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Showing posts with label 3.1 million Igbo people murdered. Show all posts
Showing posts with label 3.1 million Igbo people murdered. Show all posts
(Medal is sent back to Buckingham Palace, London, 25 November 1969)
ICONIC BEETLE’s John Lennon sends back the 1965 MBE knighthood medal bestowed on him by Queen Elizabeth II of England over Britain’s instrumental role in the perpetration of the Igbo genocide with its client state Nigeria in which 3.1 million Igbo people or 25 per cent of this nation’s population are murdered between 29 May 1966 and 12 January 1970 (phases I-III) in this foundational genocide of post-(European)conquest Africa Twitter @HerbertEkweEkwe
(Tony Williams Quintet, “From before” [personnel: Williams, drums; Sam Rivers, tenor saxophone; Wayne Shorter, tenor saxophone; Herbie Hancock, piano; Gary Peacock, bass; recorded Van Gelder Studios, Englewood Cliffs, NJ, US, 12 August 1965])
Herbert Ekwe-Ekwe BESIDES ALL the lead-countries involved in the Igbo genocide which have apparently had or still appear to have their comeuppance as a result, as perceptive sociologist and criminologist Biko Agozino aptly reminds us (“Why Obasanjo may be heading to hell”, http://massliteracy.blogspot.com.br/2013/08/why-obasanjo-may-be-heading-to-hell.html– accessed 18 December 2014), each lead-personage involved in perpetuating this heinous crime against humanity has had their life/life’s vital interests spectacularly collapse around them: 1.Olusegun Obasanjo (genocidist commander, south Biafra, who ordered the shooting down of an international Red Cross DC-7 relief-carrying aircraft to the blockaded and bombarded Biafrans near Eket, south Biafra, on 5 June 1969; for an update on this fellow, see, for instance, daughter Iyabo Obasanjo’s December 2013 open letter to her father, http://www.vanguardngr.com/2013/12/iyabo-obasanjo-writes-father-says-dear-daddy-dont-nigeria/– accessed 18 December 2013)
(Olusegun Obasanjo: ... obusonjo genocidist commander, south Biafra)
2.Murtala Muhammed (genocidist commander, northwestcentral Biafra and commander of brigade that carried out the 7 October 1967 mass execution of 700 Igbo boys and men at Asaba, west Oshimili River, Oshimili Delta, Biafra)
3.Harold Wilson
(Harold Wilson:“would accept a half million dead Biafrans if that was what it took...”)
4. Ibrahim Taiwo (parallel commander of genocidist brigade that carried out the 7 October 1967 mass execution of 700 Igbo boys and men at Asaba, west Oshimili River, Oshimili Delta, Biafra)
5.Leonid Brezhnev 6.Abdel Gamal Nasser
7.Benjamin Adekunle(genocidist commander, south Biafra)
(Benjamin Adekunle:unleashes sheer savagery in south Biafra)
8.Yakubu Gowon (head of genocidist-prosecuting regime, Lagos, Nigeria) 9.Hosni Mubarak (former commander, Egyptian air force [and later head of regime until swept away by the mass Egypt’s uprising, February 2011] whose squadrons of pilots, loaned to the genocidists, flew Soviet-built MiGs from the then East Germany [GDR] and engaged in the cowardly carpet bombings of Biafran markets, hospitals, city centres, churches, shrines, children’s playgrounds, villages, farms throughout the duration of the genocide)
10.Tony Enaharo (genocidist roving envoy) 11. U Thant (former secretary-general, UN, from Burma, contemporary Myanmar) 12.Ahmadou Ahidjo (head of regime, Cameroon) 13.Mashood Abiola (expansive weapons-contractor during the genocide who was on the verge of becoming head of regime, Nigeria, 1998) 14.Obafemi Awolowo (chief genocidist “theorist”, head of finance ministry, and deputy head of genocidist prosecuting junta who desperately craved to be post-genocide head of regime, Nigeria)
15.Gbadamosi King (genocidist air force pilot who shot down the international Red Cross DC-7 relief-bearing aircraft over the skies of south Biafra, 5 June 1969) 16.Muhammadu Shuwa (genocidist commander, north and northcentral Biafra) 17.Hafez al-Assad (head of regime, Syria, father of Bashar al-Assad) 18.Illiya Bisalla (genocidist commander, northcentral Biafra) 19.Sekou Toure (head of regime, Guinea-Conakry) 20.Houari Boumedienne (head of regime, Algeria) 21.Ismail al-Azhari (head of regime, the Sudan) 22.Diallo Telli (OAU first secretary-general) 23. Faisal bin Abdulaziz Al Saud (king of Saudi Arabia, 1964-1975) 24. Allison Ayida (Rise and fall of Nigeria, 1990, co-principal secretary, genocidist-prosecuting regime) 25. David Cameron(former British prime minister who,
with US President Obama, imposed Muhammadu Buhari, one of the vilest Nigerian
genocidist operatives throughout these 50 years of the Igbo genocide, as head of
Nigeria regime, March 2015 [since taking power, the Buhari regime’s military
and other genocidist assets, true to type, have murdered hundreds of Igbo
across occupied Biafra without any condemnation by the Cameron government];
Cameron resigned his prime minister’s position precipitously on 13 July 2016
after losing the “Brexit” referendum on British membership of the European
Union)
26. Hillary Clinton (former US secretary
of state, Obama administration, January 2009-January 2013 – remained unrelentingly
adamant, throughout her tenure, of not
designating the islamist, northcentral/northeast-based insurgent organisation,
Boko Haram, a terrorist organisation despite the latter’s murder of thousands
of African peoples, overwhelmingly Igbo, during the period [it wouldn’t be
until November 2013 that the US declared Boko Haram “terrorist” because Washington
