another part of Nigeria.

There are many Nigerians who will easily tell you: “We will never allow an Igbo person to rule Nigeria.” There are many who believe that the problem of Nigeria is from the Igbo and that once the Igbo are done away with, Nigeria’s problems will disappear.

Given this scenario, the Igbo want a true federal system that will make Nigeria look like what it was before 1966, with each state or region taking charge of most of its affairs and moving at its own pace. Sadly, anytime it mentions restructuring or true federalism, there are forces that resist it vehemently and insist that such will not be allowed.

Ironically, despite this view by many Nigerians about the Igbo, anytime any person or group from Igbo land asks that the Igbo be allowed to leave Nigeria to form their own country, the resistance from most Nigerians is fierce. This reaction creates a contradiction. If the Igbo are irritants and troublemakers, why not expel them from Nigeria the way Singaporeans were expelled from Malaysia? But if you see them as valuable and believe they must be part of the Nigerian state, why not treat them as equal partners in the union? What does Nigeria really want from the Igbo?

Last week news broke that the Department of State Services embarked on a recruitment exercise, with 165 people recruited from the North-West.  The report said that 51 people were recruited from Katsina State alone, the home state of President Muhammadu Buhari and the Director General of Department of State Security, Mr Lawal Daura, while the number of people recruited from the five states of the South-East was 44 and the number recruited from the six states of the South-South was 42.

Compare that with the academic performance of the different zones of Nigeria. The Unified Tertiary Matriculation Education of 2016 produced the following number of applicants from the six zones:

South-East (five states) = 335,883;

South-West (six states) = 320,691;

South-South (six states) = (299,632);

North-Central (six states plus the FCT) = 259,846;

North-West (seven states) = 163,240;

North-East (six states) = 96,220.

The six states that produced the highest number of candidates were:

Imo – 104,383
Delta – 78,854
Anambra – 77,694
Osun – 72,752
Oyo – 72,298
Enugu – 69,381.
The six states that produced the least number of candidates were:

Adamawa – 15,615
Jigawa – 12,664
Yobe – 10,045
Sokoto – 10,006
Kebbi – 8,947
Zamfara – 5,295
The states that were given a minimum of 130 cut-off mark out of 200 in the 2013 examination into the Unity Schools were:

Anambra – Male (139) Female (139)

Imo – Male (138) Female (138)

Enugu – Male (134) Female (134)

Lagos – Male (133) Female (133)

Delta – Male (131) Female (131)

Ogun – Male (131) Female (131)

Abia – Male (130) Female (130)

For the same examination, the states that were given cut-off marks of less than 50 were:

Borno – Male (45) Female (45)

Jigawa – Male (44) Female (44)

Bauchi – Male (35) Female (35)

Kebbi – Male (9) Female (20)

Sokoto – Male (9) Female (13)

Taraba – Male (3) Female (11)

Yobe – Male (2) Female (27)

Zamfara – Male (4) Female (2)

 The six states that scored above 50 per cent in the 2015 West African Senior School Certificate of Education were: Abia (63.94%), Anambra (61.18%), Edo (61.05%), Rivers (55.69%), and Imo (52.49%). The states that scored below 13 percent in the same examination were Kebbi (12.08%), Katsina (10.81%), Gombe (7.41%), Jigawa (6.37%), Zamfara (6.23%), Yobe (4.37%).

These are verifiable results that have remained virtually the same for decades. And they give an idea of the number of candidates that are involved in education from each state and zone, as well as their academic performance.

The point of this essay is not that it is only the Igbo that excel in many sectors. Other ethnic groups, especially from the South, also excel. But the focus of this essay is the Igbo. From the attitude of other ethnic groups, it seems that they are comfortable with the status quo. If not, they should not be focusing on the Igbo as their problem.

The call for restructuring of the country has been promoted as the solution to Nigeria’s problem.  However, there are strong forces that are hell-bent on ensuring that the restructuring of the country will never succeed. They have been erroneously schooled that restructuring will impoverish them.

