Ngodigha:
Shut up your mouth, fool. If you have read it, then you would have known that Osuji has been telling lies?. Did Achebe say Yorubas are not intelligent and they do not do well in classroom?.

tomakint: @inufBefore u take Osuji's account as ur 'gospel' try to read General Madiebo's on the war u will av a full grasp of the true picture on how genocide was committed against the Biafrans. All those claims that the FG was tryin to send food to the Biafrans were 'laughable propaganda' the food sent to Biafra by FG were for the FG troops in occupied territories of Biafra. Ojukwu insisted on the usual route for food supply from foreign aid but Gowon refused, there the starvation-driven GENOCIDE sets in!

T9ksy:



God forbid o but if any of my kids was in any state similar to the pictures of starving biafran kids that were beamed all across the world by Biafra information ministry, I surely wouldn’t be INSISTING on ANY condition that could bring succor to the dying kid…………………..never mind hundreds of thousands kids ………………..chei! Ojukwu was a cold-hearted bas.tard who is surely burning in the hottest part of hell, extantly. How can a human being purportedly fighting for his people watched as kids – his own kith and kins dying of hunger and this ugly morraphocker still felt he has something to continuing fighting for, only to then run off when his own miserable life became threatened. Then the idiiiot suddenly remembered there’s another alternative (to 2million of his own people dying), called peace.

And why should we believe Madiebo's account? Afterall, he was the general of the biafran army. would his perspective be any different from achebe's, another biafran who can only see the war from his own jaundice ethnic prism?

Another ibo logic, huh.

inufele2:

There was a genocide of which Ojukwu was part and parcel of! what will you call a leader that forced children to fight against their will, armed them with sub standard weapons and brainwashed them with bitterness, revenge and fake Igbo nationalist agenda?
What will you call a leader that watched many biafran innocent and defenceless children die like chickens without taking steps to save their lives even if it means he has to sacrifice his?

tomakint: Ojukwu was right to secede!

all4naija: I would be very happy to see the Igbo community along side the fictitious writer take this matter to the International Criminal Court(ICC) at the Hague. Then, we will see how much this matter can prove with evidences to support the Alzheimer-suffering prof(Chinua Achebe) stance on the war-crimes!

T9ksy:
Of course ke! Ojukwu was right to attempt secession .................with 120 rifles and no means of feeding his civilian population. What a bold andcourageousmove..............indeed!!!

T9ksy:



Of course ke! Ojukwu was right to attempt secession .................with 120 rifles and no means of feeding

his civilian population. What a bold and courageous move..............indeed!!!

tomakint:
Should Biafrans succeed in dragging Gowon to ICC, trust me Gowon is history! How Murtala and co were acting like animals under is watch as the GC wil finish him off

all4naija: Get your head checked, dude!

webcalculator:
check you head first!
ba.stard, have you read wole soyinka's book "the man died"? it gave a good account of what transpired during the war, though not all and FG banned it 'cos he is saying the truth.

all4naija: You need to get your head checked for your outburst! Not even about your quoting of Prof. Wole Soyinka's book but you alluding to false idea Yoruba will only support anything when it is from their tribe. It tells of your close-mindedness and Tribalism.

Da infamous:

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n October 11, 2012, a book written by Professor Chinua Achebe, the famous author of Things Fall Apart, was formally released. Published by Penguin Press HC, the book is entitled- There was a country: A personal history of Biafra. It is Professor Achebe’s take on what transpired before, during and immediately after one of the most devastating civil wars to have hit the African nation. The conflict lasted 30 months and took the lives of more than 2 million, including innocent children, women and the elderly.

Since the publication of the book, all manners of sentiments have been expressed on both sides of the divide. Those on the Biafran side, during the war, especially those that bore the brunt of the war, have offered their support of the book and see it as a worthy addition to Nigeria’s history. They argue that it was important for the book to have been written and published so that generations yet unborn will learn of what happened and take steps to prevent a repeat. Those on the Nigerian side, however argue about the timing of the release of the book. They contend that at this point in the Nigerian experiment, the book was bound to stoke interethnic tensions and lead the nation down a discordant path. They also question Achebe’s assertions in some areas of the book, especially where he seemed to have attributed the suffering of Biafrans to the policy of food blockage that was championed by the late Chief Obafemi Awolowo.

