emisun: there is this question i av been wanting to ask since i first started taking interest in global affairs and that question-why did the ojukwu led rebellion only lasted for a mere three years when others else where like Tamil tigers,LRA,FARC,PKK etc lasted longer and some of them are still rebelling.

patrick89: Y are u people always forcin igbo people to believe dat ojukwu led them to war that took millions of there lifes and properties? Y are u forcin igbos to believe that he is a vailian and not a hero? I think they are d best people to make those decision not you! People should stop all these "I knw better rant", and allow them to idolize anyone they like the way they want. As for me, I think u people didn't knw all these issues better than them, yet they still believe he is the greatest igbo man ever lived, it will be stupid and crazy for someone outside to claim to knw about my father than I do, make una chill jari!

ikanya: Ojukwu had never at any time gone to any "hideout".
His pardon by the Shagari's administration merely stated a good understanding of Ojukwu's personality, his love for a great Nigeria, the part he played to save his people and the circumstances that led to his declaration of the state of Biafra.

When Biafra's military resistance collapsed, [size=28pt]Ojukwu fled to Côte d'Ivoire[/size].

Efiong assumed leadership in this situation of turmoil, starvation, and collapse. He became Head of State of Biafra on 8 January 1970 and on 12 January announced surrender.[1]

At the time of the surrender, Efiong believed that the situation was hopeless and that prolonging the conflict would have led only to the further destruction and starvation of the people of Biafra. At that time Effiong said, "I am convinced now that a stop must be put to the bloodshed which is going on as a result of the war. I am also convinced that the suffering of our people must be brought to an immediate end."[1]

Nnaemeka L. Aneke wrote, "General Efiong’s handling of Biafra’s surrender is one of the most tactical and devoted maneuvers ever seen on the Nigerian scene. Those who do not appreciate the depth of it may not have appreciated what was at stake as Biafra capitulated."[2] Many observers had expected wholesale retribution at war's end.
[edit]

Later life


In a 1996 interview, Efiong reflected on those events:

I have no regrets whatsoever of my involvement in Biafra or the role I played. The war deprived me of my property, dignity, my name. Yet, I saved so many souls on both sides and by this, I mean Biafra and Nigeria. . . .

I felt that I played a role which has kept this country united till today. . . .

At the end of it all when I saw they (Biafran soldiers) could no longer continue and [size=28pt]Ojukwu had fled[/size], I did what was ideal after wide consultation . . . [2]

Efiong died 6 November 2003, at the age of 78 less than two weeks before his 79th birthday.

patrick89: Y are u people always forcin igbo people to believe dat ojukwu led them to war that took millions of there lifes and properties? Y are u forcin igbos to believe that he is a vailian and not a hero? I think they are d best people to make those decision not you! People should stop all these "I knw better rant", and allow them to idolize anyone they like the way they want. As for me, I think u people didn't knw all these issues better than them, yet they still believe he is the greatest igbo man ever lived, it will be stupid and crazy for someone outside to claim to knw about my father than I do, make una chill jari!

chino11: Yorubas both living and unborn will not ae chieve Ikemba's height in the history of Africa and world at large. Ikemba can only be compared to three people in the whole of Africa; great Zik, Nelson Mandela and Kwame Nkruma. As for Awolowoa he was convicted for treason by the government of Zik/Balewa and subsequent committed suicide.

Dede1:



The fight for Biafra would have continued like Tamil tigers,LRA,FARC,PKK etc if Biafra was a product of homogeneous people of eastern region which had remotely planned to remove itself from Nigeria.

dayokanu:

Mandela and Nkrumah did not run away

Infact Mandela spent 27yrs in jail for a cause he believed in

Ojuku rather fled to Abidjan and came back to marry his own goddaughter

Aigbofa:

The fight for Biafra could not continue because Biafra was not a product of homogeneous people of eastern region? When exactly did you find out the people of Biafra were not homogeneous? Before or after the war? Seems everything and everyone is responsible for the failure of Biafra, from Yorubas to Great Britain, to Russian and Americans to Biafrans themselves who were unfortunate not to be homogeneous!

chino11: And what do do you have to say about Yoruba leaders being bribed by the almjiris to slaughter Abioala, Kudirat, Fushow Williams, Bola Ige and so many unresolved murders in the Yoruba land.