The danger in this hard line against restructuring is that if restructuring fails, the alternative may not be palatable. Nigeria has moved in a self-destructive path for long. Nigeria has been wallowing in retrogression for long because some stakeholders are afraid that pulling it out and setting it on the path of progress will cost them their feeding bottle. But nothing lasts forever.

Last week the leader of the Indigenous People of Biafra, Mazi Nnamdi Kanu, met his seemingly impossible bail conditions within 48 hours. When the bail conditions were made public, the belief of many was that no serving Senator of the Federal Republic of Nigeria would want to associate with him. But the South-East caucus of the Senate met and quickly chose one of them to stand bail for him. All other conditions were also swiftly met.

If those conditions were given in December 2015, no Nigerian Senator would have wanted to be associated with Kanu. Since his coming into office, Buhari has continued to display a type of croynism and prebendalism that has never been witnessed in Nigeria. And the worst beneficiaries of this are the Igbo. He has been making it clear by his words and actions that the North and the Igbo are not equal partners in the Nigerian project. He has been distributing Nigerian resources and appointments to his kinsmen and region as if they are his personal property. This brazen nepotism has made even the fiercest Igbo critics of Kanu’s call for secession to develop sympathies for Kanu.

Nigerians must decide what they want from the Igbo. It is either they want the Igbo in Nigeria as full citizens or they want them out as non-citizens. As the English say, Nigerians can’t have their cake
 and eat it!
http://punchng.com/nigeria-must-take-a-decision-on-the-igbo/

Between Ojukwu And Nnamdi Kanu

 Between Ojukwu And Nnamdi Kanu By Onyebuchi Ememanka 

On May 30, 1967, following a chain of events in Nigeria, and following weeks of serious consultations between Ojukwu who was the Military Governor of the then Eastern Region and a cross section of the people, Ojukwu made that historic announcement which proclaimed the sovereign state of Biafra. The day he made that proclamation, the hall at Enugu was filled to capacity. The finest brains from this part of the country were there. Leaders of thought, Traditional Rulers, soldiers, members of the academia, etc. In his opening speech that day, Ojukwu said… “YOU, THE PEOPLE OF EASTERN NIGERIA… After outlining several powerful preambles, he said… HAVING MANDATED ME TO PROCLAIM ON YOUR BEHALF AND IN YOUR NAME THE EASTERN NIGERIA TO BE A SOVEREIGN STATE, NOW THEREFORE, I LT. COL CHUKWUEMEKA ODUMEGWU OJUKWU, MILITARY GOVERNOR OF EASTERN NIGERIA, PURSUANT TO THE AUTHORITY AND ABOVE RECITALS DO HEREBY SOLEMNLY PROCLAIM…. 

Ojukwu was a wise man. He studied history at Oxford. He understood the psychology of the Igbos and our neighbors. He knew he couldn’t act alone. He knew he needed the support of the people. When that announcement was made, there was an explosion of joy across the entire Eastern Nigeria. Our finest brains were fully with him. Sir Louis Mbanefo, the first Igbo lawyer accepted to serve as Chief Justice of Biafra. Others like Achebe, Okigbo, etc were there. Ojukwu understood that Biafra wasn’t an Igbo thing. It was never. He brought in an Efik man as his Second in Command. His name was General Philip Effiong. The Secretary to the Government of Biafra was also Efik. It was an Eastern Nigerian agenda. Even a Yoruba officer, Tunji Banjo abandoned his own people and fought for Biafra. That is the power of ideas supported by popular acclaim. Our people were happy. We were enthusiastic. The people had spoken through their leader. In January 1970 when the war ended, Ojukwu had fled to the Ivory Coast. He handed over to Effiong.