judged the group was “{now} develop{ing} links with other {islamists} such as
al-Qaeda … to wage a global jihad”]; on 8 November 2016, contrary to overwhelming
opinion poll indicators and leading pundits’ analyses and predictions, Clinton received
a crushing defeat in the US presidential election by anti-establishment rival candidate
Donald Trump – Clinton had run her campaign on a political platform billed
largely on the continuation of the cardinal policies of the Obama presidency
which includes its unflinching support for the Nigeria genocidist regime)
27. Barack Obama (US President who, with David
Cameron, former British prime minister, imposed Muhammadu Buhari, one of the
vilest Nigerian genocidist operatives during these 50 years of the Igbo
genocide, as head of Nigeria regime, March 2015 [since taking power, the Buhari
regime’s military and other genocidist assets, true to type, have murdered
hundreds of Igbo people across occupied Biafra without any condemnation by the Obama administration]; Obama is the first African-descent president of
the US republic in 233 years of existence and his unflinching support for an
African-led genocidist regime in Africa waging a genocide against an African
people is surely an unconscionable tragedy of his presidential legacy) (http://re-thinkingafrica.blogspot.co.uk/2016/03/herbert-ekwe-ekwe-this-piece-is.html)
(Barack Obama:... imposes genocidist operative Buhari ... unconscionable tragedy of a legacy)
... Free fall vs freedom and justice Boko Haram and close cousin Fulani militia’s insurgency incrementally ravage north Nigeria, the epicentre of the planning and execution of the Igbo genocide and the preceding “dual dress rehearsals”-Igbo pogroms (1945, 1953) without letup... But, most pointedly, the clearly discernible contours of all-Nigeria as Boko Haram becomes the most ruthless global terrorist organisation presently (http://www.abc.net.au/news/2015-11-17/global-terrorism-index-increase/6947200, accessed 17 November 2015) and the vile Buhari is emplaced congenitally as regime hemlsperson: for the aluthis Nigeria genocide state has unleashed on Igbo people these past 50 years (29 May 1966-11 November 2016), it is indeed spiralling in free fall as the rest of the world reflects cogently... If ever there was any doubt, the evidence, so far, demonstrates the contrary – namely, that no one, no agency, murders 3.1 million Igbo children, women and men in this foundational genocide of post-(European)conquest Africa and walks away free... Apart from the now 50 million Igbo survivors, the 3.1 millionare individually and collectively involved in the current historic Biafran quest for freedom and justice... And Biafra will get this freedom and justice. Undoubtedly.
Just a one-sentence reply: To understand the politics of the Igbo genocide and the politics of the “post”-Igbo genocide is to have an invaluable insight into the salient features and constitutive indices of politics across Africa in the past 50 years. Twitter@HerbertEkweEkwe
In an immensely courageous and admirable public admission made in 1970, Colonel Robert Scott of the British military breaks ranks with his employer, the British diplomatic mission in Lagos, Nigeria, where he works as military advisor, to acknowledge, gravely, that as Nigerian genocidist military forces unleash their attacks on Biafran cities, towns and villages, they are the “best defoliant agent known” (Daily Telegraph, London, 11 January 1970). Dreadful but not surprising. Mission During this phase-III of the Igbo genocide or the direct invasion of Biafra (6 July 1967-12 January 1970), the genocidists, equipped zealously by Britain, expend more small arms ammunition in the campaign to achieve their annhilative mission than the amount used by the British armed forces“during the whole” of World War II (as none other than Harold Wilson, the British prime minister himself, reveals in his memoirs: Harold Wilson, Labour Government, 1964-1970: A Personal Record, London: Weidenfeld & Nicolson, 1971, p. 630, added emphasis), the more territorially expansive and much longer duration of the latter notwithstanding. Again thanks to Britain, the Nigerians also deploy an array of heavy weaponry on land and sea for the onslaught. For their air force, the genocidists acquire squadrons of MiGs from the Soviet Union with the complement of loaned Egyptian pilots whose clearly demonstrated main specialism, throughout the mission, is to carpet bomb and strafe concentrated Igbo population centres – markets, churches, shrines, schools, children’s playground, offices, hospitals, farms, refugee centres. Thousands (mostly children, women, older citizens) are murdered in this aerial campaign (particularly from October 1967) including the destruction of an international Red Cross relief-bearing aircraft to the besieged Igbo on 5 June 1969, ordered, specifically, by genocidist commander Olusegun Obasanjo (a crime he acknowledges most unapologetically in his memoirs, appropriately entitled My Command, London: Heinemann, 1980, pp. 78-79), operating in south Biafra. Altogether, beginning from phase-I of this foundational genocide of post-(European)conquest Africa, 29 May 1966, 3.1 million Igbo or one-quarter of this nation’s population are murdered during these 44 months of gruesome death. In one sentence: The British government, headed by Harold Wilson, centrally supports the Igbo genocide militarily, diplomatically, politically – right from conceptualisation to execution.
