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Biafra Agitation: Any Justification
CHAPTER ONE -- [Total Page(s) 7]
Page 5 of 7
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What remained of the
first republic regime formally handed power over to General Aguiyi
Ironsi through Dr. Nwafor Orizu, who was the acting president as Dr.
Azikiwe was outside the country, purportedly on health reasons.
When
Aguiyi Ironsi came to power, he made the greatest mistakes of his life
which cost him both his life and those of other millions of people. He
wanted to impress the Northerners by all means that he was not
Igbo-centric but he ended up worshipping them. He surrounded himself
with too many Northerners and his regime could in fact be called
Northern regime, for he hardly took any decision without their
knowledge. To avoid suspicion, he forbade any Igbo person from speaking
Igbo in his office.[15] Again those he appointed to inquire into the
January 1966 coup were mainly biased Northerners.[16] Moreover, some
Northerners he placed in important positions were close associates of
the corrupt politicians killed in January coup, some of whom narrowly
escaped the executing bullets of the coup.
All these people,
realizing that Ironsi was ready to please them, had and used the whole
time to poison the minds of the Northern populace about the coup, which
initially was very popular among them. They aroused their emotions
against the Easterners and prepared their minds for reprisal attacks, in
a well planned programme of events. Ironsi himself lost his life in one
of these attacks.
All that eventually led to the civil war could
have been avoided had Ironsi listened to his Southern brothers,
especially the Igbos. He only listened with full confidence, to the
Northerners around him who were heartlessly bent on destroying him. The
first part of the well organized pogrom which was evidently of Northern
government initiative, started on May 29, 1966, after which thousands of
corpses of Southerners littered the major cities in the North. The
rioters afterwards could not agree on a particular reason. For some, it
was Ironsi’s unitary system of government; some others, it was to avenge
their leaders killed in January coup; but for majority, they wanted
secession for they would not be part of any federation that is not
headed by a Northerner.[17]
Seeing no punitive measure from Ironsi
against their first act, with full confidence they came back the second
time. It started between 28th and 29th May when Ironsi visited the West
on his nationwide tour. He was killed along with Lt. Col. Francis
Fajuyi, the Governor of the West. The same fate awaited soldiers of
Southern origin and Easterners in particular, majority of whom were not
lucky enough to escape. After the soldiers, the Eastern civilians became
the primary targets. Already Gowon had taken over power and declared
‘no basis for unity’.
What followed afterwards was a momentary but
continual massacre of Easterners outside their region especially in the
North, with a horrifying brutality that took tens of thousands of lives.
The killing cut across age, sex, status, and took several barbaric
forms. Some were locked up in houses and were either cut down with sharp
objects or set ablaze with the house. Many women above the age of ten
were raped to death while pregnant ones had their wombs ripped open, and
their foetuses publicly executed. Crying children scattered everywhere
as they were chased about and cut down. Some people’s heads were set on
fire and allowed to die a slow death, and so many other horrifying
stories. Those who successfully returned to the East alive were scarcely
seen without serious damage in their bodies and the East became over
crowded as the Easterners streamed back to the East.
As Ojukwu was
looking for a solution to this problem, Gowon remained heartless and was
officially pursuing Northern agenda aimed at perfecting a total
extermination of the Easterners. His diversionary ad hoc constitutional
conference that took off on 12th September 1966 was more of dictation
than discussion for within few weeks he and his Northern brothers
endorsed one stand after the other till they ironically came back to
square one: They rioted for secession initially. In the conference they
now endorsed confederation. They later shifted to federation, and
eventually ended with the unitary system of government against which
they initially rioted, all within very few weeks, and with a threat to
use force on any group that failed to comply. What a hypocrisy and
heartlessness!
CHAPTER ONE -- [Total Page(s) 7]
Page 5 of 7
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