• Northerners forced civil war on Ndigbo
• Igbo leaders to meet Jonathan on restructuring
Biafran war veteran, Col. Emmanuel Nwobosi (retd), a close ally of late Ikemba Nnewi, Dim Chukwuemeka Odumegwu-Ojukwu, has challenged former head of state, Gen. Yakubu Gowon (retd), over his recent comments on Nigeria’s nationhood and the civil war. In an interview with Sunday New Telegraph in Enugu, Nwobosi said Gowon’s failure to stop the killings of Ndigbo in 1966, despite assurances given to Odumegwu- Ojukwu, led to the declaration of the Republic of Biafra and the civil war. He described the former head of state’s assertion in a recent interview with The Guardian that he does not believe in Igbo nationality as a ‘callous disposition.’Nwobosi, now 76, played an active role in Nigeria’s first military coup on January 15, 1966, when he was a major in the Nigerian Army. He told our correspondent that as the man who presided over a decision to take the war to the people of the defunct Biafra, Gowon had no moral standing to speak on ethnic nationalism in the country. Nwobosi, who was quite angry as he spoke, accused Gowon of taking the war to the Biafrans who had opted to stay on their own following repeated pogroms that were gradually driving them towards annihilation.
He said, “What struck me was that it is over two weeks since Gen. Gowon made that callous statement all in the name of one Nigeria and nobody has cared to counter him. I am baffled. The civil war was brought on us. It wasn’t anything we prepared for and we were just out from incarceration following the military coup, the war was looming and we had to get into it almost bare-handed.”
He also responded to Gowon’s allusion in the interview to how he countered Igbo military officers like Major Emmanuel Ifeajuna whenever they spoke about longing for an independent Igbo nation; due to his belief in one Nigeria. But Nwobosi accused him of insincerity and deliberate act of denigrating ethnic nationalism, which he said was still relevant in Nigeria, decades after the war. He recalled that before Ojukwu’s declaration of Biafra, deliberate killings targeted at the Igbo in the North had taken the country by storm.
Nwobosi said that during one of the pogroms, Igbo people ran to Enugu and other parts of the defunct Eastern Region. He recalled that Ojukwu, having obtained assurances from Gowon and other Northern leaders, persuaded the fleeing Ndigbo to return to their bases in the North. He lamented that the killings occurred again, prompting further bad blood that put a question mark on the unity Gowon was propounding.
He also recalled how the first military coup he co-sponsored and executed along with the other young military officers took the nation by surprise but maintained that “we had our aim and it could be seen that the country was drifting and it was drifting in the worst state.” Nwobosi, who is still nursing a spinal injury he sustained during the civil war, disagreed with Gowon’s insinuation that the war was unnecessary. “It would not have been necessary if the right things were done at the right time. But if you ask somebody whether he was right to defend himself, then, I can answer you on that. We were right to defend ourselves. Even if it comes again tomorrow, we would be right in defending ourselves.
“There is an Igbo adage which says it is only a tree that would know it is going to be cut down or destroyed and would not move or run away but a human being would not hear that it is going to be destroyed, killed, annihilated and still stand by without reacting. “And I would give you a few examples. This had happened earlier in Nigeria’s history at that time when the Igbos where massacred in Kano. Then, it spread through other parts of the Northern Region. That was long before the civil war,” he explained.
The war veteran said he grew up in Northern Nigeria in view of his father’s profession as a male nurse and that he had many friends and other acquaintances in that part of the country. He lamented that “it was disheartening to see my own people being killed like rabbits in the north.” He said this was what compelled the South-East to secede. Meanwhile, 82 Igbo leaders of thought led by elder statesman and constitutional lawyer, Prof. Ben Nwabueze, have mapped out plans to meet President Goodluck Jonathan soon for the realisation of the restructuring of the country into six zones. He said this is in view of the import of ethnic nationalism in fostering the country’s unity.
The group’s deputy secretary, Elliot Uko, told our correspondent in Enugu that the meeting would focus on how to foster Nigeria’s unity. He maintained that the group would not join in the clamour for Igbo presidency since it remained a nonpartisan body. He explained that the Igbo Leaders of Thought is made up of 83 members of which 47 members are professors and he hinted the group would press for the nation to embrace a six-regional structure to truly catalyse Nigeria’s unity.
