By Obi Blaise
For Family Writers Press
Many conscientious individuals in Nigeria and offcourse from other parts of the world have been throwing their weights in support of the sovereignty of the Biafra nation. They are those that have refused to distort history, they are those that are standing up for the truth and will defend it at all cost. They are those that believe in absolute freedom, end to slavery, servitude and oppression and they believe in the inalienable rights of a people to exist. They stood for the oppressed by lending their voices in unison to questioning the rationale behind the mistreatment, subjugation and near extermination of a group of indigenous population. As Biafrans all over the world are clamouring for freedom, those that are supposed to be representing them have remained mute while the people are being killed by powers that be on daily bases unabated. Biafrans have suffered immeasurably in Nigeria prior to the evil amalgamation up till date and those that ought to be representing them have joined the internal slave masters in subjecting them to more severe and excruciating sufferings and there seems no end in the nearest future.
Wole Soyinka the noble laureate, has been a lone voice in the wilderness from far away Yoruba nation. But a tree they say, does not make a forest. He was quoted to have said that,"Biafra nation is undefeatable, you can kill the carrier of an idea but can not kill the ideology", "Nigeria is negotiable, What is not negotiable is peoples' rights to remain in Nigeria". After these thunderous assertions from the noble laureate, all the political big wigs from the old Eastern region have maintained a deafening silence. They are not perturbed that a discerning voice from another part of the country is supportive of the cause of a sovereign Biafra nation as being championed by their children in their own land and they all lost their voices in such a perilous time to also support them.
However, almost all the political elites, leaders of thought, Ohaneze Ndi Igbo and other known and well to do individuals of Biafra extraction were being pigeonholed and cajoled into aligning with the internal slave masters up North to continue the well orchestrated subjugation and enslavement of the indigenous population in this part of the world. In the heightened but deliberate trampling upon, of the fundamental human rights of the indigenous people of Biafra, the elites have been stampeded into maintaining a graveyard silence as if all is well. It is high time they are reminded that their silence is no longer golden. Now, considering the non-negotiability, individibility and indisssolubility of the Nigerian state, one can devise that such assertion is borne out of crass ignorance of those that believe in that school of thought because they are sole benefactors of the ill- conceived nation that has failed and is heading to absolute balkanisation.
The Indeginous People Of Biafra(IPOB) ably led by the incorruptible and impregnable leader, Mazi Nnamdi Kanu has maintained their stance on their rights to emancipate themselves into becoming an independent nation where there will be justice, equitable distribution of income and resources, mutual respect to peoples' opinions, rule of law and rights of worship amongst others. Glaringly, Biafrans in Nigeria have been politically disenfranchised, economically and socially emasculated and strangulated, then I ask, where are the elites in all these? Have they suddenly become deaf and dumb? What are there take on these? It is now clear that they are doing the bidding of their paid masters in the Nigerian seat of power at the Aso Villa.
Undoubtedly, Nigeria as an evil entity, was created on a very faulty foundation which is irredeemably on a continuous nosedive into abyss, yet, her inhabitants are pretentious about it, with much hope of building a delusional egalitarian society. How can you possibly rebuild a nation that is bound to fail, where no one speaks the true, where even those that tried to speak up were gifted with jail terms and unending prosecution by the government that is supposed to protect and serve their interests? When people are being killed albeit illegally, no one raises an eyebrow or even question why it should be so because of the fear of being sent to prison by the government. Such impunity has lingered for so long, until the leader of Indigenous People Of Biafra, Mazi Nnamdi Kanu came to the limelight and gave the people back their voices, while questioning the legitimacy and legality of the Nigerian state and in as much as the questions remained unanswered, the agitation for a sovereign Biafra nation remains the only option to ending modern slavery in the contrapted Nigerian state. Empirically, "one Nigeria" can no longer stand the test of time because there is something inorganic about her, hence, the evil amalgamation of 1914 where indigenous population with divergent views and cultures were lumped together to form a country.
The question that any right thinking human being should be asking now is, "why must a white man from the shores of Europe, come to Africa to creat a country"? Keep the answer to this question to yourself because it is as good as mine.
However, until the so-called elites stand up and be counted, until they shun fear and start speaking against the evil metted on the vulnerables, the youth will take the mantle to emancipate themselves from the shackles of injustice, unwarranted and untimely death, indiscriminate and wanton destruction of properties, illicit arrest and unlawful incarceration, illegal abduction and forceful disappearance and so many other life threatening strategies aimed at suppressing the raging inferno of the Biafra agitation by the government. Biafra has come to stay and no amount of wishful thinking, intimidation, subjugation, and maltreatment will mar her from becoming an independent nation. Therefore, the Biafran elites should as a matter of urgency brase up for eventualities because this wind of revolution that is blowing and unimpededly raging will trap them all into becoming potential victims of circumstance.
Edited by Ebere Okolie
For Family Writers Press