The leader of the Indigenous Peoples
of Biafra, IPOB and Director of Radio
Biafra, Mazi Nnamdi Kanu, has been
languishing in detention since
October 14, 2015 when the
Directorate of State Services, DSS,
arrested him. In spite of court
orders for him to be released on
bail, the Federal Government has
stubbornly held on to him. He is
being tried for treason: allegedly
operating a pirate radio outfit that
broadcast subversive messages and
leading a group which is openly
committed to the dismemberment of
Nigeria, which is what the
independence of Biafra will amount
to.
File: Nnamdi kanu
What it simply means is that Kanu
is a political detainee/prisoner. In
many cases, such prisoners can hope
for a reprieve from either prolonged,
life or death sentence through
political negotiations by his
comrades, followers or sympathisers
based on their willingness to shift
grounds or the willingness of their
opponents (the government) to shift
grounds. For instance, Kurdish
separatist leader, Abdullah Ocalan,
was sentenced to death for a
treasonable offence similar to that of
Kanu, but when he renounced
violence and opted for a political
solution to the independence of the
Kurds from Turkey, he was eventually
granted reprieve.
On the other hand, anti-Apartheid
leader, Dr Nelson Mandela remained
unbending about his desire for the
overthrow of the Apartheid regime,
and had to spend 27 long years in
jail. It took major shifts in
international attitudes to the
Apartheid regime and a willing
reformer in the person of President
FW De Klerk for conditions
acceptable to Mandela to emerge for
him to be released. He then joined a
political process that eventually saw
him becoming the President of South
Africa on the platform of his party,
the African National Congress, ANC.
However, unlike Ocalan and Kanu,
Mandela was not fighting for
separation but majority rule.
The Buhari regime refused to
entertain any notion of freedom for
Kanu until the Niger Delta Avengers,
NDA’s, massive bombing of our oil
infrastructure in the Niger Delta
held the country’s leadership by the
balls. When the Presidency shifted
grounds and became more amenable
to a negotiated settlement to enable
the country resume her full
exploitation of the oil that she had
depended on for over 40 years, the
Movement for the Emancipation of
the Niger Delta, MEND,
MEND, which had propelled the
earlier version of the Niger Delta
militancy that ended in the amnesty
arrangement, saw an opportunity to
wrest a deal that would
accommodate the interests of the
nation’s recently emerged unified
political bloc, the South East and
South-South. Thus, came the
proposal for the release of political
prisoners, including the Okah
brothers apprehended for MEND’s
acts of terror some years back, and of
course, Kanu, if they would renounce
their agitations for separatism.
Though the Federal Government has
not yet openly admitted that such
talks were ongoing, Kanu directly
made it clear he was not game for
any such deal. It was Biafra or
nothing. Even his wife, Lolo Uchechi
Okwu-Kanu, issued a statement
saying: “Anybody thinking that my
husband will renounce Biafra is
certifiably insane”.
The truth is that Kanu has found
himself in the situation that the late
Bashorun Moshood Abiola did when
he was detained by General Sani
Abacha after the Epetedo
Declaration on June 11, 1994: he is
now trapped in jail. Abacha and his
supporters would have been
overjoyed to let Abiola go only if he
would renounce the struggle for his
annulled presidential mandate, but
Abiola’s supporters, who were
fighting – and some were dying – for
him and the struggle, would have
none of that.
Fancy what would have happened if
Abiola had broken bounds,
renounced his mandate and come
back to open society? He would
instantly have become a persona
non-grata! The same National
Democratic Coalition, NADECO, civil
society groups and the Yoruba
nationalist activists who were ready
to lay down their lives for him would
have turned viciously against him.
His life and property (and possibly
those of his loved ones) could have
been in danger, for the precise
reason that many had been killed
and people’s property destroyed by
the government forces for coming
out to fight for him.
Kanu’s case is even more extreme in
that the Army has killed hundreds of
unarmed pro-Biafra protesters. They
have been given heroes’ burials
since the Biafra protests started in
the middle of 2015. Many are also
being tried for treason. With the
kind of vehement emotion that these
young men (and women) carry this
Biafra thing, Kanu’s renunciation of
the struggle would result in
consequences better not imagined.
He is far safer and better in jail, a
hero and symbol of the struggle. He
had better settle down for a long
stay and hope that like in South
Africa, the political atmosphere can
suddenly change to accommodate a
settlement terms that could safely
propel him and his loyalists out of
prison.
I don’t know how this can happen,
but there is nothing permanent in
politics – even the much-touted
“indivisibility” of Nigeria. No
political arrangement lasts forever,
much less the Nigerian type which is
guaranteed mainly by force, the
power of oil and the indecisive
character of those who complain the
loudest.
One good thing going for Kanu and
all the pro-Biafra groups is that they
profess non-violence. But IPOB’s
unbridled sabre-rattling over the
airwaves is almost as effective in
mobilising the angry youth against
the Nigerian state – if not more so –
as a call to arms.
I don’t think that any government
(even if headed by an Igbo) will look
forward to releasing Kanu to go and
continue from where he stopped.
Mazi Nnamdi Kanu has taken up a
brave and difficult struggle. It is
going to be a long one as well. Going
forward may be difficult, but going
back will be impossible, as Ghanaian
playwright, Kofi Awoonor-Williams
would say. But in politics, miracles
do happen. www.vanguardngr.com/2016/08/nnamdi-kanus-unenviable-dilemma/

long live B I A F R A

All hail the kuje Gay lord

IPOB is a pawn in a chess game, Like MEND and others.

Serously I envy Igbos, do you know how many times Activist Kanu have been bribed, cajoled, threatened to denounce Biafra but the guy still maintains his doggedness, if na we yorubas we for don collect bribe sell our own. It because of yoruba lack of principle that Fulani emirates blossom in northern yorubaland.

God bless dogged Activists all over the world.