By Tochukwu Ezukanma<\/p>\n
A female preacher on \u201cMorning Cry\u201d was killed by an unknown
\nassailant in Abuja. The murdered early morning preacher was a Yoruba,
\nand most likely, her assailant is a northern Moslem. Interestingly, in
\nall the hoopla spawned by the murder of this devout Christian lady by an
\nobvious fanatical northern Nigerian Moslem, nobody brought up the issue
\nof tribe. It was considered a crime motivated by religious bigotry.<\/p>\n
In 2003, Mohammadu Buhari ran for the presidency, and lost. He went to
\ncourt to contest his defeat. He was ridiculed by the court process. In
\n2007, he ran again for the same office, and again, lost. Supported by
\nthe leadership of his political party, All Nigerian Peoples Party
\n(ANPP), he went to court to challenge the presidential election results.
\nDisappointingly, as he contested his electoral defeat in court, the
\nchairman of the party, Ume Ezeoke, and the party leadership that
\nencouraged his going to court, pulled the rug from under his feet; and
\njoined the People Democratic Party (PDP) dominated government of
\nnational unity of President Musa Yar\u2019Adua.<\/p>\n
Buhari left the ANPP, formed a new political party, Congress for
\nProgressive Change (CPC), and then, again, ran for the presidency; and,
\nfor the third time, lost. Devastated by his third electoral defeat, he
\nlost his cool, and literally wept in public. Instructively, throughout
\nhis electoral defeats, travails and betrayals, and grief and tears, he
\nnever insinuated that he was being hated and victimized because of his
\ntribe. It was all about the struggle for power, and not about any
\ntribal-inspired conspiracy against his ever being a president.<\/p>\n
Had the female preacher, killed in Abuja, been Igbo, the Igbo would have
\nseen it strictly through our paranoiac prism, misconstrued the crime and
\ntouted her death as another evidence of the widespread hatred for the
\nIgbo in Nigeria, and a powerful testament to the lingering vestiges of
\nan earlier conspiracy by the rest of Nigerians to exterminate the Igbo.
\nHad Buhari been Igbo, the Igbo would have believed that his repeated
\nfailure to win the presidential election, and his party\u2019s betrayal of
\nhis trust following the 2007 presidential election were palpable
\nconfirmations of a sordid conspiracy against an Igbo ever being the
\npresident of Nigeria.<\/p>\n
In Zaria, the Shiite Moslems, on a religious procession, temporarily
\nrefused the passage of the Army Chief of Staff\u2019s motorcade through
\ntheir neighborhood. Piqued by the inconvenience and attendant insult,
\nthe Nigerian army killed about one thousand Shiite Moslems and burnt
\ndown many of their houses. In Odi, in retaliation to the killing of
\ntwelve policemen, the Nigerian army killed about three hundred persons,
\nand literally, razed the whole village. Those retaliatory attacks were
\nbarbaric, ghoulish, and horrifyingly, reminiscent of Nazi reprisal
\nkillings in Axis-occupied Europe. The people of Zaria are Hausa\/Fulani
\nand the people of Odi are Ijaws. The killings were heavy-handed and
\natrocious, but instructively, indifferent to tribe.<\/p>\n
Therefore, as the army struck at members of the Indigenous People of
\nBiafra (IPOB) at Emene and Oyigbo, it was not in implacable hate for the
\nIgbo and desire to wipe out the Igbo race, but in reprisal to
\nprovocations. But, with our perception of every issue blurred by the
\nfeeling that we are universally hatred in Nigeria, and invariably,
\nencircled by enemies hell-bent on our destruction, many Igbo believe
\nthat the killings at Emene and Oyigbo by the Nigerian army were not mere
\nreprisal attacks, as in Zaria and Odi, but murderous vents to
\ndeep-rooted hatred for Ndigbo, and deliberate, methodical steps in
\nimplementing an extant plan to exterminate the Igbo.<\/p>\n
To safeguard the peace of our communities and lives of our youths, we
\nmust discourage\u00a0 the provocation of the army and other security agents
\nin Igbo land. This can be done by prevailing on the IPOB leader, Nnamdi
\nKanu, to stop deceiving Igbo youths and egging them on to their earlier
\ndeaths. Paradoxically, many Igbo consider Nnamdi Kanu \u2013 that vulgar
\nparvenu that lies inexhaustibly – a Messiah; and believe that his
\nreckless and irresponsible utterances that incite Igbo youths to stone
\nhis political opponents to death and attack law enforcements agents are
\nnot hateful and unlawful, but actually, peaceful and perceptive. To
\nthem, to overpower and abduct State Secret Service (SSS) officers in
\nEmene, and kill three policemen and six soldiers in Oyigbo by members of
\nIPOB were not condemnable and comeuppance, but\u00a0 justifiable and
\nlaudable.<\/p>\n
In our self-deceit, we want to believe that we have done no wrong and
\noffended no one, but have been innocent victims of the evil machinations
\nof a country that is marginalizing, enslaving and exterminating them. We
\ndelight in lying to ourselves because we remain emotionally yoked to the
\nfalsehood of the Biafran propaganda. Biafra was founded on falsehood,
\nand the lies of the Biafran propaganda are deeply embedded in our minds;
\nthey retain a mesmeric grip on our psyche. They pander to our self-pity
\nand blame game, and provide us scapegoats for our repeated political
\nblunders. They justify our paranoia: fear and suspicion of other
\nNigerians; anger and bitterness against Nigeria; and agitation for
\nBiafra. Although Biafranism is the most dangerous idea that ever made an
\ninroad into the Igbo mind, and has visited us with our worst nightmares
\nand greatest calamities, we continue to cling to it.<\/p>\n
But then, the masses can barely think, and consequently, are susceptible
\nto political manipulation. According to the ancient Greek philosopher,
\nProtagoras, \u201cthe people have no understanding, and only believe what
\ntheir leaders are pleased to tell them\u201d. It is the people\u2019s
\ninability to think, lack of understanding and muddled credulity that
\nexplain why the Igbo did not hold Ojukwu accountable for his suicide
\nmission, Biafra, and its decimation of Ndigbo. It killed hundreds of
\nthousands in the glory of our youth and starved more than one million
\nhapless civilians to death. It is for the same reasons that we consider
\nOjukwu a hero, when, in essence, he was a despicable perfidious
\nopportunist that led his people into trouble, abandon them and ran away;
\nand believed that the struggle for his \u201cself-determination\u201d was
\nworth nearly two million Igbo lives but not his own life.<\/p>\n
It is also the same inherent limitations of the people that make it
\nimpossible for many Igbo to see Nnamdi Kanu for what he really is and
\nthe danger his neo-Biafranism portends for Ndigbo. Nnamdi Kanu is a
\ncon-artist building his financial empire at the detriment of the Igbo,
\nand his Biafran lunacy may spell the doom of the Igbo in Nigeria.<\/p>\n
Tochukwu Ezukanma writes from Lagos, Nigeria.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
By Tochukwu Ezukanma A female preacher on \u201cMorning Cry\u201d was killed by an unknown assailant in Abuja. The murdered early morning preacher was a Yoruba, and most likely, her assailant…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":63031,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_lmt_disableupdate":"","_lmt_disable":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[7,1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-77185","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-articles-opinions","category-uncategorized"],"yoast_head":"\n