₦airaland Forum

EzeUche: Some of these Ijaws are ungrateful. Jonathan would never have been elected president of Nigeria without Igbo support.

That is why I say do not bite the hand that feeds you.

No minority can ever get elected in Nigeria without support of either the Yoruba, Igbo or Hausa.

I used to tackle you for being militant against Ijaw then, I have to say that I was wrong and you were (are) right. Please accept my apologies.

I believe that Jonathan is truly God-sent to Ijaw people, because if he is not as cool and wise as he is, he would never have even emerged Nigeria's president at all. Remember that it was Dora Akunyili that broke ranks with everybody, to openly call for him to be sworn in during the Yar adua absence. He has been remarkably wise and sane, unlike most Ijaw I've met on this forum.

Honestly, if Nigeria were to descend into another civil war, I would personally focus on our southern borders to the sea. Aboki would have the Northern minorities to worry about, even before getting to Igbo land. The civil war basically stole large swathes of Igbolands and tossed them into the control of unintelligent and ungrateful lots to our south. Every land of our ancestors must be retrieved back from ants claiming giant status because of mere accident of history.

The Ijaw fool here can continue his self delusion.

Being related (or Not) has little to do with language. So, one has to dig deeper to decipher whether one is related to another.

For instance, I believe that I am related with ANYONE that believes in "live and let live" (Igbo core values -egbe bere, ugo bere". ).
I am also related with anyone that believes in justice, and equality of all, hard work, and innate love for progress.
If I do a GIS mapping of those who believe in all those, anywhere I find them, they are related to me.

Igbo is only a language I speak.

I also speak English (and a few other languages); does that make me English man? No of course.
So, we must look beyond language to find the truth.

I DO NOT RELATE, OR WANT TO RELATE WITH ANYONE WHO DOES NOT SHARE MY CORE VALUES, except on an arms-length basis.

“We want to use this opportunity to say that the incident was not targeted at any particular ethnic group as the casualty cut across all tribes of Nigeria. Victims include Hausa, Igbo, Yoruba, ethnic nationalities from North central, and South South geo-political zones”, Chief Chi Nwogu, President, Kano chapter of Igbo Community Association declared.

Addressing reporters in Kano, Chief Chi Nwogu who spoke on behalf of Igbo federating states said that the figures jointly collated by the leadership of Luxury bus Union revealed that a total of 37 persons died during the blast while 75 other sustained injuries.

“We mandated the leadership of the luxurious bus park to carefully collate the data of the affected victims. Casualty figures now indicate that thirty seven persons died in the explosion, while 75 sustained various degrees of injuries”, Chief Nwogu said.

@First bolded, the Chief is entitled to his opinion. BTW does anyone expect a Chief (obviously heavily invested in Kano) to say anything different. Unless the bus is not owned by an Igbo man, this Chief is only serving his own interest.

@Second bolded, Nigeria has become so fatalistic that THIRTY SEVEN people died in one fell swoop, and an adult is talking about is as if thirty seven goats, or chicken were killed.
These are people with families and loved ones. The Chief is irresponsible.

I have since vowed to stop crying for Igbo who willing donate their necks to the knives anywhere in Nigeria (like Chief Nwogu). I cry only for victims who were deceived by the likes of Chief Nwogu who convinces them to stick their collective heads in the sand until the next bomb goes off.

I will not vote for a Northerner for a totally different reason, and it is that there is nothing in Northern Nigeria that tells me that the best president would likely come from there. This is 21st century. If Imo State can produce more JAMB candidates than North West (the North's biggest geopolitical region), then I would pick Nigeria's president from Imo State first, before I pick any from the North West.

In my book, education is CRITICAL to 21st century leadership. This is not 19th century.

So, if the North insist on producing the president, or Nigeria would break, I say I wish them God's speed in their new republic!

UncleJJ: ha ha.... it seems ur a quack soothsayer... I am a confirmed edo boy.

you will soon say edo is not niger delta....

Your attempt at preemptive attack will not work. You've said the truth yourself with the bolded words. It is a gambit, but smart folks don't fall for gambits.

Personally, I believe that "SS" or "Niger Delta" is one of the biggest political traps in Nigeria. Only fools will be caught by that trap.

My political sense tells me that you are really in the camp of Western Nigeria when the chips finally fall where they may in Nigeria's struggle for political stability. Your political maneuvers here gives you away!

