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Umuahia Eastern, Northern Meeting; The Stand of "Ndiigbo Generation 1960-1970." By Motto: Our Distinct Destiny is in Our Hands
PRESS RELEASE Introduction: Ndiigbo Generation 1960-1970, is an umbrella body uniting subscribing Ndiigbo including those in the Diaspora, born under the stated generational period. Our motto is "Our Distinct Destiny is in Our Hands. And our ultimate goal is to attain independence as a Sovereign State, the Sovereign State of Biafra (SSB). This is not negotiable. More than 50% of our members carry Birth Certificates with Biafran Nationality. We do not in anyway feel less of who we are. We are unashamedly, BIAFRANS! We have no reason to believe otherwise having been born in Biafra and been victims of genocide, hunger and blockade, war, quota and a continuing incessant slaughter as though we are nomadic cows and the destruction of our hard earned investments in that failed State called Nigeria. We cannot feel to be anything else but Biafrans, for daily as hard as we try, we live with the pains of our reality, the pains of millions of our playmates and other loved ones callously cut down before their sun could rise, through air raids on civilian population, ordered by Rtd. General Gowon and death by hunger as directed by Awolowo and Enahoro through their hunger and blockade policy. We live with the pains of our brilliant and beautiful uncles who stood firm against injustice and made the supreme sacrifice. We live with pains of having had to contain with the harsh realities of life at such a tender and highly impressionable age, as our parents struggled to bring us up with a handout of a paltry sum of £20.00 from whatever they were worth by the abomination that is the Nigerian State. We are a generation whose innocence were stripped from them and thrown to the dogs by some dark and retrogressive forces in Nigeria aided by the former colonial power, Britain. That is the Ndiigbo Generation 1960-1970. We are resolved to take our distinct destiny into our own hands for a better today and a guaranteed tomorrow for succeeding generations after us. There will be no compromise on this resolve!!
The Moribund Peace Ploy: Our attention has been drawn to newspaper reports that some Northern elements and their Eastern collaborators are scheduled to hold a "peace" meeting. Originally, this was scheduled to take place in Jos. Some vigilant patriots of our extremely proud ancestry were quick in making a loud, bold and categorical statement, "We are opposed to this meeting being held here in Jos." We salute their courage and deep sense of alertness to checkmate the insensitivity of the Northern elements and their shameless Eastern collaborators. Ndiigbo Generation 1960-1970 are saying we are vehemently opposed to this meeting being held anywhere not to talk about holding it in Umuahia, a city that is very symbolic of who we are. This is the greatest dishonour anyone, particularly of Igbo ancestry could possibly dish out to the memory of late General Thomas Umunnakwe Ironsi, a man of valour and intimidating firsts in his career. It is the worst kind of insensitivity and disrespect anyone, particularly of Igbo ancestry could possibly show to all our beloved ones who have been cruelly and gruesomely slaughtered since 1945 by those unrepentant and irredeemable ethnic bigots, religious zealots and economic parasites, whose pastime continue to be unprovoked butchering of Ndiigbo.
Please recall, that a few weeks ago, the Jos Market was gutted by fire. Solomon Lar, a former civilian Governor of Plateau State that has Jos as its capital and under whose tenure the gutted market was built, attributed the cause of the fire to SABOTAGE. He described it as an act of TERRORISM. In over view, it was like the destruction of the WTC twin towers for the perpetrators hit at the commercial heartbeat of the State. Ndiigbo as usual were the targeted victims. The Jos inferno came just a few months after Ndiigbo were largely the victims of another TERRORIST ACT, in which thousands of them were massacred in cold blood, in some cases whole families were wiped out, their properties looted and destroyed.
Liman Ciroma Re-writes History, insulting Ironsi's memory, destroying his legacies and diminishing Ndiigbo's contributions to sustaining Nigeria: On the March 3, 2002, late General Ironsi would have been 82 years if Danjuma and his reactionary killer-group did not murder him in cold blood on July 29, 1966. For such a man who gave his life for the oneness of a country cunningly and wickedly created and skewed by Britain to serve the interests of a section of the country, he deserved to be honoured and celebrated even in death. But what did one of our pathfinders get on this momentous occasion? What was the manner of attention given to Gen. Ironsi during this period? He got a carefully planned and deliberately arranged conference to heap hatred ridden attacks on his person, rubbish his achievements and put down his proud Igbo ancestry.
Last week at Abuja, they held a conference on the civil war in which most of the key speakers directed their viperous venom on the person of General Ironsi. Liman Ciroma, a king pin of the Northern oligarchy embarked on the worst kind of revisionism. It was extremely provocative. By his own historical recollection and account, "General Ironsi caused the civil war." That was the most uncharitable thing that has ever been said about the late General.
Talking about the civil war account, before Ciroma, there was the Chief Hater of Ndiigbo himself, the former military dictator, Rtd. General Obasanjo, who in Bayelsa last year shamelessly stated that: "Resource Control caused the civil war." Ndiigbo have not forgotten that Obasanjo and his group employed the Biafran issue to rob Dr Ekwueme of victory in the PDP presidential primary in Jos in 1999. Ever since he has not relented in using Biafra to fester his stinking political nest.
