News Release: Military Invasion Of Igboland
chidi opara reports
http://chidioparareports.blogspot.com.ng/2017/09/news-release-military-invasion-of.html
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Victor Okafor
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Cornelius Hamelberg
On Saturday, 9 September 2017 22:32:00 UTC+2, vokafor wrote:
But why have we not heard from Southeastern federal legislators, federal ministers, state governors and other elected leaders about this situation? Why were they elected? Of what practical use are they if they fail to collectively rise up against this act of insanity?
On Sat, Sep 9, 2017 at 2:11 PM, 'chidi opara reports' via USA Africa Dialogue Series <usaafric...@googlegroups.com> wrote:
Link:
http://chidioparareports.blogspot.com.ng/2017/09/news-release-military-invasion-of.html
From chidi opara reports
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Cornelius Hamelberg
In his address to the nation shortly after his return to Nigeria from sick leave in the UK, President Buhari made it very clear that a United Nigeria is not subject to negotiation and recommended that any grievances by e.g. would-be secessionists should be channeled through the appropriate Nigerian legislative bodies (and their representatives?
Now that Spain seems to be denying the Catalans a right to have and respect a referendum on secession , the Nigerian government could be encouraged and even embolden to follow suit.
This very alarming addendum to the Alaigbo’s letter of grievances to the UN’s Secretary-General is very bad news indeed. It raises many questions, not least of all, about the military exercises/military presence ostensibly to suppress or by a sheer show of military muscle, to intimidate the residents of the five Igbo majority states of Igboland proper, who may want to seek Independence from Mama and Papa Nigeria; but Nnamdi Kanu has said that he’ll rest his oars for a while, wait and see how talk about “restructuring” etc., progresses. Progress of course = action, not just words, talk, as in “ Money talks, bullshit walks”
The Nigerian army spokesperson’s cynical dismissal of the Amnesty International Report on the plight of Igbos – the systemic massacres of Igbos also documented by Human Rights Watch only adds fuel to the fire, that the military can go ahead and continue to define impunity : shoot to kill without any consequences – just wipe up the blood or let Igbo blood flow into a flood as the Nigerian military deny responsibility for each and every atrocity .
In the Nigerian version of National Brotherhood Week that last line in the fifth stanza could well read ”And everybody hates the Igbos”
Re- “the Arewa-controlled and dominated Nigerian military which recently witnessed unimaginable retirement of a great number of Igbo high-ranking officers…etc.” On the tip of the tongues to ask about the ethnic composition of the battalions stationed in Igboland - I use the term Igboland advisedly and as familiarly as we use the term “Yorubaland” , both enclaves enjoying a certain cultural and territorial integrity, sovereignty within the larger context of Nigeria and therefore , just as president Buhari said recently, “Nigerians can live anywhere in the country without restrictions”
The last thing we want to hear and the first thing we must avoid at all costs is genocideOn Saturday, 9 September 2017 22:32:00 UTC+2, vokafor wrote:
But why have we not heard from Southeastern federal legislators, federal ministers, state governors and other elected leaders about this situation? Why were they elected? Of what practical use are they if they fail to collectively rise up against this act of insanity?
On Sat, Sep 9, 2017 at 2:11 PM, 'chidi opara reports' via USA Africa Dialogue Series <usaafric...@googlegroups.com> wrote:
Link:
http://chidioparareports.blogspot.com.ng/2017/09/news-release-military-invasion-of.html
From chidi opara reports
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Salimonu Kadiri
EZE Cornelius Hamelberg the First of Arochukwu has appended his signature to a blank bank cheque in favour of ALAIGBO Development Fund. Eze Cornelius Hamelberg the First is not a small insect and it baffles me how he could so easily be caught in the webb of the spider woven and laid out by Professor Wahala and his Alaigbo development Fund.
The report to which Eze Cornelius Hamelberg the First appended his signature is captioned : Military Invasion of Igboland. The false impression created by the title of the News Release from Professor Wahala is that the military invaders are from outside Igboland. That is completely untrue. The 82 Division of the Nigerian Army contains five Brigades which are permanently based in Abia, Anambra, Ebonyi, Enugu and Imo States. The 82 Division of the Nigerian Army comprising of five Brigades in the Southeast was there during Obasanjo, Yar'Adua and Jonathan's presidencies and in the last eighteen years the 82 Division of the Nigerian Army has had many military exercises. The last military exercise was named Pyton Dance 1 which is why the next exercise is logically named Pyton Dance II. According to Major D.D. Ahmadu, Chief of Training and Operation, Nigerian Army, the exercise is necessitated by mindless assassinations (even in religious places), attack on security personnel, theft of weapons, armed banditry, kidnapping, cultism and violent agitations in the judicial areas of operation of the 82 Division of the Nigerian Army.
Exercise Egwu Eke II, the real name of Exercise Pyton Dance II, is scheduled to start on Friday, September 2017 and to end on Saturday, 14 October 2017. A non careful reader of Professor Wahala's report is bound to believe that the "military invasion" of Igboland had already commenced. And not only that, the learned Professor wrongly insinuated that the aim of exercise pyton dance II is to attack self-determination movements in "Alaigbo territories." Writing to get sympathy and induce donation of money into ALAIGBO DEVELOPMENT FUND, Professor Wahala reported, "Hundreds of Igbo farmers and their children have been killed, their women and daughters raped not only in Alaigbo but in several other non-Fulani areas of Nigeria. ...//... those atrocities have been committed against them (Alaigbo) by Fulani herdsmen armed with sophisticated weapons." When migrant Igbos in Abuja return to Igboland in the middle of the night to harvest the crops of their fellow Igbo farmers for sales in Abuja and in the process kill and maim Igbo men, women and children for the sake of quick enrichment, Fulani herdsmen are blamed for the atrocities even when no Fulani, whether a herdsman or not, is in sight. Nnamdi Kanu claims that Igbo are Jews and I say no, most Igbos, just like many educated Nigerian officials, are Shylocks because of their readiness and lack of restraint to cut a pound of flesh near the heart of their brethren for the sake of money. Professor Wahala may know much about books but he surely does not know anything about ordinary Nigerians, especially Fulani herdsmen. A Fulani herdsman treasures his herds and that is why he carries a gun to defend them against rustlers (cow thieves). Therefore, it is against commonsense and even impracticable that a herdsman will abandon his herds to go on raping expedition of women and girls. Or does Professor Wahala think a herdsman is capable of raping and keeping watch of his herds at the same time? No, Professor, herdsmen are not like Nollywood actors, who always hunt for females to bite with their one-eyed snake.
The Professor claimed that high ranking Igbo military Officers have been retired but he failed to mention names of the retired Igbo Officers. In the same way, he alleged that Igbos are excluded from being members of Nigeria's Highest Security Council without providing readers with current list of members of the Nation's Security Council. Recently, I was confronted with a man who claimed that there is no single Igbo person in Buhari's government. He did not believe me when I told him that Buhari's Minister of Labour and Productivity, Dr. Chris Ngige is Igbo, Minister of Science and Technology, Dr.Ogbonnaya Onu, is Igbo and Minister of Foreign Affairs, Godfrey Onyeama, is Igbo. Those are the three I could remember at the moment. We should not forget that Nigeria is said to contain over 200 ethnic languages which implies that the Government of Buhari should contain 200 ministers if ethnic composition is a determinant of sense of belonging of every ethnic group and not production of goods and services for the masses.
Referring to Exercise Egwu Eke, the Professor wrote, "The show of force is another attempt to demonstrate to the world that ALAIGBO and the rest of Nigeria is a conquered territory." If Nigeria, including Alaigbo, is a conquered territory, the question arises as to who is the conqueror? If the show of force is an attempt to demonstrate a conquest, it means it has failed or the conquest is yet to be accomplished. Is ALAIGBO a separatist movement headed by Professor Wahala? Every war has its own profiteers. Thus, when Achebe's book, There Was a Country, came out in October 2012 Dr. Tony Nwaezeigwe asked, "One would want Achebe to explain to Nigerians in general and the Igbo in particular, what happened to the millions in foreign currency raised abroad in support of Biafra but which never got to the shores of Biafra? How much of such money were actually raised and who were those Igbo leaders of Biafra entrusted with the duty of bringing the fund to Biafra? What also happened to the millions given to such people as Dr. K.O. Mbadiwe and Mojekwu, a relative of Odumegwu Ojukwu, for the purpose of purchasing arms and ammunition to prosecute the war? Did they not cart away with the money and never returned to Biafra until after the defeat?" www.punchng.com/opinion/achebe-in-defence-of-awolowo/ 25 October 2012 by Dr. Tony Nwaezeigwe.
Alaigbo Development Fund and its proprietors need money for their own personal use and their chance of getting money is to create chaos and civil strife in the country. If the situations were as painted by Professor Wahala, Victor Okafor had asked intelligent questions as to why there were no reactions from the federal legislators, federal ministers, state governors and state assembly members from the Southeast? Can Eze Cornelius Hamelberg the First of Arochukwu help us to answer that question?
S. Kadiri
Skickat: den 9 september 2017 23:46
Till: USA Africa Dialogue Series
Ämne: Re: USA Africa Dialogue Series - News Release: Military Invasion Of Igboland
Kenneth Kalu
Victor Okafor
EZE Cornelius Hamelberg the First of Arochukwu has appended his signature to a blank bank cheque in favour of ALAIGBO Development Fund. Eze Cornelius Hamelberg the First is not a small insect and it baffles me how he could so easily be caught in the webb of the spider woven and laid out by Professor Wahala and his Alaigbo development Fund.
The report to which Eze Cornelius Hamelberg the First appended his signature is captioned : Military Invasion of Igboland. The false impression created by the title of the News Release from Professor Wahala is that the military invaders are from outside Igboland. That is completely untrue. The 82 Division of the Nigerian Army contains five Brigades which are permanently based in Abia, Anambra, Ebonyi, Enugu and Imo States. The 82 Division of the Nigerian Army comprising of five Brigades in the Southeast was there during Obasanjo, Yar'Adua and Jonathan's presidencies and in the last eighteen years the 82 Division of the Nigerian Army has had many military exercises. The last military exercise was named Pyton Dance 1 which is why the next exercise is logically named Pyton Dance II. According to Major D.D. Ahmadu, Chief of Training and Operation, Nigerian Army, the exercise is necessitated by mindless assassinations (even in religious places), attack on security personnel, theft of weapons, armed banditry, kidnapping, cultism and violent agitations in the judicial areas of operation of the 82 Division of the Nigerian Army.
Exercise Egwu Eke II, the real name of Exercise Pyton Dance II, is scheduled to start on Friday, September 2017 and to end on Saturday, 14 October 2017. A non careful reader of Professor Wahala's report is bound to believe that the "military invasion" of Igboland had already commenced. And not only that, the learned Professor wrongly insinuated that the aim of exercise pyton dance II is to attack self-determination movements in "Alaigbo territories." Writing to get sympathy and induce donation of money into ALAIGBO DEVELOPMENT FUND, Professor Wahala reported, "Hundreds of Igbo farmers and their children have been killed, their women and daughters raped not only in Alaigbo but in several other non-Fulani areas of Nigeria. ...//... those atrocities have been committed against them (Alaigbo) by Fulani herdsmen armed with sophisticated weapons." When migrant Igbos in Abuja return to Igboland in the middle of the night to harvest the crops of their fellow Igbo farmers for sales in Abuja and in the process kill and maim Igbo men, women and children for the sake of quick enrichment, Fulani herdsmen are blamed for the atrocities even when no Fulani, whether a herdsman or not, is in sight. Nnamdi Kanu claims that Igbo are Jews and I say no, most Igbos, just like many educated Nigerian officials, are Shylocks because of their readiness and lack of restraint to cut a pound of flesh near the heart of their brethren for the sake of money. Professor Wahala may know much about books but he surely does not know anything about ordinary Nigerians, especially Fulani herdsmen. A Fulani herdsman treasures his herds and that is why he carries a gun to defend them against rustlers (cow thieves). Therefore, it is against commonsense and even impracticable that a herdsman will abandon his herds to go on raping expedition of women and girls. Or does Professor Wahala think a herdsman is capable of raping and keeping watch of his herds at the same time? No, Professor, herdsmen are not like Nollywood actors, who always hunt for females to bite with their one-eyed snake.
The Professor claimed that high ranking Igbo military Officers have been retired but he failed to mention names of the retired Igbo Officers. In the same way, he alleged that Igbos are excluded from being members of Nigeria's Highest Security Council without providing readers with current list of members of the Nation's Security Council. Recently, I was confronted with a man who claimed that there is no single Igbo person in Buhari's government. He did not believe me when I told him that Buhari's Minister of Labour and Productivity, Dr. Chris Ngige is Igbo, Minister of Science and Technology, Dr.Ogbonnaya Onu, is Igbo and Minister of Foreign Affairs, Godfrey Onyeama, is Igbo. Those are the three I could remember at the moment. We should not forget that Nigeria is said to contain over 200 ethnic languages which implies that the Government of Buhari should contain 200 ministers if ethnic composition is a determinant of sense of belonging of every ethnic group and not production of goods and services for the masses.
Referring to Exercise Egwu Eke, the Professor wrote, "The show of force is another attempt to demonstrate to the world that ALAIGBO and the rest of Nigeria is a conquered territory." If Nigeria, including Alaigbo, is a conquered territory, the question arises as to who is the conqueror? If the show of force is an attempt to demonstrate a conquest, it means it has failed or the conquest is yet to be accomplished. Is ALAIGBO a separatist movement headed by Professor Wahala? Every war has its own profiteers. Thus, when Achebe's book, There Was a Country, came out in October 2012 Dr. Tony Nwaezeigwe asked, "One would want Achebe to explain to Nigerians in general and the Igbo in particular, what happened to the millions in foreign currency raised abroad in support of Biafra but which never got to the shores of Biafra? How much of such money were actually raised and who were those Igbo leaders of Biafra entrusted with the duty of bringing the fund to Biafra? What also happened to the millions given to such people as Dr. K.O. Mbadiwe and Mojekwu, a relative of Odumegwu Ojukwu, for the purpose of purchasing arms and ammunition to prosecute the war? Did they not cart away with the money and never returned to Biafra until after the defeat?" www.punchng.com/opinion/achebe-in-defence-of-awolowo/ 25 October 2012 by Dr. Tony Nwaezeigwe.
Alaigbo Development Fund and its proprietors need money for their own personal use and their chance of getting money is to create chaos and civil strife in the country. If the situations were as painted by Professor Wahala, Victor Okafor had asked intelligent questions as to why there were no reactions from the federal legislators, federal ministers, state governors and state assembly members from the Southeast? Can Eze Cornelius Hamelberg the First of Arochukwu help us to answer that question?
S. Kadiri
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Chidi Anthony Opara
The fascist wing of South-West Nigeria Intelligentsia(apology to Obi Nwakamma)!
CAO.
Cornelius Hamelberg
Haba Baba Kadiri!
This is a reply to your first two paragraphs. I will take a look at your concluding four paragraphs, later.
Without freedom of speech you wouldn’t be able or free to say some of the things that you say in this forum and get away with it. You know that under some kinds of military rule you could have been hanged like Ken Saro-Wiwa or faced the firing squad more than once, before which hanging - God forbid - we would have heard Baba Kadiri beat his chest and proclaim like Nathan Hale, “I only regret that I have but one life to lose for my country!” or be gunned down in broad daylight in Owerri or like Dele Giwa open a parcel that explodes in your face for merely singing,
“Every man gotta right to decide his own destiny,
And in this judgement there is no partiality…”
Or for merely saying, “Biafra must be free!
gunned down in cold blood because it is “unconstitutional” or because such freedom is “non-negotiable” according to President Buhari , because of an old Lugardian decree that imposed African unity on Nigeria, on you and him, the way that some people would like to see a reunion of North and South Korea, Israel and the Palestinians under Ottoman rule, maybe North South Sudan too…
Let us be thankful to the Almighty for freedom of expression without which there would be so much locked up in our heads and yearning to be free. Let us also thank Him for the right to peaceful assembly – at least that’s the way it’s supposed to be, without being gunned down by the so called custodians of the peace.