When there was more sense continuing with the war, Effiong didn’t just make an announcement on his own. He consulted our people. Even in the heat of an excruciating war, Effiong never acted alone. In his last speech to the Biafran people, Effiong said… FELLOW COUNTRYMEN AND WOMEN, AS YOU ALL KNOW, I WAS ASKED TO BE THE OFFICER ADMINISTERING THIS REPUBLIC ON JANUARY 10,1970… I HAVE HAD EXTENSIVE CONSULTATIONS WITH THE LEADERS OF OUR COMMUNITIES BOTH MILITARY AND CIVIL, AND I AM NOW ENCOURAGED AND HASTEN TO MAKE THIS STATEMENT TO YOU…BY THE MANDATE OF THE ARMED FORCES AND THE PEOPLE OF THIS COUNTRY.  He spoke and spoke. Commending our people for the resilience during the war but stated that it was time to end it. He set up a committee to negotiate with the Nigerian government. That committee was to be led by Chief Justice Mbanefo, Prof Eni Njoku, Chief Bassey and Chief Aguma . Bassey was from Cross River and Aguma, from Rivers. He then set up a committee of eminent persons to ADVISE HIM on the issues that will arise. That committee had people from across the entire Eastern Nigeria, from the military and outside. There were Igbos, Efiks, Ijaws, etc. They were men of honor and substance. I have taken the pains to present this preamble so that our people can compare and contrast between the scenarios we had and what we have now. All we hear and see today are unilateral proclamations. No consultation with anybody. 

This young man simply wakes up and makes far reaching proclamations. In doing this, he is urged on mainly by a coterie of street urchins and a mob followership, most of whom were not born when we fought the first war. The latest in this madness is the proclamation that Igbos will not vote in the 2019 elections, starting with Anambra this November. He didn’t ask the people of Anambra what they wanted. He just woke up and made an order and expects that Igbos are zombies. We shall see. 

Education is very important. If this guy had the benefit a proper education, he would have known why indirect rule failed in Igboland but succeeded in other parts of the country. When indirect rule failed, the colonial leaders introduced the Warrant Chiefs who were Lords. The entire arrangement ended in a fiasco. Igbos are by their nature, republicans and act after detailed analysis and wide spread consultations. No one can order the Igbo people around according to his own whims and caprices. Even if what you ask of them is right, the mere fact that you woke up to say it without asking them will make them resist it. Igbos don’t have powerful kings and rulers. Igbos don’t by tradition prostrate before anybody. We act by a unity of purpose. Tell me one decent and notable Igboman who is with this guy in this his movement. Will he fight the war alone? What does he think secession is? A cartoon film? The original Biafra was not an Igbo thing entirely. While Igbos were in the majority, there were others too. Today, what we have is a purely designed Igbo agitation. This is not the Biafra that Ojukwu had in mind. The other people feel uncomfortable with it and have said no.

Finally, let me ask Kanu one question. If by his imperial order, Igbos refuse to vote in 2019, what of those Igbos who were elected in a state like Lagos? Two Igbos are in the House of Reps representing two constituencies in Lagos State. One Igbo guy is in the Lagos State House of Assembly. What becomes of them? Those that know him should tell him to go and sleep over this his thing. He is a young man and should ask questions and consult his people before coming out to speak. All through history, no single individual has spoken for the Igbos except the people ask him to, or he will be alone in the market place. 

Finally, I will advise Kanu to go and read ACHEBE’s books, THINGS FALL APART AND ARROW OF GOD. They were written by Chinua Achebe, one of the finest Igbo brains who took active part in the war. In those two books, the republican nature of the Igbo man were in full display. The emphasis we place on unity and consultation. All decisions must be collectively reached for it to have efficacy. In THINGS FALL APART, when Okonkwo got too powerful and decided to run a one man show, he ended up committing suicide and his body was buried by strangers in the evil forest. The people abandoned him. It didn’t matter that he was the most popular and most powerful man in the land who had brought them honor severally. Obierika, Okonkwo’s best friend who was a more deeper man said to the white man…THIS WAS THE GREATEST MAN IN UMUOFIA, YOU DROVE HIM TO KILL HIMSELF AND NOW, HE WILL BE BURIED LIKE A DOG. IN ARROW OF GOD, Ezeulu misunderstood that the allegiance the people gave to him was by virtue of his office as the Priest of Ulu, their deity. When he became too powerful and started toying with the people, the people arose against both him and the deity. The rest was history. Even while he reigned as Ezeulu, he was constantly questioned and harassed by some men like the rambunctious Nwaka. 
Please tell Nnamdi Kanu to cultivate the habit of reading. Ururuaja writes from Umule, with one hand and his snuff box in the other.”

