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For Kanu, this egregious mistake of a country, an obvious anomaly foisted on unrelated peoples by the wicked British colonial plunderer, would never cease to undermine Biafrans’ security and prosperity. Unless and until the sovereign state of Biafra that ‘Yahweh’ has entrusted with enterprise, industry and oil wealth is actualised, the Igbos will continue to suffer in the zoo. With a horrific and sordid history of the civil war and the unyielding posture of those elements occupying the Nigerian state’s positions of authority, this vision seems a pipe dream, however. To these hindrances, IPOB’s avowed stance is to actualise its dream by any means necessary, including using violence. After all, the only language the ‘zoo’ government understands is that of violence and force. If Nigeria is unwilling to let go, the proposed state of the rising sun is ready to do it its own way.
There is no gainsaying that emotions are running wild over the Biafra secession agitation from both ends. In fact, there are mounting tensions similar to those at the prelude of the Nigeria’s civil war in the 1960s. In response to what they consider as excessive, some youth from Nigeria’s northern region, under the auspices of the Arewa Youth Forum, and backed by some elders, notably Professor Ango Abdullahi, issued a three-month eviction ultimatum to the Biafrans in the north. Although prominent northerners, including the former Vice President Atiku Abubakar, the Northern Governors Forum, the Northern Youth Council of Nigeria and other federal lawmakers among others have condemned this call, there is hardly any doubt that these tensions are signposts of serious trouble. Of note, however, is the fact that in spite of the heat the issues have generated, the federal government appear unperturbed. This should not be viewed with any bewilderment. Nigeria’s ruling elite’s nonchalance is attributable to the fact that the country has seen worse tensions before. This is not the first time Nigeria is dancing on the brink without collapsing and will not be the last. At worst, a damage control measure would be put in place to placate the agitating group.
The fact that tensions of this nature, where the country often move towards the precipice without falling into the abyss, are not new to Nigeria perhaps partly explains why government has taken protests for granted, remaining rather lacklustre about the tenuous situation. One significant pattern of this situation is that tensions of this nature end by producing new members of the ruling elite class who enjoy hegemony and partake in the sharing of Nigeria’s patrimony but creates new forms of hardship for the masses. This explains the discernible paradox of a messy situation ordinary Nigerians find themselves at one end and the opportunity the tensions they mobilise to make create for new members of the ruling elite who are able to climb higher on the rung of the state’s ladder to partake in the national cake at the other end. While the rot, suffering of ordinary masses persist, the Nigerian ruling elite and their new recruits master the art of masterminding these tensions for inclusion in the ruling elite group. They effectively (re)negotiate the political economy of power and authority for themselves without resolving issues at the heart of the tensions. Evidences of this dialectic are not better harped than in the assumption of office of Olusegun Obasanjo in 1999, shortly after the death of MKO Abiola and the ensuing uproar; and the rise to prominence and power of Goodluck Jonathan after the Niger Delta agitations reached a crescendo. Obasanjo was not only the choice candidate of the ruling elite, he ran against another Yoruba Christian from South-west. He had a landslide victory over his opponent, Olu Falae. Not only was Jonathan more favoured by the ruling elite than Muhammadu Buhari in the 2011 election, Buhari faced strong contenders that frustrated his chance of clinging presidential power even from the North. Having done with Jonathan and the Niger Delta, the same elite has returned power to the north.
One needs no prophetic abilities to foretell what the Biafran agitation might result in the Igbos’ turn. As can be seen, agitations has become the precursor through which ruling elite take turns to be included in the ruling class. Rising Biafra agitation is pregnant and ready to bring forth a new member of the ruling elite from the South-east. This is not necessarily going to address the fundamental and systemic rot in the South-east or in the ‘Zoo’ as a whole. Already, the Ohaneze Ndigbo has called for Nigeria to take the presidency to the Igbos as the only condition for remaining in the union. Is Nnamdi Kanu going to be the beneficiary of the Biafra agitation and the call for Igbo’s presidency?
Unfortunately, the pains and sorrows of the masses are trodden, trampled upon and traded for the ruling elite’s gains. Little wonder new elite inclusion hardly addresses the core of the challenges facing Nigeria. Abiola’s death and South-west protests produced President Obasanjo but nothing fundamentally changed in the structure of the Nigerian state, the quality of leadership and the nature of service delivery to Nigerians. Eight years after Obasanjo’s rule, both the South-west and Nigeria in general suffer from socio-economic morass and political oppression from his government’s wastefulness and unfavourable policies. Based on the emergence of current agitators in the Niger Delta, it is doubtful that the Jonathan’s six years reign made the much-needed transformation in the region.
The Biafran agitation for self-determination is not in itself a bad idea. After all, it should be everyone’s inalienable right to decide their national identity. What is bad however is that the ruling elite is not unaware of the decay in the Nigerian system but has refused to address it simply because it is easy to latch on religious and ethnic proclivities to sustain their grip on power. Rather than join forces with the poor and down trodden to fight an elite structure that perpetuate poverty and insecurities, Nigerians turn to one another in defence of an artificial, if not non-existent, inclinations without asking the right questions that relate to why we are where we are 60 years after independence and one hundred years after amalgamation. The problem is not being in Nigeria or sharing a sovereign state with those whom there are no cultural and emotional affinities as widely spread by the Biafrans against Hausa and Yoruba as much as that the Nigerian project has failed to address the most basics of its people’s concerns. To put this in context of an attained Biafra Republic, of what use then will a Biafran state be if its ruling elite carry over the baggage of the Nigerian state? The truth is that the Nigerian ruling elite class drawn from all the tribes are the same in their essence and agenda. It is yet to be seen how a new state status would prevent the ruling elite greed, selfishness and unquenchable quest for political and economic power at the expense of the ordinary people even outside the ‘Zoo’.
Fasakin writes from Swedish Defence University, Sweden.
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