I knew that I was going to smoke you out of hibernation or temporary retirement from the forum, with just one word of pro-Biafra or pro-Igbo sentiment. You are true to form. I am not disappointed.
There’s a chapter of the Holy Quran entitled Ankabut (The Spider) – I once listened to Hamza Yusuf deliberate on this : as you know, the spider web is the symbol of the United Nations - and as you know, that’s how the spider attacks, it makes a web around its victim, just as the ethnic enclave known as Biafra is surrounded and was similarly besieged during the last war, surrounded and besieged as is the black star in the flag of which we sing in the Ghana Independence calypso ,
“ With a black Star in the centre,
Representing the freedom of Africa”
Now, dear Baba, I am not a spokesperson of the Alaigbo, nor am I holding brief for them. Mine is only a commonsense reaction based on some common notions of fair play. It’s true that strictly speaking, the title of the report “Military Invasion of Igboland” is both alarming and misleading, however, the subsequent details in the report itself leaves nobody in any doubt that just like a Trojan horse, the Military presence was only being activated from within – the five battalions are/ were already stationed there since a long time ago, ostensibly to protect its citizens and to quell any vestige of rebellion, revolt or revolution within that part of Sovereign Federal Nigerian Territory which, with the many problems that you enumerate, seems to be tethering on the brink of being lawless – not law-abiding, ungovernable . When I first read the headline” “Military Invasion of Igboland” I thought that the worst was about to happen, that the awesome anti- Boko Haram Military of Nigeria was now descending on its main enemy symbolized by Brother Nnamdi Kanu – my spontaneous reaction was “ Holy cow, five battalions invade Igboland to arrest one man! “ - that the military invasion of Igboland was to arrest its main symbol of “resistance “ Nnamdi Kanu as in “It Takes a Nation of Millions to Hold Us Back”
What is interesting here is that you conspicuously did not choose to answer or rebut my query which was: “On the tip of the tongue to ask about the ethnic composition of the battalions stationed in Igboland?”
Before I go any further, could you please furnish us with an answer as to the ethnic composition of the five battalions stationed in Igboland?
PS: One of my great regrets is that I demurred when I was invited to join the Arochukwu Society in 1983
Yours sincerely,
Cornelius
Godwin Okeke
Quite unfortunate!
GSM
--------------------------------------------
On Mon, 9/11/17, Victor Okafor <vok...@emich.edu> wrote:
Subject: Re: USA Africa Dialogue Series - News Release: Military Invasion Of Igboland
To: usaafric...@googlegroups.com
Date: Monday, September 11, 2017, 3:22 AM
Mazi
Kadiri:
I want
to
advise you as follows: it's never right to attempt to
justify the
unjustifiable. This high-handed military invasion of
Igboland is uncalled-for
and comes across like an act of desperation. It's simply
wrong on all counts:
it’s illegal; it’s unconstitutional; and it’s
unwarranted by the circumstances
on the ground.
On Sun, Sep 10, 2017 at
7:00 PM, Salimonu Kadiri <ogunl...@hotmail.com>
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Salimonu Kadiri
Thank you for your advice, Ogbuefu Okafor!! Once more, I restate that there is no military invasion of Igboland because the 82 Division of the Nigerian Army which is to carry out the impending Exercise Egwu Eke II (Pyton Dance II), from Friday, 15 September to Saturday, 14 October 2017, has been a permanent embodiment of the Southeast States for some decades. It is not just being brought into the States from outside. You should also know that Brigade Commander in each State participates in monthly security meeting chaired by the Governor. The implication of this is that all the five Brigades and the five Governors in the Southeast States have agreed that Exercise Egwu Eke should be carried out. If the military exercise is illegal and unconstitutional, the right institution to decide that is the court of law and not you or me.
You may wish to know that Exercise Pyton Dance I took place in the Southeast from 27 November to 27 December 2016. Just as it is now, some people criticized it. The Governor of Anambra State, Willie Obiano, spoke in support of the exercise and reminded critics
that in 2014 when Jonathan was the President, his State executed operation Kpochapu in collaboration with the Joint Task Force against crime. It is also on record that last
year, there was military Exercise named Shirin Harbi in the Northeast against insurgency, cattle rustling and other sundry crimes; there was military Exercise named Harbin Kunama in the Northwest against banditry, insurgency, cattle rustling and other
crimes; and there was military Exercise named Crocodile Smile in the Niger Delta against illegal bunkering, oil theft and piracy. Therefore, there is nothing dangerous about Exercise Egwu Eke except for the professional alarmists who intend to exploit
it to raise funds into the pocket of Alaigbo proprietors.
S. Kadiri
Skickat: den 11 september 2017 04:22
Till: usaafric...@googlegroups.com
Ofure Aito
In my view and going by the imbalance in the system, I argue for a disintegration of the sovereignty called Nigeria. The history and stories that united us have long been forgotten or disregarded for ethnic selfishness. It is now a case of "monkeys dey work and baboons dey chop".
Ofure Aito
Victor Okafor
Cornelius Hamelberg
Ofure Aito,
I agree with you completely, about your misgivings, but not about your conclusion, since I don’t think that that this is a sufficient argument for the “disintegration of the sovereignty called Nigeria.”
Especially, not if such a disintegration of what could be or would have been Africa’s greatest nation, can only be achieved through bloodshed…. - ay, there’s the rub…
Consider this: What’s wrong can be righted.
In Spain, the central government has rejected the idea of a referendum for the Catalans
But, let’s get back to Nigeria: Don’t you notice some bias here? Not “ most Yoruba” ( God forbid) but in The Gospel According to Baba Kadiri, he writes “most Igbos, just like many educated Nigerian officials, are Shylocks because of their readiness and lack of restraint to cut a pound of flesh near the heart of their brethren for the sake of money” (The Gospel According to Baba Kadiri)
The emphasis is on “most Igbos” juxtaposed against “many Nigerians” but not “Most Nigerians”.
It’s a perfect example that belongs to this category: The uses and misuses of Shylock as a stereotype in popular anti-Semitism…
As Shylock pleaded on his own behalf ( a speech that has led many to commit what may be a biographical heresy, in concluding that this is strong supporting evidence of William Shakespeare’s Jewish-ness):
“I am a Jew. Hath not a Jew eyes? Hath not a Jew hands, organs, dimensions, senses, affections, passions? Fed with the same food, hurt with the same weapons, subject to the same diseases, healed by the same means, warmed and cooled by the same winter and summer as a Christian is? If you prick us, do we not bleed? If you tickle us, do we not laugh? If you poison us, do we not die?” (The Merchant of Venice, Act 3, Scene 1, Shylock's speech
Me noh want palaver or to end Baba Kadiri’s mentorship of yours truly , so when I talked to Baba Kadiri yesterday , it was not about Shylock but about the rest of his diatribe and he did proffer some cogent explications of his paragraphs 4, 5, 6. and 7. (I intend to return to those paragraphs, in a future posting)
It’s almost absolutely certain (but only time will tell) that during the – according to Baba Kadiri, “Exercise Egwu Eke II, the real name of Exercise Pyton Dance II, is scheduled to start on Friday, September 2017 and to end on Saturday, 14 October 2017” – during that exercise there is sure to be some confrontation between the military and the Igbo civilian population and this could end in more than one tragedy, especially since the commanders of the battalions are not of Igbo stock…
Prevention is better than cure, but the foolhardy will go ahead with their devilish plans anyway…
Soldiers at Nnamdi Kanu's home presages the beginning of the Roforofo fight…
Pray for us.
Cornelius
Victor Okafor
While it's okay for all of us to opine on these burning issues of the day, I suggest that each of us ought to endeavor to apply empathy and a sense of realism to their points of view. The disillusioned and alienated kids who are being killed and maimed—as we watch--by government-armed terrorists have flesh and blood like us. They have hopes and aspirations like us. They wish to have a life of comfort and security like some of you, though some of us, understandably may be watching it all with a “not in my backyard” (what the Americans call the NIMY syndrome) sense of detachment. That said, it may surprise some of us that some of those dying and mutilated kids have a better and a concrete understanding of Nigeria's political economic realities than some of us who write from the comfort of Western-situated air-conditioned offices. A sense of realism is necessitated by the Present Moment. We don’t help the situation or value add to the dialogue by being politically correct or attempting to be politically correct. We can see through it all? Where you stand during a moment a crisis is the real test of your avowed commitment to service to humanity, not just your ethnic humanity.
No doubt, Nigeria is a sick patient (and has been sick for as long as I have known it) and all manner of diagnoses and prescriptions are being preferred, not unlike the past. For those who would like to see Nigeria preserved as a common entity, the recent Yoruba Communique represented, in my view, a judicious means of doing so. But how did the Northern Wing of the nation—the real deciders of the nation’s fate--say about it within hours of its release? Their answer was "no." Did that answer not play into the hands of the alternative school of thought which views separatism--as happened to what used to be known as the Soviet Union--as the realistic path for this tortured entity known as Nigeria? In this 21st century, it does not have to follow a bloody process. It can be resolved through dialogue—if only the hegemon can find a way to restrain its military-power-induced arrogance. But it won’t do so unless it finds or is given a compelling reason to follow the path of dialogic resolution of the nation’s centrifugal challenge.
--
Chidi Anthony Opara
Our "man of the moment" should share part of the blame. With his "Biafra or death" proclamation, he set the stage for what is happening.
Our other "man of the moment", with his incurable military mentality, seized the opportunity to strike.
CAO.
Salimonu Kadiri
Haba EZE Hamelberg!! Thank you for addressing me as Baba Kadiri because to be a Bàbá in Yoruba culture is first and foremost to be a protector of inhabitants of one's community especially women, children and strangers. Thanks to the customary role of Bàbá, it is only in Yorubaland that all ethnic groups in Nigeria and non-Nigerians can live, thrive and prosper without friction.
You want to limit my freedom of expression and even suggest the termination of my life as your half-brothers did to Lumumba, Mpolo, and Okito (Congo Kinshasa); Malcom X, Thomas Sankara etc., when they expressed their desire for better living conditions for their people. I am not afraid to die for speaking the truth as I know that no one is going to live for ever. Ken Saro-Wiwa and his fellow eight Ogoni comrades were murdered by General Abacha and the most spectacular part of that tragic event was that the name of Abacha's Attorney General and Minister of Justice was Mike Agbamuche, not from the Southwest. In spite of the murder, Arthur Nzeribe, not a Southwest fascist, and others organized a million dance march in Abuja to demand Abacha's elevation to a civilian President of Nigeria through an organisation called Youth Earnestly Want Abacha (YEWA).
You have goggled 'Biafra must be free' and advocated its excise from Nigeria, just like South Sudan form Sudan, because the different ethnic groups were amalgamated by Lugard into a country. Whatever may be our aversion against Lugard, the British imperialist interest that he served also created Sierra Leone, comprising of some ethnic groups and dumped ex-slaves from America. Since charity does not begin from outside, you should start dissolving British amalgamated nation's of Africa from your own home base, Sierra Leone, and not Nigeria. If Nigerians have headaches, you as a Sierra Leonean cannot overdose yourself with Panadol for Nigerians' headaches. You harm yourself by doing that and you don't heal the headaches. I have always urged my Igbo brethren to swim with me against the stream because I am convinced that, that is the safest way by which we can all land at the shore and not be swept to middle of deep sea to drown.
Extolling example of a successful balkanalisation of an African country, you chose Southern Sudan whose independence from the Northern Sudan was based on racial ground. Northern Sudan is occupied by the Caucasian Arabs while the South is domiciled by Negroid Dimka and Nuer ethnic groups. While, Salva Kiir of the Dimka ethnic group is the President, Riek Machar from the Nuer ethnic group is the vice President of independent South Sudan. However, a civil war between the two ethnic groups has been ravaging the country shortly after independence from the North in 2011. Today, more than one million refugees from South-Sudan are in Uganda which also is a multi-ethnic country. Therefore, Southern Sudan which was supposed to be paradise in Africa because it has oil is now capital of hell in Africa as the President and his Vice turned Lucifers.
After he was granted bail, Nnamdi Kanu said at a press conference that while he was in detention he was offered Biafra consisting of Southeast States but he rejected it since his own Biafra does not only contain the 1967 boundaries but part of Kogi, Benue and Edo States. Thus, Nnamdi Kanu's Biafra will be multi-ethnic nation, just like Nigeria with the only difference that the Igbo dominated Biafra will have an Igbo President. When the agitation for Biafra was loudest and Igbo political leaders were quiet and seemed complacent, the Arewa Youth in the North issued an ultimatum asking the Igbo in the North to quit the North while all Northerners in the Southeast should return to the North. Realizing, suddenly, that hundreds of thousands of Igbo are resident in the North as against few hundreds Northerners in the Southeast, Ohaneze Ndigbo and Igbo political elites, who had hitherto been passive against Biafra agitators, quickly twisted Arewa's ultimatum to imply intension to commit genocide. Arewa's ultimatum exposed the hypocrisy of the Biafran agitators who claimed that they are persecuted and marginalized in Nigeria, especially by the Northern Hausa/Fulani. Despite that claim, it turned out that hundreds of thousands of Igbo are permanently resident and prospering in the North. If all Igbo want secession, Arewa's quit ultimatum provided a good opportunity for them to resettle in their ancestral land to realize their Republic of Biafra. A just interpretation of Arewa's quit ultimatum should be : Arewa are tired of hearing that the Igbo are not willing to live in the same country called Nigeria with them and they too reciprocated not to live in the same country called Nigeria with the Igbo. There is equilibrium in ethnic unwillingness to live together under one nation between the Arewa and IPOB precipitated by the latter. In fact, Arewa ultimatum was not different from that which the Movement for Actualization of Sovereign State Of Biafra (MASSOB) issued in November 2015 ordering all Igbos in other parts of Nigeria to return home. http://www.vaguardngr.com/2015/11/return-the-south-east-massob-tells-igbo.
You asked me to furnish you the ethnic composition of the five Brigades stationed in the Southeast and I regret to inform you that I cannot. Your request should be directed to Nigeria's ministry of defence. However, I don't think the composition would have changed drastically from the time when Lieutenant General Azubuike Onyeabor Ihejirika was Chief of Army Staff three years ago.
"I knew I was going to smoke you out of your hibernation or temporary retirement from the forum, with just one word of pro-Biafra or Igbo sentiment. You are true to form. I am not disappointed - Cornelius Hamelberg."
Your attempt to paint me as an anti-Biafran and anti-Igbo is due to the fact that you are a habitual flatterer of the Igbos and of flatterers, in general, Sir Walter Raleigh wrote, "Flatterers are the worst kind of traitors for they will strengthen thy imperfections, encourage thee in all evils, correct thee in nothing, but so shadow and paint thy follies and voices as thou shall never, by their will, discover good from evil, or vice from virtue." After my short pause from the forum, my first post was on the 6th of September in which I commented on Chidi's post on Kenya's Supreme Court's cancellation of Kenya's Presidential election and ordering new election within 60 days. Thus, my re-entry into the forum's discussion had nothing to do with your make-believe disseminated smoke or your flatteries with the Igbo/Biafrans. No, Eze Hamelberg, I love my neighbours (and in fact all human beings) as I love myself and there is no good thing on earth that I want for myself that I do not want for all my brethren, including the Igbo. My concern has been that Biafra agitation is distracting attentions from the real cause(s) of economic injustice in Nigeria and is doing a great harm to the cause of mobilizing Nigerian masses to demand their rights. Nigerian masses are all marginalized by the educated elites in the country and it is unjust to single out only the Igbo as victims of economic deprivation in Nigeria. Ethnic/religious balancing at the federal level (constitutionally described as Federal Character) is practised in Nigeria by a strong amalgam of ethno/religious elites from all parts of Nigeria at the centre and whose main function always is to share the resources of the country among themselves for the purpose of enjoying material comforts produced and imported from civilized and developed world. It is clear that despite their swaggering boasts of wanting to free our country from the economic dominance of the white world they crave nothing more than representing the economic interests of the global masters. Roads are simply non-existent as they have progressed into cemeteries where vehicles and humans are buried daily, hospitals have become morgues as educated ethno-religious elites have outsourced their medical care to the country of the former colonial masters from who they claim to have liberated our nation, schools and institutions of higher education have crumbled, electricity is epileptic even though we have had Professors as Minister of Power, pipe borne water is a dream for millions of Nigerians, most of our streets are filled with filth, dead animals and sometimes human corpses but educated elites in government and parastatals have become millionaires after stealing appropriated funds to procure the above amenities for Nigerians. The elites claim God's/Allah's blessing for the emergence of their sudden wealth. The Christians fly to Jerusalem every Sabbath on pilgrimage while Muslims fly to Mecca every Friday to pray. But ethnic agitators prevent Nigerians from confronting the elites to show us the face of God/Allah that opened foreign accounts and ferried funds meant for public utilities abroad.