Read more at: http://aledeh.com/between-ojukwu-and-nnamdi-kanu-by-onyebuchi-ememanka/

OPEN LETTER TO THE AREWA YOUTHS. By Charles Ogbu.

OPEN LETTER TO THE AREWA YOUTHS.
By Charles Ogbu.
Brethren from the North,
I bring you greetings from the Southern part of Nigeria.
On behalf of the peace-loving people of the south in general and millions of Igbo youths in particular, I start this letter by commending you for your recent open letter to the acting president, professor Yemi Osinbajo, where you called on the pastor-turned politician to organise a Referendum for the Igbos to enable them determine their future in line with international law on self determination.
By that letter, you proved to be better versed and more sophisticated in legal matters and ways of international laws with regards to the right of Indigenous People on Self Determination than the acting President who ironically is a law professor but who happen to think that quest for self determination is a crime simply because the fraudulent document known as the 1999 constitution imposed on us by military thugs did not recognise it.

Having said these, let me come to the main reason why I'm here. In your letter to the Ag. President, I noticed what I've been trying to figure out whether to classify as an innocent amnesia-induced oversight or a calculated attempt to re-write history on your part.
You cited the January 15th coup which you mischievously tagged Igbo coup and claimed was the Igbos manifestating their hatred for Nigeria. Quite frankly, when I read that part, I was left wondering whether to pause and die laughing or die crying.
You and your kind invented the word "hatred" and even went further to prove that indeed, it is not just a word. You started manifesting hatred for other Nigerians as far back as 1945 when your kind butchered hundreds of innocent southerners mostly Igbos in North central Nigerian city of Jos in an anti-Igbo pogrom, 15 years before Nigeria even got her independence from Britain. And of course, your Vampiric spirit would later rise again in search of more Igbo blood in 1953 when your people carried out another anti-Igbo pogrom in Kano which resulted in another hundreds of Igbo lives being wasted once again. This time, all you needed to start doing what you know how best to do was a minor legislative disagreement at the Lagos parliament where your lawmakers were booed for trying to delay a motion for Nigeria's independence by claiming the North wasn't yet ready for self rule.
Isn't it a classic definition of irony that a people who started doing exceptionally well in the business of killing and maiming their fellow Nigerians as far back as 1945 when Nigeria had not even dreamt of gaining independence would now open their mouth and accuse others of manifesting "hatred for Nigeria unity"? If you ever believed in the so called Nigeria's unity, why kill and maim your fellow Nigerians for the flimsiest of excuses??
Secondly, the January 1966 coup was not an Igbo coup. It was a coup carried out by mostly junior army officers led by Major Kaduna Chukwuma Nzeogwu and it had soldiers from Igbo, Yoruba, Hausa/fulani, Tiv, Esan, Ijaw, Urhobo, Bali etc on board. Hassan Usman Katsina, an hausa/fulani, who was later made military governor of Northern region, was Nzeogwu's right hand man and a major participant all through the period of the coup. Major Adewale Ademoyega, the author of "Why We Struck" was of the same rank as Nzeogwu. He was an active participant in the coup. There were major Ifeajuna, Lt. Fola Oyewole of "The Reluctant Rebel", Lt. Tijani Katsina and Saleh Dambo who were both hausa/fulani, there was Lt. Hope Harris Egheagha among other Igbos.
And that same coup was foiled by two brave Igbo men, Aguyi Ironsi in Lagos (West) and Ojukwu in Kano (North).
Now, assuming WITHOUT CONCEDING that the January 15th coup was organized and executed by only Igbo army officers, does it not still amount to conscientious idiocy for you guys to blame the whole Igbo nation for a coup carried out by few military men from the region?? How can anyone seek to justify the savagery visited on defenceless Igbo men, women and children residing in the North in the aftermath of that coup?? Did Nzeogwu who was from Delta state consult the indigens of the state before leading that coup?
How come we don't blame Dimka's coup on his ethnic group neither do we blame IBB and Buhari's coup on the whole hausa/Fulanis?

