₦airaland Forum

DeReloaded:
How did Indian/Bollywood movies get to Nigeria? Not only did they get here, they became a HUGE hit and still are in some places. Did they speak English?

The same thing that happened nwado, cept this dude is mad cos I didnt accept his love poem  

which hit?
Those stupid movies with snakes and talismen
We watched them for their songs and  funny dancing and nothing more
They didn't speak English some had English voice overs
Or am I talking of Chinese films
I can't watch any of those movies with captions that's why  I  can't watch non English movies.
It's hard to watch and read at the same time

The Iweka boys are laughing to UBA and people are here arguing?
Nigerians

AfroCynic:
Lol, it seems Re-loaded is just trying to get a rise out of you all and you are letting him. I still maintain that if the cultural was in east, the most popular language would be 'Igbo' but since it isn't, let's just accept that it is what it.

what is the most popular song
I don't live in Nigeria so I don't know
what is it?

RichyBlacK:
That's how in-da-closet tribalists/ethnic bigots talk - "taking over" my ass!

your a$$ kwa?

AfroCynic:
I do not get why Afamz is so reluctant to admit that the culture of Lagos is Yoruba, ask African China as a man from Ajegunle which language he uses the most, Naeto C reps Yoruba more than Igbo, that is just the way it is. Yoruba language is the most prevalent in music.

Like somone said earlier,you don't have to sing in Yoruba to be known.
It's a common trend now (not common in my younger days) for artistes to mix native languages with pidgin and English
They use Igbo,Hausa and Yoruba.
Doesn't mean those who didn't before this trend started were not known but a musician who hopes to make money would be foolish not to adapt to the "in thing"
A musician who's singing all yoruba songs has already "chosen his market" amongst Yorubas likewise for one who only sings in Igbo or Efik.
he will be virtually unknown and unplayed in any other areas.
However,an Igbo musician who sings partly in Igbo,partly in Yoruba,Hausa and pidgin has good business sense.
He 's covered almost all of Nigeria and will do a whole lot better because he appeals to a lot more people.
I attribute the trend to being a smart businessman not necessarily because Lagos is the nerve center as you put it


I remember Onyeka Onwenu as a child and love nwantiti
It was played everywhere and everyone knew who she was because she had English songs as well

DeReloaded:
hehhehe we are taking over andthe soon er some of you accept that Lagos is still and always will be a Yoruba state, the better.

You didnt realize your language was dying when Nollywood completely pushed Igbo speaking movies to the side for English ones. Making fun of those who refused to jump the 'wannabe white" bandwagon.

Start with your movies first before worrying about Music.

making Igbo movies would not have taken nollywood to Ghana,Togo,Sierra Leone and beyond.
It's all commercially driven.
They are business men
They're there primarily to make money
It'll be foolish to make movies in your local dialect and expect to make lots of money from it.
That's poor business judgement.


BTW wetin happen to karmamod?

Money has no color or tribe abeg
anything to sell the goods
If na me I go sing in Ibibio and Kalabari sef if it'll sell records

tamme:
theres more juju in igboland, case closed

thats a lie, theres evidence
lots of pictures of the shrine on the net

just type in akwa ibom witches and calabar witches and tell me how many hits you get

Mr. Aghedo said. Cannibalism is a taboo in Lagos, but in some parts of Nigeria, especially, in the south east states of Cross River and Calabar, human meat eating is not strange.

This is the most tribalistic statement anyone can make since misfits come in all tribes.
Is Tahiru a south Easterner?
If we found other stories of similar things by other South Westerners, can anyone then say South westerners are cannibals?
People ought to think before they make sweeping statements such as this.

I've often heard nairalanders  accuse Igbos of Cannibalism , citing the madman Clifford Orji who happens to be an Igboman.
Did he commit his crime because he was Igbo or because he was posessed of the devil ?

Secondly why did his accomplice in his human eating, a Yoruba man get less notoreity than him.[/b]Is it the same calculated attempts by the Nigerian media to paint the Igbo man as evil?



P.M. News (Lagos)
ANOL
February 5, 1999
Posted to the web February 5, 1999

By Gabriel Orok, Nkiru Nwokediuko, John Odiboh
Lagos

Crowds still gathered this morning at Toyota bus stop, Oshodi Isolo expressway, the former kitchen of the Lagos cannibal, Clifford Orji. The cannibal was arrested Wednesday by the police after the cries of Awawu, a gaunt and shackled woman from Agege gave him away.

[b]Clifford and his accomplice, Tahiru have been singing to the police in Lagos on why they had been killing fellow human beings for dinner. People always suspected that Clifford Orji was queerly different.

He used to sell razor blades at the bustling Oshodi market several years ago. Then he shifted his abode to a self-created grotto under the highway bridge in Isolo, where he advertised himself as a "native doctor Chinneyelu".