For educated Nigerians with any academic title, what is constant for them is not idealism, principle, honour or patriotic exertions. What is constant for them is the achievement of personal ambition. The palace mansions educated Nigerian elites from all ethnic groups in Nigeria build abroad and at home, the private jets and expensive cars and gargets they buy up with stolen developmental funds are products of other people's imagination, creativity, energy and high discipline in industrial enterprise. Why is natural resources poor Germany industrialised and developed and natural resources rich Nigeria is poor and underdeveloped in spite of huge academically qualified Nigerians managing the affairs of Nigeria? Should every Nigerian become a graduate before we start developing technologically, industrially and economically?
S. Kadiri
Salimonu Kadiri
In my humble opinion, the Egwu Eke II (Pyton Dance) is a cover up -Ofure Aito.
While expecting to read why Egwu Eke II is a cover up and for what, Ofure Aito summersaulted thus, "Look at the Sambisa military structure. The Arewa soldiers are posted to the south and the southern soldiers are sent to Sambisa (my departmental secretary's husband, a soldier from the southwest, was killed in Jos by a suicide bomber). What kind of composition is that? Who knows the terrain more? The southern military or the northerner."
Chibok which is located in Borno State is 60 kilometres to Sambisa forest. Jos, the capital of Plateau State, where Ofure Aito's presumed southwest soldier was killed by a suicide bomber, is more than a thousand kilometres to Sambisa forest. If it were true that a suicide bomber ever killed a southwest soldier in Jos, it could not have been in the cause of his combat duty against Boko Haram, whose area of military operations are mainly in Adamawa, Bauchi and Borno States. A redeemer should redeem self to understand that there is nothing like Northern and Southern military but a Nigerian National Army containing soldiers who are trained for combats not only anywhere in Nigeria but anywhere in the world. If not, Nigerian soldiers would not have been able to serve under the United Nations' Command in the Congo or lead ECOWA's forces to restore peace in the then war torn Sierra Leone because they were not brought up in those foreign terrains. Concerning Ofure Aito's hypothetically dead Southwest soldier in Jos, the truth is that enlistment into the Nigerian Army is voluntary and every soldier knows that his/her life is surrounded by risks of being killed, wounded and incapacitated while in the service, and regardless of geo-political zone one originates from in Nigeria. What then is the reason for emphasis on the supposedly Southwest soldier killed by a suicide bomber in Jos? Was he killed because he was a Southwest soldier?
"Back to the comment, the day I read about the military dance, I knew it was in readiness for a showdown. Why those exclusive states in the southeast? : Ofure Aito.
A showdown with who, is the question that should follow? The planners of Exercise Egwu Eke II have told the public why the exercise is going to take place. So, no one needs to speculate why it is being planned. Strange enough, Ofure Aito who objects to sending Southern soldiers to the North because they are aliens in the Northern terrains and could easily be killed there does not extend similar objections to Northern soldiers operating in the Southeast terrains which they are alien to and could easily be killed by armed MASSOB and IPOD militants. Instead the unvoiced insinuation is that soldiers of Northern extraction in the Southeast are threats to South-Easterners. Logic is defied and reason is trashed.
I argue for a disintegration of the sovereignty called Nigeria, writes Ofure Aito, because according to her, the history and stories that united us have long been forgotten or disregarded for ethnic selfishness, and concluded, it is now a case of 'monkeys dey work and baboons dey chop.'
Ofure Aito's solution to a migraine is to chop off the head and thereby give the body a healthy life. Isn't it fraudulent or dishonest to say that there is ethnic selfishness in Nigeria? When, for instance, we appoint a Minister of Power and Energy and employ a permanent secretary and a host of departmental Directors to work with him to generate and distribute electricity for all Nigerians, their ethnic origins have no bearing on the assignments given to them. Take note that they are so remunerated to enhance maximum efficiency and in addition they are entrusted with billions of dollars to procure thermal plants and transformers for the purpose of generating electricity for the entire country. If at the point of delivery, the billions of dollars for generating and distributing electricity have been pilfered by the trusted officials and the entire country is enveloped in darkness, it is not the ethnic group of the official that should be blamed for theft of electricity funds but the individual official rogues. We could talk of ethnic selfishness if the officials produced electricity for their own ethnic groups to the exclusion of all other ethnicities in the country. Moreover, funds for electricity that were illegally diverted into the private accounts of the officials are never shared with their ethnic groups. What we have in Nigeria are ethnic sheriffs, they assume office in the name/on behalf of the tribe, steal in the name/on behalf of the tribe but keep both legal and illicit earnings to themselves and their immediate families while majority members of their tribes are wallowing in abject poverty. There is no ethnic selfishness in Nigeria but individual selfishness and greed. Nigeria is ruled by self-imposed and uncompassionate ethnic sheriffs. As for the monkeys and baboons, there are only baboons nowadays in Nigeria. Nigerians seeing political leaders and officials become overnight billionaires without visible work believe in luck and prayers to get rich. Even armed robbers, kidnappers, sex hawkers and drug-traffickers seek and obtain pastors' and imams' blessings and prayers for successful adventures. That is why Nigerian baboons never protest when few people steal what should have been used for the benefit of all of us. Instead, Nigerian baboons agitate for dissolution of the country into each household a country where they expect to find, in their backyards, free cakes already baked by nature to eat.
S. Kadiri
Skickat: den 12 september 2017 09:59
Till: USA Africa Dialogue Series
In my view and going by the imbalance in the system, I argue for a disintegration of the sovereignty called Nigeria. The history and stories that united us have long been forgotten or disregarded for ethnic selfishness. It is now a case of "monkeys dey work and baboons dey chop".
Ofure Aito
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Cornelius Hamelberg
Baba Kadiri,
“Blessed are the peacemakers for they shall be called the sons of God!”
I should especially like to draw your attention to the section of the preachment entitled
Love your enemies , all said according to some, by “ the man who came and died a criminal's death.”
You say that “to be a Bàbá in Yoruba culture is first and foremost to be a protector of inhabitants of one's community especially women, children and strangers.”
He who feels it knows. You claim to love your neighbours (our Igbo Brethren and Sistren) as much you love yourself , yet we did not see you shedding any tears, not even crocodile tears when the issue of the genocide of Igbos was being discussed. On the contrary, without remorse or regret, you have argued tooth and nail with Obi Nwakanma (Rex Marinus) in this forum and I repeat , without shedding a tear.
Let me ask you: Have you ever loved or been loved by an Igbo woman? (Thinking of Taj Mahal just now)
I am not on the defensive and I do not intend to be put on the defensive mode. I understand that you would like to put me on the defensive by attributing to me words that I never uttered, perfectly absurd inanities such as that I would like to “terminate” YOUR LIFE. Where did I ever make such a preposterously homicidal proposition about my own precious Baba? Who do you think I am? Abacha? Aung San Suu Kyi as she gives silent assent to her genocidal Burmese butchers, rapists and arsonists as they massacre her innocent fellow human beings, the Rohingya Muslims?
And shame on her! Up to the beginning of the primitive Burmese moment I had rated her as second only to my absolute favourite on the international stage: Mary Robinson. Well, having betrayed her conscience, Aung San Suu Kyi is now a finished product, finished by her uncompromising silence, outmaneuvered by her military who she fears more than she fears her own death. I hope that Buhari’s military does not try any similar nonsense with my Igbo Brothers and Sisters, not even on the terminally ill because there will be hell to pay if he does so...
“I can smell
something cooking
I can tell there’s going to be a feast
You
know that sometimes Satan comes as a man of peace”
Could you please stop putting words in my mouth ? To hell with Lugard and the Lugardists! I said that. But I have “advocated” Biafra’s “excise from Nigeria”? For the various tribal reasons that you are mistakenly attributing to me about South Sudan and Sierra Leone, with those you disrespectfully describe as “dumped ex-slaves from America” etc?
Where have I done this advocacy ? Please show us! Commonsense dictates that the argument for a Biafra secession is a powerful one but at the same time, in my view, it is conditional and premised on what the Biafrans/Igbos themselves feel is their role in today’s Nigeria and Nigeria tomorrow with or without Biafra included within the Federal Nigerian borders. It is not for Baba Kadiri and the Yoruba or the Hausa or the Fulani or our Fulani herdsmen to tell the Igbo or to tell me how to feel or what to feel. However, I’m sure that the ethnicities and diverse language groups in all Nigeria and in their own consciences, even the oppressor class will readily agree with Nnamdi Kanu (wherever he is at present) and with the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King’s dictum in his letter from a Birmingham jail, that “Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere”
This is a Pan-African forum. Charity you advice begins at home and I suppose that in your parochial mind home for you is “Yorubaland “ or more specifically your neck of the woods in Ondo State. Well, I can tell you this: I was last in Sierra Leone and only for ten days, in April 1970 and then returned to my wife and to the Institute of African Studies at Legon, in Ghana. I was last in Nigeria – Eastern Nigeria, in September 1984 after a total of almost four years there. Since then I have visited other countries in Africa. I should like to add that as a Pan- African ist, all of Africa is home to me and what happens in any part of Africa from the extreme North through the two Congos to the tip of the South, is of concern to me. As a Pan Africanist I shall continue to think globally and, to the extent that I am able, to act locally.
Here is Jah Fari Mann’s Pan African reaction to xenophobia in South Africa where Nigerians and Zimbabweans were being decimated.
Have you seen this: Trump cuts off visas for countries that refuse deported immigrants
In the Sierra Leone political landscape there is a North (APC) and South (SLPP) dichotomy but there is no religion problem. Muslims and Christians, Believers and non-believers live amicably, intermarry, prosper together. N.B. If I so desire , I have a few direct front door and back door channels to anywhere in Sierra Leone, I assure you I can tell you what the oga had for breakfast and I have never backed a loser.
I expect you to maintain the integrity that is inseparable from the Yoruba title of Baba, should you reply to this , so that we may prosper together. Amin.
Salimonu Kadiri
ONYE KWUSI IKE - IF ANYBODY TALKS TOO MUCH
ANYI ACHARA YA AMU - WE CUT OFF HIS PENIS
WERE YA GWORO OGWU - AND USE IT TO MAKE JUJU
OBUGHI ARURU ALA - IT IS NOT AN ABOMINATION
OBU OTU ANYI N'EME - IT IS OUR TRADITION
The above is a song Dialas, the ethnic supremacists who consider themselves as herren-folk (slave masters) in the Southeast Nigeria teach their children to sing every morning.
Intellectual vampires and scoundrels ruining Nigeria want to sustain politics of ethnic division that has kept our nation swooning. They delight in holding the back of the mirror before patriotic Nigerians and yet accuse patriots of inability to see their faces. For decades Dialas advocated for unitary central government in Nigeria and those who opposed concentration of powers at the centre, but opted for regionalism so that each ethnic region in the federation could develop at its own pace were branded fascists advocating the Pakistanisation of Nigeria. Then in 1966, Dialas stole the coup of the revolutionary Majors to gain power at the centre. The first priority of the Dialas was to impose unitary form of government on Nigerians through Decree No.34 of 24 May 1966 which abolished regionalism. Later, the Dialas lost government power at the centre and they somersaulted, not into regionalism but, disintegration of Nigeria as a country. Now, Dialas want to extrapolate their own fascism on the people of the Southwest of Nigeria, but it is like pouring water on the back of the duck which will never stay.
S. Kadiri
Skickat: den 11 september 2017 08:15
Till: USA Africa Dialogue Series
Ämne: Re: USA Africa Dialogue Series - News Release: Military Invasion Of Igboland
The fascist wing of South-West Nigeria Intelligentsia(apology to Obi Nwakamma)!
CAO.
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Cornelius Hamelberg
Baba Kadiri,
Re- Yoruba ethics. Your definition of Baba in Yoruba culture is impressive: ”to be a Bàbá in Yoruba culture is first and foremost to be a protector of inhabitants of one's community especially women, children and strangers.”
The special regard for strangers echoes Judaism’s Torah emphasis on Love the stranger in your midst. It is a mitzvah (one of the 613 commandment) to love the ”ger” (stranger), to love the stranger ( as the Jewish people were also once guests or strangers, in the land of Egypt. You know the rest of the story...
Re – your saintly protestation:” No, Eze Hamelberg, I love my neighbours (and in fact all human beings) as I love myself and there is no good thing on earth that I want for myself that I do not want for all my brethren, including the Igbo”
This takes us back to the Almighty’s injunction in Vayikra 19:18 // Leviticus 19:18 which reads (and it’s the Almighty speaking):
”Do not seek revenge or bear a grudge against anyone among your people, but love your neighbour as yourself. I am the LORD.”
The source of the present confusion could be Jesus, quoting that sentence from the Torah which the Gospels record him as saying,” Love thy neighbour as thyself” although fortuitously and to his credit, Jesus does not add that he Jesus is the Lord – and I presume that protecting the stranger as part of Yoruba ethics probably predates both Torah and Gospels and my Egba brother (same tribe as me) Bishop Ajayi Crowther ‘s missionary activities in Yorubaland being the source of that aspect of Yoruba ethics; because Baba Kadiri, many were the slave wars among and between the Yorubas and that is how many of the Yoruba people – and Igbos too, found themselves on slave ships heading for the New World, lastly to destinations like Cuba and Brazil but by the grace of God, rescued by the British Navy patrols after the slave trade was declared a crime - and so the British navy boarded and steered some ships to liberate those human cargoes comprising Africans from between Angola and Mauritania , in Freetown, Sierra Leone.
Do you remember many years ago, I phoned to ask you the meaning of the word “Swegbe” - the title of one of Emerson's protest raps. That was the second wave of Yoruba immigration via ECOMORG, during the eleven-year civil war in Sierra Leone and the second wave of the importation of Yoruba loan words into the Sierra Leone Krio which originated with the Sierra Leone Creoles ( a very sophisticated language)
The point I want to make here is that it’s all fine and dandy saying that there is no good thing that you want for yourself that you do not want for all your brethren, “ including the Igbo”. But what about what the Igbos want for themselves? Should the Igbos only want that which Baba Kadiri wants for them? If the Igbos through a refredum should decide that they want Freedom – that they want to leave Nigeria , must they chase their dream or should it be much better if the were to succumb to some Baba Kadiri paternlaism which belives that Freedom outside of Nigeria is not good for the Igbos?
This also raises the contextual question, “Who is my neighbour?”
I once asked a Rabbi, a mischievous question, if the Palestinians were not also neighbours who the Israelis should love just as the Israelis love themselves and just as Baba Kadiri loves the Igbos?
Remember, Jesus’ Sermon on the Mount concludes with this last question : “And if you greet only your brothers, what are you doing more than others? Do not even Gentiles do the same?” and his ultimate advice: “Be perfect, therefore, as your Heavenly Father is perfect.”
In Chapter Six of his “A Rabbi talks with Jesus” Jacob Neusner’s perspective on Jesus’ Sermon on the Mount , concludes with the observation that the Almighty requested that His people be holy, not that they be “perfect”
I leave you with Commander-in-Chief’s Egba Ijesha Ibadan
SincerelyYours,
Cornelius Hamelberg
Baba Kadiri,
Re- Yoruba ethics. Your definition of Baba in Yoruba culture is impressive: ”to be a Bàbá in Yoruba culture is first and foremost to be a protector of inhabitants of one's community especially women, children and strangers.”
The special regard for strangers echoes Judaism’s Torah emphasis on Love the stranger in your midst. It is a mitzvah (one of the 613 commandment) to love the ”ger” (stranger), to love the stranger ( as the Jewish people were also once guests or strangers, in the land of Egypt. You know the rest of the story...