Let me quickly remind you that in the evening of the January 15th coup, a Boeing 707 belonging to the Nigerian Airways arrived Kano with almost the whole Northern establishment back from Lagos where they had gone to attend Commonwealth Prime Ministers' conference. Ojukwu, it was, who received them at the airport and even when orders from the coup plotters were to shot all Politicians, Ojukwu gifted them with protection. I don't suppose you would like this kind of history, seeing as it seem to contradict the adulterated version you were groomed with.
In the said letter, you correctly stated that Ojukwu refused to recognize Gowon but you mischievously failed to state that Ojukwu's refusal to recognise Gowon was in protest over the refusal of the hausa/fulani military officers who killed the head of state, Aguyi Ironsi, to allow Brigadier Ogundipe to take over as the next in rank according to military tradition.

Still in that same letter, you stated that Ojukwu declared Biafra but you conveniently failed to tell the public that Ojukwu didn't just wake up in the morning, smoke his Benson cigarette and rushed to declare Biafra. He (Ojukwu) did his best to de-escalate tension and even succeeded in reaching a landmark accord with Gowon in Aburi, Ghana, which if implemented, would have put an end to the Igbo genocide going on in the North and averted the moral tragedy that was the Biafra war. But, Gowon, unilaterally chose to defy the terms of this last minute Aburi Accord, leaving the Oxford product, Ojukwu, with no choice but to pull his people out of a country that was and still is, deaf, dumb and blind to the sanctity of the lives of the same people it exists mainly to protect.
Let me quickly say this not just to you, The Arewa Youths but to all Nigerians and foreigners alike:
This current Biafra agitation IS NOT a bait for Igbo presidency, Restructuring or appointments. Any Igbo man thinking it is should simply go for a DNA test to ascertain not just his paternity but his ancestry, too. My generation is simply sick and tired of sharing the same country with people who derive enormous pleasure from killing their fellow human beings over the flimsiest of excuses like the burning of the Koran in a far away Afghanistan, the shooting of a Palestinian boy by a murderous Israeli soldier in Gaza, the drawing of the cartoon of Prophet Muhammad in far away Denmark by a cartoonist who is neither Igbo nor Nigerian.

Igbo youths are not aggrieved with Nigeria solely because their parents were massacred in the Biafra war. We are aggrieved because almost 50 years after the war, the same people who killed our parents are still killing us even in our homes using fulani herdsmen, in our churches and cities using hausa/fulani soldiers who kill us and bath us with acid, and our places of business using almajiris who slaughter us and burn our shops with state-sponsored impunity for no just cause other than the insatiable urge to spill blood.
My fellow youths, we have lied to ourselves for far too long. How about a little honesty here? All these killings points to one thing which is that our world views are world apart. While you delight in resorting to violence as solution to almost every disagreement, we, the Igbos and indeed, all southerners have serious aversion to bloodshed. It is our belief that our God fight for us, not the other way round.

I love the concluding part of your letter where you rightly asserted that the Biafra agitation is not an issue over which a single drop of blood should be shed. We agree completely. We have all advanced beyond the primitive era of war. We are not asking for war. We are only asking for a YES or NO vote known as Referendum. Now, my dear brethren, add a little work to your faith by prevailing on your leaders who control every facet of the Nigerian govt to allow for a Plebiscite for the Igbos. After they have voted and the YES vote carries the day, you can then give Igbos living in your region whatever condition under which you want them to live.
Dishing out quit notice to Igbos residing in your region when they are yet to be officially granted their referendum and Biafra is only tantamount to putting the cart before the horse. Until the Igbos officially get their Biafra, they remain Nigerians with all the right and privileges of Nigerian citizens including the right of living and doing business anywhere in Nigeria.