(Harold Wilson: central role)
Survived It is indeed an extraordinary survival story of history that someone that goes by the name Obiageli, Nkechi, Chinyere, Ifeoma, Amaechi, Nwakaego, Ngozi, Chinelo, Ada, Uzo, Chibundu, Nkemdilim, Chukwuka, Okwuonicha, Chikwendu, Ogonna, Nwafo, Ikechukwu, Onwuatuegwu, Chukwuemeka, Onyekachi, Nnadozie, Okonkwo, Chido, Okafo, Nkeiiru, Ifeyinwa, Uchendu, Nwaoyiri, Amaka, Ofokaaja, Nnamdi, Mbazulike, Chukwuma, Ndukaeze, Chidi, Nneka, Onyeka, Ifekandu, Obioma, Chioma, Ndubuisi… actually walks the face of the earth, today, having survived this programmed sentence of death.
(Ornette Coleman Quartet, “WRU” {or Wit and its Relation to the Unconscious –Freud} [personnel: Coleman, alto saxophone; Don Cherry, pocket trumpet; Scott LaFaro, bass; Ed Blackwell, drums; recorded: Atlantic Studios, New York, US, 31 January 1961])
(Tony Williams Quintet, “From before” [personnel: Williams, drums; Sam Rivers, tenor saxophone; Wayne Shorter, tenor saxophone; Herbie Hancock, piano; Gary Peacock, bass; recorded Van Gelder Studios, Englewood Cliffs, NJ, US, 12 August 1965])
Besides all the lead-countries involved in the Igbo genocide which have apparently had or still appear to have their comeuppance as a result, as perceptive sociologist and criminologist Biko Agozino aptly reminds us (“Why Obasanho may be heading to hell”, http://massliteracy.blogspot.com.br/2013/08/why-obasanjo-may-be-heading-to-hell.html– accessed 18 December 2014), each lead-personage involved in perpetuating this heinous crime against humanity has had their life/life’s vital interests spectacularly collapse around them: 1.Olusegun Obasanjo (genocidist commander, south Biafra, who ordered the shooting down of an international Red Cross DC-7 relief-carrying aircraft to the blockaded and bombarded Biafrans near Eket, south Biafra, on 5 June 1969; for an update on this fellow, see, for instance, daughter Iyabo Obasanjo’s December 2013 open letter to her father, http://www.thisdaylive.com/articles/senator-iyabos-11-page-letter-to-her-father-gen-obasanjo/166935/– accessed 18 December 2014)
(Olusegun Obasanjo: ... obusonjo genocidist commander, south Biafra)
2.Murtala Muhammed (genocidist commander, northwestcentral Biafra and commander of brigade that carried out the 7 October 1967 mass execution of 700 Igbo boys and men at Asaba, west Oshimili River, Oshimili Delta, Biafra)
3.Harold Wilson
(Harold Wilson:“would accept a half million dead Biafrans if that was what it took...”)