Re – your saintly protestation:” No, Eze Hamelberg, I love my neighbours (and in fact all human beings) as I love myself and there is no good thing on earth that I want for myself that I do not want for all my brethren, including the Igbo”
This takes us back to the Almighty’s injunction in Vayikra 19:18 // Leviticus 19:18 which reads (and it’s the Almighty speaking):
”Do not seek revenge or bear a grudge against anyone among your people, but love your neighbour as yourself. I am the LORD.”
The source of the present confusion could be Jesus quoting that sentence from the Torah which the Gospels record him as saying,” Love thy neighbour as thyself” although fortuitously and to his credit, Jesus does not add that he Jesus is the Lord – and I presume that protecting the stranger as part of Yoruba ethics probably predates both Torah and Gospels and my Egba brother (same tribe as me) Bishop Ajayi Crowther ‘s missionary activities in Yorubaland being the source of that aspect of Yoruba ethics; because Baba Kadiri, many were the slave wars among and between the Yorubas and that is how many of the Yoruba people – and Igbos too, found themselves on slave ships heading for the New World, lastly to destinations like Cuba and Brazil but by the grace of God, rescued by the British Navy patrols after the slave trade was declared a crime - and so the British navy boarded and steered some ships to liberate those human cargoes comprising Africans from between Angola and Mauritania , in Freetown, Sierra Leone.
Do you remember many years ago, I phoned to ask you the meaning of the word “Swegbe” - the title of one of Emerson's protest raps. That was the second wave of Yoruba immigration via ECOMORG, during the eleven-year civil war in Sierra Leone and the second wave of the importation of Yoruba loan words into the Sierra Leone Krio which originated with the Sierra Leone Creoles ( a very sophisticated language)
The point I want to make here is that it’s all fine and dandy saying that there is no good thing that you want for yourself that you do not want for all your brethren, “including the Igbo”, but what about what the Igbos want for themselves? Should the Igbos only want that which Baba Kadiri wants for them? If the Igbos through a referendum should decide that they want Freedom – that they want to leave Nigeria , must they chase their dream or should it be much better if they were to succumb to some Baba Kadiri paternalism which believes that Freedom outside of Nigeria is not good for the Igbos?
This also raises the contextual question, “Who is my neighbour?”
I once asked a Rabbi, a mischievous question, if the Palestinians were not also neighbours who the Israelis should love just as the Israelis love themselves and just as Baba Kadiri loves the Igbos?
Remember, Jesus’ Sermon on the Mount concludes with this last question : “And if you greet only your brothers, what are you doing more than others? Do not even Gentiles do the same?” and his ultimate advice: “Be perfect, therefore, as your Heavenly Father is perfect.”
In Chapter Six of his “A Rabbi talks with Jesus” Jacob Neusner’s perspective on Jesus’ Sermon on the Mount concludes with the observation that the Almighty requested that His people be holy, not that they be “perfect”
I leave you with Commander-in-Chief’s Egba Ijesha Ibadan
SincerelyYours,
Cornelius
On Wednesday, 13 September 2017 21:32:54 UTC+2, ogunlakaiye wrote:
ugwuanyi Lawrence
Chidi Anthony Opara
Haven't you yet noticed that many of us here ignore certain persons?
CAO.
Salimonu Kadiri
Eze Rabbi Hamelberg!! Normal person talks in logical association; that is to say, one point leads to another point; there is no scattering of points to confuse listeners. As if psychotic, your talk often lacks logical association as you muddle and mix up issues. You asked me where you have proposed the termination of my life on the ground of what I have said in my posts in this forum. Here follows excerpts from your post of 11 September 2017.
Referring to me you wrote, "WITHOUT FREEDOM OF SPEECH, YOU WON'T BE ABLE OR FREE TO SAY SOME OF THE THINGS YOU SAY IN THIS FORUM AND GET AWAY WITH IT. YOU KNOW THAT UNDER SOME KINDS OF MILITARY RULE, YOU COULD HAVE BEEN HANGED LIKE KEN SARO-WIWA OR FACED THE FIRING SQUARD MORE THAN ONCE, BEFORE WHICH HANGING - GOD FORBID - WE WOULD HAVE HEARD BABA KADIRI BEAT HIS CHEST AND PROCLAIM THE NATHAN HALE, 'I ONLY REGRET THAT I HAVE BUT ONE LIFE TO LOSE FOR MY COUNTRY!' OR BE GUNNED DOWN IN BROAD DAYLIGHT IN OWERRI OR LIKE DELE GIWA OPEN A PARCEL THAT EXPLODES IN YOUR FACE." Isn't it very clear that you adjudged me qualified for Ken Saro-Wiwa and Dele Giwa's treatment because of what I say in this forum?
Every man gotta right to decide his own destiny; and in this judgement there is no partiality; Or for merely saying Biafra must be free - Cornelius Hamelberg, 11 September 2017. You continued that those agitating for the freedom of Biafra would be, "GUNNED DOWN IN COLD BLOOD BEAUSE IT IS 'UNCONSTITUTIONAL' OR BECAUSE SUCH FREEDOM IS 'UNNEGOTIABLE' ACCORDING TO PRESIDENT BUHARI, BECAUSE OF AN OLD LUGARDIAN DECREE THAT IMPOSED AFRICAN UNITY ON NIGERIA, ON YOU AND HIM." Having forgotten that you wrote those words, you now turn around to ask me, "COULD YOU STOP PUTTING WORDS IN MY MOUTH?" Attempting to cover your nakedness with a fig leaf, you exclaimed, "TO HELL WITH LUGARD AND LUGARDISTS! I SAID THAT." Thereafter you asked rhetorically, "BUT I HAVE 'ADVOCATED' BIAFRA'S EXCISE FROM NIGERIA?" The implication of what you wrote is that Buhari intends to gun down Biafran agitators because he believes that their demand is unconstitutional and that the unity of Nigeria is unnegotiable, a stand that you claimed is premised on old Lugardian decree that imposed African unity on Nigeria, on me and Buhari. The last thing I will think of you is that you wrote the above under the influence of alcohol otherwise, there is no other way of advocating the excise of Biafra from Nigeria than what you have consciously expressed in writing as cited above. While not opposing your 'every man gotta right to declare a country', my proposal is, why can't you lead with example to declare a Republic of Hamelberg out of Sierra Leone and let other Sierra Leoneans follow suits to complete the fragmentation with Republics of Johnson, Soukura, Steven, Coker, Williams etc. After you have succeeded in smashing the Sierra Leone egg on the ground to produce many free eggs, other countries in Africa will copy you.
You seemed ruffled by my demand that your charity to disintegrate Nigeria should start from your own country, Sierra Leone. Therefore you resorted to sloganeering that you are a Pan-Africanist. Slogan, Shimon Peres once declared, is like a parfym, it smells good but tastes bad. Your slogan would have been appropriate if you have called yourself Pancake Africanist which implies that you will have to smell and taste it. We all have our dreams about the rosy world we want to live in, but there is great difference between dream and reality. Your supposedly Pan-Africanism does not allow you to travel to any country in Africa without a personal passport that identifies your nation of origin in the world and in most cases you will even be required to obtain a visa. I love globalisation and free movement of people and goods as propagated by the global powers. However, the same global powers that applauded the fall of Berlin walls in 1989 are silent when walls that are four times higher and ten thousand kilometres longer were erected to alienate Palestine Arabs and a global Führer without moustache is currently planning to erect a gigantic wall of immense dimension to alienate Mexicans. Regardless of your Pan-Africanist ideology, you will need a visa to enter Nigeria today unless you possess ECOWA's passport and if Nigeria is fragmented to many countries you will need many entry visas to all the emerging countries out of Nigeria.
The impending military exercise, Egwu Eke II, by the 82 Division of the Nigerian Army in the Southeast has been projected by Nigerian professional ethnic warriors and trouble rousers as an anti-Igbo exercise. Yet, all Igbo Governors of the Southeast had
on many occasions in the past collaborated with the same Army to carry out military exercises for reasons similar to the impending one without anyone raising eye brows. About four years ago, 12 September 2013, the then
Governor of Abia State, Theodore Orji, expressed gratitude to the Nigerian
Army for collaborating with the State Government in eradicating kidnapping and criminal activities in the State.
He said that the State government would continue to co-operate with the military to fight security challenges and described security as key to socio economic development. THE GOVERNOR THANKED THE CHIEF OF ARMY STAFF, LT. GENERAL AZUBUIKE IHEJIRIKA, AND
OTHER HIGH RANKING OFFICERS, FOR THEIR DOGGED FIGHT IN RESCUING ABIA AND THE COUNTRY FROM CRIMINAL ELEMENTS. In his speech, the Chief of Army Staff,
LT. GENERAL AZUBUIKE IHEJIRIKA, REPRESENTED BY THE GENERAL OFFICER COMMANDING, 82 DIVISION OF THE NIGERIAN ARMY, ENUGU, MAJOR GENERAL A.A. OLANIYI, THANKED THE GOVERNOR FOR HIS LOGISTIC SUPPORT TO THE MILITARY AND ASSURE NIGERIANS THAT HIS MEN WERE COMBAT
READY TO WAGE WAR AGAINST ANY CASES OF KIDNAPPING, ARMED ROBBERY AND RELATED CASES IN PARTS OF THE COUNTRY.
http://www.premiumtimesng.com/regional/south-east/144603-governor-orji-commends-nigerian-army-eradicate-kidnapping-abia.html
The differences between 2013 and 2017 are, while Jonathan was President in 2013, Buhari is President now; while Lt. General Ihejirika was Chief of Army Staff in 2013, Lt. General Buratai is now Chief of Army Staff; while Theodore Orji was Governor of Abia State in 2013, Dr. Okezie Ikpeazu is now PDP Governor of Abia State; and while the military exercise in 2013 was motivated mainly by the surging incidents of armed robbery and kidnapping, secessionist agitation has been added to the purpose of the exercise in 2017. So, where is Buhari wrong in this? If the impending military exercise is invasion, why are the five Governors in the Southeast, that belong to the PDP opposition party against Buhari's government and are Chief Security Officers of their respective state, silent? Rather than condemn he military exercise, the Governor of Abia State, Dr. Okezie Ikpeazu, in declaring a two-day curfew in Abia stated, "The Abia State Government unequivocally states that Abia is a component state of the Federal Republic of Nigeria and subscribes to the supremacy of the constitution of the Federal Republic of Nigeria and all other extant laws." He stressed that the government recognizes the constitutional right to the freedom of movement for all Nigerians, BUT OBJECTS TO THE INFLUX OF PEOPLE INTO ABIA STATE FOR PURPOSES OF UNSETTLING THE ENDURING PEACE IN THE STATE, AND ADDED THAT ABIA STATE WILL CO-OPERATE WITH SECURITY AGENCIES TO MAINTAIN THE RULE OF LAW AND ORDER.
If Buhari rescues a child from drowning, ethnic warriors will say Buhari kidnapped a child. Instead of ethnic agitation, Nigerians should agitate, that Buhari, National Assembly members and other high ranking government officials should make public their declaration of assets; declare Nigerian owners of oil blocs and what qualified them to own them; set up a special tribunal to try cases of corruption in Nigeria and stop importation of generators and forbid their use in the country with immediate effect.
Finally, in the Nigerian civil war many innocent lives were lost. For me, it was a war that should not have taken place. Nigerian masses, including poor me, were powerless to stop the madness. However, in the annal of warfare, Nigeria is the only country in the world that had voluntarily invited International Observer Team to trail the back of her soldiers at the war front and to report on their conducts in prosecuting the war. If you have forgotten, I will remind you that the International Observer Team were drawn from the United Nations, Organisation of African Unity (OAU as it was then known) Canada, Britain, Poland and Sweden. They wrote volumes of reports both collectively and individually, that exonerated Nigeria from the accusation of committing genocide against the Igbo. Their final report dated 12 February 1970 contained the following, "There was no evidence of genocide - intentional or planned systematic and wanton destruction of civilian lives or property - in the war zone. Continued accusations of intended genocide can only be interpreted as malicious disregard of the authenticated facts. The conduct of the Federal Military Government forces was as good as that of any forces during and after a war." In his book on the civil war in Spain titled, Homage to Catalonia, George Orwell observed, "ONE OF THE MOST HORRIBLE FEATURES OF WAR IS THAT ALL THE WAR PROPAGANDA, ALL THE SCREAMING LIES AND HATRED COME INVARIABLY FROM PEOPLE WHO ARE NOT FIGHTING (p. 67)." Many who are talking about genocide against the Igbo during the civil war today were either not born then or did not partake in fighting. Therefore my dear Eze Rabbi Hamelberg, I cannot shed tears for a genocide that never occurred. I am not like you, a dog, that will yap and wag tail to a beloved person even when the beloved is a criminal.
S. Kadiri
Cornelius Hamelberg
Baba Kadiri,
I was only joking about smoking you out. I’m going to ignore the dog and the baboon this time, but but the next time,
I’m going to drown you in the lagoon and by that I mean that like Ali
Float like a
butterfly, sting like a bee. The hands can't hit what the eyes can't
see
But I’m going to hit you so hard you will know that I am not Eze or Obi…
Mood I’m in, I just watched Stephen Sackur interviewing Howard Jacobson on BBC Hardtalk and smiled when he confessed to his reverence for the literary classics as inhibiting the outlet of his own creative energies. Immediately after which I found myself here reading Baba Kadiri’s latest. I feel honoured that it is a sharp reprimand of his acolyte Cornelius.
Given this freedom of speech - even the freedom to be stupid and IQ-deficient that I accord myself, I am glad that I am not your mentor. As you say, you can’t understand somebody who is talking through his ass, and I quite agree with you, if I may say so, agree with every single wordy thing that you have just said or could say about me, even if you were speaking in tongues in your standard Yoruba dialect or in modern Nigerian pidgin English. Who be me? Indeed, it’s just as you say: A ”normal person” such as Baba Kadiri, ”talks in logical association; that is to say, one point leads to another point; there is no scattering of points to confuse listeners” - and I can assure you that you have never confused me. I am not easily confused. Sometime I stand in front of a magnificent work of art – Picasso – Rembrandt, Klee, some classical music, some jazz, some poetry such as by e.g. the very allusive Eliot, even re-reading Ulysses five decades later, or in front of what a man usually stands in front of, not confused but often spellbound or dumbfounded. When it comes to the language of public discussions such as in this forum, I suppose that George Orwell’s directness and simplicity could be an ideal - even if what he says could also raise interminable questionnaires, squabbles and some babble from the likes of Baba Kadiri, some baby babble
Indeed, it’s exactly as you say, “as if psychotic” My “talk often lacks logical association”as I “muddle and mix up issues.” Quite right. Perhaps you would like me to undergo some psychiatric treatment, to straighten me out , so that I can understand myself and thereby understand you better? Like humour, the normalcy to which you would like to adjust me is so culture-dependent that, as someone once put it, if the Buddha were to be your psychiatrist, by the end of the treatment you the end product would probably come out of your psychosis as an enlightened Baba, instead of trying to drag me down into the same hole that you are in.
Qul Huwallahu ahad
Unfortunately, I can neither read/ misread nor understand for you. As to the asethetics, in the ranks of your idols, the Benin Bronzes, Oshogbo, and for language purity, Daniel Olorunfẹmi Fagunwa, Wole Soyinka, Tai Solarin, Chief Gani Fawehinmi, Chief Obafemi Awolowo etc, you can take your pick...
When it comes to “logic” let me paraphrase what I said in that first excerpt you tossed at me (I am reminded of Norman Mailer who said that he would like to write a special column for slow readers) concisely, I meant the following:
You should thank your lucky stars that here in this forum, the word is free; under a military dictatorship the word is usually not free and that’s why Ken Saro-Wira and Dele Giwa did not live to tell the tale.
