I did some time ago, argued that what the Igbo man needs to unmasked the real view of him in the Nigerian landscape, is to push for equality and par play. You know efforts have been heavily invested (though on futility) by Britain and her insidious actors to separate mainstream minds Ndigbo from those with critically embedded minds. The essence of this operation is to sustain the continuity of Nigeria on the lips of these Igbo mainstream minds thus making them the drivers’ and agents of their own clog. This strategy predates this age, for instance, prior to 1917 Balfour Declaration, Britain applied same on Jews thereby stoking the agenda of internal divisive project. Amongst the Jews of the time, the Zionists were hated by other mainstream Jewish minds with deep Anglophobic exposures. It was Hitler’s highhandedness against the Jews irrespective political or philosophical divides that forced the Jews to understand that the Jews were endangered species not minding ones inclinations and affiliations.
The central message here is that hatred against a people is symbiotic in nature. One can feign ignorant as much as he chooses to, but the fact remains that no Jew is hated or loved more than other. Same goes to an average Igboman. Like a popular Rat Race, no matter how faster a rat runs than others, it doesn’t makes him human. He still remains a Rat! The Igboman in Lagos might be vocal enough to speak out while the other Igboman in APC might be careful in speaking out his humiliations, that doesn’t mean that the one in APC is treated different. Few months ago, we heard the likes of Ogbonnaya Onu, Dav Umahi, Orji Uzor Kalu, Chibuike Amaechi and the rest shouting “where is the Justice, where is the Justice”. That was really an outburst that negated the principle of “political correctness” that too many of them subscribed to. The different is that the Igboman in Lagos doesn’t understand political correctness and thus expresses his plight in the hands of Igbophobians while the house Niggers who called themselves “Igbo leaders” though experiencing same, got shutdown by political correctness mantra.
Irrespective ones divide, the hatred is ethnocentric propelled by some idiots who already have access to governance of the land. That is why it is a dangerous dynamics. Nazism did not posed a threat until nazists got access to European Governments. One outside would want to ask what actually is the cause(s) the Phobia? To an Igboman, he would said he can’t fathom any reason for the madness. Ask other non-Igbo as I have done in certain quarters, the popular says, “dey too dey show up”. Others said, “Igbos(sic) are domineering). The connotative meaning of “show up or domineering” here as the phobics alluded is the immeasurable spirit of an Igboman towards survival. Those who ought to have learn and import this passion for survival life system of an Igboman, choose to malign those who chose the best path to life.
Since after the Biafran/Nigerian war, Ndigbo unlike their compatriots in Nigeria and Africa have travelled across global spheres and managed to organically, integrated in the socio system of their hosts. It is this wide tentacle spread that for me, have been under-utilized by the Ndigbo. Sometimes people have a weapon they lack understanding of its usage and efficacy. For Britain, the diaspora Igbo population must be made to be creole enough in defending the colonial structure aka Nigeria than his/her indigenous identity. This particular project led to diaspora Igbo population marketing and running a PR for the British owned Nigeria on pro bono. Some Igbo creoles were enmeshed on this mess that they never withheld their resentments to anyone who thought otherwise. It was a norm amongst the diaspora Igbo population to think that anyone who didn’t walk on this path of promoting Nigeria on pro bono is either a “tout”, “foolish” or “myopic”. Funny enough, the insidious Nigerian elites pretentiously made some Igbos(sic) political class that they were loved.
To the British government, separating the diaspora Igbo population from getting accustomed with the home reality is the right policy. That is to say, making the diaspora strength to be uninterested with home affairs. That policy for me would have seen a century life-wire if that was done without the emergence of IPOB and Nnamdi Kanu or if there were equal treatment by the Nigerian elites towards their class of Igbo extraction respectively. The two occurrences vis-à-vis Nnamdi kanu and exclusions, ruined the British policy. It is as bad as American plan since Henry Kissinger’s era to keep Russia and China away from each other only for the same America to engage in provocative moves against the duo. You can keep two enemies apart when you don’t turn them enemies to any. When you do, you give them reasons to shun their differences and solve you jointly as an existential threat. That is exactly what Britain and her Nigerian elites have helped Ndigbo achieved. From making the Igbo leaders to shout “where is the Justice” to “proscribing” those who are asking for freedom, they have created a unifying front for Ndigbo just as Biden’s miscalculation have done to Russia and China.
Today, everyone is going berserk because Igbo unification is steering on their faces. I understand the place of IPOB in the whole scenario. The more IPOB engages in multifaceted moves on Biafra, the more she ruins the chances of Britain winning the hearts of Igbo elites for Nigerian project. In as much as IPOB seems the trusted channel of Igbo and Biafran course, the non Biafran elites feel that their compatriots are useless to be entrusted with responsibility. The more these Igbo elites are robbed of the opportunity, the more they get nostalgic about the fiasco called Nigeria. In this case, IPOB should intensify her activities in other to pave way for more humiliation of Igbo elites which in turn would force them to be responsible. For the Nigerian state, she is living on a borrowed time as every indexes of failure, she has acquired them.
Written by
Chika Austine