Occasionally, he violently pursued stray-walkers to his "sanctuary" during day time. In the dead of the night he usually blanketed the air around him with the meat-like odour from his special barbecue.

People merely suspected that this barbecue- loving recluse was not normal; that he was possibly mad. But no one was prepared for the horrendous discovery of last Wednesday: that Orji was also a cannibal - a man eater! The discovery sent shock waves throughout the sprawling metropolis of seven million people, drawing hundreds of people to the under-the-bridge abode of Orji, where he also kept a well-kitted kitchen to prepare cooked and roasted human flesh! How long the afro-haired man from Enugu State has been feeding on human flesh in Lagos is unknown.

How many people he has slaughtered for dinner is also unknown, as Orji has not revealed much during police interrogations and even the parade before klieglights and journalists in Lagos Thursday. A shrill cry of a famished and emaciated lady, waiting to be slaughtered, was what gave up Orji Wednesday.

The noise attracted passersby who not only discovered the woman but also stumbled on a phalanx of human parts in Orji's make-shift home. Human bones, skulls, legs, hands, freshly cooked soup with human meat, were discovered.

The uproar triggered by this shock discovery was said to have attracted men of the Operation Sweep. Surrounded, Orji attempted to escape.

But the police quickly arrested him and took him to the Makinde Police Station in Oshodi, nearby. The lady being dressed for slaughtering, and who Orji had turned into a sex-slave for several days, was freed and taken to the hospital in Ikeja.

The arrest of another person, said to be Orji's accomplice in the human-flesh eating business introduced a new dimension to the tragedy. Police have since found that Orji and his friend were not just human eaters, they were also human spare-parts sellers, as money, cheques were said to have been recovered at the make-shift home at the popular Toyota Bus Stop on the Oshodi-Isolo Expressway.

Were Orji and his accomplice mad? Some people interviewed at the scene of the tragedy believed they are sane. Some did not.

"What evidence do you have to claim that he's mad," said Chuks Igbokwe who spoke with the National Concord. "As far as I am concerned, he might be one of these Otokoto ritual murderers who trade in human parts. If he is mad, why should he kill and eat his victims?" People who frequently passed by Orji's make-shift home of horror recounted incidents when they were chased by the iron-rod wielding Orji; incidents when his potential victims escaped by the whiskers; incidents when the smell of his human barbecue pervaded the environment.

"Any time wey I pass here, I go see the man eating meat . . . I no know say na person im de chop," Okechukwu, a motor spare parts dealer told The Guardian Wednesday.

The controversy about Orji's mental state will linger for some time. Up till this morning, Lagosians continued to troop to Orji's former home as news of Orji's cannibalism spread.

On Thursday, Orji and his accomplice were paraded to newsmen by the Lagos State Police Commissioner, Sunday Aghedo. The journalists who crowded the premises of the Special Anti-Robbery Squad (SARS of the Lagos State Police Command, Ikeja, covered their noses with handkerchief while interviewing Orji who claimed to be a native of Enugu State.

Besides Orji was a middle-aged man, unidentified by the police, and who was bleeding on his nose and mouth. Mr. Sunday Aghedo, the state commissioner of police, described the two men as human eaters.

On display beside them were roasted parts of human beings - heads, leg, hand and the abdomen. One severed head wore a permed hair of a lady identified as "Eno", a trader from Akwa Ibom.

Aghedo continued: "These are the men who were arrested yesterday by members of the Operation Sweep. They were arrested with human parts in their enclave at the local airport area and taken to Makinde Police Station. They are now answering questions on homicide at the State Crime Intelligence Department (SCID)". When it was his turn to speak, Orji confessed to the media men: "We are human meat eaters. We have killed over three people, especially young girls who hawk wares. We always lured them to our enclave under the pretext that we wanted to purchase their wares. Once they are in our net, we pounced on them and killed them for eatable meat. My colleagues is the human hunter while I am the butcher. We usually go for girls with permed hair."

"Why, have you taken to human eating; is it because you cannot afford animal meat?, "a journalist asked Orji. Orji replied: "We have been eating human meat for the past seven years before coming to Lagos. It is our culture to eat human meat".

"If you are a free man today will you still be eating human meat?" Orji was asked again.

"Yes, to me there is no difference between human and goat meat," Orji replied. The lack of remorse by the cannibals is making the police doubt the mental state of the men.

"They may be victims of psychic and spiritual problems. Before prosecution, we have to send them to psychiatric home for medical examination. Who knows, they maybe mentally sick".

Mr. Aghedo said. Cannibalism is a taboo in Lagos, but in some parts of Nigeria, especially, in the south east states of Cross River and Calabar, human meat eating is not strange.