4. Ibrahim Taiwo (parallel commander of genocidist brigade that carried out the 7 October 1967 mass execution of 700 Igbo boys and men at Asaba, west Oshimili River, Oshimili Delta, Biafra)
5.Leonid Brezhnev 6.Abdel Gamal Nasser 7.Benjamin Adekunle(genocidist commander, south Biafra)
(Benjamin Adekunle:unleashes sheer savagery in south Biafra)
8.Yakubu Gowon (head of genocidist-prosecuting regime, Lagos, Nigeria) 9.Hosni Mubarak (former commander, Egyptian air force [and later head of regime until swept away by the mass Egypt’s uprising, February 2011] whose pilots, recruited by the genocidists, engaged in the cowardly carpet bombings of Biafran markets, hospitals, city centres, churches, shrines, children’s playgrounds, villages, farms throughout the duration of the genocide) 10.Tony Enaharo (genocidist roving envoy) 11. U Thant (former secretary-general, UN, from Burma, contemporary Myanmar) 12.Ahmadou Ahidjo (head of regime, Cameroon) 13.Mashood Abiola (expansive weapons-contractor during the genocide who was on the verge of becoming head of regime, Nigeria, 1998) 14.Obafemi Awolowo (chief genocidist “theorist”, head of finance ministry, and deputy head of genocidist prosecuting junta who desperately craved to be post-genocide head of regime, Nigeria) 15.Gbadamosi King (genocidist air force pilot who shot down the international Red Cross DC-7 relief-bearing aircraft over the skies of south Biafra, 5 June 1969) 16.Muhammadu Shuwa (genocidist commander, north and northcentral Biafra) 17.Hafez al-Assad (head of regime, Syria) 18.Illiya Bisalla (genocidist commander, northcentral Biafra) 19.Sekou Toure (head of regime, Guinea-Conakry) 20.Houari Boumedienne (head of regime, Algeria) 21.Ismail al-Azhari (head of regime, the Sudan) 22.Diallo Telli (OAU first secretary-general) 23. Allison Ayida (“Rise and fall of Nigeria” [1990], co-principal secretary, genocidist-prosecuting regime)
... Boko Haram insurgency incrementally ravages north Nigeria, epicentre of the planning and execution of this genocide and the preceding “dual dress rehearsals”-Igbo pogroms (1945, 1953) without letup... But, most pointedly, all-Nigeria, as Boko Haram becomes the most ruthless global terrorist organisation presently ( http://re-thinkingafrica.blogspot.co.uk/2015/11/institute-for-economics-peace-global.html, accessed 17 November 2015): for the alu this Nigeria genocide state has unleashed on Igbo people these past 49 years (29 May 1966-10 December 2015), it is spiralling in free fall as the rest of the world cogently reflects... If ever there is any doubt, the evidence, so far, demonstrates the contrary – namely, that no one, no agency, murders 3.1 million Igbo children, women and men in this foundational genocide of post-(European)conquest Africa and walks away free... Apart from the 50 million Igbo survivors, the 3.1 million are individually and collectively involved in the current historic Biafran quest for freedom and justice... And Biafra will get this freedom and justice. Undoubtedly.
(Medal is sent back to Buckingham Palace, London, 25 November
1969)
Iconic Beetle’s John Lennon sends back the 1965 MBE knighthood medal bestowed on him by Queen Elizabeth II of England over Britain’s instrumental role in the perpetration of the Igbo genocide with its client state Nigeria in which 3.1 million Igbo people, one-quarter of this nation’s population, are murdered between 29 May 1966 and 12 January 1970 in this foundational genocide of post-(European)conquest Africa Twitter @HerbertEkweEkwe
Just a one-sentence reply: To understand the politics of the Igbo genocide and the politics of the “post”-Igbo genocide is to have an invaluable insight into the salient features and constitutive indices of politics across Africa in the past 50 years.
Herbert Ekwe-Ekwe The “Igbo Question” is intrinsically linked to the Igbo strategic goal, presently, which is to end the occupation of their homeland, Biafra, by genocidist Nigeria – imposed since 13 January 1970. This is phase-IV of the genocide, launched by Nigeria on Sunday 29 May 1966. 3.1 million Igbo people or 25 per cent of this nation’s population were murdered by Nigeria and its allies including, especially, Britain, which supported the genocide right from conceptualisation to execution – politically, diplomatically, militarily. These were 44 months of uninterrupted, unimaginable carnage and barbarity perpetrated on a people. No single nation or people in Africa has suffered such a gruesome and devastating state(s)-premeditated and organised genocide in history.
(George Russell Sextet, “Thoughts” – personnel: Russell, piano; Don Ellis, trumpet; Dave Baker, trombone; Eric Dolphy, bass clarinet; Steve Swallow, bass; Joe Hunt, drums [recorded Riverside Record, New York, US, 28 May 1961])
Architecture Given the critical links between the salient features of the politics of the occupation and the overarching architecture of the genocidal campaign, most agree that the Igbo termination of the occupation is at once the beginning of their freedom march from Nigeria and the implementation of an expansive socioeconomic programme of reconstruction unprecedented in this southwestcenral region of Africa. If this is the case, one does not need an Igbo “presidency” in Abuja to achieve this as some Igbo commentators as well as a few others have, at times, contended, but quite uncritically. Indeed no Igbo “presidency”, not even one reinforced with an all-Igbo personnel in the key cabinet military/police/“security”-positions can halt this genocide. This campaign has now acquired an inexorable logic to its being. What the emergence of Boko Haram and its other subalterns have demonstrated in Nigeria is that the prosecuting agency of the genocide has become very much decentred, very much motivated, very much engagingly virulent. The typical Boko Haram suicide-operating cell is a handful-strength, in single digits, and none in the group knows any of the others until they meet at the designated, targeted site of operation – in which they, invariably, are not expected to survive! If any survives, they, of course, become a member of new cell of hitherto unknown members and the cycle goes on...
