Year 53: Igbo people, 29 May 1966 – genocide, survival, remembrance, restoration-of-independence

Herbert Ekwe-Ekwe

TODAY, Wednesday 29 May 2019, marks the 53rd anniversary of the launch of the Igbo genocide. Beginning at mid-morning on Sunday 29 May 1966 to 12 January 1970, Britain, Nigeria’s
suzerain-state, then under the premiership of Harold Wilson, and the composite aggregation of its Nigeria client-state on the ground, 3000 miles away in southwestcentral Africa – military officers, the police, Fulani emirs, muslim clerics and intellectuals, students, civil servants, alimajiri, journalists, politicians, other public figures – planned and embarked on the Igbo genocide. 

This is the foundational genocide of post-(European)conquest Africa. It is also Africa’s most expansive and devastating genocide of the 20th century and the inaugurator of contemporary Africa’s age of pestilence. A total of 3.1 million Igbo people, 25 per cent of this nation’s population at the time, were murdered during those harrowing 44 months – phases I-III of the genocide.  Not since Germany’s genocide against the Herero, Nama and Berg Damara peoples of Namibia in the early 1900s had any African nation been subjected to such indescribable barbarity and carnage as the Igbo.

YAKUBU GOWON headed the regime in Nigeria that executed the genocide and Obafemi Awolowo, a lawyer, a senior advocate of the Nigerian bar, was his deputy, effectively the prime minister, the genocidist “chief theorist” for the campaign and head of the all-powerful finance ministry. Awolowo also principally initiated and programmed phase-IV of the genocide, ongoing, since 13 January 1970, aimed, strategically, to dismantle/degrade the illustrious Igbo economy in perpetuity. The Igbo economy, pre-genocide, was Africa’s most dynamic and resourceful. The genocidists have murdered tens of thousands of additional Igbo in phase-IV of the slaughter and now deploy the Fulani militia and Boko Haram terrorists (presently two of the world’s five deadliest deadliest terrorist groups) as enhanced murdering assets in their scorched earth campaigns across Biafra.

IF THE Fulani islamist/jihadist-led league of genocidist executioners on the ground in Nigeria (whose centrally actuating membership crucially includes the following pan-African nations: Yoruba, Gwari, Jukun, Jawara, Kanuri, Tiv, Edo, Nupe, Hausa, Urhobo, Bachama) which has carried out the Igbo genocide with such fiendishness these past 53 years were European (bekee, oyibo, oyinbo, tubaab, obroni ... ), and not African, there would have been a thundering outrage and expansive campaign against these perpetrators with hollering of “racist”, “fascist”, “exclusivist”, “supremacist”, “segregationist”, “occupationist”, “b***** c******* o********”, “imperialist”… mounted across the rest of the world, particularly from the African World – continental Africans, Africans in Europe, Africans in the Americas, Africans in Asia, Africans in Australasia.

Thus, as far as African critical opinion is concerned, despite its wide geographical spread, Africa’s state-organised mass murderers who slaughter an African people in Africa, it would appear from this devastating history of five decades, can literally get away with murder. Shocking! Unpardonable!

YET the Igbo genocide by the Fulani & co and other Africa-based state/estate’s horrendous crimes against African peoples and nations are distinct empirical determinants of those distressing lines sketched in historian Chancellor Williams’s commanding insight of Africa’s devastating history as shown here:

Now the shadows lengthened. The Europeans had also been busily building up and training strong African armies. Africans trained to hate, kill and conquer Africans. Blood of Africans was to sprinkle and further darken the pages of their history … Indeed, Africa was conquered for the Europeans by the Africans [themselves], and thereafter kept under [conquest] control by African police and African soldiers. Very little European blood was ever spilled. (Chancellor Williams, The Destruction of Black Civilization, 1995: 218)

Neither Britain nor Nigeria can destroy the Igbo determination to be free. Igbo are irrepressible. Igbo will restore Biafra’s independence. No one can stop this outcome. Biafra’s restoration-of-independence signals to the rest of the constituent peoples or nations i.e.,  pre-conquest and occupation of Africa, enveloped in the European-created “Berlin-states” of death, immiseration, desolation and hopelessness, that freedom and transformation, right there in Africa, are achievable goals – that African peoples can build, reconstruct, embark on all possibilities of working for themselves and appropriating the fruits of their labour from their land and on their own terms...