Lastly, let me conclude by reminding you that even in the event of a successful referendum for Biafra, all property legally acquired by the Igbos anywhere in Nigeria remain theirs and are protected by international law. Nigerians did not loose their property in Britain when the latter granted her independence in 1960, did they?? The world has progressed considerably. I would remind you that the 'abandoned property' era is over but I'm sure you know that, don't you??
Instead of killing ourselves and creating IDPs everywhere, let us peacefully do "To Your Tent, Oh, Israel!". That way, we will still do things together but as good neighbours under a mutually agreed terms.
Love From A Biafran,
Charles Ogbu
(culled from facebook)
https://www.facebook.com/groups/radiobiafralondon/permalink/1492714134176351/

THE BIAFRAN LOYALTY

When you see Biafrans disparaging the struggle, please send them this article

THE BIAFRAN LOYALTY

By M.M. Mbanaja

You don't need to wait till you are hit by my case before you identify positively with your root. I was born in Ebute Meta area of Lagos before the war, I started my schooling and life in Lagos and as soon as the war broke out, we were bundled back to the east, then I was about ten years old.

My parents feel very much at home in Lagos and were loved so much by the Yaba/Ebute Meta community that as we came back to Lagos by 1970 to start life afresh after the civil war, my father's hotel, then at Alagomeji, Yaba called New Nigerian hotel was protected and managed by my father's Yoruba friends. This made us fall in love with the Yorubas and as I was going through my education I mingled with my Yoruba friends as if I was a Yoruba myself since I write and speak the Yoruba language fluently. I was a perceived stakeholder or what we used to call omo oluwabi, son of the soil. At this time I joined my Yoruba friends to make a caricature of Ndigbo whom we referred to as" aje okwute ma mu omi", Igbo man that eats stone without drinking water.

With that confidence, on my return from Europe, I joined politics in my area of residence at Okota and was a state officer of CNC and later contested and won an election as the councilor of ward F3, Okota, under the Babangida's zero party. At the end of the celebration, the SS officers came to my house with a letter informing me that I cannot be sworn in as the councillor for security reasons, before I knew what was going on, I was bundled to Shangisha the SS office where I was detained till after a Yoruba shoe maker, Taiwo living in my street was sworn in as the councillor instead of myself, the winner.

Before the arrival of my lawyer and notable Igbo leaders from Okota, to my rescue with copies of my earlier security clearance at the same office , Alhaji Sabiu Okolanwo who is the current population commissioner of Lagos state and my supposed political mentor came in with chief Wilson, now late to appeal to me to accept the illegal verdict in good faith because the family took the decision and that there is no way the Ejigbo family can allow a non-indigene to rule them in their soil and that there is a compensational position awaiting for me as a board member of NTA, then with head office at V.I., Lagos. Engr. Maduka was the then DG and a brother Charles Nwachukwu was his secretary.

It was Chief Dapo Saromi, the then minister of communication that gave me a letter to be appointed as a board member. But, overnight, the same group that gave me the appointment over turned it via phone calls saying that if I take that position, what will their people say hence I was referred to my state for any appointment. From there, I became a born again Igboman. It donned on me that no amount of force or Yoruba I speak can make me a Yoruba man and, north, south, east and west, no place like home. Since then, I never looked back in tracing my root and saying nice things about the only people I have, the Igboman.

This is why, whenever I hear an Igbo man criticizing an Igboman, or the burden of self-imposed marginalization by an Igboman to Igboman, I feel very sad, I see it as total ignorance and total submission to our foes.

