₦airaland Forum

Abagworo:
One of the major undoing of this recent Biafra struggle is unwarranted attack on Okorocha who has never at any time or place reacted. The same Okorocha used his influence to help release Nnamdi Kanu after all the lies by the later calling him okoroawusa and disrespecting his parents. Enough said.

Agumbankembu:
It took only three years of Nnamdi Kanu shouting on Radio Biafra for them to know what is right. IPOB is making our people have an unprecedented unity of purpose. Even at that day, Enugu govt ordered it's workers to do the remembrance at home.
Okorocha were begging workers to come to work, they ignored him.
Ikpeazu said it was within people's right to do remembrance day.

We are not there yet, let's do more.
#Igwebuike

greenermodels:
obiano campaign organization should stop all these their useless online propaganda, obiano with other south east governors are against Biafra,he did nothing about those killed and arrested. it's election time and him and his wife are now building toilets and sharing jelly cans as their own achievement. this monument is not a cenotaph and this ceremony was held two years ago.obiano would be voted out for his poor performance, poor moral character and betrayal of the Biafran course.

daveson2020:
Good morning Mr obiano, it's already too late for you we are not voting for you again under your watch they slaughtered my friends and families we want you out.

Ronaaldo:
The people who were slaughtered were actually from Enugu and Ebonyi states. Not a single Anambra soul was lost.

daveson2020:
So because they are from enugu and ebonyi as you said they deserve to be slaughtered like animals?
You must be a heartless blood sucking monster.

KemjikaEme:
.
You are the sick person here!
It is a memorial of the people that died while fighting for the freedom and liberation of Biafra.
A lot of crazy and unbalanced minds roaming all over nairaland.

umarshehu58:
If you believed Kanu is a mere F**l like some illiterate Igbos, give it a like.
Because how can such person achieve biafra through hatred and insults?

sha! mek una keep dreaming.

TopGunFighter:
and the others that died, died in vain.... I wish president buhari can let the biafrans go and let's build a wall and cage you pple.....

UNIZIK1stSon:
Anambra State Governor, Willie Obiano has erected a Transparent Wall of Honor at the Cenotaph in Alex Ekwueme Square containing the names of all heroes past in remembrance of Late Biafran heroes.

Speaking at the memorial event, Governor Obiano stressed the need to keep remembering our heroes past while we celebrate them for the bravery they showed.

Obiano said: "Without memory, life assumes the attributes of a futile gaze into the void of time....Let's Celebrate the bravery of these great spirits who lost their lives yesterday that we may find peace today"

See Photos of the Transparent Wall of Honor below:

http://mynaijainfo.com/2017/05/anambra-obiano-erects-cenotaph-honor-biafran-war-heroes/

subtlemee:
Lol...I refuse to be intimidated by you men's folk

KemjikaEme:
You are inane! The more you write,the more fooolish you become.

Agumbankembu:
It took only three years of Nnamdi Kanu shouting on Radio Biafra for them to know what is right. IPOB is making our people have an unprecedented unity of purpose. Even at that day, Enugu govt ordered it's workers to do the remembrance at home.
Okorocha were begging workers to come to work, they ignored him.
Ikpeazu said it was within people's right to do remembrance day.

We are not there yet, let's do more.
#Igwebuike

greenermodels:
you've said nothing, tell that your oga at awka that we're going to vote him out for joining the other south east governors to oppose the sit at home order, tell him that apc would not save him rather they would use all those vehicles and gun boats that he has been buying for the police, army and navy to rig him out. tell him that anabrarians are not happy with his moral conduct. tell him that we have sacrificed so many lives and have so many battles ahead that we can't risk having sabotuers like him in government. ee would do to him and his likes what Catalonia did to their politicians by voting them out.