There were reports of food vendors selling human meat as animal meat to unsuspecting hungry travellers.

Inside the Cannibal's Kitchen

1. Rusty frying pans

2. Bucket

3. Bowl containing human bones

4. Grill on another metal bowl

5. Firewood

6. Human parts: roasted limbs, palms, wrists, ankles, feet, thigh, skulls.

7. Rice, yam, gari, pepper, and oil

8. Soup pot with human meat.

9. A gaunt lady waiting to be slaughtered

10. Cutlasses, knives.

11. Cellular phone

12. Money estimated to be N500,000

It's strange that a Calabar person would be accusing any Nigerians of diabolic practices when story has it your area is the capital of witches,dog eating and cannibalism, in the whole of Africa

tamme:
why should you use Okija shrine as your NL name its scary
I thought they used to kill people in that shrine?

I abhor juju and idol worship

But

There is no evidence whatsoever that people were killed in Okija shrine
There is evidence however that family members of some dead went and dumped their bodies at the shrine because they were said to have been killed by the alusi okija (okija deity).
That;s what I read

spoilt:
married woman?
No be real bad market be that?
Im always puzzled why men will lay everything down for a woman who is spoken for when there are a billion planktons in the ocean who are free of all encumbrances just waiting to be had?

I think some men find it invigorating to snatch other people's women
haven't you had men who knew you were married, hit on you?
even in naija parties with your husband a few feet away.
That's why there's a word called adultery

Where were they when people were branding little boys and girls as witches and driving nails into their skulls?
Because their own kids were not affected abi?
Now that kidnappers are on rampage and  fear don catch them they're placing curses.

The cries of a dead man

I was a graduate student when the cataclysmic events of 1966 happened. Apart from my revulsion at the needless murders of the innocent, nothing upset me more than Ojukwu's dishonest formulations and his attempt to kidnap the Ogoni, among others, into his Igbo empire called "biafra." I knew that he pinned his hopes of the economic viability of "biafra" on the oil of the Ogoni and the Ijaw. I rebelled. I became Secretary of a small committee which met nights in Port Harcourt and issued a communiqué calling on Gowon to create a Rivers State by decree.

When, by sheer quirk of fortune, this happened in 1967, I abandoned family and caution, crossed the fighting lines and found myself in Lagos. There I became a member of something called the Interim Advisory Council of Rivers State and, subsequently, Administrator for Bonny. I returned to the war front and struck up friendships with gentlemen like Sani Bello who comes from Kontagora, Akinrinade from Ife, Obasanjo from Abeokuta, Yakubu Danjuma from Takum, Dan Ato, now deceased, from Bida. I had reason to hope that my nightmare as an Ogoni in Nigeria was about to end.

With the war ended, and as a Commissioner in Rivers State, I soon found that the Rivers State for which I had fought did not end my nightmare. In the first place, oil money from Ogoni country (as well as Ijaw country) was being carted away to Lagos, leaving the Ogoni illiterate and backward. This is anti-federalism. Worse still, the Ijaws were taking their frustrations out on the non-Ijaws of the State. For the Ijaws alone number more than the eight other ethnic groups in Rivers State put together. Though historically disunited, the Ijaws find unity when it comes to lording it over the non-Ijaws. The Ijaws will want to perpetuate this. Today, there is not even a Commission from my Local Government Area in the Rivers State Cabinet such as it is. My dilemma as an Ogoni is not about to end.

http://www.nigerdeltacongress.com/articles/Awo%20and%20the%20Creation%20of%20States.htm

Someone was saddened because I called Ijaws lazy.
Well see how their young men are running around in canoes demanding heaven and earth from the federal; government.
Now would you believe that these same Ijaw youths that cry marginalization were given jobs and they turned around and "subletted" the jobs to Igbos for a fee?
yes I said it and it's documented in an article.
Their young men would rather run around in AK 47,s,chase women and drink gin than work.
They gave the jobs to Igbos who would give them a portion of the wages.
Now does that sound like a people that like to work?
The average Ijaw man is said to be very lazy and their youths in 2009 have proven this.

Ibime:
What does this debate have to do with abandoned property? Even here in London, homeless squatters move into abandoned properties and it can take years to legally move them out. There is no war situation where people will abandon property where others will not move in. With all the bombing going on in PH those days, Housing was in short supply and any 'new' property on the market would be quickly occupied.

My family also abandoned property in Asaba. Did we get it back? Abeg, if you have an abandoned property, seek legal recourse to reclaim your land, not using it as an excuse to propagate division. You can call the 'abandoned property' syndrome a symbol of 'long throat' or you can call it a retribution or a revolution against the oppressive classes. Pick one, it doesn't really matter to me.