Inalienable Prior to Boko Haram, still on the Igbo “presidency”, we mustn’t forget that Nigeria was under the leadership of an Igbo general when the genocide began on 29 May 1966. Thus, Igbo “presidency”, however attractive the proposition, offers no route to the Igbo halting the genocide. None whatsoever. The route remains Igbo freedom from Nigeria. This is an inalienable Igbo right with or without the genocide as I have argued severally. If the Scots, for instance, one-tenth of the Igbo population and without a genocide antecedent would wish to leave a union they have largely been exponential beneficiaries for 300 years (“Rights for Scots, Rights for the Igbo”, http://re-thinkingafrica.blogspot.co.uk/2012/01/rights-for-scots-rights-for-igbo.html, accessed 18 July 2015), the Igbo, surely, don’t require any agonisingly turgid historical and sociological treatise to wish to leave Nigeria.
Resolution Contrary to the amazingly ahistorical discourses on the nature of the state and its survivability in some circles, particularly in Africa, the state is very much a transient relationship in human history: Kemet, Roman “empire”, Ghana “empire”, Mali “empire”, Czarist “empire”, Austro-Hungarian “empire”, Ottoman “empire”, British “empire”, Malaya Federation, West & East Pakistan, Soviet Union, Yugoslavia, Czechoslovakia, Ethiopia, the Sudan... Twenty-three (23) new states have, for example, emerged in Europe since the end of the 1980s. Even though a population of about 350 million, one-third of Africa’s population, Europeans presently have more states per capita than Africans! And as history shows, the catastrophe is not the collapse of the state; the catastrophe isto destroy/attempt to destroy constituent peoples within the state as the Igbo, for instance, have faced in a Nigeria since 29 May 1966. Here lies the Igbo Question. Twitter@HerbertEkweEkwe
However you disguise it, this thing
does not change:
The perpetual struggle between Good
and Evil.
(TS Eliot, “Choruses from the Rock”, 1934)
On 30 May 1967, Biafra formally
declares its independence from the Nigeria genocide-state in the wake of the
murder of 100,000 Igbo children, women and men across most of north/parts of west Nigeria in phases-I and II of the
genocide Nigeria launched on 29 May 1966 (29 May 1966-3 January 1967, 6 January 1967-5 July 1967) and which would be expanded, subsequently, to phase-III with
the genocidist invasion of Biafra (6 July 1967-12 January 1970) and its murder
of 3 million additional Igbo children, women and men – foundational, most
gruesome and expansive and devastating genocide of post-(European)conquest
Africa Twitter @HerbertEkweEkwe
In an immensely courageous and admirable public admission made in 1970, Colonel Robert Scott of the British military breaks ranks with his employer, the British diplomatic mission in Lagos, Nigeria, where he works as military advisor, to acknowledge, gravely, that as Nigerian genocidist military forces unleash their attacks on Igbo cities, towns and villages, they are the “best defoliant agent known” (Daily Telegraph, London, 11 January 1970). Mission Dreadful but not surprising. During this phase-III of the Igbo genocide or the direct invasion of Igboland, Biafra (6 July 1967-12 January 1970), the genocidists, equipped zealously by Britain, expend more small arms ammunition in the campaign to achieve their annhilative mission than the amount used by the British armed forces“during the whole” of World War II (as none other than Harold Wilson, the British prime minister himself, reveals in his memoirs: Harold Wilson, Labour Government, 1964-1970: A Personal Record, London: Weidenfeld & Nicolson, 1971, p. 630, added emphasis), the more territorially expansive and much longer duration of the latter notwithstanding. Again thanks to Britain, the Nigerians also deploy an array of heavy weaponry on land and sea for the onslaught. For their air force, the genocidists acquire squadrons of MiGs from the Soviet Union with the complement of loaned Egyptian pilots whose clearly demonstrated main specialism, throughout the mission, is to bomb and strafe concentrated Igbo population centres – markets, churches, shrines, schools, children’s playground, offices, hospitals, farms, refugee centres. Thousands (mostly children, women, older citizens) are murdered in this aerial campaign (particularly from October 1967) including the destruction of an international Red Cross relief-bearing aircraft to the besieged Igbo on 5 June 1969, ordered, specifically, by genocidist commander Olusegun Obasanjo (a crime he acknowledges most unapologetically in his memoirs, appropriately entitled My Command, London: Heinemann, 1980, pp. 78-79), operating in south Biafra. Altogether, beginning from phase-I of this foundational genocide of post-(European)conquest Africa, 29 May 1966, 3.1 million Igbo or one-quarter of this nation’s population are murdered during these 44 months of gruesome death. The British government, headed by Harold Wilson, centrally supports the Igbo genocide militarily, diplomatically, politically – right from conceptualisation to execution. Survived It is indeed an extraordinary survival story of history that someone that goes by the name Obiageli, Nkechi, Chinyere, Ifeoma, Amaechi, Nwakaego, Ngozi, Chinelo, Ada, Uzo, Chibundu, Nkemdilim, Chukwuka, Okwuonicha, Chikwendu, Ogonna, Nwafo, Ikechukwu, Onwuatuegwu, Chukwuemeka, Onyekachi, Nnadozie, Okonkwo, Chido, Okafo, Nkeiru, Ifeyinwa, Uchendu, Nwaoyiri, Amaka, Ofokaaja, Nnamdi, Mbazulike, Chukwuma, Ndukaeze, Chidi, Nneka, Onyeka, Ifekandu, Obioma, Chioma, Ndubuisi… actually walks the face of the earth, today, having survived this programmed sentence of death.