"Abiola’s Death: Al-Mustapha Insists Some Yoruba Leaders Were Bribed By Gen.Abdulsalami…Says More Incriminating Evidence In Seized Video Tapes"

http://ireports-ng.com/2011/08/09/abiolas-death-al-mustapha-insists-some-yoruba-leaders-were-bribed-by-gen-abdulsalami-says-more-incriminating-evidence-in-seized-video-tapes/


Yorubas both living and unborn will not ae chieve Ikemba's height in the history of Africa and world at large. Ikemba can only be compared to three people in the whole of Africa; great Zik, Nelson Mandela and Kwame Nkruma. As for Awolowoa he was convicted for treason by the government of Zik/Balewa and subsequent committed suicide.

Can somebody get me the picture of Awolowao's suicide attack on himself with otapiapia

patrick89: Y are u people always forcin igbo people to believe dat ojukwu led them to war that took millions of there lifes and properties? Y are u forcin igbos to believe that he is a vailian and not a hero? I think they are d best people to make those decision not you! People should stop all these "I knw better rant", and allow them to idolize anyone they like the way they want. As for me, I think u people didn't knw all these issues better than them, yet they still believe he is the greatest igbo man ever lived, it will be stupid and crazy for someone outside to claim to knw about my father than I do, make una chill jari!

ekwy nwa:

@ Chino tell them, they re cowards and that they shall remain.

The continuous villification of General Ibrahim Badamosi Babangida (IBB) over the annulment of June 12,1993 presidential election, even 17 years after leaving power as the military president has compelled him and his followers to attempt at putting the records right by unmasking the gladiators, and the role they played.

According to one of his loyalists who is also a gubernatorial aspirant in Imo state, Mr. Brady Chijioke Nwosu, “Babangida's weakness remains his benevolence. After seeing the video recorded by Babangida's security network during his reign containing the meetings where many groups and high level individuals some of who claim to be democrats today were begging and pleading that IBB should annul the June 12, 1993 Presidential election, we pleaded that IBB should allow it to be aired publicly but he refused, admitting and taking responsibility over what happened. However, with recent events in the polity he has agreed to release the video”.

Forces behind the annulment of Jun12

A top member of the defunct Social Democratic Party (SDP) told TNT that June 12 died before the elections. “You will recall that there was a subsisting court order stopping the election from taking place and the party hierarchy did not appeal because by then Chief Abiola had parted
ways with his political associates.” Asked what happened, he opined that Chief Abiola established a campaign organization and that undermined the authority of the party. It is not done any where in the world, no matter how popular the candidate is.” The then Chairman of SDP, Chief Anthony Anenih was said to have had confrontations with Abiola before the election; Alhaji Abubakar Rimi had parted ways with Abiola, Jonathan Zwingina,
head of Abiola's Hope 93 had seen the signs that the elections may not hold due to the clandestine moves of the human rights groups and most of Abiola's kinsmen to Aso Rock to forestall the conduct of the election.Chief Abiola had also boasted to Chief Arthur Nzeribe that he could win the election without the South East, a statement that infuriated and motivated Nzeribe to form the Association for Better
Nigeria,(ABN) the group that got a court injunction stopping the conduct of the election.

Before, June 12, many prominent Yorubas due to envy and selfishness had gone to Babangida, pleading with him not to allow Abiola run for the election. Some of these people included traditional rulers, the Oni of Ife, Oba Okunade Sijuade, Alhaji Ibrahim Dasuki, etc. There were many of them who dined with Abiola in the day and hanged out with Babangida at night and deceived him using most of the military top brass to force him not to allow the election hold in the first place. This group included, Olusegun Obasanjo, Lateef Jakande, Wole Awolowo, Sunday Unongo, Lamidi Adedibu, Tochukwu Onwugbufor, TOS. Benson, Olu Onagoruwa, Sunday Adewusi, Ebenezer Babatope, Sule Lamido, Clement Akpamgbo, Rtd Justice Nasir,
Umaru Dikko who did his shooting from exile.

Obasanjo was said to have called Babangida several times and gave him a firm order not to hand over power to Abiola. Abiola and Obasanjo had a long time hatred for each other and Obasanjo confirmed his position when he said that Abiola was not the messiah Nigeria needs.

