Biafra’s voice will prevail in these two antithetical worldviews at play in contemporary Africa

Herbert Ekwe-Ekwe

TWO voices in the southwestcentral region of Africa with such contrasting worldviews are in contestation presently:

1. For the first voice, from the Fulani islamist/jihadists in the north of the region, it is to threaten and threaten to murder, and indeed murder and murder and murder under the overarching, marching flaming banner of the herd as it and  parents and grandparents have done during the course of the gruesome Igbo genocide these past 53 years (29 May 1966-7 June 2019) and the Igbo pogroms in Kano (1953) and Jos (1945) and the dreadful legacy of foreparents’ trail of murders and subjugations of indigenous African populations across the entire north stretches of the region since they left their Futa Djallon highlands home of northwest Africa, 1500 miles away, just over 200 years ago to the day. The country that has unfailingly enhanced the monstrosity of this “voice” and its death mission throughout the trajectory is Britain, principally its creator. 

2. For the other voice, in the south of the geography, in Biafra, Land of the Rising Sun, it is engaged, uncompromisingly, in an assured, resilient quest for freedom that views life, yes, African life, as sacrosanct and is eager to employ its incredible talent of creativity and enterprise to transform the lives of its people, an outcome with epochal consequences for the region and all the continent and the rest of the African World – including, especially, in the Americas and Europe.

(Jackie McLean Quintet, “Love and hate” [personnel: McLean, alto saxophone; Grachan Moncur III, trombone; Bobby Hutcherson, vipraphone; Larry Ridley, bass; Roy Haynes, drums; recorded: Van Gelder Studio, Englewood Cliffs, NJ, US, 20 September 1963])

*****Herbert Ekwe-Ekwe is the author of The longest genocide – since 29 May 1966 (2019) and co-author, with Lakeson Okwuonicha, of Why #DonaldTrump is #great for #Africa (2018)

Twitter @HerbertEkweEkwe