GEJ knows where his real political base is.

Katsumoto: Your post doesn't take certain things into cognizance.

1. Generals and not foot soldiers win wars. Would you credit Macedonians, Greeks, Spaniards, Bulgarians for Roman military victories or would the defeat and victory be accorded to the Roman generals who led those armies? The Battles between Caesar and Pompeii were fought by mainly European foot soldiers but history records it as a Roman civil war.

2. Before the start of the civil war, Yoruba was under-represented in the Army because the British didn't want Yoruba Muslims in the Army. (Read COLONIAL ARMY RECRUITMENT PATTERNS AND POST-COLONIAL MILITARY COUPS D’ÉTAT IN AFRICA: THE CASE OF NIGERIA, 1966-1993 - Ejiogu for reasons). Anyone with a knowledge of Yoruba warfare would tell you that the main Yoruba Army was in Oyo/Ibadan axis and they were mostly Muslims. But with the encroachment of BAF on Western soil, Gowon had no problems enlisting them to fight the war. It's like saying it was only Biafrans who were in the Army pre-1967 that fought for Biafra.

No, you are wrong on that bolded words. The only reason there was an up-tick in the numbers of Yoruba who joined the Nigerian army then was because of the colossal failure of the Biafran Expeditionary Force led by Banjo, a Yoruba man. Two factors made that failure possible and I must be fair in my findings.

(1) The BEF was a poorly equipped force. Had the BEF been equipped with about 50 -100 tanks, and 155mm artillery howitzers, even Banjo would have been silly to try sabotaging the force. Such an equipped force would have sacked Lagos even from Ijebu-ode or even outskirts of Ondo state just after Ore.

(2) Even with its poor state of equipment, had the BEF being under the command of an Igbo man or Ibibio man, they would have at least marched to Lagos and sacked Gowon.

The Aburi records shown in this thread proved that Biafra had enough military strength to sack Gowon from Lagos (of course no one envisaged that Ojukwu would put such a force under the command of a man with a history of mutiny like Banjo). Now I am not saying that Biafra could have held Lagos for too long without at least capturing the Nigerian Navy and using it to blockade the North against arms importation. If these scenarios played out, I doubt that Yoruba would have found any courage, or conviction to join the military, at least not on the side of the North. It would have been a totally different war.

The Yoruba only joined an already equipped and well financed army (they calculated that they would only be picking up the pieces of Biafra's defeat). If the North at any point had changed their minds about confronting the East, the Yoruba would have returned to their pre-war habits of dodging military service. They were only encouraged to join because they knew there was no real threat from Biafra.

Lt.-Col. Ojukwu: If every Region wants to go its own way and think one day we will meet again, I feel that it may not work properly.... On immediate re-organisation, one would like to see first of all proper command and control. Secondly, we all agreed that most of the soldiers in each Region should come from that Region. The East and the Mid-West are lucky they have all their people there, unfortunately in the West, I have not got enough Westerners in the place and the people in the West are very afraid now because a lot of their own people were killed during January, July and August. I have tried to clear the fear from them but still they insist on having more Yorubas than they have at the moment. [size=14pt]I know there are not enough Yorubas in the Army and those who are there are mostly tradesmen.[/size] I do not want to disrupt other units, but from what I said when we last met in Lagos, we can find an immediate solution to the Yoruba problem. That is, try and continue on the normal quota business which we started in Zaria and as a crash programme we should use Abeokuta area as a crash programme training centre for Westerners, for Mid-Westerners who cannot go to Zaria and possibly for the Easterners who cannot go to Zaria at the moment. I still feel very strongly about this, this is the only way to clear the problem of the Yorubas and this is the only way we can get the confidence of the people of the West because they feel they are the only people now being helped because there are not enough Yorubas in the Army.

ONE CLEAR MAJOR observation by Gowon, which everybody in the room acknowledged and Ojukwu strategically wanted to surmount by insisting that every regional governor must agree to any central governments recommendation before being accepted as law. The Yoruba did not have minimal representation in the army. Infact according to the quote above, they had mainly TRADESMEN (whatever that means!).
So, Aburi would have served them perhaps more than the Easterners and Midwesterners that had enough military personnel.
But if an independent observer (a non-Nigerian) were to observe constant taunts by some Yoruba Nairalanders, he/she would have thought that Nigerian army of that time was dominated by Yoruba.

