Na yourself you de do!
Our people have many proverbs and idioms used to define the
unlucky or ill-fated fellow. He needs to pick his teeth after drinking water;
whenever he goes hunting, even the tortoise would learn how to climb; the day
he searches for a wife, only mad women would be available and the day he wants
to ‘do’, the lady’s ‘holy-of-holies’ grows thorns. As you can agree with me, these are unusual
occurrences, with water sticking in between someone’s teeth, as the weirdest.
But that is the fate of onye chi ojoo (the ill-fated fellow). As it is, we, the
DOT-people or IPOBians, ( for PMB, every ‘onye-Igbo’ is IPOBist) have become the quintessential ill-fated
people. This includes Dave Umahi who swore
that Ebonyi would NEVER
be a part of Biafra because that would be tantamount to second slavery ( haa)!
I don’t know whether he spoke for himself or for his people and whether he has
bothered to find out those who constitute arch-IPOBians; those who act before they think on behalf of IPOB.
Anyway, because we are an ill-fated people, whenever we or some of us do less
than 1% of what others do freely, it becomes a front-page news and we, all of
us, become subjected to the ‘language-they-can-understand’ treatment. By the way, there is a book titled ‘An
ill-fated people: Zimbabwe before and after Rhodes’ by Lawrence Vambe and
published by Heinemann in 1972. I read it during the period when I read ALL the
titles in the African Writers Series.
Just look at the recent front-page news and you can
understand what I mean. This includes the militarisation of ana-Igbo, and the arrest and brutalisation of Chief Chiwetalu
Agu for wearing Biafranist attire. I don’t know what was running
around his head on that day but our
people say that we should first save the chicken kidnapped by the hawk before
asking it why it strayed into the danger zone. But the issue is that nobody has
said a word to Gumi, the uncrowned Minister of Terrorist Affairs(he has already requested for the establishment of the
ministry), or Executive Consultant to bandits, who hobnobs with heavily armed
assorted bands of terrorists, who pleads that we stop killing bandits because
they have families and who just said that
Nigeria would end if Buhari declared bandits as terrorists( which is
what they are). Even the armed terrorists are neither arrested nor ‘neutralised’ because, according to the great Lai, the government does
not want to harm the people, because they are petty criminals who love Nigeria
and because they are a favoured people. But the reverse is the case with my
people, my people because, we are an
ill-fated people.
In the past few weeks, it has been a reign of terror (ROT) in Anambra state, supposedly by UGM. The gruesome murder of Dr Akunyili was the
height of it. Of course, the carnage at Nnewi, (the burning of the house of the
drainage specialist, Joe Igbokwe, together with the DSS and FRSC complexes) and
the attack on the Project Specialist, Hon Azubogu, occurred around the same time. Then came the attack on APGA rally at Ihiala
on 12/10/21.Some people have already accused IPOB and its ‘military
arm’ ESN of complicity. Suddenly, just suddenly, Mr Malami, announced the
intention of the FGN to declare a SoE
(State of Emergency) in Anambra State, where gubernatorial election is
scheduled to hold in November 6. Beyond the fact that Anambra has been safe and
calm in the past 7years+, a look at the terror statistics in Nigeria shows that
before SoE gets to Anambra, it
would have become a national affair. On October 8, terrorists murdered 19
Nigerians, including 2 brothers, in Ungwan Lalle at Sabon Birni LGA of Sokoto
State, ‘at a sitting’. They then upped
the ante by murdering another 43 at Goronyo town in the same Sokoto State and a bandit-leader Shehu Rekeb had the temerity to
go public with ‘why we struck’
and our media gave him attention. That made it 62 Nigerians at ‘two
sittings’;s more than the number of people
killed in Anambra in the last three months. (This does not make it less
repulsive). In the first 6 weeks of this year, 1521 Nigerians were murdered by NSAs (Non State Actors), with Kaduna, Zamfara and Borno states
responsible for 497, 267 and 257 respectively. The entire SouthEast and the
entire South accounted for 85 and 300 respectively, making the SE, the most
peaceful region in Nigeria. Yet, the South (SE, and Anambra in particular) is
where the pythons and crocodiles are gyrating now, in the forms of golden
dawn, enduring peace and still-water.