ipodstinks:
By kelvin Amurun.
The Nigerian civil war from 6 July 1967 to 1 January 1970 was fought to counter the secession of Biafra from Nigeria. Biafra was a nationalistic aspiration of the Eastern Igbo people at that time and it was borne from the fact that they could no longer coexist with the Northern dominated federal government.
The Nigerian Civil war otherwise known as the Biafra war attracted international attention due to the brutal events of that period. How the conflict was interpreted by foreigners and Nigerians cannot be over emphasised.
The conflict took a toll of human lives. The Igbo tragedy was largely perpetrated in Northern Nigeria, however there was a forgotten tragedy that most international and national observers over looked. The forgotten Biafra ethnic minorities- Efik, Ogoja, Ibibio etc and the Mid West (Urhobo, Edo, Itsekiris, Isoko, Asaba) experience during the Biafra invasion and the Federal Government occupation.
Each time I get into debate with my Igbo brothers and the issue of marginalisation, distrust and ethnic cleansing is shown to my face in a one dimensional sense, I have often reacted with the question….Is warfare one-sided? And who is marginalising who in Nigeria?
The slaughter, rape and torture of the people of the mid west have not been fully blown out in the open until now. Many present day Mid Westerners of my generation have no clue on what actually transpired in a Biafra occupied Mid Western region and what transpired among the Biafra minorities in the East.
This write up is not to point a blaming finger at anyone but is meant to catalyse the objectivity of the individuals from the various regions of Nigeria to sense aright the issue of marginalisation and also to show the reader that the sins of warfare and conflicts is not one-sided. This write up will have to kill the delusion and one sided bias of that question…..WHO IS MARGINALISING WHO and what really happened to the Southern minorities during the war.
In Omakas book titled The Forgotten Victims: Ethnic Minorities in Nigeria Biafra War, 1967-1970, he said: The gory experiences suffered by the Biafra minorities have largely been neglected in the historiography of the Biafra war.
This write up will also assert that the atrocities perpetuated by Biafra soldiers on Biafra minorities during those early and late months of the war has largely been hidden from the public debate hence they should be accorded due recognition of victim hood.
Following the massacre of the Igbo people living up North, the Federal Government responded to the Igbo secession with “police action” that was partially military. I will not go into the reason for these atrocities. That is not the purpose of this write up.
However it must be pointed out that blame for atrocities must not be one sided. The Igbo people had a right to defend themselves and the UN recognition against genocide gives a people the right to secede. This is not debatable.
Wikipedia states that the Geneva Conventions comprise four treaties, and three additional protocols, that establish the standards of international law for the humanitarian treatment of war. This convention is binding to all warring parties.
The dominating argument of the Nigeria Biafra War is that the Igbo were targeted for extermination by the Muslim North. International media played a significant role in exposing humanitarian tragedies especially in Igbo speaking parts of Biafra. However not much was reported on the atrocities perpetuated against minorities in Biafra both by the Nigerian military forces and Biafra militias.
A Newsweek magazine once report that some of the worst massacres of the war occurred when the federal troops captured minority regions whereupon minority tribesmen turned on the Ibos in blood fury. The quote presents Igbo as victims in the hands of minorities without referencing the experience the minorities suffered in the Igbo dominated region before the arrival of the federal troops. There was another report stating that Ibos were killed by the local people in their thousands in the Mid West on arrival of federal troops. No one seems to ask the question…..why was this the case?
It is not denying the fact that Igbo were massacred during the civil war, however there is an error in the representation of the victims of the massacre.
The number one question is: Attributing the 1966 massacre in the North as only Igbos is an error of judgement. In the G C M Onyiuke led tribunal, it was clearly shown that ethnic minority groups in Eastern and Mid Western Nigeria were victims. It was easy to mistake an ethnic minority for Igbo apart from mere physical appearance there was no other distinct feature to differentiate Igbo from non Igbo. You cannot tell unlike the Yoruba or Hausa facial marks. Ethnic minorities were also killed.
While the Igbos retreated back to the East to form a defence line and secede, no one seems to ask the question if the Biafra ethnic minorities (present day Cross River, Akwa Ibom etc) were actually consulted on the need to secede and if they agreed.
The argument that the war was only Hausa Fulani and Igbo is purely too simplistic.
In the early days of Nigeria, the domination of the three major ethnic groups of Yoruba, Hausa Fulani and Igbo in the political atmosphere of Nigeria was obvious. The leaders of the ethnic minority ethnic groups had found themselves in a disadvantaged position in the entire federal political equation. As a result of this, minority leaders in different regions began to form movements that started the agitation for the creation of more states were their interest will be largely protected. Some of this movement included the Calaber Ogoja River (COR) state, Mid West State movement and Middle Belt State movement. This movement agitated for minority rights in the larger state.