Have you guys gone to ask for your abandoned property in the North?

You obviously haven't been following.
Ijaws stole Igbo property and PH is the only place Igbos lost property totally or had to go through hoops to get them because that's what the awusa man promised the lazy labourers.
"help me win Biafra and I'll give you their homes"
Igbos got back their property in northern and western Nigeria very easily.
Your folks were the ones with sticky fingers and clung like parasites and leaches unto people's sweat.

Ibime:
Igbos need to learn the history of Rivers State before coming to claim any and everything that sounds Igbo.

Michael Okpara was the worst thing that ever happened to Eastern Region. If only the Premiership of Eastern region had gone to a Calabar man like one of the Ita's, Eastern Nigeria would be united today.

This problem started from Enugu. They renamed everything in PH with Igbo names. A well known relative of mine founded the Rivers State College of Technology or whatever its called now. He invited a Mr Mbonu to be a director of the school. When the papers went to Enugu for them to classify the name of the road, they chose to rename the road Mbonu Street instead of my relative's name. Mbonu Street is in present day D-Line.

This is a scene that was replicated ALL OVER PH. The same goes for the whole Rumu/Umu debate.

You cannot ask why Rivers State people are wary of Igbo people with behaviour like this. The stealing of Igbo lands after the war is not justified, but some would call it a retribution of sorts.

Igbos love to claim everything in Rivers State. Do the Igbo's know the history of the Oba and Ekpeya people of Ahoada? They are people who migrated from Benin after falling out with the Oba. Today they have merged the language of trade (Igbo) with their native language and the Igbo lay claim to them. If you see an Ahoada man, ask him about his history. Ahoada today lies between core Igbo lands and Etche and Ikwerre lands. Any presumption that lands further South than Ahoada must have Igbo ancestry should be put in perspective when we consider the Ahoada example.

My father used to do missionary work in Ihugbogo in Ahoada land and I tell you, the poverty and backwardness there is complete! You will never find such depravity in any Igbo land. The same goes for Etche. The poverty I saw with my 2 eyes in these 2 places can only be compared to the poverty I saw in Ogoni land. If the Eastern Regional Government saw these people as their Igbo brothers, I assure you they would not overlook their miserable plight. Instead they are too busy trying to lay claim to Ikwerres in PH, neglecting all the Igbo groups that lie closer to the core Igbo lands.

We are not fooled.

Igbos need to investigate the history of all these Igboid peoples before claiming them. As I have said before, Igbo was the dominant language of trade and has made its way into the languages of many tribes. There is a tribe up the Imo River called the Ndoki. This tribe are widely presumed to be Igbos. They speak Igbo and have adopted Igbo customs. The truth is that they are Ijaws who travelled up the river looking for freshwater to farm as you cannot farm in saltwater land. When they found the place, they named it "Ndokiari" which means "this is what were looking for" in Ijaw language. Today these people live as Igbos, but if you question them deeply, they will tell you they are Ijaws.

The same holds for most of the Igbo tribes in Rivers State. Ikwerres do not have a recorded history, but they are ADAMANT that they are not Igbos, although they speak a dialect of the 'language of trade' and observe some Igbo customs.

The people of the South South are no fools and resent Igbo incursion into their lands, whether they be Ikwerre, Etche, Rebisi or Ijaw.

We were put together as the Eastern Region, but some from within us decided to pursue a tribalist agenda, renaming our towns and roads, using the Eastern bank ACB as a conduit for tribal 'projects' and claiming everything within sight in the hope that they would one day reach the sea. We had no such problems when we were administered from Calabar.

Me, I don talk my own. The stories that my elders told me are what you are hearing now. My elders are no illiterates, but a Royal family who were involved in governing PH and Rivers State. If you consider it a prejudice, then hopefully this prejudice would go some way to explaining why Rivers State was divided over the Biafra issue. If Igbos are interested in unity, then they must address these long-held grouses to do with their mismanagement of the former Eastern Region and their imperialistic attitude to their former trade-partners.

Do Igbos call these people Igbos or did they identify themselves as Igbos prior to 1960?
Your elders are telling you lies.
There are historical facts that buttress the claims and show who is Igbo and who's not despite what politics say.
See these pictures or art work taken by a white man in 1930,archived somewhere with labels.
Did the Igbo man also tell the white man who was Igbo and who wasn't?


http://mccoy.lib.siu.edu/jmccall/jones/riverine.html

as for renaming umuola and umuobasi with rumu rumu
was that not an Ijaw scheme to rename clearly Igbo towns with weird sounding rivers names whatever that means
Thankfully there are people who kept records and they're there for all to see.
It may also interest you that there are Ikwerre,Etche,Ndoni and Ekpeye elders that have continually cautioned there people to stop the "we are not Igbo nonsense".
Even you the Ijaws have no problem calling them Igbo when the politics suits you and at someother times,you call them Rivers when it suits you as though Rivers is the name of a people.