You don’t get peace by raw force or fiat and the water cannot be still when it
is consciously being troubled.
Launching new versions of crocodile dance
Now just the other day, Nnamdi Kanu was brought to court
and charged with, among others, insulting the President and looting the Oba’s
place in Lagos. (Are these enough to kidnap somebody from another country?) We
all know that these are not acts of terrorism and even if they were offences,
there are laws under which such can be tried. But we all saw when a young man
slapped the French President the other day and in a lesser degree, the
public hot-slap given to Brig Gen Abedin Khorram, the
governor of Iran’s East Azerbaijan province on 23/10/21. The most laughable however, is the one about
looting the Oba’s palace. Before long, they will accuse him of being
responsible for the regular tanker-fires at Otedola bridge, Lagos. However, on 21/10/21,
15 men were charged for the invasion of Oba’s Palace. The accused were Olawale, Ajayi, Rafiu, Lukman et al. These do
not look like Kanu’s men. By the way, if
the FG charged Kanu to court for badmouthing the President, what will it do to Fani Kayode? They just
invited him to come and chop!
Now, the precarious situation in Anambra and indeed in the
SouthEast, started with the Ghost Town Strategy (GTS).
It started with Monday lockdowns and then the rebuttal of the GTS by IPOB
itself and then the brutal attempt by some unknown elements to enforce the same
lockdown. And then the GTS became an amoeba. One week, it is just Monday; another week it
is Monday and Tuesday or Monday and Thursday as it was last week. So, when you
wake up every morning, you listen to news and rumours to ascertain whether the
day was open or closed. And if you wanted to schedule an activity, you would
undergo a 30-day dry fasting so that the date would not fall into
a GTS day. There was even threat of 30-day lockdown and now a threat of one-week
lockdown starting from November 5th. IPOB has denied the November 1
week lockdown, which is obviously targeted at the Anambra Elections. As it is
now, nobody is sure of who is announcing or enforcing the lockdown. But people,
remembering what had happened to those found on the wrong side of the
Ghost-Town days, have decided to stay away but some of us claim that the stay
at home evidenced love and support for IPOBism. Of course, people in Imo spoke,
when they mobbed an Unknown Young Man enforcing GTS (which was why those at
Nsukka deployed masquerades for the enforcement). Now PMB, who doesn’t talk
much has ordered that the election must hold and his foot soldiers had
reinforced that directive. Nobody brings war home!
Nsukka spirits enforcing GTS
Incidentally, I have been on the road on 4 of these lockdown
days, not necessarily because I wanted to prove that ‘nothing mega’
(nothing is happening) but because I just had to travel on these days. On the
first day, I went to the Igbo-Ukwu market square to see things for myself. I
have also spoken to a lot of people, those who are directly affected by the
lockdown; the ‘ejehu olu ma elighi nni’ group (Those who cannot
eat unless they go to work). The last two people I spoke with were drivers, who
appeared sympathetic to IPOB but decried the lockdown, which impoverished them.
On 25/10/21, transport workers in Abia State asked IPOB to provide them with
palliatives to cushion the negative effects of these ghost-town days, including
some vehicles burnt in the process of enforcement.
So, who is responsible
for this ROT in Anambra State? As can be seen in the charges against Nnamdi
Kanu, the Government is ready to accuse IPOB of everything, including the number of police tollgates on the Shagamu-Onisha high way, the increasing
bloodletting by the ‘harmless’ bandits or the wrinkles in
Buhari’s face. IPOB has denied involvement and promised to cut the ears of
those enforcing the GTS. But our security officials will accuse IPOB before
even getting to the scene. We should
however remember that the founder and GO
of ‘Hopism’, Governor Uzodinman had told us that 70% of those
arrested for the Imo mayhem were not Nd’Igbo. How did our
security people respond to this weighty information? And just the other day, a
meeting of traditional rulers in Imo State ended in an orgy of blood. It had
been reported officially that the policemen on duty were recalled by their commander
before then. What has our security people done with that information?
Buying Justice;Vanguard, 27/10/21
But why do we still talk of UGM when governor Umahi threatened
the other day to punish the parents of UGM? If he knows the parents of the UGM,
then he sure knows the UGMs!