(Ornette Coleman
Quartet, “WRU” {or Wit and its Relation to the Unconscious – Freud} [personnel: Coleman,
alto saxophone; Don Cherry, pocket trumpet;
Scott LaFaro, bass; Ed Blackwell, drums; recorded: Atlantic Studios, New York, US, 31 January 1961])
Thursday 2 January 2014 – Rotimi Amaechi, speaking on AIT television, insists: “… Jonathan has developed Abia, and Imo but he refused to develop Rivers. Are we Biafrans?” (http://universalreporters247.blogspot.com.br/2014/01/rivers-group-scolds-amaechi-over-his.html[accessed 2 January 2015]). In a swoop, albeit unwittingly, Rotimi Amaechi, head of regime of the Rivers administrative region, alludes to a critical plank of phase-IV of the Igbo genocide by Nigeria, beginning on 13 January 1970, which focuses on the non-development/dismantling of the economy of Igboland – Africa’s most resourceful and enterprising, prio to the genocide. Extraordinary! To underscore the historic significance of Amaechi’s declaration, readers are invited to click on the follow-up link and note, particularly, material under subtitle “Phase-IV..” http://re-thinkingafrica.blogspot.com.br/2013/10/genocidist-generals-genocidist-theorists.html (accessed 3 January 2015)
Whoever says history isn’t so incorrigibly fascinating?!
(Charles Mingus Sextet, “Conversation” [Mingus, bass; Clarence
Shaw, trumpet; Jimmy Kneeper, trombone; Shafi Hadi, alto and tenor saxophones;
Bill Evans, piano; Dannie Richmond, drums; recorded: Bethlehem Records,
Cincinnati, US, 16 August 1957])
(Tony Williams Quintet, “From before” [personnel: Williams, drums; Sam Rivers, tenor saxophone; Wayne Shorter, tenor saxophone; Herbie Hancock, piano; Gary Peacock, bass; recorded Van Gelder Studios, Englewood Cliffs, NJ, US, 12 August 1965])
Besides all the lead-countries involved in the Igbo genocide which have apparently had or still appear to have their comeuppance as a result, as perceptive sociologist and criminologist Biko Agozino aptly reminds us (“Why Obasanjo May Be Heading To Hell”, http://massliteracy.blogspot.com.br/2013/08/why-obasanjo-may-be-heading-to-hell.html– accessed 18 December 2014), each lead-personage involved in perpetuating this heinous crime against humanity has had their life/life’s vital interests spectacularly collapse around them: 1.Olusegun Obasanjo (genocidist commander, south Biafra who ordered the shooting down of an international Red Cross relief-carrying aircraft to the encircled Igbo over south Biafra on 5 June 1969; for an update on this fellow, see, for instance, daughter Iyabo Obasanjo’s December 2013 open letter to her father, http://www.thisdaylive.com/articles/senator-iyabos-11-page-letter-to-her-father-gen-obasanjo/166935/– accessed 18 December 2014) 2.Murtala Muhammed (genocidist commander, northwestcentral Biafra and commander of brigade that carried out the 7 October 1967 mass execution of 700 Igbo boys and men at Asaba, west Oshimili River) 3.Harold Wilson 4. Ibrahim Taiwo (parallel commander of brigade that carried out the 7 October 1967 mass execution of 700 Igbo boys and men at Asaba, west Oshimili River) 5.Leonid Brezhnev 6.Abdel Gamal Nasser 7.Benjamin Adekunle(genocidist commander, south Biafra) 8.Yakubu Gowon (head of genocidist-prosecuting regime) 9.Hosni Mubarak (former commander, Egyptian air force [and later head of regime until swept away by the mass Egypt’s uprising, February 2011] whose pilots, recruited by the genocidists, engaged in the cowardly carpet bombings of Igbo markets, hospitals, city centres, churches, shrines, children’s playgrounds, villages, farms throughout the duration of the genocide) 10.Tony Enaharo (genocidist roving envoy) 11. U Thant 12.Ahmadou Ahidjo 13.Mashood Abiola (expansive weapons-contractor during the genocide who was on the verge of becoming head of regime, Nigeria, 1998) 14.Obafemi Awolowo (chief genocidist “theorist” who desperately craved to be post-genocide head of regime, Nigeria) 15.Gbadamosi King (genocidist air force pilot who shot down the international Red Cross relief-bearing aircraft over the skies of south Biafra, 5 June 1969) 16.Muhammadu Shuwa (genocidist commander, north Biafra) 17.Hafez al-Assad (head of regime, Syria) 18.Illiya Bisalla (genocidist commander, northcentral Biafra) 19.Sekou Toure (head of regime, Guinea-Conakry) 20.Houari Boumedienne (head of regime, Algeria) 21.Ismail al-Azhari (head of regime, the Sudan) 22.Diallo Telli (OAU first secretary-general) 23. Allison Ayida (“Rise and Fall of Nigeria” [1990], co-principal secretary, genocidist-prosecuting regime) ... Boko Haram insurgency incrementally ravages north Nigeria, epicentre of the planning and execution of this genocide and the preceding “dual dress rehearsals”-Igbo pogroms (1945, 1953) without letup... But, most pointedly, all-Nigeria: for the alu this genocide state has unleashed on Igbo people these past 48 years (29 May 1966-18 December 2014), it is spiralling in free fall as the rest of the world cogently reflects... If ever there is any doubt, the evidence, so far, demonstrates the contrary – namely, that no one, no agency, murders 3.1 million Igbo children, women and men in this foundational genocide of post-(European)conquest Africa and walks away free... Apart from the 50 million Igbo survivors, the 3.1 million are individually and collectively involved in the current Igbo historic quest for justice... And the Igbo will get this justice. Undoubtedly.