I'm happy to see some smart Yoruba folks accepting that Ojukwu was right.

kettykin: you claim to know the difference between FX and GDP, can you explain how a state like Osun with no definite economic base besides
a River Goddess and some hectares of indian hemp farms is rated higher than Anambra state that has seversl large and medium scale enterprises including automobile and auto parts manufacturing firms, large scale breweries and pharmaceutical firms , Medium scale petrochemical refinery and the largest distributive / retail business in the whole of Africa

This got me crackin' up.

dayokanu: The bolded is very true. Imagine for example a man like Ojuku a common war criminal who should be hung at the stakes and stoned for leading 3million people to their death and when things got hot Fled in the middle of the night leaving the vulnerable to their fate is being hailed as a Hero

Very unfortunate

You have a very dark soul, and I have decided to interact as little as possible with dark souls henceforth.

So, I would say this once to you and then leave you to continue on your usual path.

History states that Ojukwu never planned nor wanted war. He went to Aburi and painstakingly negotiated a peaceful settlement (an internationally supervised Accord) to end the Nigerian crisis.
Everybody, including Gowon, signed onto that Accord happily, raised glasses, hugged and all the rest, only for Gowon to return to Nigeria to trash the Accord. History also recorded that Gowon was the first to order a military action against Eastern Nigeria. All these are facts. Ojukwu never initiated any war; Gowon did.

History also shows that Ojukwu was given a burial which even Nigerian presidents never got. His fame is all over Africa and people like Jerry Rawlings graced his funeral. His coffin was carried by GENERALS in the Nigerian army. These are FACTS.

Now, lets wait for your hero Gowon to die, and lets compare notes then.

Bye.

He made sure that our votes counted, unlike Obasanjo who rendered our votes irrelevant.
He allowed opposition parties to win elections in states where they are strong.
He allowed our democracy to progress, and I would even say that he grew it. FACT!

OP I totally agree with ALL your observations.

I would summarize it by saying that there is NO WAY for Gowon to justify his "Police action" against the Eastern Region, after reneging on Aburi.
NO WAY.

I suspect that Gowon must have been mis-advised by those who preach "might is right", but any TRUE Christian knows that there is God who is the final power and judge of ALL men irrespective of their worldly powers.

If you take a very careful look, you will see that God has already judged ALL the key players who foisted war on Nigeria, and in the process killed 2 million innocent Nigerians. He is visiting them one by one. Even powerful nations which played devious roles against Biafra will not be spared by God.

Nigeria's problems would have been solved since 1966 ( a whopping 47 years ago!), but today we are on the verge of another war in the North (Gowon's home region), this time foisted by an extremely violent sect, fanned by Satan himself.

God's judgment is SURE.

Gowon's memoir would only amount to self immolation.

@ndu_chucks, how can you equate Boko Haram with any other group in Nigeria, I mean REALLY?
I'm shocked at your attempt to muddle the waters and make the whole thing look like they are all the same. Boko Haram has killed more Nigerians BY FAR (thousands) than any other group in Nigeria. Even MEND targeted pipelines, while Boko haram targets PEOPLE.
I agree that the government should NEVER use the pretext of fighting terrorism to kill willy nilly, and in the process killing innocent people, and those whose guilt should in any case be determined by a competent court of law in Nigeria; I would support the military or any security agencies returning fire against those shooting at them or shooting at ordinary Nigerians. You tried to bring the Ezu River murders here, but you know fully well that those Ezu victims were UNARMED and were EXECUTED without trial.
I consider you a friend, so please stop trying to muddle the waters and trying to create a collective guilt unnecessarily.

Yes, I also agree that ultimately the security of lives and property of all Nigerians are the prerogative of the federal government, but that doesn't mean that we should support armed groups killing Nigerians and in the process making the federal govts job harder. All responsible Nigerians should never target fellow citizens for any reasons, except for self defense (in my own opinion).

So, lets condemn terror by this aimless Northern Nigerian terrorist group without reservations.
Dalu.