THE world must now know that Biafra flowers innumerable Biafras of rebirth not seen in Africa for 500 years, since 1492.

(Andrew Hill Sextet, “Dedication” [personnel: Hill, piano; Kenny Dorham, trumpet; Eric Dolphy, bass clarinet; Joe Henderson, tenor saxophone;  Richard Davis, bass; Tony Williams, drums; recorded: Van Gelder Studio, Englewood Cliffs, NJ, US, 21 March 1964]) 

Herbert Ekwe-Ekwe is a specialist on the state and genocide and wars in Africa. He is the author of several books including The longest genocide – since 29 May 1966 (2019), Readings from Reading: Essays on African History, Genocide, Literature (2011), Biafra Revisited (2006), African Literature in Defence of History: An essay on Chinua Achebe (2001) and co-author, with Lakeson Okwuonicha, of Why Donald Trump is great for Africa (2018)

Twitter@HerbertEkweEkwe

125th birthday of Chancellor Williams

(Born 22 December 1893, Bennettsville, South Carolina, US)

Herbert Ekwe-Ekwe

DISTINGUISHED historian and sociologist, prolific author including the authoritative tome, The Destruction of Black Civilization: The Great Issue of a Race between 4500BC and 2000AD (1974) – It would appear that Chancellor Williams has the Igbo genocide poignantly in mind particularly as he writes the very distressing lines in his illustrious study (see quote from p. 218 below) of Africans trained by conqueror-European World occupation forces in Africa to murder other Africans so ruthlessly… 

In the past 51 years, beginning on 29 May 1966, Fulani islamist/jihadists in British-contrived Nigeria, fully supported in the campaign by an assemblage of African constituent nations such as the Yoruba, Edo, Kanuri, Hausa, Urhobo, Tiv and Nupe especially, have been trained and feverishly equipped militarily by their bature/oyinbo massa British overlords to slaughter 3.1 million Igbo people in Biafra (29 May 1966-12 January 1970, phases I-III) and tens of thousands more subsequently (13 January 1970-present day [22 December 2018], phase IV) in this foundational, most gruesome, and most devastating genocide of post-(European)conquest Africa… 

THE genocide continues unrelentingly and the immanently hate-driven perpetrators wage this crime against humanity on every conceivable contour of Igbo political, social, economic existence…

Chancellor Williams, The Destruction of Black Civilization: The Great Issue of a Race between 4500BC and 2000AD (Chicago: Third World, new edition, 1995), 345pp, pbk, US$12.43/£12.99:

Now the shadows lengthened. The Europeans had also been busily building up and training strong African armies. Africans trained to hate, kill and conquer Africans. Blood of Africans was to sprinkle and further darken the pages of their history … Indeed, Africa was conquered for the Europeans by the Africans [themselves], and thereafter kept under [conquest] control by African police and African soldiers. Very little European blood was ever spilled. (The Destruction of Black Civilization, p. 218)

(John Coltrane Sextet, “Out of this world” [personnel: Coltrane, tenor saxophone; Donald Garrett, clarinet, bass; Pharoah Sanders, tenor saxophone; McCoy Tyner, piano; Jimmy Garrison, bass; Elvin Jones, drums; recorded: live at Penthouse Jazz Club, Seattle, US, 30 September 1965])

*****Herbert Ekwe-Ekwe is the author, with Lakeson Okwuonicha, of Why Donald Trump is great for Africa (2018)

(https://www.amazon.co.uk/Why-Donald-Trump-great-Africa-ebook/dp/B07KFQHXKV/ref=tmm_kin_swatch_0?_encoding=UTF8&qid=1542585950&sr=8-1)

Twitter @HerbertEkweEkwe

Igbo genocide and this gripping irony of our times

Herbert Ekwe-Ekwe

IF THE executioner Fulani islamist/jihadist-led genocidist regime on the ground in Nigeria that has carried out the Igbo genocide with such fiendishness these past 52 years were of European descent (bekee, oyibo, tubaab... ) and not African, there would have been a thundering outrage and expansive campaign against this perpetrator with hollering of “racist”, “fascist”, “exclusivist”, “supremacist”, “occupationist”, “b***** c******* o********”, “imperialist”… mounted across the rest of the world, particularly from the African World – continental Africans, Africans in Europe, Africans in the Americas, Africans in Asia, Africans in Australasia. 