Chief Anenih as the chairman of SDP had led a delegation of party members to Babangida not to allow Abiola due to irreconcilable differences. Wole Awolowo, son of the late Sage, Chief Obafemi Awolowo had vendetta in mind. He went to Babangida fronting his mother, Chief Mrs.HOD. Awolowo, pleading to Babangida not to allow Abiola to hold power in retaliation to what Abiola did to their father in 1979 and 1983 when he campaigned against Awolowo in the South- West.


[b]Abiola was publicly loved but secretly hated by his own people, especially all the Awolowo's boys [/b]under the defunct Unity Party of Nigeria (UPN). And so most of the Yorubas that took appointment under Gen.. Sani Abacha's government were Awolowo's loyalists. African Guardian of June 27, 1994 reported the events of pre and post June 12 as follows:

``These human right groups did every thing they could against the SDP, whose intelligentsia and
youth membership were more accessible to them, in order to prevent a successful presidential
election on June 12, 1993.

They dismissed the whole exercise as a fraud, the candidates as Babangida's puppets and the two parties as Parastatals and called for a boycott. They of course failed. But by turning 360 degrees and riding on the June 12 victory they managed to put themselves in a position from which they could continue diverting attention. They undermined the credibility of the June 12 presidential election even before it had taken place.``After the annulment of the election on June 23, 1993 and the massive popular nationwide outrage against it, these human rights groups changed their position 360 degrees, in a most unprincipled way. The very election they had noisily denounced as a fraudulent exercise in a fraudulent political programme, they turned around to acclaim as expressing the democratic will of the Nigerian people. The question of how the SDP, the parastatal of a military dictatorship, could produce a democratic election victory has never been answered by these groups, because their denunciation of the SDP was not in the first place derived from a well thought out and a principled position, but was simply theatrical political demagoguery.

The truth remains that even most of those who sincerely worked for Abiola never believed that his muslim- muslim ticket will sell, some believed that Babangida had planted Alhaji Tofa of the NRC to coast to victory against Abiola. Even Alao Aka- Bashorun had called MKO the puppet of IBB.

As the first set of the June 12 1993 presidential election result was being released, there was fear especially on the part of Abiola's haters in the south- west. They placed calls and pressure on IBB and sent documents showing the security risk in allowing an Abiola presidency, his dealings with American CIA and debts mounting into billions of dollars on the parts of the Nigerian government to Abiola, an issue they argued will sink the country's interest.The pressure was heavy, Babangida consulted and not only was it reached that Abiola's presidency would be unfavourable, Babangida felt unsave in the hands of the military establishment. On the 23rd of June, 1993 Babangida did the obvious; the election was annulled and the same group became sympathetic to Abiola. Babangida while signing the annulment decree was quoted as saying, ``The step was taken to save our judiciary from being ridiculed and politicized locally and internationally.`

The cashing in of political vultures

http://thetycoonmagazine.com/tycoon1/article2.html

alj harem:

But that is one person

Imagine Nzeribe buying weapons to kill Igbo

Igbo on Igbo crime is worse

Are you aware that Nzeribe bought weapons to kill 3 million Igbo people ?

BTW we have not concluded on Abiola but Nzeribe is in Abuja enjoying blood money. LOL mumu Igbo people

dayokanu:

Mandela and Nkrumah did not run away

Infact Mandela spent 27yrs in jail for a cause he believed in

Ojuku rather fled to Abidjan and came back to marry his own goddaughter

ekwy nwa:

confused ,mallam how far? it really sucks to be a nama

alj harem:

I am yoruba, I have told you times without number, I am yoruba from the Awori-egun stock

ekwy nwa:

really? since when?

alj harem:

since I decided to

alj harem:

since I decided to

bakila:

You are living in Nigeria, some folks writing tribal rubbish are not. Like someone said the bigots have reported for duty. Our collective bigotry has left those at the helm of affiars with plenty options to amass wealth and leave us messed up. If all the sectional Army and civilians have directed their concern at those in power we would have been less frustrated.
But alas Onlytruth Eze gburugburu of Niaraland is a Biafran.

ndu_chucks:

This attempt to turn the BH war into a religious war is irresponsible at best.

Stick with discussing Achebe and Ojukwu for now. Happy Easter Monday