The most common comment you often hear is this: “Biafra (permit me to use Biafra in this contest because it represents the only unity of Ndigbo) will be nice but you know our people, they can’t govern themselves; they are always arguing among themselves and love money more than themselves.” Horrible! This is what Nigeria has done to the Igbo and indeed other Easterners. Nigeria has made the Igbo lose faith, and trust in themselves, their relatives, community and Igbo land itself. Nigeria has made the Igbo lose faith in their talent, ingenuity, creativity, competence and abilities. It is shocking, but it is true. Fear and doubt are now our bedfellows and our greatest enemies. Our people have been programmed to believe that they cannot govern themselves successfully and effectively; in fact that they cannot live together peacefully. Our people have been programmed to hate themselves, their children, their extended families and their communities. This poison has been fed not only to the Igbo but also to other ethnic groups in the Eastern Region. In many of our communities, especially in Cross River State people are torturing, and killing their children, calling them witches. False prophets are making money branding innocent children witches and programming parents to believe that these children are responsible for their poverty, hardships, and illnesses. Thousands and thousands of Igbo people troop to Lagos and Ogun State to hand over millions of hard earned dollars given to them by their relatives to charlatans and con men who claim to be prophets and evangelists. The con men then “prophesy” to them that it is members of their families and their best friends who as witches are the cause of their poverty, joblessness, suffering, failure to have a husband, failure to have a baby, illness and other misfortune. Then they go back home and literally set their families ablaze. We have become a society that is cannibalizing itself. The elders are selling our youth up North for money. The youths are kidnapping the elders and demanding huge ransom money. This is the tragedy that has befallen Igbo society. It breaks my heart to watch magnificent Igbo Nation become degenerate in just one generation. Nigeria has almost destroyed the Igbo and her sister Nations in Eastern Region.

Our people have lost contact with the reality of their history as they are continually fed garbage by Nigeria. In 1965 and just before the first coup, there were four regional governments and the federal government of Nigeria. Of these five governments, the government of the Eastern Region was the most stable, politically and fiscally. The next was the government of Midwestern Region. Don’t take my word, check the records for yourself. Who said that our people cannot govern themselves? Ask your elders about Igbo Union and Ibibio Union Organizations dispersed all over West Africa. These Unions organized our people wherever they lived all over Africa, channeled resources home and became one of the engines of development throughout the Eastern Region. Most of our political leaders Michael Okpara, Akanu Ibiam, Mbonu Ojike, E.O. Eyo, Dennis Osadebay, H.U. Akpabio, Eyo Ita, Jaja Wachuku, Alvan Ikoku, Nwafor Orizu, M. C. K. Ajuluchukwu, Nyong Essien, Margaret Ekpo, Oyibo Odinammadu, Mokwugo Okoye and so many others were men and women of vision and transparent honesty who transformed Eastern Region into an enviable model of political stability and economic empowerment.

It is, therefore, time for Ndigbo to stop digging their own graves through self-condemnation and unwarranted criticisms that have served only the purpose of our foes.

It is my view that unless all Igbo, Efik, Ibibio and Anang tribes see BIAFRA as their avatar through an unalloyed loyalty using the old Eastern Nigeria unity that gave Biafra the leadership, courage and vision to withstand the barrage of land, air and sea attack on the heavily armed federal Nigerian troops, Russian MIG fighters British and European support for 30 gruesome months, our people will continue to play the second fiddle under her foe, Nigeria.

The most salient political wisdom today is for our political class, organized labor, students union, market women, captains of industry, the intellectuals, the clergy and the pro-Biafran groups to understand that everything positive demand we want from Nigeria is inside closing ranks, uniting and showing loyalty to well organized non-violent Biafran struggle. There is a full package inside a united Biafran struggle and that includes Igbo presidency, political, infrastructural and economic development of the Eastern region, Biafra in and outside Nigeria and above all, the pride and love of a nation in unity as partners in progress

This clarion call for healing, peace and reconciliation amongst Ndigbo through a common front, Biafra, is more germane today than ever before where our ancestors will invoke the spirit of 'onye aghala nwanne ya' which is an Igbo philosophical thrust of our 'Igbo bu ike' that made Ndigbo an inseparable bunch in the Igbo Union days before the civil war of survival.