BTW why are you talking of PH?
Ijaws should be talking of Bonny not PH
You folks are now a minority in Rivers state,most of you folks are in Bayelsa so you don't have any more claim to PH than an Owerri man.
It's not his state,neither is it yours.

Osisi said she doesn't know what I call Igbolizing as if PH was not in the Eastern Region. Eastern is a Geographical expression and has nothing to do with "Igbolising". Should every Eastern city expect to be Igbolised?

I also wonder if Osisi would answer whether after Okpara built Trans-Amadi, Presidential etc (with Niger Delta oil money), did he staff all these fanciful places with indigenous Ikwerre and Ijaw people? This is what we can call economic annexation, a keynesian stimulus for Igbos, or even an artificial repopulation of PH which even the so-called Ikwerre-Igbos resisted. After shifting PH demographics to the point that PH starts to look like Onitsha, crowding out Indigenous money in the market place and increasing competition (and prices) for goods, property, jobs and services, would you not expect some resentment from the indigenes?

Now you're talking.
This is the reason I said whoever started this thread was talking rubbish
We cannot unite with a people with inferiority complex who are scared of competition, would jump at the thought of acquiring goods and property they didn't work for.
I'm sure you know that today Igbos still own a large chunk of the real estate in PH because the same lazy Ijaws and Ikwerres couldn't even hang unto their stolen real estate for too long.
They turned around to sell them back to Igbos for a few bottles of gin.
Please speak no more.
You're only confirming the stereotypes about Ijaws

Older Igbo men said that the picture of a typical Ijaw man and the riverine Igbos before the war was that a lazy labourer who drank kai kai from morning till night.
They were afraid of real work
Igbos did not take their jobs, they were simply allergic to work.
No wonder the thought of stolen goods from their more affluent,more hardworking cousins was to enticing to pass up.

So Ibime,Igbos did not take your jobs,the same things your youths are doing today,wanting to be paid for doing no work didn't start today.It started with your fathers back then.
You have to get your hands dirty to eat.
Your fore fathers may have traded in perm kennels and slaves but their offsprings sat around bearing funny names and waiting for handouts.
Who in their right minds will name a Child Goodhead and Blue Jaja?

Ibime:
Can you then explain why the Ikwerres did not support the war effort?
Until you address this question, there is no need pointing fingers at Ijaws.


If there's anything you should take from this thread, it should be this:


(1.) Ijaws and the tribes of Rivers State are sympathetic to the Biafran cause, but any secession movement must be done in consultation and agreement.

(2.) There can only be consultation and agreement when Igbo's drop their imperialistic and dismissive tendencies. This includes:

(a.) Claiming Opobo as Igbo land (the most laughable of all)

(b.) Claiming the whole of Igwe Ocha (PH) as Igbo land when half of it belongs to the Okrikas

(c.) Not respecting the rights of the Ikwerre's to determine their own identity

(d.) Igbolising the whole of PH during the Eastern Regional Government to the chagrin and resentment of PH indigenes (including the Igbo speaking ones)

(e.) And many more ([size=5pt]including inability to differentiate between Ogonis and Ijaws[/size]).

and who said they didn't at first before changing sides at the prospects of stealing Igbo property like their Ijaw neigbours
was George Kurubo ,an Ijaw man not a Biafran air pilot at the beginning of the war?
Na long throat for stolen good cause am.

and I don't know what you call Igbolizing.
PH was in the Eastern region.
PH was an eastern town
Michael Okpara was the eastern Nigerian premier who moved the headquarters of shell from Owerri to PH,built Hotel Presidential and the transamadi Industial lay out to make the Eastern region compete with Lagos in attracting tourists etc.
Forget all this SS,NE nonsense.
Ijaws were easterners together with Igbos and efiks until yesterday.
Go and read and stop being afraid of the Igbo man.

All Biafrans are brothers and sisters bound together by ties of geography, trade, inter-marriage, and culture and by their common misfortune in Nigeria and their present experience of the armed struggle. Biafrans are even more united by the desire to create a new and better order of society, which will satisfy their needs and aspirations. Therefore, there is no justification for anyone to introduce into the Biafran fatherland divisions based on ethnic origin, sex or religion. 'To do so would be unpatriotic. Every true Biafran must know and demand his civic rights. Furthermore, he must recognize the rights of other Biafrans and be prepared to defend them when necessary. So often people complain that they have been ill-treated by the police or some other public servant. But the truth very often is that we allow ourselves to be bullied because we are not man enough to demand and stand up for our rights, and that fellow citizens around do not assist us when we do demand our rights. In the new Biafran social order sovereignty and power belong to the people. Those who exercise power do so on behalf of the people. Those who govern must not tyrannize the people. They carry a sacred trust of the people and must use their authority strictly in accordance with the will of the people. The true test of success in public life is that the people who are the real masters are contented and happy. The rulers must satisfy the people at all times.