We mourn a great man of letters! A genius of generational proportions. We are blessed to have known you in life and in death Nze Chinualumogu.
We are proud to call you fellow countryman. We are even prouder to call you fellow Igbo!
You chiseled our story in the most stable of African basement complex rocks!
Generations will invoke your rare incorruptibility and wise paths.
Literature in Africa will never be the same because of you!

Rest in peace okeosisi!

Signed,

Onlytruth, Ndu di n'eziokwu 1 of Igboland, Eze Ndigbo III Nairaland.

xtgozie: I wouldn't say I didn't get the picture u tried to paint.

But the fact still remains, the attacks on the Igbos, are terrorist attacks.
Not only u have condemned the terrorism in the northern Nigeria, but Ndigbo has in totality condemned and abhorred terrorist and their acts, both in d north and any part of d word in its fullest measure.

I have not seen this thread as a tool to engineer or minister the disintegration of Nigeria as its valuable option. But rather a call on the Fed. Govt. And those concerned to stand on their toes if need be and force a stop on the killings of Ndigbo in the northern parts of Nigeria, and also address d killings of ndigbo in any part of this country to a point where u, me and every Igbo person(s) will say, "at last justice is served".

So young man which I believe u are. Whatever school of thought u belong to, like I care. It has gone beyond tribal interests , to a point where u and those with and without concerns should know, that humans are being killed. So let's not play politics on a table of blood. Cos people will get stained.

The killing of my brothers and sisters in the north and in every part of this country must stop. And must stop now. Because it has gotten to a point where it's no longer the call of the FG.


If u will allow me respond to if Boko Haram should be granted amnesty. It will point us on " who and whom are these terrorists ", since the Federal Government claims they are faceless!

NOTE: the security of our Nation is not "squarely the responsibility of GEJ and its crew" like u above stated. But a collective responsibility of all of us. And I believe that this thead and its OP has taken its role, in playing a part in a collective responsibility of "our national security.


Ndi banyi ekenem unu.
Onye jisike olue ani Eze.

Very well said my brother.
Thanks!

This is why I personally believe that the CORE VALUES of Christianity (the Golden rule -do onto others as you would have them do unto you) is yet to be sown in Nigeria.
A lot of people go to church in Nigeria, but VERY FEW capture this core Christian teaching. That is why you see almost satanic levels of wickedness in Nigeria, and people carry on as if all is normal. BTW these satanically hateful monsters would be the first to accuse others, but they would also be the first to jump on the weak heartlessly.

Who shall defend and protect the weak in Nigeria?

I still try not to see Nigeria as a Hobbesian jungle of basic natures state where animal instincts dominate all human actions.

Who choses how he/she will be born in this world?

Does any of these characters in this show of sheer wickedness ever wonder that they may be born hermaphrodites too?
Oh, they think that God is asleep and ignores this type of wickedness?

The problem in Northern Nigeria if left unstopped can derail the Nigerian train. But then, we all know that.
I hope no one starts to blame people who say enough is enough.
Nigeria has a culture of blaming victims.

Left to me I would repeat my advice to Ndigbo. Before buying or building on any piece of land outside Igboland, please ask yourself a simple question:

CAN YOU FIGHT AND DEFEND YOURSELF AND YOUR PROPERTY IF NEED BE?

If you remotely answered NO to this question, then you must cease and desist from ever doing that.
This advice will remain perennial.

May the souls of the dead RIP. Amen.

ikeyman00: @@@@

onlytruth u are so right on point

Thanks bro.

Nigeria is very easy to diagnose. The country is self explanatory. The fact remains that some foreigners also have vested interest in Nigeria (some of which is also devious, lol).
The ultimate truth remains that Nigeria has been unable to rise above tribalism right from the days of Ahmadu Bello who specifically had a policy in place to first hire a Northerner; if none was found, he went for a FOREIGNER; if none was found, he then went for a Southerner as an EXPATRIATE (working strictly on CONTRACT basis) IN HIS OWN COUNTRY. Go figure that.

But let's fast forward to today.

We have a President (GEJ) who has achieved more in office in 2 -3 years than Obasanjo achieved in 8 years. FACT.
He is achieving more daily, and by 2015 would have achieved more than Shagari, Obasanjo and Yar adua COMBINED.
Yet, he is the most HATED Nigerian president of all time -the hate coming mainly from the North and West of Nigeria.
What is his crime? His is not from the traditional ruling part (alliance of North and West) in Nigeria. I cannot see any other reason he is so hated.
Obasanjo and Yar adua condoned BIGGER and more endemic corruption than he is doing now. He would have done more if he were from Nigeria's power blocks. He knows he has limits as an Ijaw man from East. He is staying within those limits, but the same people keeping him in those limits are the ones hating him for not giving them el dorado on top of Nigeria's hellish foundations.