IF NIGERIA is a Baby in my WOMB, I will ABORT it,

BIAFRA Girl Spit Fire: IF NIGERIA is a Baby in my WOMB, I will ABORT it, If is LIFE, I choose DEATH

Why it is better to Free Biafra- Obasanjo writes to share his views Admin June 1, 20

Obasanjo writes to share his views Admin  June 1, 20

The whole world is now watching and listening closely to know the important plea for independence which is coming out of Western Africa. Nigeria has a population of roughly 180 million people with a balanced religious mix of roughly 49.3% Christian and 48.8% Muslim. We know most of the Christians live in southern Nigeria, a land previously controlled for over thousands of years by a people living in a land known as Biafra. Biafrans were a proud people. They were mostly Christian and a bastion of free-enterprise in Western Africa. With the formation of Nigeria in the breakup of Great Britain’s empire, Biafra lost its independence when it was unilaterally combined with the Muslim dominated north.

Today, the drive for a Muslim caliphate in Africa remains focused on three primary African states, South Africa, Kenya and Nigeria, where large populations of Christians remain. The all-out effort to destabilize the Christian power base has been carried out by Al-Shabaab in Kenya and Boko Haram and Fulani herdsmen in Nigeria.

Boko Haram, an extremist Sunni Islamic fundamentalist sect strongly influenced by the Wahhabi movement, is committed to establish Nigeria as an Islamic State under Sharia Law. Their impact is strongest in the North. Seeking more grazing land for their herds, Fulani militants, linked to Boko Haram, have killed at least 20,000 people since 2009. The Fulani herdsmen have been moving south to areas dominated by Christians and non-religious farmers. They are well armed, and their coordinated attacks are increasing.

The atrocities against moderate Muslims and Christians are well documented but not widely covered in the Western press. Recently, angry Muslims youths in Kano decapitated a woman plastics trader alleging that she blasphemed the Prophet Muhammad. When the shop owner refused to allow a young man to wash his legs for the usual Muslim’s prayers in her shop because other customers were there, the young man shouted Allahu Akbar and lied to his friends that the owner had blasphemed. They dragged her away, beheaded her carried her head through the market and town center.

Many feel that now is the time for Biafra independence. The Biafran “George Washington,” Nnamdi Kanu, is out from jail from trumped up charges. Judges have refused to officially charge him. But fearing his leadership, Nigerian President Muhammadu Buhari has decided to free him instead to know the fate of Biafrans. His long sustained incarceration has just fueled the flames for independence. The number of supporters of freedom for Biafra has quadrupled since Kanu’s imprisonment.  

Recently, Niger Delta Avengers blew up vital Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation oil pipelines. A new militant group, Red Egbesu Water Lions, has joined them in demanding that Nnamdi Kanu be released. Unless the Buhari government releases Kanu and moves toward a referendum on independence for Biafra, militants promise to shut down oil and gas production in the region.

In the past, Shell and British Petroleum have formed lucrative agreements with the Northern Muslim politicians to control 80% of the Nigerian oil, primarily from wells in the south. Not only are resources from Biafra being sold and profits diverted, the lack of environmental controls have resulted in pollution—hurting farming and fishing in the south.

Freedom isn’t free, but nowhere in Africa is freedom more important than in Biafra. But what are the Western powers doing? Unfortunately, very little. Britain has called for the release of Nnamdi Kanu but said little about the freedom referendum he supports. While covering the atrocities of Boko Haram in the North, there is little or no coverage of the Islamic terrorists brutalizing the Biafran Christians in the South.

This is about more than stopping Islamic extremism in Nigeria. Supporting the freedom of Biafra establishes a beachhead for Christian capitalism in Africa that puts a stop to a vision of a united Muslim caliphate in all of Africa.

America received support from France in breaking free of England. It’s time for the UN and Western powers to do their part to free the people of Biafra while independence is still possible without expanded bloodshed.

Chief Olushegun Obasanjo

http://dailyinfong.com/article-why-it-is-better-to-free-biafra-obasanjo-writes-to-share-his-views/