I love this Ojukwu man
chei!
I may have run away to him during the war if I heard this

naijaking1:
@Osisi
Thanks for the Ahiara post, it sums up my arguement.

The guy was a visionary
Everything he fought for,every Nigerian tribe besides Hausas can agree with
It's only a fool or an illiterate that'll say Biafra went to war for no reason.
If Hausas rose up today and murdered 50,000 Yorubas in cold blood,I bet you Yorubas wouldn't want anything to do with Nigeria.
It was Biafra yesterday,the Ijaws are currently enjoying what it menas to be killed and pillaged

I'll enjoin every Nigerian and indeed any "Biafran" who has never done so to go and read the ahiara declaration by Ojukwu in 1969.
It was so prophetic.
let me post an excerpt and a link to the full text.

[b]The Biafran struggle is, on another plane, a resistance to the Arab-Muslim expansionism, which has menaced and ravaged the African continent for twelve centuries,

Our Biafran ancestors remained immune from the Islamic contagion. From the middle years of the last century Christianity was established in our land. In this way we came to be a predominantly Christian people. We came to stand out as a non-Muslim island in a raging Islamic sea. Throughout the period of the ill-fated Nigerian experiment, the Muslims hoped to infiltrate Biafra by peaceful means and quiet propaganda, but failed. Then the late Ahmadu Bello, the Sardauna of Sokoto tried, by political and economic blackmail and terrorism, to convert Biafrans settled in Northern Nigeria to Islam. His hope was that these Biafrans of dispersion would then carry Islam to Biafra, and by so doing give the religion political control of the area. The crises, which agitated the so-called independent Nigeria from 1962, gave these aggressive proselytisers the chance to try converting us by force. [/b]

[b]It is now evident why the fanatic Arab-Muslim states like Algeria, Egypt and the Sudan have come out openly and massively to support and aid Nigeria i[/b]n her present war of genocide against us. These states see militant Arabism as a powerful instrument for attaining power in the world. Biafra is one of the few African states untainted by Islam. Therefore, to militant Arabism, Biafra is a stumbling block to their plan for controlling the whole continent. This control is fast becoming manifest in the Organization of African Unity. On the question of the Middle East, the Sudanese crisis, in the war between Nigeria and Biafra, militant Arabism has succeeded in imposing its point of view through blackmail and bluster.

It has threatened African leaders and governments with inciting their Muslim minorities to rebellion if the governments adopted an independent line on these questions. In this way an O.A.U. that has not felt itself able to discuss the genocide in the Sudan and Biafra, an O A.U. that has again and again advertised its ineptitude as a peace maker, has rushed into open condemnation of Israel over the Middle East dispute. Indeed, in recent times, by its performance, the O.A.U. might well be an organization of Arab unity.

Our struggle, in an even more fundamental sense, is the culmination of the confrontation between Negro nationalism and white imperialism. It is a movement designed to ensure the realization of man's full stature in Africa.

Ever since the 15th Century, the European world has treated the African continent as a field for exploitation. Their policies in Africa have for so long been determined to a very great extent by their greed for economic gain. For over three and half centuries, it suited them to transport and transplant millions of the flower of our manhood for the purpose of exploiting the Americas and the West Indies. They did so with no uneasiness of conscience. They justified this trade in men by reference to biblical passages violently torn out of context,  This brutal and unprecedented rape of a whole continent was a violent challenge to Negro self-respect. Not surprisingly, within half a century the theory and practice of empire ran into stiff opposition from Negro nationalism. In the face of the movement for Negro freedom the white imperialists changed their tactics. They decided to install puppet African administrations to create the illusion of political independence, while retaining the control of the economy. And this they quickly did between 1957 and 1965. The direct empire was transformed into an indirect empire, that regime of fraud and exploitation, which African nationalists aptly describe as neo- colonialism.

Nigeria was a classic example of neo-colonialist state, and what is left of it, still is. The militant nationalism of the late forties and early fifties had caught the British imperialists unawares. They hurried to accommodate it by in stalling the ignorant, decadent and feudalistic Hausa-Fulani oligarchy in power. For the British, the credentials of the Hausa-Fulani were that not having emerged from the middle ages they knew nothing about the modern state and the powerful forces that now rule men's minds. Owing their position to the British, they were servile and submissive. The result was that while Nigerians lived in the illusion of independence, they were still in fact being ruled from Number 10 Downing Street. The British still enjoyed a strangle hold on their economy.