I repeat that foreigners should really stay away from prescribing for us. We know our problems.
A cancer man showing signs of pains cannot be told that his disease is PAIN. Nope. His disease is CANCER.

Whoever is interested in Nigerian truth knows where to look. The problem is that a lot of lookers are not honest.

I hate when all these foreigners try to tell us the origins and roots of our problems.
She only ended up showing us the SYMPTOMS that everybody knows already.

The ROOT of those symptoms is TRIBALISM and ISLAMIC EXTREMISM.

In Nigeria, you are more likely to advance if you are not competent BUT an Islamic scholar, than if you are a genius IGBO engineer.

Many leading politicians in Nigeria only go about looking for areas dominated by Igbo. They will ignore all other areas.

The last army imbroglio comes to mind.

If these foreigners don't know anything about Nigeria, they should do us a favor and STFU.

I appeal to umu Igbo to PLEASE ignore those baiting the usual "chicken fights" between Igbo and Yoruba.
I have declared that wasteful and irrelevant.

Both Igbo and Yoruba died in that Kano bus bombing.

Let's keep the kids where they belong -under the chair.

BTW I appeal to umu Igbo to PLEASE ignore those baiting the usual "chicken fights" between Igbo and Yoruba.
I have declared that wasteful and irrelevant.
Both Igbo and Yoruba died in that Kano bus bombing.

Let's keep the kids where they belong -under the chair.

Hehe. I noticed a clear shift in Ohanaeze position on Igbo attacking others in the East. This is a historical shift, and I bet they made that shift out of a concern that Igbo youths are beginning to see them as part of the enemy killing them in Nigeria.
Igbo opinion/followership/consensus on any issue is like a freight train. It is SLOW to build, but when it gathers speed is very difficult to stop.
Kids can keep laughing at Ohanaeze's warning, but wise men already understand the message behind the message.

bamu_hanya: I feel for the victims.Not only this ones but all others even yet to be discovered.I am from the North and I share in your pains.Igbos need to keep tribalism out of such issues.So Nigeria as a whole stands with you for justice.It would be hard and difficult for someone like me despite my feeling towards this unjustifiable killing of the innocent to come out and join your ranks for justice with fingers already pointed toward me and my entire people suggesting we are all involved or we have certain hidden motive that we encourage against your people.That said,i share in your sorrow and hope the victims get justice.I stand with you if need be.I feel everyone regardless should see the bigger picture and where it could end.
[size=14pt]All involved should face justice and the victims most have justice not becuase they are Igbos or anything but Becuase they are innocent people and Nigerians that have a right to live and get justice[/size].

Thank you for these words which included the KEYWORDS -ALL INVOLVED SHOULD FACE JUSTICE.

The killing started way before Kano bombing. Every sensible Igbo should see it and be on FULL alert mode.
Shying away from this thread will never change the facts on the ground. The mayhem will never stop until we call it by name and face it head on.

OP,

The more reasonable question is this; WHERE HAVE YOU BEEN SINCE THIS THREAD BELOW STARTED?

DID YOU EVEN BOTHER TO LOOK IN ON IT?

https://www.nairaland.com/1227633/denied-delayed-justice-apo-6-ezu/2


I have said that I am no longer interested in things that cannot make any impact on the ground.
The thread referenced here is the MOST IMPORTANT thread as far as Igbo council members here are concerned. The enemy has since declared war on Igboland.

A man whose house is on fire does not chase around rats. They are killing us in Igboland. That is far more relevant concern than the killing happening elsewhere in Nigeria.
If we cannot have peace and security in Igboland, then we are finished.

Every other issue is IRRELEVANT.

^^

Anyway, I digress!
What we need for NOW is JUSTICE FOR THOSE HAPLESS NIGERIANS KILLED WITHOUT COURT PROCESS.