I want to state
unequivocally that the GTS, which costs Anambra State N19,6bn each day or
N3,8trn cumulatively (according to Soludo & Ohaneze) cannot be in the
interest IPOB, or even the Igbos. This is because we are punishing and
brutalizing ourselves, and destroying our properties. Most important, PMB and
his government do not give a damn. If PMB did not notice the El Zakzaky group
who were protesting in his ‘doormot’ for months, how will he
notice and respond to people engaging in self-annihilation the DOT part of the
country. One uninformed local told me
on the first day of the lockdown that government would be pained by the amount
of money (levies and taxes) it would fail to collect on that day, which was an
Nkwo day. How much does the FG collect from Nkwo IgboUkwu? Even if it fails to
collect anything, the CBN is there to provide ways and means advances! However,
the GTS hurts our people and you cannot save or liberate the people by
inflicting pain and sorrow on them. As
one Unknown Compatriot had asked nobody in particular after the
first Ghost Town Monday: who owns the busses that were burnt today? Who
owned the goods in the busses? Whose businesses were truncated? Who was killed:
whose children were stopped from taking NECO math’s exams? Whose children will
be denied admission into tertiary institutions because they did not have Maths?
Who is being affected economically? To all these questions he responded: Igbo
Man. Unfortunate; Sad!
PROVERBS - Words of Wisdom and Guidance | IK Muo
I agree that sacrifices are needed to achieve any worthwhile objective but the sacrifices must be strategically aligned to the said objectives. And now, Anambra State is said to have approved a Monday-Saturday School week because of the ghost-Mondays. And that is after the Governor and South East leaders had ordered a stoppage of the GTS, to which IPOB responded ‘you no fit’! Governor Ikpeazu who is doing signs and wonders at Aba agreed with them, saying that the SE stakeholders, including governors, lacked the capacity to stop the GTS.
I want to state, also unequivocally, that
disrupting the November 6th election, totally or partially will NOT
benefit Anambra State, IPOB or Nd’Igbo.
When it is partially done, people ‘boasting of connection in high
places’ (Achebe, 1983) will write the results and we have a government
willy-nilly. If it is totally disrupted, those in a hurry to impose an
emergency rule will have their way and that will not be in our interest as NdiAnambra
or Nd’Igbo.
I
witnessed the Biafran war of independence, LIVE and I will not wish for an
encore of it. However, separation does not always mean war and in any case, we
cannot because of fear of death, run away from war that is brought to our doormot. As our people would say, one cannot, for
fear of a monkey, fall down from the tree.
Also, if we want to go on our separate ways, we must talk it over; everybody
MUST be carried along (not the type of carrying along by our politicians). Our
people say that with proper negotiation, people will readily end up in the mat (What
do they do on the mat? I no know!).
Most important, we must prepare for it to the best of our capability. Being oji
onu egbu oji (one who fells the iroko tree with
his mouth), is NOT optimal
Conclusion is what writers do when they are tired. I want to
condemn all the bloodletting and syndicated
ROT in Anambra State. The killings and ROT, including enforced GTS is
not in our interest. Threatening to disrupt or actually disrupting the election
will also not help us. However, the degree of Igbofobia, IPOBfobia and
DOTfobia in the presidency is condemnable and stands condemned. I also
repeat ad-nauseum, my age-old view that the way Nigeria is presently structured
and run is NOT sustainable. This cannot stand and something MUST happen in that
regard. What will happen when and how it will happen, the son of man does not
yet know. But things cannot continue to be done the way it is being done today.
As I was writing this,
‘somebody’ wrote: Sunday Igboho
crippled; Nnamdi Kanu incarcerated, Gumi& Miyetti Allah, protected.
And now, Justice Ladiran Akintola has just ruled, in a suit filed by Sunday
Igboho, that based in international and domestic laws, agitation for self
determination is LEGAL. So, wither the consolidated suit against Kanu?
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Great advice given: sacrifices must align with objectives otherwise people will 'help' their enemies to destroy themselves, their economy and of course their future.
ReplyDeleteWhat a good write up.
ReplyDelete