(In the Punch interview, Yakubu Gowon states, “[I]f the US was truly a diplomatic friend to Nigeria, it should do everything possible to
keep the corporate existence of Nigeria”.)
Extraordinary!
Gowon can’t really be missing this, which the world knows is his: “[C]orporate
existence of [génocidaires]”! Whoever wants to be associated with Genocigeria
or Crimeigeria not to mention being part of this quagmire of evil?
(Booker
Little Sextet, “Man of words” [personnel:Little, trumpet; Julian
Priester, trombone; Eric
Dolphy, alto saxophone; Don
Friedman, piano; Art Davis,
bass; Max Roach, drums;
recorded: Nola’s Penthouse Studios, New York, 17 March 1961])
Testimony
The Igbo
genocide, 29 May 1966-12 January 1970, perpetrated by Nigeria and its allies,
is the foundational genocide of post-(European)conquest Africa. 3.1 million
Igbo people or one-quarter of this nation’s population were murdered during
these phases I-III of the crime. Nigeria launched phase-IV of the
genocide on 13 January 1970 and it is continuing... Twitter @HerbertEkweEkwe
“Election” time in Nigeria is time-of-death. It is
also time-of-destruction, time-of-desolation, time-of-waste, time-to-waste...
Obasanjo: Prelude Olusegun Obasanjo captures the characterisation of
this season most vividly, if not horridly, in a February 2007 proclamation at Abeokuta,
west Nigeria: “it’s do or die” (all-africa.com,
11 February 2007). And Olusegun Obasanjo should know. Olusegun Obasanjo knows exactly
what he is talking about: he has been head of regime in Nigeria for 11 years
and had been schooled for this role whilst commander of Nigeria’s death squad
in south Biafra during the Igbo genocide, murdering tens of thousands of Igbo
people in towns and villages in the region in addition to personally ordering
the shooting down of a clearly-marked international Red Cross aircraft flying
in urgently needed relief supplies to the besieged and bombarded Igbo in June
1969 (Olusegun Obasanjo, My Command:
1981: 79 ). Nigeria murdered 3.1 million Igbo or one-quarter of this nation’s
population between 29 May 1966 and 12 January 1970. Arguably, among his
colleagues, Olusegun Obasanjo most espouses the haematophagous signature of this genocide-state
he has served so assiduously since 29 May 1966.
Anthem
Already the strains of
“it’s do or die” anthem shrill ominously in Nigeria 3-4 months before
“elections”, if indeed these are eventually held, heralded this time round by that
“dog-and-the-baboon-would-all-be-soaked-in-blood” prologue scripted by
Muhammadu Buhari (The Vanguard,
Lagos, 15 May 2012), another Igbo genocide commander, and prospective candidate
for head of regime in the “polls”. Junaid Mohammed, a public official from
Kano, north region, had lately, at last, worked through a chorus for this
anthem with the predictable, recognisable, hate-filled line to incite the next Igbo
murder trail: “Igbo [are] devoid of
any shame to show their greed, selfishness and contempt” (nigeriavillagesquare.com, 26 October 2014). The Igbo and the world,
surely, have not failed to take note of this evident trigger, in October 2014, to expand, even
further, the Igbo genocide.
Position paper
The Igbo response to this
Nigerian time-of-death can’t be any clearer and more focused. Igbo must resolutely
and totally safeguard Igbo life and property in Igboland forthwith. “Eternal
vigilance is the price of liberty”, as Wendell Phillips’s aphorism invokes, aptly
becomes the overarching banner of reference to work with. Igbo in the Nigeria diaspora must similarly take
great care of their lives and interests during these times. Inevitably, Igbo
will respond to the political platforms of the contending parties and
coalitions for the “polls”. For any of these parties/coalitions or whosoever interested
in seeking the Igbo vote at any level in any constituency in Igboland or in
Nigeria, the following position paper is squarely on the table, articulating
Igbo demands for their vote:
1. Publicly
acknowledge the Igbo genocide carried out by Nigeria from 29 May 1966 to 12
January 1970. Nigeria murdered 3.1 million Igbo people or one-quarter of this
nation’s population in this foundational genocide of post-(European)conquest
Africa.