CFCfan: ^^^
I concur with your position on establishing state police. State Police will be responsible for investigating most crimes, with the exception of financial crime and human-rights abuses. Those should be handled by a federal police, just like the FBI in the US.
Inter-state crime (same set of criminals committing crimes in 2 or more states) would definitely be within the purview of the federal police.

I once advocated the scrapping of current police force and replacing it with current SSS for starters.
Then states should form their own police forces according to a nationally agreed criteria. For example, known tribalists should not serve in any state police in the country.

Heck even IBB recommended state police. Warts and all, that guy still remains the most intelligent northerner to rule Nigeria.

So, I guess I am ditching my earlier position on death penalty, just to ensure that killers of helpless Nigerians are brought to justice and handed down with a MAXIMUM sentence.

Nothing else would deter demons in security services.

CFCfan: ^^^
True. That's why the Nigeria Police Force needs to be totally overhauled. A new set of managers and trainers (for the police colleges) need to be hired by the FG, in order to ensure that a new professional orientation is entrenched in the force. Another alternative could be the enactment of a constitutional amendment which allows states to set up their own police forces.

In all honesty, state police would be the first honest attempt at solving this problem; but it seems like there are elements within Nigeria that are hardcoded with a third world mindset. The most annoying part of it all is that the country we copied her political system -the US- has SEVERAL LEVELS OF POLICE FORMATIONS. Even certain public transit companies have their own police. That way it is easy to hold someone accountable should something go wrong.

Why on earth would a single police force with a singular boss (based in Abuja) serve a nation of 170 million with 36 states, 6 geopolitical zones, and 250 different ethnic groups? Pray how is that even remotely possible?

Professionalism must start with RESTRUCTURING (read dismemberment of current force).

I am not a supporter of death penalty in civilian cases of murder; BUT I am a ardent supporter of death penalty in cases of security agents killing civilians. No option of fine, or compensation would do in those cases. Else, it means that Nigeria has sacrificed the lives of the entire 170 million citizens to a motley force of 300 or so thousands of individuals. It would then mean that the military government served Nigerian civilians better.

So, all remedies are welcome, provided that the killers are brought to justice according to Nigerian law -a life for a life!

CFCfan: The "Ezu River 50" incident has to be probed by a judicial commission of inquiry!

Yes, to recommend a restructuring of the police at least to demand that force members should be serving in their own tribal areas in Nigeria. It is clear enough to me that Nigerians have not risen above tribalism in politics; what makes us think that they can rise above it in security services?

But on the issue of the dead people, it is necessary that the culprits are arrested, tried, convicted and hanged according to Nigerian law. Anything short of that would not be fair to the deceased. We need to start latching on to cases like these and never letting go until culprits are handed down the punishment prescribed by the law. We also need to reject any diversions.

Thanks.

Ngwakwe: The most annoying part of this Police escapade is their boldness in confronting anyone who dares pronounce his/her right.

The Police will boldly say " I will waste you and raise an allegation against you".

There is now a culture of impunity in the Police Force that needs to be checked.

If we bring this discussion as a predominant topic in the public domain, we will be able to force the law makers to act in to a check to this animalistic behaviour prevalent with our Law Enforcement Agencies.

Great idea, but there is something more we can do.
Since we are in a civilian govt, I think it is time we start to sit at home in elections. Let them make up the numbers as usual, but at least none of them would boldly claim to have our mandate to kill our people with impunity.

I bet you, if we threaten to sit at home for 2015 elections, and mobilize intensively for it, JUST WATCH AND SEE ACTION FROM THE FEDERAL GOVT.
The police is a federal govt agency. In fact they and other federal agencies are the only armed agencies in Nigeria.
The states don't have any armed agency.
So, we have to ask account from relevant places.

WHO KILLED OUR PEOPLE AND DUMPED THEM IN EZU RIVER?

Have they been tried and hanged according to Nigerian law?

These are the two questions we must seek answers for.

In all honesty, this is the ONLY issue that every Nigerian (Igbo mainly) should have a laser focus on. Not any 2015 elections or daily arguments on Nairaland.
We should start to FOCUS on things that are relevant to us.

I hereby declare all DAILY verbal exchanges between Igbo and Yoruba totally asinine and irrelevant.

At a stage, MEN should be able to rise above the prosaic and apply the mind to that which is greater than self.

Anytime a poor man is killed by the police with impunity, EVERY NIGERIAN is in danger. Mark my words.