Ekweremadu’s double shuffle
Deputy Senate President Ike Ekweremadu addressed a meeting, last July, of Igbo leaders. It came on the heels of the furious reaction in other parts of the country to the proBiafran agitation that has gripped the South-East and its people. His address ‘Biafra: The Legal, Political, Economic and Social Questions’ left no room for doubt about Senator Ekweremadu’s leanings and preferences with regard to the activities and objectives of the Indigenous People of Biafra (IPOB), the organisation that demands the secession of Igbo South-East from Nigeria. Under the right, less challenging circumstances, which the paper dwelt on, he would lead the Igbos to the exit door, citing “structural imbalances with ripples of disequilibrium in the distribution of resources and opportunities since the end of the civil war in 1970” and “mistreatment of the region” since after the 2015 election as factors justifying that decision.
This long-winded sentence simply alleges marginalisation.
Igbos have over the years woven a narrative of victim-hood which is retailed at every opportunity; they also nurse what Guardian columnist Dan Agbese calls “a sense of injury” for which in their eyes other Nigerians haven’t atoned enough. The considered view here is that these charges are spurious, looking at the whole rather than snapshots of, the period since 1970.
The reactions of Nigerians and their government at the end of the civil war is something we should ever be proud of. The war-time leader General Yakubu Gowon laid down the marker with the No Victor No Vanquished speech - it committed the federal government to the 3Rs of Reconstruction, Rehabilitation and Reconciliation. There were no mass executions, no mass trials or incarceration of rebel soldiers or officials. Instead, many of the soldiers who fought on the secessionist side were reabsorbed into the Nigerian armed forces and most civil servants returned to their posts. Igbo students returning to universities in other regions were re-admitted. Local authorities in both the Northern states and the West handed back to Igbo returnees their landed properties and the rental incomes that accrued during their absence.
Rehabilitation and reconstruction in the Eastern states were undertaken in line with available resources and executive capacity. The two National Development Plans (1970-1975, 19751980) had many projects earmarked for both then East-Central state and Cross River and Rivers states. Since then every university, polytechnic, college of education, FMC, etc in any other state of the federation has a sister in South-East.
Most importantly, there has been no legislation under either military or civilian government since 1970 that overtly or covertly has sought to abridge the rights of the Igbos in relation to any appointment, opportunity or pursuit. It was thus possible for them to float a political party in the Second Republic in line with our ethnic-based politics and gained thereby foothold in both the executive and the legislature. Additionally, senior Igbo officers have played important roles in every military government since 1970.
Igbo expression of dissatisfaction began with drip-drip complaints such as “no Igbo man has ever held the post of Minister of Defence or Interior or Agriculture” or “the post of InspectorGeneral of Police or Chief of Army Staff or GMD of NNPC.” These barriers have now been serially broken; the biggest one requires more adroitness and less aggression towards fellow countrymen to breach.
The chuminess between Igbo leaders and Kanu and IPOB irritates other Nigerians who have been target of hate speech from the outfit. Only an act of brinkmanship by another youth group would get them to comment publicly on IPOB activities; even at that it was to defend its “fundamental rights.” They have outsourced decision-making to street mobs even as they hob-nob with Afenifere in the campaign for restructuring. With insiders pissing in, Nigeria’s health as one country is seriously compromised. M T Usman, Kaduna.