You may think that I am mad - please feel free to think and believe so, but I am not mad and that's why I have no intention of going through a line-by-line comprehension exercise with you, about what I said or did not say. Please feel free to do yourself a favour and try to understand the rest of what I said in the same spirit as my short paraphrase above - to understand what somebody else says to you as a normal person should understand. I don’t like dictatorships, especially not the ones that tell me how to think, how to speak – maybe even how to sing and above all what to write and how to write. I’m not here to start explaining every sentence that I wrote. Feel free to understand anything any way you choose. You may continue with your ping-pong discussions with your interlocutors instead of wasting your precious time with the likes of me since there’s no compelling reason or reasons for me to engage you further. Truly, I am not Nigerian and ironically, for the time being I have much more engaging matters to attend to.
And there you have it. Rest in peace
Cornelius
https://www.amazon.com/Fanon-Modern-masters-David-Caute/dp/0002112760
https://www.abebooks.com/9780006338338/Marx-Modern-Masters-McLellan-David-000633833X/plp
https://www.amazon.com/Levi-Strauss-Modern-Masters-Edmund-Leach/dp/0006322557
...
Salimonu Kadiri
Professor Lawrence Ugwuanyi,
Pardon me for belated response to your diatribe beneath.
You quoted me correctly but your comments diverged completely from the contents of what you excerpted. You wrote, "... THE YOUNG OFFICERS THAT STAGED THE COUP (AND WHO WERE PEOPLE BEYOND ONE ETHNIC GROUP - A COUP THAT ALSO TOOK THE LIFE OF A HIGH RANKING MILITARY IGBO OFFICER) HAD NO CONNECTION WHATSOEVER WITH GENERAL IRONSI AND THAT THE 1966 COUP CANNOT BE BRANDED IGBO COUP - DEFINED AS COUP DONE BY IGBO FOR THE IGBO."
If I were not shy, I would have said that you, a whole Professor, did not understand what you read in my post. Respectfully yours, what you have done is called ignoratio elenchi in Latin which in English means an ignorance of proof, defined as a deliberate act of evading the real issues and drawing conclusions that are irrelevant and completely at variance with the subject matter. In order to illuminate your ignorance of proof, I hereby reproduce what I wrote that you pretended to be commenting about : Then in 1966, Dialas stole the coup of the revolutionary Majors to gain power at the centre. The first priority of the Dialas was to impose unitary form of government on Nigerians through Decree No. 34 of 24 May 1966 which abolished regionalism. Later the Dialas lost government power at the centre, and they somersaulted, not into regionalism but, disintegration of Nigeria as a country.
There is no smoke without fire. The fire was ignited by your pal, Chidi Anthony Opara, when he branded those he 'termed Southwest Nigeria intelligentsia' he disagreed with as fascists. My response to him was to demonstrate that Dialas of the Southeast are the real fascists and you, as an Igbo, should know that all South-Easterners are not Dialas. Traditionally and culturally, the Southeast is composed of the minority Diala (Slave Masters) and majority, Osu (Slaves).
Now, let me respond to your diversionary comment. Contrary to your claim, I did not assert that the Majors staged Igbo coup, rather, I stated that their coup was stolen by the Dialas and I did not mention the Igbo. Although Dialas are Igbo, just like Osu, stealing of the Majors' coup by Dialas would not make the coup theft of 1966 a theft by all Igbo. You wrote that the young officers that staged the coup were beyond one ethnic group. Personally, I am not interested in the ethnic composition of the planners of the coup but their political ideology. Since you are interested in the ethnic composition of the coup planners of January 15, 1966, I hereby provide you a list of their names and the roll that each of them played in the coup.
Major Patrick Chukwuma Nzeogwu led the coup in the then capital of Northern Region, Kaduna. He was assisted by Major Timothy Onwuatuegwu and Captains Ben Gbulie and Goddy Ude. Major Nzeogwu killed the Premier of the North Ahmadu Bello and two of his wives, while Major Onwuatuegwu killed Brigadier Samuel Adesujo Ademulegun as well as his eight months pregnant wife in their bedroom. He also killed Colonel Ralph Shodeinde and wounded his wife fatally in their bedroom. Captain Gbulie led troops to take command of strategic buildings in Kaduna. Thursday night, 13 January 1966, Captain Goddy Ude was issued with a .38-calibre pistol and ample live ammunition in Kaduna with instruction to proceed by road to Kano. He was to kill the commander of the 5th Battalion Kano, Lieutenant Colonel Chukwuemeka Odumegwu Ojukwu but on getting there, Goddy Ude turned pacifist and did not want bloodshed, understandable, of a fellow Igbo man.
In Lagos, the capital and seat of government at that time, Major Emmanuel Ifeajuna led the coup in the South. He was assisted by Majors Adewale Ademoyega, Humprey Chukwuka, Don Okafor, Chris Anuforo, John Obienu, Chude Sokei as well as Captains Emmanuel Nwora Nwobosi, Ogbo Oji, and G.S. Adeleke.
Major Ifeajuna captured Prime Minister Balewa and Finance Minister Okotie-Eboh. While he killed Balewa, Major Anuforo killed Okotie-Eboh. Major Don Okafor was assigned to kill Brigadier Maimalari but exchange of fire between Okafor's men and the guards around Brigadier Zakariya Maimalari's house provided him the opportunity to escape through the backdoor. While Maimalari was walking towards Doddan Barracks, he saw Major Ifeajuna and beckoned to him to stop. Ifeajuna stepped out of his car and gunned him dead. Major Anuforo killed Lieutenant Colonels Arthur Chinyelu Unegbe and Arbogo Largema. Major Humphrey Chukwuka killed Lieutenant Colonel James Yakubu Palm and Colonel Kuru Mohammed. Major John Obienu was assigned the duty of coming to Lagos with armoured cars to neutralise the 2nd Battalion, Ikeja. He reneged and linked up with Ironsi who had infiltrated the coup plotters with his men and had monitored their movements all along. Captain Emmanuel Nwora Nwobosi killed the Premier of Western Region Samuel Ladoke Akintola. Major Adewale Ademoyega was to lead and assign troops to occupy and control all strategic locations in the Federal Capital, such as Police Headquarters, Post and Telecomunication, Telephone Exchange, Parliament Building and Nigerian Broadcasting Corporation. He was to be assisted by Captain Ogbo Oji. Captain G.S. Adeleke was to provide arms and ammunition.
In Enugu, Major Chude Sokei was assigned the duty to kill Premier of the East, Michael Okpara, and Premier of the Midwest, Dennis Osadebay. He was to be assisted by Lieutenant Jerome Oguchi. Both Sokei and Oguchi turned pacifists that did not want bloodshed.
If according to your insinuation, the coup of January 15, 1966 was not an Igbo coup mainly because one high ranking Igbo military officer was among the eight non-Igbo military officer killed in the coup, what then is your insinuation that no single Igbo politician was among the politicians killed? What motivated the killings of Balewa (An Hausa and Federal Prime Minister), Okotie-Eboh (an Uhrobo and Federal Minister of Finance), Ahmadu Bello (Premier of the North), Samuel Akintola (Premier of the West) but not the Igbo Federal Acting President - Nwafor Orizu, the Igbo Premier of the East - Michael Okpara and the Igbo Premier of Midwest - Dennis Osadebay? Taken into consideration that the Igbo led NCNC party had been in a coalition government at the federal level with the Hausa led NPC party since 1960 up till January 15, 1966, what political crime did Balewa, Ahmadu Bello, Akintola and Okotie-Eboh (all non-Igbo) commit that warranted their being killed but not Okpara, Osadebay and Nwafor Orizu (all Igbo)? The December 1964 federal elections were contested by two main opposing political alliances, NNA - comprising of NPC and NNDP, and UPGA - comprising of NCNC, AG, NEPU and UMBC. NNA was declared the winner of the elections which UPGA dominated Igbo NCNC refused to accept. After many noises, the NCNC abandoned its allies, AG, NEPU and UMBC, in UPGA to join the federal national government led by Balewa's NNA in 1965. If the Igbo led NCNC had stayed in opposition with its allies in UPGA after the December 1964 federal elections one would, probably, have understood why they were exonerated from the political and economic crimes that warranted the coup and killings of January 1966.
Your claim that the young officers that staged the coup of 15 January 1966 had no connection whatsoever with General Ironsi is half true. Ironsi had foreknowledge of the coup through Majors Don Okafor, John Obienu and Captain Ogbo Oji. Ironsi himself was among the officers listed to be killed by the revolutionary Majors. Why he escaped being killed was revealed, in Ben Gbulie's Book, Nigeria's Five Majors thus, "But by far the thickest wedge cast between the coup executors and success was the ugly element of treachery that manifested itself in the course of the nocturnal operation. To begin with, both Major Don Okafor and captain Ogbo Oji*had taken a stand against any step that might embody the killing of Ironsi. Ben Gbulie noted in asterisk that Ogbo Oji was a native of Umuahia in the Eastern Region, and a kinsman of Ironsi's (p. 125-126)." That explained why General Ironsi was not at home when Major Humphrey Chukwuka arrived there with his troop to kill him. Ironsi was already at Ikeja 2nd Battalion, the only infantry in Lagos at that time, where he linked up with Major John Obienu who was entrusted with the task of supporting the revolutionary Majors with armoured cars from Abeokuta Garrison. Ben Gbulie noted, "Moreover, it turned out that at that very crucial stage of the operation, .... Major John Obienu had, for some insane reason, turned traitor; and that he was, in fact, a down-right insincere coward. His failure to honour his pledge and turn up that night with his armoured cars was the one deciding act that led ultimately to the collapse of the Lagos operation - a calamitous act of sabotage that by depriving our colleagues of the much-needed fire-power WITH WHICH TO CRUSH IRONSI'S COUNTER-REVOLUTION, FINALLY DROVE A NAIL INTO THE COFFIN OF OUR OBJECTIVE (p. 126)." Captain Ben Gbulie lamented over the fact that Major John Obienu who had attended all meetings of the planned coup with the revolutionary Majors had joined forces with the enemies of the revolution and was actively aiding and abetting them.
The revolutionary Majors did not plan Igbo coup but Ironsi infiltrators that consented only to killing non-Igbo soldiers and civilians and the way Ironsi stole the coup of the Majors turned it to an ethnic coup. It is a fact that, at 12:30 PM, on January 15, 1966, in a broadcast in the name of the Supreme Council of the Revolution of Nigerian Armed Forces, on Radio Kaduna, Major Patrick Chukwuma Nzeogwu declared the suspension of the Constitution and dissolution of the regional government and elected assembly. He listed embezzlement, bribery and corruption among offences that qualified one for death sentence. At 14:30:00 hours, Lagos Radio under the control of Ironsi soldiers announced that dissident soldiers had mutinied and kidnapped the Prime Minister and the Finance Minister. The radio announcement stated further that the General Officer Commanding (GOC), Ironsi, and a vast majority of the Nigerian Army were loyal to the federal government and assured the nation that the mutiny would soon be brought to an end. Next day, at 23:50:00 hours the acting President announced that power had been transferred to the Army and called upon Ironsi to address the nation. It has since been revealed that document for the transfer of power to Ironsi was signed by Zanar Bukar Dipcharima of the NNA/NPC, while Kingsley Ozumba Mbadiwe signed on behalf of NCNC. The Republican Constitution of 1964 did not permit anyone to transfer power to the Armed Forces. The President could only dissolve Parliament on the advice of the Prime Minister. In case of death or incapacitation of the Prime Minister, Parliament should meet to elect a new Prime Minister among the Party that controlled majority members in the House. Knowing that if the Parliament was allowed to meet under the security of the Army that had claimed to be loyal to the constitution, Dipcharima would certainly be elected the new Prime Minister to replace Balewa that was presumed killed, the Acting President, Nwafor Orizu, vowed not to assent to the election of a new Prime Minister, a refusal which the constitution did not grant him. Despite the fact that Ironsi seized power by tacitly telling Dipcharima that he could not guarantee the loyalty of the Army to his government unless power was handed over to him, First of April Nigerian intellectuals continue till date to claim that Ironsi quelled the Major's coup. He stole the coup of the Majors and supplanted them. It is just like an Inspector of Police claiming to have quelled robbers' attempt to seize a house from a Landlord and the Inspector of Police, after declaring to the Landlord that he could not guarantee the safety of the house from robbers coming back, eventually obtains a signed document from the Landlord transferring the ownership of the house to him. Everyday is First of April for some Nigerian Intellectuals in which they are either being fooled or fooling others.
I had expected a Professor like you to correct me if the Igbo led NCNC had not advocated unitary form of government for Nigeria since inception in 1943. You should have contradicted me that Major General Aguiyi Ironsi did not promulgate Decree No. 34 of 24 May 1966, in accordance with the recommendation of his one-man commission of enquiry on unitary form of government headed by Francis Nwokedi, that abolished regions. You should have contradicted me that Decree No. 34 of 24 May 1966 did not constitute the implementation of the NCNC quest, since 1943, for centralisation of power in Nigeria. Instead, you responded that I am not properly educated because of my asserted views. In Nigerian daily experiences, properly educated Nigerian Professors are not able, to generate and distribute electricity (they generate and distribute darkness), to refine crude oil (they export crude oil and import fuel and even get money for fuel subsidy without importing fuel), to mine iron ores at Ajaokuta and work them into metals, to construct and maintain motor-able roads etc. With those demonstrated popular qualities of properly educated Nigerian Professors, I cannot but thank my Creator for not being properly educated and for not being a Professor.
S. Kadiri
Skickat: den 15 september 2017 10:15
Till: Usaafricadialogue
Ämne: Re: SV: USA Africa Dialogue Series - News Release: Military Invasion Of Igboland
Salimonu Kadiri
Eze Rabbi Hamelberg!,
In a presumed forum of jokers, clowns and intellectual masturbators, you can wish a person the fate of Ken Saro-Wiwa and Dele Giwa for exercising his freedom of expression and call your wish, a joke. If you suggest that the best way to bleach a cloth white is to soak it in red oil and I honestly consider your suggestion mad, what does it matter if you respond that you are only joking and end your response by wishing me to 'rest in peace' when I am still living? Do you say 'rest in peace' to the living in the Republic of Hamelberg? I wish you a long life.
S.Kadiri.
Till: USA Africa Dialogue Series
Ämne: Re: USA Africa Dialogue Series - News Release: Military Invasion Of Igboland
Baba Kadiri,
I was only joking about smoking you out. I’m going to ignore the dog and the baboon this time, but but the next time,
I’m going to drown you in the lagoon and by that I mean that like Ali
Float like a butterfly, sting like a bee. The hands can't hit what the eyes can't see
But I’m going to hit you so hard you will know that I am not Eze or Obi…
Mood I’m in, I just watched Stephen Sackur interviewing Howard Jacobson on BBC Hardtalk and smiled when he confessed to his reverence for the literary classics as inhibiting the outlet of his own creative energies. Immediately after which I found myself here reading Baba Kadiri’s latest. I feel honoured that it is a sharp reprimand of his acolyte Cornelius.
Given this freedom of speech - even the freedom to be stupid and IQ-deficient that I accord myself, I am glad that I am not your mentor. As you say, you can’t understand somebody who is talking through his ass, and I quite agree with you, if I may say so, agree with every single wordy thing that you have just said or could say about me, even if you were speaking in tongues in your standard Yoruba dialect or in modern Nigerian pidgin English. Who be me? Indeed, it’s just as you say: A ”normal person” such as Baba Kadiri, ”talks in logical association; that is to say, one point leads to another point; there is no scattering of points to confuse listeners” - and I can assure you that you have never confused me. I am not easily confused. Sometime I stand in front of a magnificent work of art – Picasso – Rembrandt, Klee, some classical music, some jazz, some poetry such as by e.g. the very allusive Eliot, even re-reading Ulysses five decades later, or in front of what a man usually stands in front of, not confused but often spellbound or dumbfounded. When it comes to the language of public discussions such as in this forum, I suppose that George Orwell’s directness and simplicity could be an ideal - even if what he says could also raise interminable questionnaires, squabbles and some babble from the likes of Baba Kadiri, some baby babble
Indeed, it’s exactly as you say, “as if psychotic” My “talk often lacks logical association”as I “muddle and mix up issues.” Quite right. Perhaps you would like me to undergo some psychiatric treatment, to straighten me out , so that I can understand myself and thereby understand you better? Like humour, the normalcy to which you would like to adjust me is so culture-dependent that, as someone once put it, if the Buddha were to be your psychiatrist, by the end of the treatment you the end product would probably come out of your psychosis as an enlightened Baba, instead of trying to drag me down into the same hole that you are in.