As a writer myself, having published a book about the Biafra war titled, “Surviving In Biafra- The Story of the Nigerian Civil war, I have come to respect the rights of every one to air their views, whether in writing or otherwise, on any issues. I have also come to understand that in a war situation, because no one has the ability to be in all locations at one time, people are bound to see many issues from different vantage points which in turn inform their conclusions. As a result of this thinking style, I have largely stayed away from criticizing either the antagonists or protagonists of Professor Achebe’s book. I must say, though, that I took issues with the “intellectually lazy” ones amongst us. These are the people who are too lazy to get the book and read yet they engage in “mouthing off” about the book just based on snippets they read here and there. I call that intellectual laziness because they do not have the full context of the assertions made in the book and yet come to half-baked conclusions. Unfortunately, as the saying goes that an empty drum makes the most sound, it is this category of people that make the most noise about the book, advancing shallow and meaningless arguments and coming to silly conclusions that defy logic. The right cause of action would have been to read the whole book first and then make more informed conclusions and deductions based on a holistic understanding of the contents as stated in the book.

I also took issue with the people who believe that the release of the book is either ill-timed or that it was bound to upset the apple cart in the Nigerian nation. They believe that Achebe should have “let sleeping dogs lie” and not even write the book. To those people I will simply say that merely sweeping the Biafran experience under the rug will not make things better. Fully discussing the experience in all manners of forum, coming to some form of consensus as to what happened, will help Nigeria heal and work towards preventing such from occurring again in the future. The reason why tensions, occasioned by that war, have not fully abated is that right after the war, the Federal government basically clamped down on Igbos by allowing federal soldiers to stay in the Igbo heartland longer than necessary. It was basically anathema or taboo, at the time, to talk about the war or even express any type of anger about the various losses that people suffered. Nigerian soldiers were hovering over Igbos in all the cities and villages they occupied like the sword of Damocles. As a result, people never really had the opportunity to grieve their losses or vent their anger and frustrations about their losses. It was just of late, as the democratic experiment in Nigeria started taking hold, that people started feeling freer to vent. It is therefore inappropriate for anyone to blame Professor Achebe for writing and releasing the book now. Let me remind those with that type of mindset that there are countless books about the American Civil war and as I write, many more are on the way. People have been analyzing and dissecting what happened from all vantage positions, perspectives and angles. The goal here is that that type of war will never take place in the United States again. As they say, if you do not understand where you are coming from, you can hardly tell where you are headed.

My silence on the book was however cut short lately. That was after I read the comments attributed to General Gowon. Remember him? He was the one that presided over the war on the Nigerian side. During a recent visit to Governor Mu’azu Babangida Aliyu of Niger state, General Gowon was asked by journalists what his take was regarding Achebe’s book. He responded that Achebe wrote the book from a position of ignorance. He then added that he and Chief Awolowo had no regrets regarding their roles during the war. As if he had not made enough head-turning and mind-boggling comments, he postulated that “if there was no secession, there would not have been civil war”. After reading his comments, I was forced to break the studied silence that I had wanted to maintain on this issue.

First, Gowon says that Achebe wrote the book from a position of ignorance. This is assertion flies in the face of the facts considering the important position that Achebe occupied in Biafra during the war. However, for the sake of argument, let us assume that Gowon is right that Achebe does not have the full details of the war but that he, Gowon, has all the details. If so, what has prevented Gowon from writing his own memoir 42 years after the civil war? If he has all the facts as he should, why has he not done Nigerians the favor of publishing a book so we will know what exactly happened? Instead, he prides himself in taking unwarranted swipes at anyone that dares to put their own side of the story out there. Gowon reminds me of one of my contemporaries when I was growing up. Anytime a disagreement or a fist fight occurred between him and someone and they were called to tell their sides of what happened, he would never tell his own side. Instead, he will elect to wait for the other person to tell his own side and then simply say that the person’s version is not true. All efforts to make him tell his own side of the story always failed but he would adamantly argue that the other person’s version was not true. Even at that young age, I always felt that the behavior was too childish and silly and that he was hiding something. That is the same way I feel about what Gowon has been doing with the story of the Nigerian civil war. Many actors in the war have written their sides of the story and all I hear or read is that Gowon said they got it all wrong but he would not use his own memoir to “set the record straight”. I have now come to the conclusion that Gowon is hiding something. If he has nothing to hide, I see no reason why he will not tell Nigerians how he piloted the ship of state as the nation burned and millions died from 1967 to 1970.