The leaders of the state creation movement believed that the formation of their states will eliminate the domination of the major ethnic groups.
In Chinua Achebes book titled There was a Country, he had this to say on the Niger Delta Region page 47: …”The minorities of the Niger Delta, Mid West and the Middle Belt were always uncomfortable with the notion that they had to fit into the tripod of the largest ethnic groups that was Nigeria…….many of them Ijaw, Kanuri, Ibibio, Tiv, Itsekiri, Isang, Urhobo, Anang and Efik were from ancient nation states in their own right. Their leaders however, often had to subsume their own ethnic ambitions within alliances with one of the big three groups in order to attain greater political results.
And so during the civil war this minority groups were faced with a great dilemma.
THE CONFLICT AND WAR CRIMES.
Revelations about the war atrocities on the minorities have emerged recently. New surviving records, physical evidences and oral histories of the war suggest that minorities in Biafra and mid west became individual and collective victims of the war.
The Biafra minorities did not have a say in the succession. A prolific journalist named Suzanne Cronje on the Biafra war stated that the feelings of the minorities were difficult to define. Loyalties were in fact divided. The cry out for a separate state by the minorities was not a clamour to secede.
When the war broke out, Biafra had stationed some of its troops in the Cross River region including Ikun in Biase Local Government. Though the Ikun initially supported Biafra and had friendly relations with the soldiers, as time went on tensions emerged. Some Ikun men were suspected of collaborating with Nigerian soldiers with no hard evidence. As a result murder, arrests, looting and rapes was meted on that community. William Norris of the London Times who visited Biafra reported an eye witness account of how Ibibio men were surrounded and beaten to death in Umuahia on April 2 1968. They were reportedly forced to march across an open space while the local people attacked them with sticks and clubs.
On another episode, Biafra soldiers took Ikun men to Ohafia for a meeting but never came back with them. An informant alleged that soldiers returned to the community and rounded up some men within their reach and shot them. A survivor who lost her four day old son and grandmother seemed to have suspected foul play from the Ohafia people with whom they share a common boundary.
This victimization continued until the Biafra headquarters issued a statement to stop the genocide. However by this time, the remaining people had escaped leaving behind only soldiers and Ohafia, also some Ikun with a mixed blood of half Ohafia.
B J Ikpeme a Senior Medical Officer in the then Eastern region revealed atrocities perpetuated by Biafra soldiers against the minorities in towns of present day Cross River and Akwa Ibom States.
Ikpemes argument was that Ojukwu`s declaration of Biafra was done against the wishes of the majority of Calaber, Ogoja and Rivers provinces who for many years had agitated for a separate state and not a secession from Nigeria. They were never consulted and Ikpeme also argued that the Igbo leadership had concluded plans of either to force the five million non Igbo speaking Biafra minorities to accept Biafra or eliminate them out rightly. It was on this basis that soldiers were quickly sent to the minority areas to keep down the people, detain or kill anyone who raises an opposing voice against Biafra.
In Asang town alone about 400 people were carried away to unknown destinations and never came back. Attan Onoyon town suffered the same fate. Enyong was burnt down and many people killed by Biafra soldiers. Biafra soldiers shot many villagers in Ekpenyong, present day Akwa Ibom. On October 18 1967, about 169 civilians in detention were lined up by Biafra soldiers and shot (source: New York Times as an informational advertisement by the Consulate General of the Federal Republic of Nigeria New York).
There was a special operations group within the Biafra forces called Biafra Organisation of Freedom Fighter (BOFF). It was set up in Bende. The objective of the special operations was to suppress the enemy within.
On the disappearance of a Major Archibong, investigations revealed that members of the special operations decapitated their victims for ritual purposes. Head hunting in warfare was a cultural practice in some parts of Biafra known as old Bende.
The minorities in Rivers area seemed worse off. Apart from torture and other forms of human rights abuses, they were also evicted from their homes and Igbo names were allocated to streets. Some Kalabari young men were evicted and sent to Umuahia, Owerri, Abiriba and Ozuitem most likely to avoid infiltration of the enemies. Chief Samuel Mbakwe a Biafra Provincial Administrator of the Okigwe Province had noted the influx of refugees from Port Harcourt.
An Irish priest who served in Rivers State reported that the Igbo soldiers were suspicious of some Rivers people who sometimes led federal troops through their lines along hidden creeks. This attitude, according to the priest, created a mixture of panic, fear, and hatred among the Biafra troops towards some indigenous people of Rivers State. People who were maltreated were said to have been involved in this act of “sabotage” against Biafra.
It is asserted that no fewer than six thousand Rivers people were sent to different refugee camps in Igboland.
The truth must be told. This ppl hide this from the war history. Time has come to tell the world their atrocities.. If it sure for you and you have strong back up, discredit this.