Thus, as far as African critical opinion is concerned, despite its wide geographical spread, Africa’s state-organised mass murderers who slaughter an African people in Africa, it would appear from this devastating history of five decades, can literally get away with murder.

YET the Igbo genocide by the Fulani & co and other Africa-based state/estate’s horrendous crimes against African peoples and nations are distinct empirical determinants of those haunting lines sketched in historian Chancellor Williams’s commanding insight of Africa’s devastating history as shown here:

Now the shadows lengthened. The Europeans had also been busily building up and training strong African armies. Africans trained to hate, kill and conquer Africans. Blood of Africans was to sprinkle and further darken the pages of their history … Indeed, Africa was conquered for the Europeans by the Africans [themselves], and thereafter kept under [conquest] control by African police and African soldiers. Very little European blood was ever spilled. (Chancellor Williams, The Destruction of Black Civilization: The Great Issue of a Race between 4500BC and 2000AD [Chicago: Third World, 1995], p. 218.)

(John Coltrane Sextet, “Out of this world” [personnel: Coltrane, tenor saxophone; Donald Garrett, clarinet, bass; Pharoah Sanders, tenor saxophone; McCoy Tyner, piano; Jimmy Garrison, bass; Elvin Jones, drums; recorded: live at Penthouse Jazz Club, Seattle, US, 30 September 1965])

Twitter@HerbertEkweEkwe 

124th birthday of Chancellor Williams

(Born 22 December 1893, Bennettsville, South Carolina, US)

Herbert Ekwe-Ekwe

DISTINGUISHED historian and sociologist, prolific author including the authoritative tome, The Destruction of Black Civilization: The Great Issue of a Race between 4500BC and 2000AD (1974) – It would appear that Chancellor Williams has the Igbo genocide poignantly in mind particularly as he writes the very distressing lines in his illustrious study (see quote from p. 218 below) of Africans trained by conqueror-European World occupation forces in Africa to murder other Africans so ruthlessly … In the past 51 years, beginning on 29 May 1966, Hausa-Fulani/islamist-led Nigeria has been trained and feverishly equipped militarily by its bature British overlords to slaughter 3.1 million Igbo people in Biafra (29 May 1966-12 January 1970) and tens of thousands more subsequently (13 January 1970-present day [22 December 2017]) in this foundational, most gruesome, and most devastating genocide of post-(European)conquest Africa … The genocide continues unrelentingly and the immanently hate-driven perpetrators wage this crime against humanity on every conceivable contour of Igbo political, social, economic existence…

Chancellor Williams, The Destruction of Black Civilization: The Great Issue of a Race between 4500BC and 2000AD (Chicago: Third World, new edition, 1995), 345pp, pbk, US$12.43/£12.99:

Now the shadows lengthened. The Europeans had also been busily building up and training strong African armies. Africans trained to hate, kill and conquer Africans. Blood of Africans was to sprinkle and further darken the pages of their history … Indeed, Africa was conquered for the Europeans by the Africans [themselves], and thereafter kept under [conquest] control by African police and African soldiers. Very little European blood was ever spilled. (The Destruction of Black Civilization, p. 218)

(John Coltrane Sextet, “Out of this world” [personnel: Coltrane, tenor saxophone; Donald Garrett, clarinet, bass; Pharoah Sanders, tenor saxophone; McCoy Tyner, piano; Jimmy Garrison, bass; Elvin Jones, drums; recorded: live at Penthouse Jazz Club, Seattle, US, 30 September 1965])