Qul Huwallahu ahad
Unfortunately, I can neither read/ misread nor understand for you. As to the asethetics, in the ranks of your idols, the Benin Bronzes, Oshogbo, and for language purity, Daniel Olorunfẹmi Fagunwa, Wole Soyinka, Tai Solarin, Chief Gani Fawehinmi, Chief Obafemi Awolowo etc, you can take your pick...
When it comes to “logic” let me paraphrase what I said in that first excerpt you tossed at me (I am reminded of Norman Mailer who said that he would like to write a special column for slow readers) concisely, I meant the following:
You should thank your lucky stars that here in this forum, the word is free; under a military dictatorship the word is usually not free and that’s why Ken Saro-Wira and Dele Giwa did not live to tell the tale.
You may think that I am mad - please feel free to think and believe so, but I am not mad and that's why I have no intention of going through a line-by-line comprehension exercise with you, about what I said or did not say. Please feel free to do yourself a favour and try to understand the rest of what I said in the same spirit as my short paraphrase above - to understand what somebody else says to you as a normal person should understand. I don’t like dictatorships, especially not the ones that tell me how to think, how to speak – maybe even how to sing and above all what to write and how to write. I’m not here to start explaining every sentence that I wrote. Feel free to understand anything any way you choose. You may continue with your ping-pong discussions with your interlocutors instead of wasting your precious time with the likes of me since there’s no compelling reason or reasons for me to engage you further. Truly, I am not Nigerian and ironically, for the time being I have much more engaging matters to attend to.
And there you have it. Rest in peace
Cornelius
https://www.amazon.com/Fanon-Modern-masters-David-Caute/dp/0002112760
Salimonu Kadiri
In the anal of human history, there have been fools who despised facts and ignored truths to their own perils. As for me no post in this forum, on which I have something tangible to contribute will be ignored as long as I have time.
S. Kadiri
Till: USA Africa Dialogue Series
Haven't you yet noticed that many of us here ignore certain persons?
CAO.
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Cornelius Hamelberg
Eze knows that you have no respect no
Sense of humour, but if you can
You may laugh if you like
In derision
Bitter Old Negro that you are
Baba S. Kadiri
Once again I exercise the quality of mercy: I have not hit you yet, although you are stubbornly asking for it. This is not the Nigeria-Biafra War between you and me, because in the first place, I am not a Nigerian, although perhaps more an oppressed Biafran at heart, and not shuffering and shmiling so please feel free to believe whatever you think, some kind of make-belief, hopeful and prayerful to your Ogun that you are going to escape the first punch followed by a dazzling series of left hooks and right uppercuts by flying away, like a naughty boy chicken wings airborne on your Federal military parachute,as you did the last time, flying safely back to base, landing safely in your dream, on some greener pasture on your home turf in your beloved neck of the woods / forest/ jungle in Ondo.
Obviously, you haven’t bitten the dust yet and that’s why you still have the gall to read and not understand, still pompous and egotistical here on earth and not six feet down, a zillion miles away from the other dimension, a much hotter place said to be fuelled by stones and the bones of men, like you still so full of themselves, in your case, maybe because the title “Baba” is making you giddy and that’s why with all lack of humility, you will never understand what you think that you understand.
It may be an unconscious death wish, to eat and not digest, to toil and not to rest. You don’t even understand a joke when you stumble and strain your brain over one and that’s why it’s impossible for you to smile for the little while we still have left in your vale of tears. I haven’t hit you yet but when I do - like Ali - Float like a butterfly, sting like a bee, the hands can't hit what the eyes can't see – and the whole of this forum is my witness - your mixture of dog and baboon will drown in a tear-filled lagoon, tear-filled I said , not blood-filled - because I’m going to hit you so hard that you are going to go out, like a NEPA light - into the big bad night – and wake up crying and enlightened - if you wake up and that is when it will finally dawn on thee that I am neither Eze nor Obi…
In the meantime, jokers, clowns, masturbators, feel exalted, misconstruing and falsifying what I said. Where did I say and by which logical inference or deduction did you arrive at the miss-understanding that I wish or wished or prayed that my own Baba Kadiri should share the same fate as Ken Saro-Wiwa or Dele Giwa. What I said was that the smoking you out was a joke - but you are such an illiterate literalist that I wonder how you read, enjoy and digest the phantasmagoria of people like Amos Tutuola or your favourite incarnation, Daniel Olorunfẹmi Fagunwa , not to mention the Divine poetry of the Torah – such as this coming Sabbath’s prophetic Torah portion Haazinu in which we find the Song of Moses
What I actually said was “I knew that I was going to smoke you out of hibernation or temporary retirement from the forum, with just one word of pro-Biafra or pro-Igbo sentiment. You are true to form. I am not disappointed.” In fact that's why you are still here, dribbling like Diego Maradona and not like Jay Jay Okocha (I wonder how you would feel, if he or any EZE asked for the hand of your beautiful daughter. Of course, I suppose it would depend on which EZE would have the temerity/ “ testicular fortitude” to thus importune you? )
Now the literalist that you, and utterly devoid of a sense of humour your response that was that you had already come out of hiding - your words : “After my short pause from the forum, my first post was on the 6th of September in which I commented on Chidi's post on Kenya's Supreme Court's cancellation of Kenya's Presidential election and ordering new election within 60 days. Thus, my re-entry into the forum's discussion had nothing to do with your make-believe disseminated smoke or your flatteries with the Igbo/Biafrans. No, Eze Hamelberg, I love my neighbours (and in fact all human beings) as I love myself and there is no good thing on earth that I want for myself that I do not want for all my brethren, including the Igbo. “
After which you slipped back into voluntary hibernation and started rearing you head again and still haven’t stopped because the subject on the table is BIAFRA and , understandably, the people that you claim to love as much as you love yourself, THE IGBO PEOPLE !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
By the way BTW - that’s the real Baba in your last response to Professor Lawrence Ugwuanyi - succinctly deal with the matters in which he is a confirmed encyclopedia , although I for one don’t appreciate the distinctions you make among and between people, your Masters and slaves mentality. Which one are you exactly?
Guess who’s here ( Click on images)
Think positive! How could I ever bear ill-will towards you or my Igbo Brethren?
To be read and understood by a Muslim such as you : Surah al Maida Ayat 8
I am resting in peace and waiting until the 26th of October.
Sincerely,
Cornelius
ugwuanyi Lawrence
I got a number of follow-ups to my comments on a clear case of prejudice and bias wearing the gown of truth was published here some days ago but work and duty have affected my desire for some comments on the comments. I am glad I now can.
First, let me acknowledge the fact that Kadiri collaborated with one my principal claims that an Igbo army officer was also killed in the coup with your submission that “Major Anuforo killed Lieutenant Colonels Arthur Chinyelu Unegbe”. To other claims made let me provide some response.
Kadiri:“Traditionally and culturally, the Southeast is composed of the minority Diala (Slave Masters) and majority, Osu (Slaves)”.
Ugwuanyi: Diala in Igbo is interpreted to mean Son of the soil. The Igbo term for what Kadirir in his uniformed imagination calls Slave master is Nwa Amu literary meaning “free born”. What is held to be slaves in Igbo context is miles away from this articulation of the idea. Many of the Osu are those dedicated to deities for falling short of one demand or the other from the deity. The predominant feature of the slavery in Igbo context, at least judging from the Igbo world I very well know is discrimination in matters of leadership and marriage.
Kadiri: “Now, let me respond to your diversionary comment. Contrary to your claim, I did not assert that the Majors staged Igbo coup, rather, I stated that their coup was stolen by the Dialas and I did not mention the Igbo”.
Ugwuanyi: Except you are merely figurative here- this is a fearful ignorant assertion. A good number of those who have held political power and influence in Igbo land are believed to have come from the Osu world. Many of them were believed to have sent to school earlier as a form of punishment but it ruined out a blessing in disguise!
Kadiri : “Although Dialas are Igbo, just like Osu, stealing of the Majors' coup by Dialas would not make the coup theft of 1966 a theft by all Igbo”.
Ugwuanyi :Refer to my earlier reply above.
Kadiri : “You wrote that the young officers that staged the coup were beyond one ethnic group. Personally, I am not interested in the ethnic composition of the planners of the coup but their political ideology.
Ugwuanyi: How do I know except my reading your ideas. It does not suggest otherwise at least with the effort to misuse Igbo words to your favour! You might, if you wish do a study of majority of your claims in this forum to see or elect someone else to do and see how far it can be seen to be something different from ethnic sentiments!
Kadiri : “Since you are interested in the ethnic composition of the coup planners of January 15, 1966,Major Patrick Chukwuma Nzeogwu led the coup in the then capital of Northern Region, Kaduna. He was assisted by Major Timothy Onwuatuegwu and Captains Ben Gbulie and Goddy Ude. Major Nzeogwu killed the Premier of the North Ahmadu Bello and two of his wives, while Major Onwuatuegwu killed Brigadier Samuel Adesujo Ademulegun as well as his eight months pregnant wife in their bedroom. He also killed Colonel Ralph Shodeinde and wounded his wife fatally in their bedroom. Captain Gbulie led troops to take command of strategic buildings in Kaduna. Thursday night, 13 January 1966, Captain Goddy Ude was issued with a .38-calibre pistol and ample live ammunition in Kaduna with instruction to proceed by road to Kano. He was to kill the commander of the 5th Battalion Kano, Lieutenant Colonel Chukwuemeka Odumegwu Ojukwu but on getting there, Goddy Ude turned pacifist and did not want bloodshed, understandable, of a fellow Igbo man.
In Lagos, the capital and seat of government at that time, Major Emmanuel Ifeajuna led the coup in the South. He was assisted by Majors Adewale Ademoyega, Humprey Chukwuka, Don Okafor, Chris Anuforo, John Obienu, Chude Sokei as well as Captains Emmanuel Nwora Nwobosi, Ogbo Oji, and G.S. Adeleke.
Major Ifeajuna captured Prime Minister Balewa and Finance Minister Okotie-Eboh. While he killed Balewa, Major Anuforo killed Okotie-Eboh. Major Don Okafor was assigned to kill Brigadier Maimalari but exchange of fire between Okafor's men and the guards around Brigadier Zakariya Maimalari's house provided him the opportunity to escape through the backdoor. While Maimalari was walking towards Doddan Barracks, he saw Major Ifeajuna and beckoned to him to stop. Ifeajuna stepped out of his car and gunned him dead. Major Anuforo killed Lieutenant Colonels Arthur Chinyelu Unegbe and Arbogo Largema. Major Humphrey Chukwuka killed Lieutenant Colonel James Yakubu Palm and Colonel Kuru Mohammed. Major John Obienu was assigned the duty of coming to Lagos with armoured cars to neutralise the 2nd Battalion, Ikeja. He reneged and linked up with Ironsi who had infiltrated the coup plotters with his men and had monitored their movements all along. Captain Emmanuel Nwora Nwobosi killed the Premier of Western Region Samuel Ladoke Akintola. Major Adewale Ademoyega was to lead and assign troops to occupy and control all strategic locations in the Federal Capital, such as Police Headquarters, Post and Telecomunication, Telephone Exchange, Parliament Building and Nigerian Broadcasting Corporation. He was to be assisted by Captain Ogbo Oji. Captain G.S. Adeleke was to provide arms and ammunition.
In Enugu, Major Chude Sokei was assigned the duty to kill Premier of the East, Michael Okpara, and Premier of the Midwest, Dennis Osadebay. He was to be assisted by Lieutenant Jerome Oguchi. Both Sokei and Oguchi turned pacifists that did not want bloodshed.”
Ugwuanyi: This is perhaps the most informative effort you supplied. However I am not sure you are aware that the story about the coup and the war is believed to have been summarily burnt after the war as volunteered by an eminent historian a year ago at a lecture in a Nigerian University. Since this position became a public knowledge, it has become clear to me why any story can make round about the coup and the war. Hopefully historians will further probe this issue and institute intellectual criminal proceedings against this historical evil. Now this does not mean that we should dismiss all available stories about the war but perhaps be curious and scholarly is seeking and sifting the truth about what happened-by at least citing our sources and the collaborations about the sources. In the light of this one would have expected to supply all your sources on this matter. To point an illustration: Compare these two positions you provided:
“In Lagos, the capital and seat of government at that time, Major Emmanuel Ifeajuna led the coup in the South. He was assisted by Majors Adewale Ademoyega, Humprey Chukwuka, Don Okafor, Chris Anuforo, John Obienu, Chude Sokei as well as Captains Emmanuel Nwora Nwobosi, Ogbo Oji, and G.S. Adeleke.”
“In Enugu, Major Chude Sokei was assigned the duty to kill Premier of the East, Michael Okpara, and Premier of the Midwest, Dennis Osadebay. He was to be assisted by Lieutenant Jerome Oguchi. Both Sokei and Oguchi turned pacifists that did not want bloodshed.”
Kadiri:The revolutionary Majors did not plan Igbo coup but Ironsi infiltrators that consented only to killing non-Igbo soldiers and civilians and the way Ironsi stole the coup of the Majors turned it to an ethnic coup.
Ugwuanyi: Who could this Ironsi’s infiltrators be except perhaps the one that is reported aginst his death- as supplied by you. Is it Chukwuka who went to kill him or the one who was in Kano to kill Ojukwu. If they were against the lives of Igbos why would they agree to go for these mission in the first place. How do you balance this with your claim that “Major Anuforo killed Lieutenant Colonels Arthur Chinyelu Unegbe”, both of whom are supposed to be Igbos!
Kadiri :First of April Nigerian intellectuals continue till date to claim that Ironsi quelled the Major's coup. He stole the coup of the Majors and supplanted them.
Ugwuanyi: This is merely re-enforcing a position that is not founded. It is wrong to believe that anyone who got power in Nigeria wanted it! You might refer to the famous phrase “not my will” by then young Gen.Obasanjo with reference to assuming the Head of State in 1976! Without a good knowledge of the antecedents of Gen. Ironsi it is significantly wrong to hold this position. You need to provide more solid facts on Ironsi e.g his personal love for power to hold this view. For example if you had Ironsi’s biography Ironside written by Chuks Iloegbunam and have grounds to support your view from any psycho-analytic narrative on this matter it will make more sense. For now these views are groundless hypothesis!
Kadiri : I had expected a Professor like you to correct me if the Igbo led NCNC had not advocated unitary form of government for Nigeria since inception in 1943. You should have contradicted me that Major General Aguiyi Ironsi did not promulgate Decree No. 34 of 24 May 1966, in accordance with the recommendation of his one-man commission of enquiry on unitary form of government headed by Francis Nwokedi, that abolished regions.
Ugwuanyi:I am afraid that you are aligning Zik’s NCNC with Ironsi .This is may mean that you don’t share the view that the military have a different disposition with Civilians and that even if both are Igbo these are different institutions capable of shaping thought differently.
Kadiri: Instead, you responded that I am not properly educated because of my asserted views.
Ugwuanyi: I had cause to question the education that leads to a thinking that subverts truth and abhors the rigour and pains involved in searching it. The simple answer to this would have been to outline the schools attended in which case you might not be at fault as much as formation received. Assuming that one’s education is heavily ideological-chances are that faults with views canvassed can easily be located-in which case understanding where the person is coming from (interpreted to mean knowledge, ideas and ideals availed) becomes a way of understanding how and why he could hold some views.
Kadiri :In Nigerian daily experiences, properly educated Nigerian Professors are not able, to generate and distribute electricity (they generate and distribute darkness), to refine crude oil (they export crude oil and import fuel and even get money for fuel subsidy without importing fuel), to mine iron ores at Ajaokuta and work them into metals, to construct and maintain motor-able roads etc. With those demonstrated popular qualities of properly educated Nigerian Professors, I cannot but thank my Creator for not being properly educated and for not being a Professor.
