Nnamdi Kanu founded the Indigenous People of Biafra, IPOB in 2012 off the back of his massively popular Radio Biafra which he started in 2012. The years 2012 to 2015 were quiet as the government of Jonathan largely ignored the group.
Then Maj. Gen. Buhari (retd) became president, IPOB faced a different approach. The government took them seriously and violent clashes after another saw the federal government declare IPOB as a terrorist group (a declaration that the US, the EU, and the UK refused to endorse).
Watching IPOB revolved as a group and following the utterances of their leader Nnamdi Kanu without sentiment, you would struggle to like them. In fact, the group is set up to attract animosity and feed off the hatred the authorities, outsiders, and wary insiders nurse towards them.
Is this tactic sustainable? Only time would tell.
In the meantime, hate IPOB if you may, but for the sake of objectivity, you owe IPOB (no, yourself) one question, what do they really want? This question is hard to answer and can be the stuff of dissertations. It is easier to answer questions about the historical wrong that has been done to their people for which we urge you to ask five questions aloud and try to answer them before you condemn IPOB.
Questions to ask before you condemn IPOB
Has anyone been punished for the war crimes committed against the Igbos
After the counter-coup of 1966, led by the north against the Military Government of Ironsi, there were organized massacres of the Igbos in many parts of the country, most especially the north. Tens of thousands of Igbos were butchered and in a handful of cases, severed heads of Igbos were sent home via trains.
The government of Gowon in the centre didn’t do anything to protect Igbos and anyone who looks like Igbos outside of the eastern region. Even if these killings can be pushed aside, the Nigerian way, as mob actions, it is hard to push aside the crimes of rape, destructions, massacres, and starvation perpetrated by the Nigerian military and civilian governments.
The one in Asaba led by a certain Murtala Muhammed who later became head of state stands out. He gathered every man in the town to sing the national anthem in a show of allegiance to the federal government. But everyone was gunned down in cold blood.
Read the “Terrorists” of IPOB by FFK
Murtala Murtala is the face of the 20 naira note. He is a national hero. More than this, he is the symbol of how war criminals were elevated to high offices and hero status for killing Igbos.
Has the Federal Government officially apologized for the atrocities it committed in the East during the war?
After the war in January 1970, Gowon made the (in)famous quote of “No victor, no vanquished”. He launched the three Rs of Reconstruction, rehabilitation, and reconciliation which did little to rebuild Igboland, rehabilitated Igbo morales and businesses, or reconcile Igbos with the rest of the country.
When Gowon was removed from power in 1975, the government of Murtala/Obasanjo abandoned all pretext about reconstructing, rehabilitating, and reconciling any place, anything, or anyone.
Instead, they created 7 more states and only gave the Igbo speaking people two states of Anambra and Imo but gave the Yorubas who are more or less the same population as the Igbos four states of Oyo, Ogun, Ondo, and Lagos states which is the origin of the Igbos having the fewest states among geopolitical regions.
The governments that followed, those of Shehu Shagari, Buhari/Idaigbon, Babangida, Abacha, Obasanjo, Yar’adua/Jonathan, and the second coming of Buhari have treated the Biafran issue as a taboo that must be kept out of any official mention in order not to invoke old demons or whatever the reason.
In fact, the authorities removed history from school curricula. They have something to hide. Beyond hiding stuff, some administration made policies that told the Igbos “You lost the war, so continue shrink and be grateful for the crumbs you get off the common table.”
Have Igbos been paid reparations for their huge properties looted, vandalized, and seized before, during, and after the war?
As of 2019, undetonated bombs from the Civil War are still been unearthed from villages in the East. This is a reminder that the war is over but not really over. War is physical and also psychological, sociological, cultural, and political.
The Igbos may have a respite from fighter jets, tanks, and machine guns, but the psychological and political blasts have continued to reverberate.
The Igbos have been left to fend for themselves with the 20-pound token given in exchange for the millions they lost in the war.
What would have happened if Biafra won the Civil War?
The Igbos managed to lift themselves off poverty and through hard work, perseverance, and their apprenticeship system, risen geometrically on the economic ladder where the economy, sometimes, grew arithmetically, and sometimes, regressed.
The economic prosperity of Ndigbo is not the payment for what was stolen from them because the government cannot point at one policy that they enacted that specifically targetted the Igbos for advancement. Everything the Igbos have they hustled.
To help you understand this point, Boko Haram-harassed North East has not suffered up to one-tenth of what Igbos went through during the war but there is a North East Development Commission today.
Have the Igbos fully been accepted into the Nigerian system?
When it comes to sports and entertainment, the Igbos are part of the Nigerian system. But politically, not so much. Anti-Igbo sentiments have remained since the end of the Civil War and began to sharply increase when Jonathan was president and when IPOB and separatist sentiments began to beat drums.
In many cases, the Hausa-Fulani have hidden under the pretext of religion to kill Igbos and destroy their businesses. No one has ever gone to jail for killing Igbos and looting their belongings in the north. It now looks like it is acceptable to kill Igbos.
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Politically, there are offices that are no-go areas for Igbos. Nine years after the war, an Igbo was the speaker and vice president. Then 16 years of military governments put Igbos where they belong as errand boys and foot soldiers of maladministrations.
With the return of civil rule, the Igbos were thrown the senate presidency. Eight years later, they had to settle for a mere deputy senate presidency. When Buhari became president, there was no more pretence about where the Igbos should be – the backbench.
They didn’t vote for Buhari and they had no cause to; where a wise president would try to win them over, Buhari has only rod, demotion of and bypassing qualified Igbos for appointments, negligence of Igboland, and Python Dance for the Southeast.
Has Buhari been fair to Ndigbo?
There is no analysis for this one. The answer is obvious. Or should be.
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