Twitter @HerbertEkweEkwe

Igbo genocide: reflecting on a gripping irony of our times

Herbert Ekwe-Ekwe

IF THE executioner Hausa-Fulani/islamist-led genocidist regime on the ground in Nigeria that has carried out the Igbo genocide with such fiendishness these past five decades were European and not African, there would have been a thundering outrage and expansive campaign against the perpetrator (“racist”, “fascist”, “exclusivist”, “supremacist”, “occupationist”, “imperialist”…) mounted across the rest of the world, particularly from the African World. Yet the Igbo genocide and other Africa state/estate-horrendous crimes against African peoples and nations are distinct empirical determinants of those haunting lines sketched in historian Chancellor Williams’s commanding insight of Africa’s devastating history as shown here:

Now the shadows lengthened. The Europeans had also been busily building up and training strong African armies. Africans trained to hate, kill and conquer Africans. Blood of Africans was to sprinkle and further darken the pages of their history … Indeed, Africa was conquered for the Europeans by the Africans [themselves], and thereafter kept under [conquest] control by African police and African soldiers. Very little European blood was ever spilled. (Chancellor Williams, The Destruction of Black Civilization: The Great Issue of a Race between 4500BC and 2000AD [Chicago: Third World, new edition, 1995: p. 218])

(George Russell Sextet, “Nardis” {composer: Miles Davis} [personnel: Russell, piano; Don Ellis, trumpet; Dave Baker, trombone; Eric Dolphy, bass clarinet; Steve Swallow, bass; Joe Hunt, drums; recorded: Riverside Records, New York, 8 May 1961])

Twitter @HerbertEkweEkwe

123rd birthday of Chancellor Williams

(Born 22 December 1893, Bennettsville, South Carolina, US)

Distinguished historian and sociologist, prolific author including the authoritative tome, The Destruction of Black Civilization: The Great Issue of a Race between 4500BC and 2000AD (1974)

Chancellor Williams, The Destruction of Black Civilization: The Great Issue of a Race between 4500BC and 2000AD (Chicago: Third World, new edition, 1995), 345pp, pbk, US$12.43/£12.99:

Now the shadows lengthened. The Europeans had also been busily building up and training strong African armies. Africans trained to hate, kill and conquer Africans. Blood of Africans was to sprinkle and further darken the pages of their history … Indeed, Africa was conquered for the Europeans by the Africans [themselves], and thereafter kept under [conquest] control by African police and African soldiers. Very little European blood was ever spilled. (The Destruction of Black Civilization, p. 218)

 Twitter @HerbertEkweEkwe

122nd birthday of Chancellor Williams

(Born 22 December 1893, Bennettsville, South Carolina, US)

Distinguished historian and sociologist, prolific author including the authoritative tome, The Destruction of Black Civilization: The Great Issue of a Race between 4500BC and 2000AD (1974)

Chancellor Williams, The Destruction of Black Civilization: The Great Issue of a Race between 4500BC and 2000AD (Chicago: Third World, new edition, 1995), 345pp, pbk, US$12.43/£12.99:

Now the shadows lengthened. The Europeans had also been busily building up and training strong African armies. Africans trained to hate, kill and conquer Africans. Blood of Africans was to sprinkle and further darken the pages of their history … Indeed, Africa was conquered for the Europeans by the Africans [themselves], and thereafter kept under [conquest] control by African police and African soldiers. Very little European blood was ever spilled. (The Destruction of Black Civilization, p. 218)

 Twitter @HerbertEkweEkwe

121st birthday of Chancellor Williams

(Born 22 December 1893, Bennettsville, South Carolina, US)

Distinguished historian and sociologist, prolific author including the authoritative tome, The Destruction of Black Civilization: The Great Issue of a Race between 4500BC and 2000AD (1974)

Chancellor Williams, The Destruction of Black Civilization: The Great Issue of a Race between 4500BC and 2000AD (Chicago: Third World, new edition, 1995), 345pp, pbk, US$12.43/£12.99

Now the shadows lengthened. The Europeans had also been busily building up and training strong African armies. Africans trained to hate, kill and conquer Africans. Blood of Africans was to sprinkle and further darken the pages of their history … Indeed, Africa was conquered for the Europeans by the Africans [themselves], and thereafter kept under [conquest] control by African police and African soldiers. Very little European blood was ever spilled. (The Destruction of Black Civilization, p. 218)

 Twitter @HerbertEkweEkwe