Nigeria: Averse to Facts
Nigeria is a place where facts mean nothing. Regarding Professor Achebe's not-as-yet-released book, “There Was A Country”, pre-release excerpts have caused an already rumbling active volcano re-cocking for eruption to explode prematurely. At the center? Chief Awolowo's role in Nigeria's genocidal war against the Igbo / Biafra during the Nigeria-Biafra War. What are the facts?
Here is an authoritative link to a report of an interview conducted with Chief Awolowo where, in his own words, he stated what he did during the war. And, why he did it. It appears in “Punch” of October 8 2012:
http://www.punchng.com/news/for-the-record/my-role-in-the-civil-war-awolowo/
After reading through this Punch article, it will do everyone a good service if somebody was to step up and say, “this report is a forgery”; “this interview never happened;” “the publication is a fraud”—or something to that effect. That will probably not happen, because the supporters and defenders of Chief Awolowo are using or republishing the same document and variations thereof in their unprecedented lash-out at Professor Achebe for writing that Chief Awolowo was the architect of Nigeria's starvation policy against Igbo-Biafra during the war, and that Chief Awolowo provided intellectual backing for the Nigerian military government of that time. Well, what facts boil out of this document relevant to these specific assertions?
1. Twenty Pounds Policy:
In the matter of the “twenty pounds” policy, whose effect was to cheat the Igbo, post-war, out of their pre-war savings in Nigeria's banks, Chief Awolowo says that it was he who laid down the principle; he says that although he was not part of the panel raised to work out and decide the specifics, he did approve the panel's recommendations. Yes, of course, he gave his reasons.
2. Starvation Policy:
In the matter of the starvation policy, whose mantra was that starvation is a legitimate weapon of war, in defense of Nigeria's genocidal blockade of Igbo / Biafraland, resulting in some of the horrific experiences Chief Awolowo says he witnessed himself when he encountered Kwashiorkor victims in Biafraland / Igboland, Chief Awolowo also says that he masterminded and carried out the policy. He also gives his reason.
Question: Is it a fact that Chief Awolowo was the architect of Nigeria's starvation policy against the Igbo / Biafra during that war?
Answer: Yes. Chief Awolowo himself says so.
3. Reasons for the Starvation (and other anti-Igbo / Biafra) policies:
In the matter of the source of the reasons and rationalization for these policies, their articulations and principles; their sustenance and enforcement, and the approvals necessary to carry out and sustain these policies, Chief Awolowo says that he is the one responsible and he shows off the lucidity of his thinking in these policies. He gives at least one example of how this worked in the section about the Nigeria Currency Change policy. He leaves no doubt as to whose reasoning subtends these policies.
Question: Is it a fact that Chief Awolowo provided intellectual backing for the Nigerian military government waging a war of aggression against Igbo / Biafra?
Answer: Yes. Chief Awolowo himself explained how that worked.
Chief Awolowo, without equivocation, in his own words, says he did these things. These are the facts. Why would anyone be arguing about whether he did it or not? He says he did! What should, however, generate controversy and fierce challenge are the reasons he gave for his deadly policies and for his role in Nigeria's military government / war cabinet. With a certain coolness and lucidity, Chief Awolowo rationalizes his acts; with similar calculated coldness and single-mindedness, even a hint of pride in his work, Chief Awolowo affirms that he is indeed the architect of these policies.
As such, all those lambasting Professor Achebe need to re-examine their motive. It is not mere assertion that Chief Awolowo was the architect of the Starvation Policy; it is a fact issuing from Chief Awolowo's own mouth. It is not mere conjecture that Chief Awolowo lent intellectual legitimacy to the Nigerian military government aggressing against Biafra; Chief Awolowo himself affirms it in talking about his policies and gives us examples how, making it a fact.
The real victims of Chief Awolowo's policies do, and should, have a right to question his rationalization, and to advance their own reasons why a person (who says he sees himself as a friend of the Igbo and who says that the Igbo are his friends) can so deliberately and so thoroughly hurt his victims and be so proud of doing so. Why shouldn't an Igbo, a Biafran, and a victim himself like Professor Achebe challenge Chief Awolowo?
Chief Awolowo at least deserves credit for admitting to what he did (thereby shaming all those who would today deny that, ostensibly to protect him). No one can say the same for the other Nigerians (and their international friends) who prosecuted the genocidal war against Biafra, including, but especially, Gowon. They are in denial, or pretend to not know what they did.