2. Pay
comprehensive reparations to all Igbo survivors and families of this genocide
since 13 January 1970.
3. Support Igbo
current efforts to prosecute all persons and interests involved in the Igbo
genocide. Genocide is a crime against humanity. There is no statute of
limitations in international law for the apprehension and
punishment of those responsible for this crime.
4. Return in full,
including interests since 13 January 1970, the sum of Igbo savings and other
bank accounts sequestrated by Nigeria soon after the end of that phase of the
genocide when a surviving “male-head” of an Igbo family was doled out £20.00.
5. Return in full
Igbo property assets sequestrated by Nigeria since 13 January 1970 and pay full
compensation for the non-use/loss of earnings on these assets since.
6. Comprehensively
account for the pillaging of the oil and gas reserves in the Igbo oil and gas fields
in Rivers, Imo, Abia and Delta administrative regions since 13 January 1970.
Return in full, in addition to accruing interests, the billions of dollars
worth of oil and gas sales from these reserves since.
7. Comprehensively pay compensation
for blanket policy of Nigeria’s non-development of Igboland after the latter’s
destruction/degradation of the Igbo economy in the wake of the phase of the
genocide, 29 May 1966-12 January 1970.
8. Comprehensively pay compensation for Nigeria’s deliberate policy
to ignore ever-expanding soil erosion/landslides and other pressing ecological
emergencies particularly in northwest Igboland since the mid-1970s.
9. Comprehensively pay reparations to tens of thousands of Igbo people
who Nigeria state/quasi-state operatives have murdered since 1980. There have
been 21 cases of premeditated pogroms against the Igbo, particularly in north Nigeria,
between 1980 and 2014, in which tens of thousands of Igbo have been murdered. 90 per cent of the 54,000
people murdered in Nigeria by the state/quasi-state operatives and agents since
1999 are Igbo people. At least 80 per cent of people murdered by the Boko Haram
across swathes of lands in north/northcentral Nigeria since the outbreak of the
insurgency are Igbo. Hundreds of thousands of Igbo families have abandoned
homes and businesses in the affected region and returned to Igboland.
10. Igbo will not vote APC or
any parties/fractions/tendencies affiliated to this party. This party’s Lagos
region regime deported Igbo people from Lagos to Igboland twice in the past 24
months (http://re-thinkingafrica.blogspot.com/2013/08/igbo-deportation-from-lagos_2.html). These deportations are clear violations of the human rights of the Igbo
deportees, rights guaranteed by the United Nations relevant conventions and
articles to which Nigeria, a UN member state, is a signatory. No APC functionary,
at any level, has unambiguously condemned this outrage.
11. Completely dismantle
Nigeria’s military and administrative occupation of Igboland, enforced since 13
January 1970. Comprehensively pay reparations for this occupation.
12. Support current
Igbo efforts for an internationally organised referendum in Igboland to
determine Igbo goal for the restoration of sovereignty. The right of a people
to self-determination is inalienable, guaranteed by the UN relevant conventions
and articles to which Nigeria, a UN member state, is a signatory.
(Booker Little Sextet, “Moods in free time” [personnel: Little, trumpet; Julian Priester, trombone; Eric Dolphy, alto saxophone; Don Friedman, piano; Art Davis, bass; Max Roach, drums; recorded: Nola’s Penthouse Studios, New York, 17 March 1961])
Igbo are arguably the world’s most brutally targeted
and most viciously murdered of peoples presently. Not since 29 May 1966-12
January 1970 has Igbo life under Nigerian occupation acquired such a gripping
existential emergency. Twitter @HerbertEkweEkwe
Herbert Ekwe-Ekwe is specialist on the state and on genocide & wars in Africa in the post-1966 epoch – beginning with the Igbo genocide, 29 May 1966-present day, the foundational and most gruesome genocide of post-(European)conquest Africa. 3.1 million Igbo or 25 per cent of this nation’s population were murdered by Nigeria and its allies, principally Britain. Africa and the rest of the world largely stood by and watched as the perpetrators enacted this horror most ruthlessly. The world could have stopped this genocide; the world should have stopped this genocide. This genocide inaugurated Africa’s current age of pestilence. During the period, 12 million additional Africans have been murdered in further genocide in Rwanda (1994), Zaïre/DRCongo (variously, since the late 1990s) and Darfur – west of the Sudan – (since 2004) and in other wars in Africa. African peoples have, presently, no other choice but exit/dismantle the extant genocide-state (the bane of their existence & progress) & construct own nation-centred states that serve their interests. He is author of several books & papers on the subject and his new book is entitled The longest genocide – since 29 May 1966 (2019).