Furthermore, Gowon says that he does not regret any of the actions he took during a war that resulted in the death of millions, including children, pregnant women and elderly men and women. I cannot believe that someone who calls himself a Christian and witnessed the carnage that his actions or inactions caused in Biafra, the loss of innocent children, women, and elderly, will be making such a statement that borders on sadism. All the pictures of young children with bloated stomachs, at the throes of their deaths, should at least move Gowon to regret the war. At the minimum, as a Christian, this man should have stated that he regrets that the war ever took place considering the cost in human lives and suffering. He is trying to say he fought the war to keep Nigeria one but Gowon has never told Nigerians how he would have stopped the atrocious genocide that was being committed against the Igbos in the north at the time had they stayed on in Nigeria. Even a goat resists when being led to the slaughter house, talk less of humans. He still has not told Nigerians how he would have safeguarded the lives of Igbos in Nigeria had they tried to stay on and not seek self-determination.

Gowon tells reporters that he is ready to face the international criminal court. I see this as a bluff. If he were that confident about his actions, he would have written a book and told us what happened but he is afraid that he will be called to the carpet for his actions in that war. How can General Gowon justify to the world the fact that he did nothing while pregnant Igbo women were disemboweled in the north? How can he justify to the world the fact that he did nothing while humans were being massacred in the north like animals after he became the head of state post Ironsi? How would Gowon justify to the world the fact that he sent those Russian-made migs (aircrafts) to fly to civilian enclaves in Aba, Umuahia, Owerri, Afikpo, Onitsha, Nnewi, to strafe and bomb civilians with reckless abandon? I thought that innocent civilians and children are supposed to be spared in conventional wars? I do not have to be told that Gowon flouted the rules of conventional war because not once, not twice or three times did I, as a little boy, have to run for cover in Nnewi to escape the sadistic bombing missions of Russian migs that Gowon sent to Biafra to bomb civilians. If Gowon is the Christian he wants us to believe, he should at least say that it was wrong for him to have sent those Russian migs.

[b]Will Gowon tell me that he was unaware of the massacre in Asaba where civilians were tricked into thinking they were coming out to greet Nigerian troops but then were dastardly gunned down? I do not have to be told that story by someone because it hit close to home. I lost many of my relatives in that massacre in Asaba. The least General Gowon could do is to openly say that he regrets what happened during the Asaba massacre. He is more concerned with telling Nigerians that he does not regret any of his actions. The Asaba massacre alone is enough to send him to the Hague, like Charles Taylor, to answer for his actions and inactions. After all, Charles Taylor did not personally commit any of the atrocities but was the helmsman when the atrocities were committed. This is precisely why Gowon is not releasing his memoir because he knows he is on the hook. He will have a lot of questions to answer.

Will Gowon say he did not know that the federal soldiers maltreated Igbos, at the end of the war, during an occupation that lasted more than a year? In my village, they forced young children to go fetch water for them or serve them and if you refused, you were subjected to koboko flogging. All these atrocities took place under General Gowon’s watch and he still does not regret the war or his actions? It is either General Gowon has sadistic tendencies or is simply trying hard to keep himself out of the international criminal court that he says he is willing to face.
[/b]
In the interest of full disclosure, I must admit my own bias and point of view. As catalogued in my book about Biafra, I was only 7 years when the war started and turned 10 when it ended in 1970. At that age, just like other kids that age in Biafra, I lived through, saw or heard things that a child should never have to. That experience is still etched in my memory and will probably remain there till my dying day. The air raids by Russian migs, the death of young children from Kwashiorkor, the death of relatives massacred in Asaba, general suffering and privation and the death of my beloved brother, Fidelis, that fought in the war. Yet, what I witnessed pales in comparison with what some other children, who were closer to the various theaters of war, went through. I remember when I started secondary school in 1973, I met many kids, about my age, that survived the war. This was three years after the war but the memories were still fresh in the minds of the young lads. We exchanged stories about what we experienced. Some talked about the brutal death of parents, siblings and other relatives either through air raids, starvation and plain heartbreak. I recall the case of one of my dorm mates. I had noticed that portions of his fingers were missing and he would always try to hide it whenever possible but yet he was a great artist and whenever he was drawing, the missing fingers would become apparent. One day he opened up and said that he used to have all his fingers intact. But immediately after the war, while in elementary school somewhere in Owerri, they were cleaning the school compound and clearing and burning brushes. He gathered a load of trash and just as he dumped it into the fire, an explosion occurred and that was how he lost portions of his fingers. It was later discovered that he had inadvertently picked up unexploded ordnance. He lives with that scar, occasioned by the war, till date.