Which brings up the context of this horrible drama... Nigeria is a place where facts mean exactly nothing. It is only in Nigeria that people are numb, or pretend to be insensitive to obvious grievous wrongs perpetrated against others and against humanity. It is only Nigerians that refuse to accept the fact that ethnic cleansing is genocide—good luck! if you expect that they would acknowledge and accept the fact of the occurrence of ethnic cleansing itself at all. It is only Nigerians that refuse to acknowledge that completely blockading a race of people for the purpose of maliciously and deliberately starving them to submission and death is genocide, a crime against God and against humanity. Check out Chief Awolowo's rationalization for his life-sapping starvation policy directed against the Igbo and Biafra—after he actually saw Kwashiorkor-ridden Igbo and Biafran children? Did you actually, really, really read and understand it? Yes, he was so moved, he tells us, by that ungodly, inhumane and haunting sight—a parent with children of his own—that he decided that the best course of action was to go for total starvation, and by his own words and in his own calculations, many more of such Igbo / Biafran children would die so horribly, “but the [most important thing to him was that Biafran] soldiers will suffer the most.” Go back and re-read Chief Awolowo, “in his own words”.
Of course, not every single Nigerian is completely desensitized to pricks of conscience. Chief Enahoro was one of Chief Awolowo's disciples during the war, travelling the world over to sell Chief Awolowo's Nigeria's starve-Biafra-to-death policy; he, Chief Enahoro, must have at one time shared the same rationalization with his mentor. But, one day, well after the war, Chief Enahoro officially apologized to the Igbo for his role in propagating such a genocidal policy, at last, showing remorse. That's a human being for you! And even now, here and there, above the din of sheeple falling over themselves to defend the indefensible are a few cases of Nigerian commentators breaking ranks to essentially state that Chief Awolowo's Starvation of the Igbo / Biafrans policy was wrong, is Genocide, and that an apology is the correct response at this time. Amen!
In the final analysis, it all comes down to what is wrong with Nigeria, and why Nigeria can never rise from its comatose position but must in fact eventually dissolve. As we speak, forceful defenders of Chief Awolowo proffer the document above as proof that Chief Awolowo's war legacy makes him a hero to Nigeria and a benevolent to the Igbo and Biafrans; a functionary whose war actions must not be challenged. After all, in Chief Awolowo's mind, by this document and his account, he was a friend of the Igbo who executed a “quick kill” of the Igbo using his starvation policy in the Biafra war, thereby sparing the Igbo an agonizing death, so as to deserve being hailed “the savior of the Igbo”? And, at the same time, the Igbo / Biafrans, on their part, are not expected to or supposed to protest, else, all Hell will be brought down on them—again. This is friendship?! How can such completely antagonist, mutually exclusive collective views exist in a relationship called one country, if not by force and by cynical pretense? Such a feat defies even Schizophrenia.
What is happening in response to Professor Achebe's new book here is only a variation and just one instance of what is common all over Nigeria: different cultures with starkly different senses of what is wrong and what is right, what is acceptable and what is not, what is a good relationship or what is not, what is fair or what is not; different value-systems, different world views, and for that matter, different concepts of what the other's human life is worth—if at all another's life is worth anything to some cultures. In short, these cultures do not agree and will never agree on what is humanity and what constitutes a human being. These cultures are constantly grinding on one another and pounding one another with their respective alien pestles, in a hideous mortar called one-Nigeria, now completely devoid of goodwill, the more aggressive the culture, the more successful and domineering they are at it. These cultures have no business being thrown and forced together as one country.
Professor Achebe's book is not quite in public circulation yet. The excerpt about Chief Awolowo contains facts which Chief Awolowo himself established as facts in the areas noted above. The typical Nigerian tradition of fighting against obvious facts is heating up the polity at this time, when moral humanity demands a recognition of hideous wrong done and a healing apology be tendered to Humanity. Chief Enahoro did just that. Yet, all this will add nothing if Professor Achebe's conclusion in his book is that Nigeria should remain one, as he has been wont to state in the past. Facts—yes, facts—do not support one-Nigeria. The root of all evil and wickedness in Nigeria is one-Nigeria. The ultimate source and enabling medium of genocide and ethnic cleansing in Nigeria is one-Nigeria. The destroyer of the peoples living in Nigeria and the squanderer of their resources is one-Nigeria. There is a sense that in fact, “There Was A Country” is not the epitaph for Biafra that Professor Achebe implies in the title of his new book. “there was a country” is most apt as a description of Nigeria: a system which so thoroughly corrupts and wastes the peoples and their aspirations should not be allowed to exist. It will not.
Oguchi Nkwocha, MD
Nwa Biafra
A Biafran Citizen
[email protected]