Source: New Telegraph
• Igbo leaders to meet Jonathan on restructuring
Biafran war veteran, Col. Emmanuel Nwobosi (retd), a close ally of late Ikemba Nnewi, Dim Chukwuemeka Odumegwu-Ojukwu, has challenged former head of state, Gen. Yakubu Gowon (retd), over his recent comments on Nigeria’s nationhood and the civil war. In an interview with Sunday New Telegraph in Enugu, Nwobosi said Gowon’s failure to stop the killings of Ndigbo in 1966, despite assurances given to Odumegwu- Ojukwu, led to the declaration of the Republic of Biafra and the civil war. He described the former head of state’s assertion in a recent interview with The Guardian that he does not believe in Igbo nationality as a ‘callous disposition.’Nwobosi, now 76, played an active role in Nigeria’s first military coup on January 15, 1966, when he was a major in the Nigerian Army. He told our correspondent that as the man who presided over a decision to take the war to the people of the defunct Biafra, Gowon had no moral standing to speak on ethnic nationalism in the country. Nwobosi, who was quite angry as he spoke, accused Gowon of taking the war to the Biafrans who had opted to stay on their own following repeated pogroms that were gradually driving them towards annihilation.
He said, “What struck me was that it is over two weeks since Gen. Gowon made that callous statement all in the name of one Nigeria and nobody has cared to counter him. I am baffled. The civil war was brought on us. It wasn’t anything we prepared for and we were just out from incarceration following the military coup, the war was looming and we had to get into it almost bare-handed.”
He also responded to Gowon’s allusion in the interview to how he countered Igbo military officers like Major Emmanuel Ifeajuna whenever they spoke about longing for an independent Igbo nation; due to his belief in one Nigeria. But Nwobosi accused him of insincerity and deliberate act of denigrating ethnic nationalism, which he said was still relevant in Nigeria, decades after the war. He recalled that before Ojukwu’s declaration of Biafra, deliberate killings targeted at the Igbo in the North had taken the country by storm.
Nwobosi said that during one of the pogroms, Igbo people ran to Enugu and other parts of the defunct Eastern Region. He recalled that Ojukwu, having obtained assurances from Gowon and other Northern leaders, persuaded the fleeing Ndigbo to return to their bases in the North. He lamented that the killings occurred again, prompting further bad blood that put a question mark on the unity Gowon was propounding.
He also recalled how the first military coup he co-sponsored and executed along with the other young military officers took the nation by surprise but maintained that “we had our aim and it could be seen that the country was drifting and it was drifting in the worst state.” Nwobosi, who is still nursing a spinal injury he sustained during the civil war, disagreed with Gowon’s insinuation that the war was unnecessary. “It would not have been necessary if the right things were done at the right time. But if you ask somebody whether he was right to defend himself, then, I can answer you on that. We were right to defend ourselves. Even if it comes again tomorrow, we would be right in defending ourselves.
“There is an Igbo adage which says it is only a tree that would know it is going to be cut down or destroyed and would not move or run away but a human being would not hear that it is going to be destroyed, killed, annihilated and still stand by without reacting. “And I would give you a few examples. This had happened earlier in Nigeria’s history at that time when the Igbos where massacred in Kano. Then, it spread through other parts of the Northern Region. That was long before the civil war,” he explained.
The war veteran said he grew up in Northern Nigeria in view of his father’s profession as a male nurse and that he had many friends and other acquaintances in that part of the country. He lamented that “it was disheartening to see my own people being killed like rabbits in the north.” He said this was what compelled the South-East to secede. Meanwhile, 82 Igbo leaders of thought led by elder statesman and constitutional lawyer, Prof. Ben Nwabueze, have mapped out plans to meet President Goodluck Jonathan soon for the realisation of the restructuring of the country into six zones. He said this is in view of the import of ethnic nationalism in fostering the country’s unity.
The group’s deputy secretary, Elliot Uko, told our correspondent in Enugu that the meeting would focus on how to foster Nigeria’s unity. He maintained that the group would not join in the clamour for Igbo presidency since it remained a nonpartisan body. He explained that the Igbo Leaders of Thought is made up of 83 members of which 47 members are professors and he hinted the group would press for the nation to embrace a six-regional structure to truly catalyse Nigeria’s unity.
Source: New Telegraph
No comments:
Post a Comment