I want General Gowon to realize that when he says he does not regret the war or his actions during the war, many of the children that were the direct recipients of the brutality occasioned by his actions are still alive and read his statements. They will continually wonder what manner of Christian he is. They will at best be seeing him as a hypocrite that masquerades as a Christian.

Finally, if Gowon feels that Achebe’s book was written in ignorance, if he feels he has nothing to hide and would be ready to face the international criminal court, let him put forth his own memoir, detailing his actions during the civil war and let Nigerians be the judge. I regret the fact that Odumegwu Ojukwu also failed to release his own memoir before he passed on. As the two principal actors, their memoirs would have had a measure of importance and add to the important discourse of what happened and what needs to be done to prevent that type of episode from reoccurring.

HERE I STAND

remark D: I gat to say, this really touched me. Got me sober after feeling a bit riled up by comments from posters whom act like little kids by trying to deneegrate someone else who isnt from the same ethnic group as they are; having a one-way myopic point of view; and even if/when they know or come across a plausible/reasonable view from others, as long as it counters theirs, it is an automatic reject. its sad, really sad. God help us all. Thank you very much for this post; which newspaper was it published in?
.

Da infamous: This why i hardly engage on some issues here on NL because most of them are not thinking straight so why bother? the article is from Nigeria world by Alfred obiora nzekwe...as i said sometimes when i read some comments i laugh is better they don't comment at all because it make them look like a product of evil...

marveouz:


Typical....."proud and arrogant; they see them as feeling superior to other people".

inufele2:

Stupeed son of a baboon! Go to where you belong with your relative below.

chief batiatus:

Igbos always disappoint unfailingly. From the english you speak you aPpear educated but see how unobjective you are? I realised that igbos are the only tribe in nig where an educated person and an illiterate have no difference in thinking. So all the truths told by your brother osuji has not raised a soul search in you? You will rather pelt him with stones? Very disappointing

M-16:


HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA ,
YORUBASTARD VERY UGLY ORANGUTAN , IT LOOK LIKE BOLA TINUBU ,IN FACT 95 % OF YORUBA'S LOOK EXACTLY LIKE THIS APE .
TYPICAL YORUBA FACE BOOK OR BOOK FACE YORUBA .BASTARD'S IN A SORRY STATE SORRY DESTITUTE

inufele2:

Yaba left escapee they are looking for you already to return you back to the asylum where you belong. Typical lousy yiboman.

M-16:


yorubastard 's ,tacky ghetto bastard's ,idiot's who has their ugly stinking poo in plastic bags , I have this white woman who took graphic image of yoruba girls defecating on the side walks .pig's will scavenge ,over weight yorubastard's and their igbo night mare

inufele2:

Igbo dog keep barking, barking is normal to Igbo you're only exhibiting your natural behaviour. A typical Igbo need a white to validate his sanity no wonder you're drooling on your oyinbo pics. Next time take your oyinbo master to take pictures of aba to let you know how filthy alaigbo is. Cretinous Igbo monster.

M-16:


YORUBASTARD ,YORUBA HOG'S KEEP CLOAKING ,YOU 'RE EXHIBITING YOUR BEHAVIOR .A TYPICAL UGLY BASTARD I CAN'T WITHSTAND YOUR AZZ LICKING POSTING PICTURE'S OF YOUR WHITE WOMAN GOD PRETENDING TO YORUBA LANGUAGE WHILE THEY HAVE THIS YORUPIG'S SINGING WHITE WOMAN PRAISES .I HAVE ALL YORUBASTARD'S IN STATE EVERY DAY DYING TO GET WHITE WOMAN ,BASTARD'S ARE SO OBSESSED WITH ANY THING WHITE WOMAN ,THERE ARE SO MANY SINGLE LADY YORUBASTARD IN AMERICA WHY BECAUSE THEIR MAN DON'T WANT UGLINESS IN THEIR FAMILY . THE SAME WAY YOU CAN'T TAKE YOUR FOREIGN TO IBADAN OR OSHOGBO , DON'T BRAG ABOUT LAGOS BUILT BY ALL ETHNIC IN NIGERIA .CRETINOUS YORUBASTARD MONSTER

inufele2:

Who let this dog out

M-16:

cloak cloak , cloak ,cloaking sound of pig ,who let the pig's out , cover your trash can