The crises, which rocked Nigeria from the morrow of ‘independence’, were brought about by the efforts of progressive nationalists to achieve true in dependence for themselves and for posterity. For their part in this effort, Biafrans were stigmatised and singled out for extermination. In imperialist thinking, only phoney independence is good for blacks. The sponsorship of Nigeria by white imperialism has not been disinterested. They are only concerned with the preservation of that corrupt and rickety structure of a Nigeria in a perpetual state of powerlessness to check foreign exploitation, 

Fellow countrymen and women, we have seen in proper perspective the diabolical roles, which the British Government and the foreign companies have played and are playing, in our war with Nigeria. We now see why in spite of Britain's tottering economy Harold Wilson's Government insists on financing Nigeria's futile war against us. We see why the Shell-BP led the Nigerian hordes into Bonny, pay Biafran oil royalties to Nigeria, and provided the Nigerian army with all the help it needed for its attack on Port Harcourt. We see why the West African Conference readily and meekly cooperated with Gowon in the imposition of a total blockade against us. We see why the oil and trading companies in Nigeria still finance this war and why they risk the life and limb of their staff in the war zones.


Fellow Biafrans, these are the evil and titanic forces with which we are engaged in a life and death struggle. These are the obstacles to the Negro's efforts to realize himself. Thugs rag the forces, which the Biafran revolution must sweep aside to succeed,  We do not claim that the Biafran revolution is the first attempt in history by the Negro to assert his identity, to claim his right and proper place as a human being on a basic of equality with the white and yellow races. We are aware of the Negro's past and present efforts to prove his ability at home and abroad. We are familiar with his achievements in pre-history; we are familiar with his achievements in political organizations; we are familiar with his contributions to the world store of art and culture. The Negro's white oppressors are not unaware of all these. But instead of their awareness they are not prepared to admit that the Negro is a man and a brother. From this derives our deep conviction that the Biafran revolution is not just a movement of Igbos, Ibibios, Ijaws, and Ogojas. It is a movement of true and patriotic Africans. It is African nationalism conscious of itself and fully aware of the powers with which it is contending, 

We have indeed come a long way. We were once Nigerians, today we are Biafrans. We are Biafrans because on May 30, 1967, we finally said 'no' to the evils and injustices in which Nigeria was steeped. Nigeria was made up of peoples and groups with very little in common. As everyone knows, Biafrans were in the forefront among those who tried to make Nigeria a nation. It is ironic that some ill-informed and mischievous people today will accuse us of breaking up a united African country. Only those who do not know the facts or deliberately ignore them can hold such an opinion. We know the facts because we were there and the things that happened, happened to us.

Nigeria was indeed a very wicked and corrupt country in spite of the glorious image given her in the European press We know why Nigeria was given that image. It was her reward for serving the economic and political interests of her European masters. Nigeria is a stooge of Europe. Her independence was and is a lie. Even her Prime Minister was a Knight of the British Empire; but worse than her total subservience to foreign political and economic interests, Nigeria committed many crimes against her nationals, which in the end made complete nonsense of her claim to unity. Nigeria persecuted and slaughtered her minorities; Nigerian justice was a farce, her elections, her politics her everything was corrupt. Qualification, merit and experience were dislocated in public service. In one area of Nigeria, for instance, they preferred to turn a nurse who had worked for five years into a doctor rather than employ a qualified doctor from another part of Nigeria. Barely literate clerks were made Permanent Secretaries. A university Vice Chancellor was sacked because he belonged to the wrong tribe. Bribery, corruption and nepotism were so widespread that people began to wonder openly whether any country in the world could compare with Nigeria in corruption and abuse of power. All the modern institutions the legislature the civil service, the army, the police, the judiciary, the universities, the trade unions and the organs of mass information were devalued and made the tools of corrupt political power. There was complete neglect and impoverishment of the people. Whatever prosperity there was, was deceptive. There was despair in many hearts, and the number of suicides was growing every day. The farmers were very hard- hit. Their standards of living had fallen steeply. The soil was perishing from over-farming and lack of scientific husbandry. The towns, like the soil, were wastelands into which people put in too much exertion for too little reward. There were crime waves and people lived in fear of their lives. Business speculation, rack-renting, worship of money and share practices left a few people extremely rich at the expense of the many, and those few flaunted their wealth before the many and talked about sharing the national cake. Foreign interests did roaring business spreading consumer goods and wares among a people who had not developed a habit of thrift and well fell prey to lying advertisements. Inequality of the sexes was actively promoted in Nigeria. Rather than aspire to equality with men, women were encouraged to accept the status of inferiority and to become the mistresses of successful politicians and business executive, or they were married off at the age of fourteen as the fifteenth wives of the new rich. That was the glorious Nigeria, the mythical Nigeria, celebrated in the European press.