daveson2020:
Good morning Mr obiano, it's already too late for you we are not voting for you again under your watch they slaughtered my friends and families we want you out.

oxygen247:
No amount of propaganda can save Obiano. We have not forgotten the blood of biafrans that were shed under his watch.

seniwellsFX:
correct story. The truth is that,the people of the Niger Delta would have suffered the same way we are suffering under the current set up in Nigeria,if not more if we were under Biafra as at then. My dad usually Tell's me stories of how Biafra soldiers were systematically killed while ferrying them across the creeks in bayelsa. This was due to the atrocities committed by the Biafran soldiers. They forced most of the minority people into changing their names and even some of their cultures. I grew up to see my aunties and even uncles bearing Igbo names like ene,ngozi,emelike and others.and I asked,how come an ijaw woman or man is bearing Igbo name. My parents told me it was so just to avoid tuture and to some extent murder from the Biafran soldiers. Biafrans then saw the minority regions of the Niger Delta as a conquered region. just as the current Nigeria is seeing the region.am not against Biafra,neither am I against secession. In fact as an ijaw man,i want the current Nigeria to either be restructured or disintegrate into several nations. So everyone can be on its own. Igbos are claiming the Niger Delta to be part of biafraland without the consent of the people of the region.the same mistake they did in 1967. Ask yourself why the people of Niger Delta are so quiet to the issue of Biafra? It's for a reason for which I know lots of people understand.

Agumbankembu:
Eka, nobody called you in this "Ozoemena" thread.

Small thing nau u will say Igbos will enslave you.

ediman:
Igbo enslave Akwa Ibom?

Not anymore. Our eyes have open. Take your Biafra to cameroun. Akwa Ibomites are not interested

greenermodels:
obiano campaign organization should stop all these their useless online propaganda, obiano with other south east governors are against Biafra,he did nothing about those killed and arrested. it's election time and him and his wife are now building toilets and sharing jelly cans as their own achievement. this monument is not a cenotaph and this ceremony was held two years ago.obiano would be voted out for his poor performance, poor moral character and betrayal of the Biafran course.

oxygen247:
Lie. If he wants to be taken serious he should start speaking up for illegal detention of Ifeanyi Ubah.

subtlemee:
Juvenile delinquency

ipodstinks:
Hmmmm, my brother, after reading that story from that Niger delta author, I weep for my ppl. When I was serving in rivers state, I have friends both from delta. One is living in isoko, the other one, henry is living in Ibadan. He told me how they moved to Ibadan. He told me when they were in delta, Igbo ppl invaded their community and killed so many of them, he said, they tried to run to their Igbo neibours but they chased them away, he said, it was a Yoruba man of blessed memory that escaped them with some others he could help from their town to Ibadan. There in Ibadan, the man gave them accommodation, food n some money as the had nothing on them. He said the man went to meet other ppl to help him to help his friends and they did. He said that was how the become Ibadan ppl till today and never return to their town again. I have created topic on Midwest invasion(Benin and Delta). You can read more there what happened in the Midwest.

Ronaaldo:
The people who were slaughtered were actually from Enugu and Ebonyi states. Not a single Anambra soul was lost.

Benekruku:
The names written on the cenotaph re not up to 3,000,000. Were they not documented?