Shameful! How Northern manipulators fooled Ohanaeze

“The trick is that while they dangled their useless meeting before Ohanaeze (just to give them a false sense of importance), Buhari will be annihilating their kith and kin in the Delta with his Northern dominated Army. After that, they will face Igbo squarely. That is “divide and rule” in its simplest definition, and Biafran demolition is their target.” Tim Tochukwu.

For many Biafrans in the thick of agitation for the independent state of Biafra, anger rose on receiving the news that Ohanaeze Ndigbo, a rusty and inconsequential group from Biafraland, on Sunday, February 21, had a meeting with some Northern manipulators. To make the matters worse, the Biafrans considered it appalling that in the current dispensation in expired Nigeria, some Biafrans could still be so-shortsighted to hold such a meeting, and then come out with the trash they called a statement.

Since October last year, after Nnamdi Kanu, the Biafran leader was kidnapped by Nigerian government, Biafrans have been in the streets in Biafraland protesting, and asking for his release. Internationally, Biafrans were also simultaneously protesting daily in front of Nigerian embassies; British embassies; European Union (EU) and United Nations (UN) offices. In the process of the protests in Biafraland, nothing less than 1000 Biafrans was murdered by the Nigerian government and its agents. More than double of that number were inflicted with varying degrees of injuries.

In spite of these, and instead of initiating a meeting with the leadership of Biafra, the usually dubious and manipulative peoples of the North went to hold a meeting with some elements in Biafraland who they described as Igbo leaders. Meanwhile these people were mere stooges and quislings, who the North had gathered in the past to consistently help them thwart the emergence of true Igbo leadership.

Naively or foolishly, these so called Igbo leaders sat with the Northern manipulators who had come under the aegies of Arewa Consultative Forum (ACF) to release a statement. The statement, in the main, was that they had faith in Nigeria, and had agreed to live together in one indivisible Nigeria. And going through the statement, it proved to Biafrans why Nnamdi Kanu have often referred to those so-called Igbo leaders in Ohanaeze as naïve and foolish.

The meeting was reported to have been held behind closed door. Why closed doors? Where they agreeing payment and terms of payment? Then they condemned the killing of some unarmed Biafran agitators... So which ones did they condemn their killing and which ones did they agree with their killing?

Ohanaeze and ACF also called on the Federal Government to release all those detained on the account of the agitations as well as compensate their families. And so we ask “after that what?” So after that, Nnamdi Kanu will continue to remain in the enemy’s gulage; Biafraland will still remain the back-garden of the Fulani and Yoruba; and Biafrans will continue to be their slaves? So this is the fate Ohanaeze wants for the people it claims to lead, while its membership smile to the banks with bribe-money and quislings’ appointments from. Pathetic jokers!

Ohanaeze also signed the trash: “We will also continue to meet with our other brothers, the Afenifere, the South-South Peoples Assembly, the Ishekiri, the Urhobo and many other socio-cultural groups to promote peaceful co -existence and unity of Nigeria”.

“Unity”, as what? Is it unity as slaves or as conquered people? The Fulani and Hausa, or even Yoruba are no brothers of Biafrans; neither have they ever treated Biafrans as brothers. Biafrans have nothing in common with the Fulani, the Yoruba and the Hausa. Their brothers are in Niger Republic; Chad Republic; Cameroun; and even in Benin Republic, and they know it. They can do well to go and seek them out to be united with them, and not with Biafrans.

How come they in Ohanaeze did not understand the game of the Northerners as they claimed to be Igbo leaders? How come they did not see the anomaly of ACF representing the North and its different ethnic nationalities; but intending to hold meetings with representatives of Ijaw, Itshekiri, Urhobo, etc., which are parts of a whole – East (Biafra). It is a shame that Ohanaeze did not realize that by accepting to go into that meeting alone, without their Brothers in the former Eastern Region (Biafra), they were defeated already.

Why would the North come in block to meet parts of a splintered East? Is the North more homogenous than the East (Biafra)? Of course they are not because the North consists of different ethnic nationalities more than the East. They have Hausa, Fulani, Junkun, Borno, Tiv, Kaje, Gbagyi, Kanuri, Berom, and several others. Even at that, they are not from the same root, (they are not even blood-related). For instance, the Fulani peoples are nomadic cattle herders from Senegal, their kith and kin are still in Futa Djallon Mountains till this day.

But Biafrans are same people from same root – Ijaw, Ibibio, Igbo, Itshekiri Ogoja, even Igala Idoma, and others. They are related by blood. They have lived together for thousands of years in a confederation that had not seen conquests and empire-building. So how come the Northern manipulators would stage such a meeting with Ohanaeze, and they would attend?

Ohanaeze is not representing anybody, and have never done. They are a bunch of self-appointed leaders. Ndigbo are not even qualified to meet with the North without their brothers in Biafra, not to talk of an insignificant Igbo group, Ohanaeze, which only exists to enrich its members at the expense of those they claim to lead.

Perhaps the most important question would be, “If Ohanaeze claims to truly seek the good of their people, how come they did not spot the ‘divide and rule’ in that meeting from the onset”. The best thing they should have done would have been to first decline the offer, then seek a meeting with their Biafran brothers in the East. If the North is Arewa; East is Biafra. With that they would have forged a common front to meet with the North.

But no! Their bank accounts and quislings’ appointments are better for them than the good of their people. If that was not the case, it would have occurred to them that the meeting was set up because Muhammadu Buhari was already on a mission to decimate Niger Delta – their Biafran brothers. The trick is that while they dangled their useless meeting before Ohanaeze (just to give them a false sense of importance), Buhari will be annihilating their kith and kin in the Delta with their Northern dominated Army. After that, they will face Igbo squarely. That is “divide and rule” in its simplest definition, and Biafran demolition is their target.

Enough of the manipulations, lies and deceits! Let it be known today that Ohanaeze does not speak for Biafra. They neither represent Igbo or Biafra. They are a group of quislings and saboteurs set up by the Northern controlled National Party of Nigeria (NPN) of 1979. Biafrans had thought that they would change their orientation over time, but their last meeting suggests that indeed, a leopard cannot change its spots.

We ignore them and move on with our march to Biafra.

By Tim Tochukwu