Then worst of all came the genocide in which over 50,000 of our kith and kin were slaughtered in cold blood all over Nigeria and nobody asked questions; nobody showed regret; nobody showed remorse. Thus, Nigeria had become a jungle with no safety, no justice and no hope for our people. We decided then to found a new place, a human habitation away from the Nigerian jungle. That was the origin of our revolution. From the moment we assumed the illustrious name of the ancient kingdom of Biafra, we were rediscovering the original independence of a great African people. We accepted by this revolutionary act the glory, as well as the sacrifice, of true independence and freedom. We knew that we had challenged the many forces and interests, which had conspired to keep Africa and the black race in subjection forever. We knew they were going to be ruthless and implacable in defence of their age-old imposition on us and exploitation of our people. But we were prepared, and remain prepared, to pay any price for our freedom and dignity

, 

http://www.africaresource.com/war/vol2.2/biafra/ahiara.htm

tamme:
Igbo people what do want us in the south south and south east  to do?
apologise, then what happens next

This is the most stupid Calabar person I ever met.
I have never in my entire life read such nonsense from any one from that area.
Your fathers and grandfathers fought and died for Biafra
They were Biafrans.
Nigerian troops also destroyed their areas,killed their men and women and raped their women.
Go and read or ask your father if he's still alive
You're sounding like a fool with your utterances
I have an uncle a Biafran soldier who was killed at Ogoja from what I was told.
Ogoja was a home for many Igbos
go and read

dangermous:
olohun all of them for that SS and SE. Dem too get[i] ijogbon[/i]

ROFL
and the efulefu you were addressing is also from that area
This is funny

Crude Oil:
@osisi*

They dont need to bring one candidate. All they have to do is to unanimously support one candidate, Something the igbos cant do.

Like which people support one candidate?
are there any elections in Nigeria won by votes?

Ibime:
Sorry, maybe not you, but your Igbo brothers keep making the mistake all the time.

You referred to a man who came begging on his knees before Ohanaeze (Saro-Wiwa) to which Naija-King replied:

"That's what beats me. Some people want to talk about unity without fully addressing, understanding(not really apologizing), and reviewing the past errors in our relationship with the Ijaw people."

This is not the first time that Igbo NLers' keep calling Saro-Wiwa an Ijaw man.

at least they tried and placed in within the same viscinity.
Go to the west,they'll call him omo ibo

Crude Oil:
Hey, what I meant was that the Igbos should unite within themselves first, before thinking of uniting with other tribes.The disunity amongst the igbos is very disgusting. Thats the reason they have not been able to produce a unanimous presidential candidate for the past 8 years. That's why their language and culture is dying.

Please tell me
In what election did all hausa produce just one candidate
and in what election ,did all Yorubas produce just one candidate

I've heard these lies for too long.
are Atiku,IBB and Yaradua not Hausa?

Ibime:
@ Osisi & NaijaKing

When will Igbo people learn that Saro-Wiwa is not an Ijaw man, but an Ogoni man.

Who in their right mind would call Opobo an Igbo land?

It is this kind of dismissive attitude that creates conflict between Igbo's and their surrounding neighbours.




@ NaijaKing,

I cannot answer your questions from when I was not born. Who are these Ijaw men that betrayed the Igbo's? Who do they speak for? How many followers did Adaka-Boro have? If you stop being regressive, you would have noticed that Asari-Dokubo is working closely with MASSOB because anyone in Souther Nigeria should know that our destinies are interlinked, both Ijaws, Igbo's, Efiks etc.

and I never called saro wiwa an Ijaw man
I made reference to an Ijaw man who betrayed Igbos and was murdered by Nigerian troops  (Adaka BORO) and you called saro wiwa.
I lived in PH
I know Ijaw names and I know sarowiwa is Ogoni

I don't know about uniting.
Let's just live peacefully as neighbours while we continue to intermarry like we've always done.
The Pepples,The Harts,Then Ben stowes,The Fubaras,the Long Johns,The Tobys etc.
They marry our women,we marry theirs
Despite all this,Igbo/Rivers or Bayelsa marriage and Igbo/akwai IBom and Cross river marriages are still common

bawomolo:
you are the one going off tangent. is the title of the thread, "Igbo's want their properties from Ijaws" or " Igbos and Ijaws should unite"?

For these so-called reconciliation committee to succeed, both sides have to admit their wrongs. Part of the risks of war is the loss of property and land. Doesn't make it right, its just one of the risks. You can't get reconciliation by playing the victim game. isn't this the same thing we accuse african americans of doing?

and for some reason in this case that risk happened to have been incurred only in PH with some Ijaw men and sticky fingers
smells fishy.