Rex Marinus
Lawrence, you're wasting very precious time responding to the rantings of an ignoramus who does not know the meaning of the word "Diala" and its circulation in Igbo land, yet makes really, really laughable claims about the Igbo of whom he knows absolutely nothing about. Igbo sociology is beyond his ken, but he talks of the "Osu" whose meaning and provenance, or even circulation in Igbo society he knows nothing about. It is difficult to teach an individual with the mind of a concrete. All you do is waste your time, and when it hits you that you're talking to a robot, you then sit down and laugh as he makes a jest of himself. I do not know if you have ever read Salimonu Kadiri in any decent, not to talk about distinguished peer-reviewed journal, except on this forum, where he has the right to piss fallacies like an incontinent diabetic. He does not exist. He is a hybrid invention.
His take on Nigeria's military history, especially of the coup of 1966, is automatic; cut and paste, from all kinds of collage and patch-work of conspiracy theories, elaborate fiction, and popular myth, the sort that you pick from shebeens and mama-puts, with which he insults the intelligence of serious scholars of this period, many of whom prefer to stay quiet and watch him dance the "surugede." If you challenge him on one fact, he repeats his fiction ad nauseam, in this circumlocutory fashion that makes any engagement with him a waste of time as you'd soon find out if you continue. There is no point to it, except to measure his small ethnic phallus. He has never read Ifeajuna's unpublished memoir; he never sat down with any of the surviving key participants in that event to talk, or debrief them, nor does he have the capacity for contextual interpretation of the data that has emerged since the use of the drafts of his version of those events to justify a war. Now the Chude Sokei that he talks about was not in Nigeria on January 15, for instance. He was in India. This mishmash of fallacies makes Kadiri's claims absolutely laughable. It is not rooted in fact. All he has done is to tease out useful, appliable narrative from just two published sources, Gbulie's The Five Majors and Ademoyega's Why We struck, and a few popular assertions in the popular press. If you have read any of these two books, you'd see how Kadiri slants his sources, and beyond that he has very little facts.
As Deputy Permanent Secretary in the Foreign Ministry in charge of International intelligence in 1966, for instance, Leslie Harriman had access to copies of the debriefing of the soldiers involved in the coup; so did Stanley Wey as Chief Secretary; and somewhere still in the GCM Onyiuke papers, are original copies of these debriefs that outline the structure, operational aims, and backgrounds to the 1966 coup. In other words, there were various civilians too who could have deepened Kadiri's awareness of the facts of that history if he sought them out like all true scholars do of participants and close observers of events before they arrive at possible conclusions. But Kadiri did not, he just picks up Gbulie and Ademoyega, and then cuts-and-pastes, and makes repetitive, sophomoric, ignorant and perverse assertions that he makes with singular, often mindless consistency, and often to the applause of his fellow-travelers whose singular contributions to this forum is to cheer-lead, with the same kind of unoriginality and mindless consistency, any hokum that tickles them. As you'd soon find out, you cannot debate with Kadiri. He will "Kadiri" you to death! It is a waste of time Lawrence. There is nothing in that hole.
Obi Nwakanma
Sent: Monday, September 25, 2017 10:35 AM
To: Usaafricadialogue
Subject: Re: SV: SV: USA Africa Dialogue Series - News Release: Military Invasion Of Igboland
Ibukunolu A Babajide
Från: 'ugwuanyi Lawrence' via USA Africa Dialogue Series <usaafricadialogue@googlegroups.com>
Skickat: den 15 september 2017 10:15
Till: Usaafricadialogue
Ämne: Re: SV: USA Africa Dialogue Series - News Release: Military Invasion Of Igboland
"Then in 1966, Dialas stole the coup of the revolutionary Majors to gain power at the centre. The first priority of the Dialas was to impose unitary form of government on Nigerians through Decree No.34 of 24 May 1966 which abolished regionalism. Later, the Dialas lost government power at the centre and they somersaulted, not into regionalism but, disintegration of Nigeria as a country."
When you read this from someone who is "supposed" to be properly educated; who should diligently seek truth and facts-and should know that truth is sacred- and attempt to live above prejudice,hate and bias especially in making claims before a learned community -you might be forced to probe the kind of school attended and the upbringing that produced the mind.
There are many literature that have discussed this coup to indicate that the young officers that staged the coup (and who were people beyond one ethnic group - a coup that also took the life of a high ranking military Igbo officer)had no connection whatsoever with Gen Ironsi and that the 1966 cannot be branded Igbo coup-defined as coup done by Igbo for the Igbo.
But to live above prejudice that produced this rampaging lies is often a task which many people are not in a position to attain!
Indeed the price of truth is often pain(Bernard Fonlon,1986)) and this is the challenge here.
It may even be most painful to live or seek or speak the truth especially if one's opinion is backed with a belief that what is important is to raise a voice even if it is a cracked hoarse voice.The deeper challenge of/for truth here may be to locate the psychological complex at work !
A philosopher one said "Think twice to speak one and thrice to act ones" (Ugwuanyi,1998:48).
I would join him to add think four times to write once!
L.O.UgwuanyiProfessor of PhilosophyUNIABUJA.
ONYE KWUSI IKE - IF ANYBODY TALKS TOO MUCH
ANYI ACHARA YA AMU - WE CUT OFF HIS PENIS
WERE YA GWORO OGWU - AND USE IT TO MAKE JUJU
OBUGHI ARURU ALA - IT IS NOT AN ABOMINATION
OBU OTU ANYI N'EME - IT IS OUR TRADITION
The above is a song Dialas, the ethnic supremacists who consider themselves as herren-folk (slave masters) in the Southeast Nigeria teach their children to sing every morning.
Intellectual vampires and scoundrels ruining Nigeria want to sustain politics of ethnic division that has kept our nation swooning. They delight in holding the back of the mirror before patriotic Nigerians and yet accuse patriots of inability to see their faces. For decades Dialas advocated for unitary central government in Nigeria and those who opposed concentration of powers at the centre, but opted for regionalism so that each ethnic region in the federation could develop at its own pace were branded fascists advocating the Pakistanisation of Nigeria. Then in 1966, Dialas stole the coup of the revolutionary Majors to gain power at the centre. The first priority of the Dialas was to impose unitary form of government on Nigerians through Decree No.34 of 24 May 1966 which abolished regionalism. Later, the Dialas lost government power at the centre and they somersaulted, not into regionalism but, disintegration of Nigeria as a country. Now, Dialas want to extrapolate their own fascism on the people of the Southwest of Nigeria, but it is like pouring water on the back of the duck which will never stay.
S. Kadiri
Från: usaafricadialogue@googlegroups.com <usaafricadialogue@googlegroups.com> för Chidi Anthony Opara <chidi...@gmail.com>
Skickat: den 11 september 2017 08:15
Till: USA Africa Dialogue Series
Ämne: Re: USA Africa Dialogue Series - News Release: Military Invasion Of Igboland
Victor Okafor, Kenneth Kalu,
The fascist wing of South-West Nigeria Intelligentsia(apology to Obi Nwakamma)!
CAO.
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Chidi Anthony Opara
I couldn't have expressed this better. Thank you very much Obi.
Let me however, confess that I find the fellow in question entertaining sometimes.
CAO.
ugwuanyi Lawrence
"Positions which stand as a follow-up to my comments on a clear case of prejudice and bias wearing the gown of truth was published here some days ago but some duties have affected my desire for some comments on the comments. I am glad I now can.
First, let me acknowledge the fact that Kadiri collaborated with one of my principal claims that an Igbo army officer was also killed in the coup with his submission that “Major Anuforo killed Lieutenant Colonels Arthur Chinyelu Unegbe”. To other claims made let me provide some response.
Kadiri:“Traditionally and culturally, the Southeast is composed of the minority Diala (Slave Masters) and majority, Osu (Slaves)”.
Ugwuanyi: Diala in Igbo is interpreted to mean Son of the soil. The Igbo term for what Kadiri in his uniformed imagination calls Slave master is Nwa Amu literary meaning “free born”. What is held to be slaves in Igbo context is miles away from this articulation of the idea. Many of the Osu are those dedicated to deities for falling short of one demand or the other from the deity. The predominant feature of the slavery in Igbo context, at least judging from the Igbo world I very well know is discrimination in matters of leadership and marriage.
Kadiri: “Now, let me respond to your diversionary comment. Contrary to your claim, I did not assert that the Majors staged Igbo coup, rather, I stated that their coup was stolen by the Dialas and I did not mention the Igbo”.
Ugwuanyi: Except you are merely figurative here- this is a fearful ignorant assertion. A good number of those who have held political power and influence in Igbo land are believed to have come from the Osu world. Many of them were believed to have been sent to school earlier as a form of punishment but it turned out a blessing in disguise!
Kadiri : “Although Dialas are Igbo, just like Osu, stealing of the Majors' coup by Dialas would not make the coup theft of 1966 a theft by all Igbo”.
Ugwuanyi :Refer to my earlier reply above.
Kadiri : “You wrote that the young officers that staged the coup were beyond one ethnic group. Personally, I am not interested in the ethnic composition of the planners of the coup but their political ideology.
Ugwuanyi: How do I know except by reading your ideas. It does not suggest otherwise at least with the effort to misuse Igbo words to your favour! You might, if you wish, do a study of majority of your claims in this forum or elect someone else to do so, and see how far it can be seen to be something different from ethnic sentiments!
Kadiri : “Since you are interested in the ethnic composition of the coup planners of January 15, 1966,Major Patrick Chukwuma Nzeogwu led the coup in the then capital of Northern Region, Kaduna. He was assisted by Major Timothy Onwuatuegwu and Captains Ben Gbulie and Goddy Ude. Major Nzeogwu killed the Premier of the North Ahmadu Bello and two of his wives, while Major Onwuatuegwu killed Brigadier Samuel Adesujo Ademulegun as well as his eight months pregnant wife in their bedroom. He also killed Colonel Ralph Shodeinde and wounded his wife fatally in their bedroom. Captain Gbulie led troops to take command of strategic buildings in Kaduna. Thursday night, 13 January 1966, Captain Goddy Ude was issued with a .38-calibre pistol and ample live ammunition in Kaduna with instruction to proceed by road to Kano. He was to kill the commander of the 5th Battalion Kano, Lieutenant Colonel Chukwuemeka Odumegwu Ojukwu but on getting there, Goddy Ude turned pacifist and did not want bloodshed, understandable, of a fellow Igbo man.
In Lagos, the capital and seat of government at that time, Major Emmanuel Ifeajuna led the coup in the South. He was assisted by Majors Adewale Ademoyega, Humprey Chukwuka, Don Okafor, Chris Anuforo, John Obienu, Chude Sokei as well as Captains Emmanuel Nwora Nwobosi, Ogbo Oji, and G.S. Adeleke.
Major Ifeajuna captured Prime Minister Balewa and Finance Minister Okotie-Eboh. While he killed Balewa, Major Anuforo killed Okotie-Eboh. Major Don Okafor was assigned to kill Brigadier Maimalari but exchange of fire between Okafor's men and the guards around Brigadier Zakariya Maimalari's house provided him the opportunity to escape through the backdoor. While Maimalari was walking towards Doddan Barracks, he saw Major Ifeajuna and beckoned to him to stop. Ifeajuna stepped out of his car and gunned him dead. Major Anuforo killed Lieutenant Colonels Arthur Chinyelu Unegbe and Arbogo Largema. Major Humphrey Chukwuka killed Lieutenant Colonel James Yakubu Palm and Colonel Kuru Mohammed. Major John Obienu was assigned the duty of coming to Lagos with armoured cars to neutralise the 2nd Battalion, Ikeja. He reneged and linked up with Ironsi who had infiltrated the coup plotters with his men and had monitored their movements all along. Captain Emmanuel Nwora Nwobosi killed the Premier of Western Region Samuel Ladoke Akintola. Major Adewale Ademoyega was to lead and assign troops to occupy and control all strategic locations in the Federal Capital, such as Police Headquarters, Post and Telecomunication, Telephone Exchange, Parliament Building and Nigerian Broadcasting Corporation. He was to be assisted by Captain Ogbo Oji. Captain G.S. Adeleke was to provide arms and ammunition.
In Enugu, Major Chude Sokei was assigned the duty to kill Premier of the East, Michael Okpara, and Premier of the Midwest, Dennis Osadebay. He was to be assisted by Lieutenant Jerome Oguchi. Both Sokei and Oguchi turned pacifists that did not want bloodshed.”
Ugwuanyi: This is perhaps the most informative effort you have made and supplied. However I am not sure you are aware that the story about the coup and the war is believed to have been summarily burnt after the war as volunteered by an eminent historian a year ago at a lecture in a Nigerian University. Since this position became a public knowledge, it has become clear to me why any story can make round about the coup and the war. Hopefully historians will further probe this issue and institute intellectual criminal proceedings against this historical evil. Now this does not mean that we should dismiss all available stories about the war but perhaps be curious and scholarly in seeking and sifting the truth about what happened-by at least citing our sources and the collaborations about the sources. In the light of this one would have expected you to supply all your sources on this matter. To point an illustration: Compare these two positions you provided:
“In Lagos, the capital and seat of government at that time, Major Emmanuel Ifeajuna led the coup in the South. He was assisted by Majors Adewale Ademoyega, Humprey Chukwuka, Don Okafor, Chris Anuforo, John Obienu, Chude Sokei as well as Captains Emmanuel Nwora Nwobosi, Ogbo Oji, and G.S. Adeleke.”
“In Enugu, Major Chude Sokei was assigned the duty to kill Premier of the East, Michael Okpara, and Premier of the Midwest, Dennis Osadebay. He was to be assisted by Lieutenant Jerome Oguchi. Both Sokei and Oguchi turned pacifists that did not want bloodshed.”
Kadiri:The revolutionary Majors did not plan Igbo coup but Ironsi infiltrators that consented only to killing non-Igbo soldiers and civilians and the way Ironsi stole the coup of the Majors turned it to an ethnic coup.
Ugwuanyi: Who could these Ironsi’s infiltrators be, except perhaps the one that is reported to be against his death- as supplied by you. Is it Chukwuka who went to kill him or the one who was in Kano to kill Ojukwu. If they were against the lives of Igbos why would they agree to go for these mission in the first place. How do you balance this with your claim that “Major Anuforo killed Lieutenant Colonels Arthur Chinyelu Unegbe”, both of whom are supposed to be Igbos!
Kadiri :First of April Nigerian intellectuals continue till date to claim that Ironsi quelled the Major's coup. He stole the coup of the Majors and supplanted them.
Ugwuanyi: This is merely re-enforcing a position that is not founded. It is wrong to believe that anyone who got power in Nigeria wanted it! You might refer to the famous phrase “not my will” by then young Gen.Obasanjo with reference to assuming the Head of State in 1976! Without a good knowledge of the antecedents of Gen. Ironsi it is significantly wrong to hold this position. You need to provide more solid facts on Ironsi e.g his personal love for power to hold this view. For example if you had read Ironsi’s biography Ironside written by Chuks Iloegbunam and have grounds to support your view with books such as this or from any psycho-analytic narrative on this matter it will make more sense. For now these views are groundless hypothesis!
Kadiri : I had expected a Professor like you to correct me if the Igbo led NCNC had not advocated unitary form of government for Nigeria since inception in 1943. You should have contradicted me that Major General Aguiyi Ironsi did not promulgate Decree No. 34 of 24 May 1966, in accordance with the recommendation of his one-man commission of enquiry on unitary form of government headed by Francis Nwokedi, that abolished regions.
Ugwuanyi:I am afraid that you are aligning Zik’s NCNC with Ironsi .This is may mean that you don’t share the view that the military have a different disposition with Civilians and that even if both are Igbos these are different institutions capable of shaping thoughts differently.
Kadiri: Instead, you responded that I am not properly educated because of my asserted views.
Ugwuanyi: I had cause to question the education that leads to a thinking that subverts truth and abhors the rigour and pains involved in searching for it. The simple answer to this would have been to outline the schools attended in which case you might not be at fault as much as formation received. Assuming that one’s education is heavily ideological-chances are that faults with views canvassed can easily be located-in which case understanding where the person is coming from (interpreted to mean knowledge, ideas and ideals received ) becomes a way of understanding how and why he or she could hold some views.
