NWODO AND THE FUTURE OF NDI IGBO (1)
The Igbo will fulfil their destiny in Nigeria, writes I. B. O (IBO) MEANT SOMETHING GREAT. “I” STOOD FOR INDUSTRY AND INGENUITY; “B” MEANS BOLDNESS AND “O” STOOD FOR OBEDIENCE
The inaugural speech of Chief John Nnia Nwodo, the new chair of Ohaneze Ndi Igbo, the apex pan-Igbo socio-cultural organisation, has been making the rounds. It is a must read. It inspires. It speaks truth to power. In an age in which many Igbo intelligentsia and politicians have cowardly refrained from calling things by their names in public ostensibly for fear of losing some political “favours”, John Nwodo’s speech is an invitation to courageously show firmness in subscribing to the principles of democracy - equality, social justice and non-discrimination on grounds of place of origin, religion and ethnic affiliation - as enshrined in our 1999 Constitution.
Nwodo’s speech depicts him as a man highly uncompromising with the truth. One truth which the Nwodo-led Ohaneze Ndi Igbo must hurriedly restate is that the Igbos are still capable of fulfiling their destiny in Nigeria. Speaking about the Igbos during the days of his pioneer missionary work in Igboland, Bishop Joseph Shanaham, said: “You can search the whole world and find no people more charming than Ibos”. To Shanaham, the letter I. B. O (IBO) meant something great. “I” stood for industry and ingenuity; “B” means boldness and “O” stood for obedience. But unfortunately the qualities and place of an Igbo man are irresponsibly being denied in the strange Nigerian stereotypes. For instance, one of the strange stereotypes is that Igbos do not go to school. Another stereotype is that despite their resourcefulness the Igbos are incapable of forging a unity to properly clinch what belongs to them in Nigeria. For example, writing in The Guardian Newspaper of last Sunday under the title “The Ambivalence of Ndigbo,” Dan Agbese alluded that Igbos are a confused lot who seem not to know what they want in Nigeria. Instead of seeking alibi in Igbo marginalisation, Ndigbo should strive to grab the presidential power which they think they deserve as nobody would deliver it to them on a platter of gold. He quotes the late Ojo Maduekwe as once saying that the demand for Igbo President was “idiotic”. Agbese also quotes Rocha Okorocha who, in reaction to Olusegun Obasanjo’s assertion that Igbos should produce the next Nigerian president, said that no Igbo man can be president until President Buhari had done two terms.
In case Agbese doesn’t know, very few people took the political views of Ojo Maduekwe seriously during his time. Similarly, very few persons really bother these days to reckon with words falling from the lips of Rochas Okorocha. Contrary to Agbese’s view, it is untrue that Igbos are incapable of getting what they think they deserve in Nigeria. The Igbo race remains a highly intelligent race. Igbos are quick grabbers. They are conversant with the Nigerian political terrain. They know what they want in it. Truth is that the hijacking of Igbo politics by those whom Chinua Achebe branded as Igbo political renegades may have sounded the death knell of the collective survival bids of Ndigbo. In the various Ndigbo publications, at the various pan-Igbo cultural association gatherings and Igbo economic summits, the collapse of traditional Igbo political leadership alluded to by Professor Adiele Afigbo, Elizabeth Isichei, Dr. Chuba Okadigbo, Dr. Arthur Nwankwo, Professor Chinua Acbebe and others had constantly featured. For instance, copiously quoting Prof. Afigbo, Prof. Anya O. Anya, in his incisive paper at the Ohaneze Ndi Igbo National Symposium marking the Igbo Day in September 2009 stated that the collapse of the traditional Igbo political leadership had led to the inauguration of “permanent experimentation in Igbo land in the search for the appropriate” leadership that would lead to the much-vaunted harnessing of the potential and endowments in Igbo land. According to Prof. Anya, there was no where that experimentation was most loudly felt in Igbo land at that time than in the messy Anambra political situation. Remember the ruffians and scallywags who once hijacked the Anambra politics until God used the person of Peter Obi to redeem Anambra State? Remember the Okija Shrine melodrama and all that? The point I am trying to make is that the hijacking of Igbo politics by some Igbo political renegages is only a momentary set back and not a death-knell.
Happily Nwodo understands this. Small wonder he said in his speech that the days of seeking consolation in Igbo marginalisation are over. Igbos, according to Nwodo, are poised to seize the moment and excel in it. After all, Igbo ingenuity thrives in adverse circumstances. It is still a mystery today how the Igbos survived the Nigerian Civil War. “The challenge of disadvantages should be the Igbo man’s gold mine”, said Sir Louis Odumegwu Ojukwu many years ago. In seizing the moment, Igbos, said Nwodo, will no longer tolerate atrocities committed against them. One atrocity which Nwodo is urging the Buhari government to stop immediately is the killing of demonstrating unarmed citizens who respectfully call themselves Indigenous People of Biafra (IPOB) and Movement for the Actualisation of the Sovereign State of Biafra (MASSOB). For example, on February 9, 2016, the Nigerian soldiers shot and killed countless unarmed pro-Biafra protesters who were peacefully holding prayers inside the football field of Ngwa High School, Aba in Abia State. The photographs of the murdered victims were circulating on whatsApp at a time. On May 30, 2016, over 30 Igbo civilian demonstrators were killed and many injured by the military after the several clashes involving the military, police and members of IPOB and MASSOB at Nkpor-Agu, Niger Bridge, Onitsha and Asaba. Then recently the security operatives shot and killed some members of IPOB who were holding a pro-Trump rally in Port Harcourt.
The questions begging for answers are: why shoot and kill defenceless civilians holding a peaceful rally? I don’t know what is wrong us in Nigeria. For instance, in the past two weeks or so, some American citizens have been organising serious demonstrations against President Trump yet Trump has not ordered the security agents to kill the demonstrators. But here in Nigeria the Nigerian securities operatives are killing demonstrating defenceless civilians. The same Nigerian security agents who have refused to shoot and kill the murderous Fulani herdsmen are turning round to open fire and kill unarmed Nigerian civilians?