Kadiri :In Nigerian daily experiences, properly educated Nigerian Professors are not able, to generate and distribute electricity (they generate and distribute darkness), to refine crude oil (they export crude oil and import fuel and even get money for fuel subsidy without importing fuel), to mine iron ores at Ajaokuta and work them into metals, to construct and maintain motor-able roads etc. With those demonstrated popular qualities of properly educated Nigerian Professors, I cannot but thank my Creator for not being properly educated and for not being a Professor.
Ugwuanyi: You have labelled me a Nigerian Professor on the ground that I am lecturing in a Nigerian University. I thought you could have imagined that I may well be a non-Nigerian working in a Nigerian University in which case it will only be safe to locate me as a Professor in a Nigerian University. Furthermore, would you for a while rethink the clause “properly educated Nigerian Professors”. Is this not a big class covering nearly all Professors that are Nigerians including perhaps those working outside Nigeria but are Nigerians! Are you safe enough to allow this broad category to be covered by your claims? Now assuming that you narrow it to Nigerian Professors of Nigerian University, my simple worry is whether you can provide any idea of University that locates the job of a Professor as to “generate and distribute electricity… to refine crude oil …to mine iron ores at Ajaokuta and work them into metals, to construct and maintain motor-able roads etc.” Can you make reference to any theory of a University and University Professorship that supports your claim? What is your idea of a University and your idea of a University Professor? Yearly or so there is always this South African conference that eminently theorises on the idea of the African University, the latest of which was held some months ago. I hope it is not wrong for one to recommend that you attend this conference. Perhaps your claim here could lead you to search more about the University idea and the idea of a University Professor through such conference.
Chidi Anthony Opara
CAO.
Salimonu Kadiri
Thank you Professor Ugwuanyi for not yet joining the gang of the snails that have recoiled into their shell when truth hit their filaments. You asserted that, "Diala in Igbo is interpreted to mean Son of the soil. The Igbo term for what Kadiri in his uninformed imagination calls Slave master is Nwa Amu, literary meaning 'free born."
My non-Professorship intelligence tells me that the Son of the Soil is equal to free born and an indigenous Igbo person who is neither a son of the soil or free born must be called something. If every indigene in Igbo land is the son of the soil and free born, what necessitates their being stated? Are there not Igbo indigenes who are neither the son of the soil nor free born? If there are Igbo, who are neither sons of the soil or free born, what name(s) are they called in Igbo and what qualify them not to be regarded as sons of the soil or free born?
You asserted that, "A good number of those who have held political power and influence in Igbo land are believed to have come from the Osu world. Many of them are believed to have been sent to school earlier as a form of punishment but it turned out a blessing in disguise!!" What were Osu being punished for or what warranted their being punished?
May I refresh your memory that it was after the end of the civil war that the people of the South-Eastern Nigeria decided that their ethnic group, which up to that time had been spelt IBO should thereafter be spelt IGBO. Reasons for the injection of the alphabet, G, into the spelling of the name of IBO ethnic identity is unknown to me. Therefore, it is not unlikely that the meaning and the use of Osu and its hybrids in Igbo land have changed without my being aware of it. If that is the case, please excuse my ignorance, Professor.
Historically, on 20 March 1956, Dr. Nnamdi Azikiwe delivered a speech in the Eastern House of Assembly while seconding the motion for the THE SECOND READING OF THE ABOLITION OF THE OSU SYSTEM BILL. Before quoting from what Dr. Azikiwe said, I wonder if abolition of Osu system as being proposed then was intended to stop the Osu from being sent to school as punishment, as you had wanted readers to believe? Here follows some of what Dr. Azikiwe said, "This Bill seeks to do three things: to abolish the Osu system and its allied practices including the Oru or Ohu System, to prescribe punishment for their continued practice, and to remove certain social disabilities caused by the enforcement of the Osu and its allied system. ....//... What is Osu system and why must it be abolished? ... According to this Bill, the Osu system includes any social way of living which implies that any person who is deemed to be an Osu or Oru or Ohu is subject to certain prescribed social disability and social stigma. An Osu may be a person who has been dedicated to a shrine or a deity and that person and his descendants are therefore regarded as social pariahs with no social rights which non-Oru are bound to respect. An Osu may be a person who is descended or can be proved to be descended from a SLAVE and that person and his descendants are for ever proscribed as social pariahs. ...//... Mr. Speaker, this Bill offers a challenge to the morality of the Easterners. I submit that it is not morally consistent to condone the Osu or Oru or Ohu system. I SUBMIT THAT IT IS DEVILISH AND MOST UNCHARITABLE TO BRAND ANY HUMAN BEING WITH A LABEL OF INFERIORITY, DUE TO THE ACCIDENTS OF HISTORY. I SUBMIT THAT HUMAN BEINGS ARE ENTITLED TO THE RIGHT OF SOCIAL EQUALITY (P. 91-94, ZIK-SELECTED SPEECHES OF DR.NNAMDI AZIKIWE)." To the best of my knowledge the cast system in Igbo land vis á vis Diala and Osu and its surrogates, Ohu and Oru are still in practice today despite the efforts of Dr. Nnamdi Azikiwe to outlaw it already in 1956. The simple logic here is that the existence of Sons of the Soil and Free Borns presume the existence of slaves.
You asked for the source of my information on the executors of the January 15, 1966 military coup and the rolls played by each participants. It would appear as if you read your mind and not everything I wrote. Otherwise, you would have discovered that I referred to the book written by one of the participants in the coup, 'NIGERIA'S FIVE MAJORS : COUP D'ETAT OF 15TH JANUARY 1966, FIRST INSIDE ACCOUNT By Ben Gbulie. For your information, Ben Gbulie was a Captain in 1966 and he worked together with Majors Patrick Chukwuma Nzeogwu and Tim Onwuatuegwu to execute the coup in Kaduna. After General Ironsi had stollen the successful coup of the Majors, all the coup planners, except Major John Obienu and Chude Solei, were detained at Kirikiri Maximum Prison at Apapa. It was there thatCaptain Ben Gbulie had the opportunity to interact with fellow coup executors and to find out what happened in Lagos.
You asked, "Who could these infiltrators be (that were Ironsi's moles among the Majors)?" If you did not just gloss over my previous post, you would have discovered that I mentioned Majors Don Okafor and John Obienu as well as Captain Ogbo Oji as General Ironsi extended arms within the plotters. Not only that, I also quoted from p. 125-126 of Ben Gbulie's Nigeria's Five Majors to support my claim of Ironsi's foreknowledge of the coup and he monitored the steps of the coup plotters. When he was in captivity, the British television was allowed to interview Major Patrick Chukwuma Nzeogwu in January 1966. This is what he told his interviewer, "We wanted to get rid of rotten and corrupt ministers, political parties, trades unions and the whole clumsy apparatus of the Federal system. We wanted to gun down all the bigwigs on our way. This was the only way. We could not afford to let them live if this was to work. We got some but not all. GENERAL IRONSI WAS TO HAVE BEEN SHOT. BUT WE WERE NOT RUTHLESS ENOUGH. AS A RESULT HE AND THE OTHER COMPROMISERS WERE ABLE TO SUPPLANT US (P.32-33, The Nigerian Military: Sociological Analysis of Authority and Revolt 1960-67, By Robin Luckham)"
Contrary to your claim, I am not equating Zik to Ironsi. Certainly, both are different persons. However, it was not accidental that Ironsi opted for unitary form of government in Nigeria as it had been propagated by Azikiwe since the 50s. If it was not his will to seize power, he could have stopped the Majors from executing the coup or when he claimed, through the Lagos Radio, at 14:30:00 hours of 15 January 1966, that he was loyal to the Federal government, he should have provided security for the Parliament to meet and elect a Prime Minister from the party that commanded the support of majority members of the House.
Normally, no one expects Professors of English, of Philosophy, of History, of Geography or of Literature to refine crude oil, produce potable water, construct motor-able roads, generate and distribute electricity, treat patients in the hospitals or procure medicines for the sick. We know that educated Nigerians of various academic disciplines are employed and remunerated to perform those functions, but so far, Nigeria remains where it is economically and industrially. Those who claim that they possess the knowledge to produce what we need have been given the opportunity to demonstrate their skills, but at every point of failed delivery Nigerians have been blindfolded, or rather fooled, with ethno-religious dichotomy by the so-called educated class. Therefore, when you averred that I am not properly educated in the Nigerian sense of what being educated implies, I responded that I have no regret for that because of what they have done with Nigeria. No pawn was meant, at least, from my side to any professor.
S. Kadiri
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Salimonu Kadiri
My last exchange with you on this forum was about the origin of Eze in Igbo land. I asserted that it evolved from the Warrant Officer created by Lord Lugard since the Igbo had no governing institution when the colonialists arrived. The saying then was Igbo Enwe Eze (Igbos have no King). In fact, the red cap is not a crown and a King must have a crown. The transformation of Warrant Chiefs to Eze, incurred the protest of the igbo with the terminology, EZEBUILO which translates to A-King-Is-An- Enemy. You offered a different meaning to the word Ezebuilo which was quiet different from the meaning offerred to the word by Chinua Achebe on page 16 of his book, Home And Exile. You were angry because I decided to accept Achebe's meaning of the word Ezebuilo than your own fanciful and mud-polishing meaning of Ezebuilo.
On reading yours below, I am reminded of an Igbo psychiatrist, Dr. Thomas Osuji, who sometimes ago published a paper on the social and mental traits of the Igbo. He wrote, "The Igbo is boastful; he is full of braggadocio. He fancies himself superior to other persons. Worse, he wants you, the person he imagines that he is superior to, to accept his deluded self-assessment. If you humour him and go along with him and treat him as if he is superior person, he feels fine and gets along with you. If you call his bluff and tell him that he is a naked emperor pretending to be robed in diadem, he feels angry at you. For the Igbo to get along with you, you must collude with him and tell him what he wants to hear, that he is the King of the hill." All Igbos are probably not like you but you fit in exactly into Dr. Osuji's diagnosis of the social and mental traits of an Igbo.
S. Kadiri
Till: USA Africa Dialogue Series
Salimonu Kadiri
Lawrence, beware of the neo Third Reich revenger, Obi Nwakanma, whose sole aim is to reverse the outcome of the Nigerian civil war that ended, 15 January 1970. First, an understanding of how Adolf Hitler began the World War II would shed light on the political goal of Nwakanma to start another civil war he hopes to win.
World War II, ended with the defeat of Germany and her allies, which led to the treaty of Versailles in 1919. Adolf Hitler did not accept the Treaty and planned to repeal it. The German Nazi Bible, authored by Adolf Hitler, called MEIN KAMPF was published in two volumes. The first volume was published on July 19, 1925 with the subtitle, EINE ABRECHNUNG (A Reckoning) and the second volume, DIE NATIONALSOZIALISTISCHE BEWEGUNG (The Nazi Movement), was published on December 11, 1926. Hitler promised the Germans that if he was voted into power he would deal with the Jews and every German would eat buttered bread pasted with gem. By 1933 Hitler became German Chancellor and he cleaned the Jews from German soil but the promised bread for Germans did exist not to talk of pasting it with butter and gem. Germany knew in advance that the extermination of the Jews would not bring bread pasted with butter and gem to the hungry Germans and that was why he wrote on p.3 of Mein Kampf thus, "One blood demands one Reich. Never will the German Nation possess the moral right to engage in colonial politics until, at least, it embraces its own sons within a single state. Only when the Reich borders include the very last German, but can no longer guarantee his daily bread, will the moral right to acquire foreign soil arise from the distress of our people. Their sword will become our plough, and from the tears of war the daily bread of future generations will grow." Those were Hitler's words in 1925. The practical application of getting daily bread for the Germans was expressed by the German Chancellor, Adolf Hitler, in the German Reichstag on February 20, 1938 thus, "Our economic situation is a difficult one, not because National-Socialism is at the helm, but because 140 people must live on a square kilometre; because we are not in possession of those great, natural resources enjoyed by other people, because, above all, we have a scarcity of fertile soil. If Great Britain should suddenly dissolve today and England become dependent solely on her own territory, then the people there would perhaps have more understanding of the seriousness of economic tasks which confront us. ...//... No matter what we may achieve by increasing the German production, all this cannot remove the impossible nature of the space allotted to Germany. The claim for German colonial possessions will, therefore, be voiced from year to year with increasing vigour, possessions which Germany did not take away from other countries and which today are virtually of no value to these Powers but appear indispensable for our own people (p. 63, Peace With Dictators By Sir Norman Angell)."
Just like Hitler did not agree that the Germans were defeated in the World War 1 and prepared for World War II, Obi Nwakanma does not believe that Biafrans were defeated and surrendered on January 15, 1970. To him one Colonel Achuzia who was electric bulb hawker in Port Harcourt when the war broke out in 1967 was superior to Philip Effiong who was already a Lieutenant Colonel in 1965 in the Nigerian Army. Obi Nwakanma does not believe that the Second in Command to Ojukwu, Philip Effiong signed any surrender document even though Effiong and Obasanjo admitted in their books that Philip Effiong surrendered on behalf of Biafra. He has maintained that Awolowo committed genocide against the Igbo for having said that opposing soldiers should not be fed because feeding them would make them fight harder.
In Obi Nwakanma's world, books authored by Adewale Ademoyega and Ben Gbulie, two participants in the coup of January 15, 1966, should be discountenanced while unpublished work of Emmanuel Ifeajuna he had access to should be taken as the bible of the coup. According to Obi Nwakanma, Major Chude Sokei was not in Nigeria during the coup. Since Nwakanma was not in the Nigerian army and he was not among the coup plotters, how then could he have known that Chudi Sokei was in India on a course? The simpleton said Chudi Sokei was on course, but he did not tell readers what course. The false impression Nwakanma is trying to give readers is that the Premier of the East, Michael Okpara, was not killed because Major Chude Sokei, who was given that assignment, was not in Nigeria at the time of the coup. If it was so, Captain Ben Gbulie would have known and would have shared this important information with the readers of his NIgeria's Five Majors. Rather, Ben Gbulie wrote, "Moreover, both Major Chude Sokei and Lieutenant Jerome Oguchi of the 1st Infantry Battalion, Enugu, HAD RANKED VERY HIGH ON THE LIST OF THE STRONG ADVOCATES OF A BLOODLESS COUP. And these were none other than the two young men upon whose shoulders squarely rested the onerous task of prosecuting the coup in the hill-clad coal city. Actually they had taken the whole thing quite philosophically. There was no earthly reason why anyone should engage in blood-letting if one could avoid it. And no earthly reason why any politician should be killed unless it was absolutely necessary. They (Sokei and Oguchi) had been so dogmatic in their stand that they could scarcely hide the fact that they totally abhorred bloodshed - BLOODSHED IN ANY SHAPE OR FORM (p.136, Nigeria's Five Majors: Coup D'état Of 15th January 1966 First Inside Account)."
Telling readers why Okpara was not killed, Ben Gbulie stated, "IT WAS THEREFORE AGAINST THIS BACKGROUND THAT THE ENUGU OPERATION HAD FAILED TO TAKE PLACE AS PLANNED (p.136)." Although Major Chudi Sokei and Lieutenant Jerome Oguchi were among the coup plotters, they were not arrested and detained by General Aguiyi Ironsi as he did to other plotters (p.158-159). It is obvious that Major Sokei and Lieutenant Oguchi turned pacifists when the target to be eliminate, Michael Okpara, was an Igbo like themselves. Otherwise, they could have declined to be part of the coup if all other plotters did not assure them that the coup was not going to be bloodless.
Just like Hitler, Obi Nwakanma's Biafra consists not only the Igbo ancestral home but extends to parts of Kogi, Benue, Edo States, and the entire South-South. One can see Obi Nwakanma's either arrested mental development or refusal to understand history and realty as they are and not as he wants them to be. This ignorant scoundrel who is allergic to commonsense and lessons of history want another civil war in Nigeria and when he is told that war is not the solution to our problems, he gets angry and resort to grammatical diarrhoea which he thinks is a sign of erudition but which normal people see as a symptom of lunacy. He has invented history to justify his intended war on Nigeria but only the gullible will believe him.
S. Kadiri.
Skickat: den 25 september 2017 15:09
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Ämne: Re: SV: SV: USA Africa Dialogue Series - News Release: Military Invasion Of Igboland