Shortly after Obasanjo's Bayelsa lie of the century, Professor Bolaji Akinyemi, a Foreign Affairs minister under General Ibrahim Babaginda dictatorship, spoke at Arewa House, Kaduna. Akinyemi by the way is an opportunistic military apologist who single-handedly through an open letter to Abacha got him to overthrow the Shonekan led Interim National Government (ING). He did that with the hope that Abacha will make him a Foreign Minister and when this did not happen, he joined forces with NADECO to fight Abacha. It is this same professor of International Relations who should be well-grounded and very truthful in the basic history of Nigeria that stoutly stated that "it was a quarrel between a Col. And a Lt. Col. that caused the civil war." It took Olu Faleye, Obasanjo's opponent in the "Ballot Box Stuffing" exercise that brought Obasanjo to power to tell the world that it was because of Gowon's government failure to honour Aburi Accord in letter and in spirit that the civil war was fought.
And of course Rueben Abati, their arrowhead in this well planned and carefully co-ordinated devilish plot ultimately aimed at undermining Ndiigbo roundly, continues to use the pages of Alex Ibru-owned Guardian of Lagos to consolidate these lies. We are sure more of this mutilation of history on alter of political expediency and financial gains, will come. As provocative as they will continue to be, we will remain focused till we reach our promised land. We will never be distracted for that's what all these are suppose to achieve.
Background of The Principal Character in the Moribund Peace Project, Rochas Okorocha: From newspaper reports, the man at the centre of this phoney meeting is one Rochas Okorocha. Rochas Okorocha we understand is one of those who lay claims to "leadership" in Igboland. We are meant to believe that he was asked by his party hierarchy to step down for Achike Undenwa for the Imo State governorship race in 1999. We are told that he wants to reclaim "his" office,come 2003. Reports have it that he is a billionaire. Also reports say he has being generous to the less privileged in the society, using the billions he has made not through inventions like Bill Gate, but through contracting for The Nigerian Police and other agencies of the Nigerian State.
Ndiigbo, especially Ndiigbo Generation 1960-1970, are well aware of how there fortunes in all aspects of life in that evil State that is Nigeria have plummeted on account of CONTRACTOR POLITICIANS who mortgage the fate of a whole Nation, The Igbo Nation for crumbs from our oppressors in Abuja. In the life of the current Nigerian administration, Rochas Okorocha working with the leadership of the Association of Local Government of Nigeria (ALGON) used money meant to improve the lot of the rural dwellers to purchase thousands of Parado Jeeps for the Nigerian Police Force. This they claimed was to improve security in Nigeria. However, rather than any improvement being noticed in the security sector in Nigeria, banditry and assassinations have increased. The most notorious indicator has been the gruesome murder of Bola Ige, the Chief Law officer of Nigeria.
We have been compelled to lay bare the antecedents of Rochas Okorocha so that everyone will see that what we have at hand is another meeting between a very insignificant number of Ndiigbo with clearly discernible and vested economic and political interests and their Northern collaborators who are equally guilty of pauperising their own people. This is about everything but peace between the East and the North. Therefore we are vehemently opposed to it being held anywhere in Nigeria, not to talk about holding it in Umuahia, Gen. Ironsi's birth place.
Our Stand on the Phoney Peace Project: Having critically and carefully reviewed all the issues related to this so-called meeting between the Eastern "leaders" and their Northern counterparts, we wish to make our position very clear on the issue.
1. We are vehemently opposed to this kind of piecemeal approach to addressing the fundamental questions of the Nigerian State.
2. In view of the recent deliberate denigration of late General Agui Ironsi by Liman Ciroma speaking for the Core North, and the pain and provocation caused his immediate family, his kith and kin and all sincere Ndiigbo everywhere, it will be the height of disrespect, insensitivity and irresponsibility for anyone to attempt to hold a phoney peace meeting in Igboland, especially in Umuahia the birth place of late General Ironsi.
3. Ndiigbo would hold the facilitators of this meeting completely accountable should there be a breakdown of law and order in Umuahia or anywhere in Igboland leading to the loss of any Igbo life or the destruction of any property as a result of this meeting.
4. Any Igbo who attends this meeting shall be deemed to be doing so to protect his personal economic and political interests and not that of Ndiigbo as a people as they are foolishly claiming.
5. We believe that what Nigeria needs at this point is a National Conference with full Sovereign Powers and equal representation from all ethnic nationalities and in which all national questions would be honestly addressed and resolved to achieve fairness, equity and justice. Agenda of such a conference must include the issue of self determination, for nationalities wishing to get out of the unworkable colonial construct.
6. Finally, our mode of operation is peaceful. We will support a sincere peace move when we see one. This one being pursued through half-hearted and largely playing to the gallery approach does not fit into our expectation.
We represent a generation of Ndiigbo who have suffered the most in the failed experiment of nationhood in Nigeria. We are saying to all concerned, Enough is Enough! And we have resolved to take our distinct destiny into our hands. We are sure our Chi Ukwu is with us and he will see us through. Chukwu gozie Alaigbo. Cordinator, Ndiigbo Generation 1960-1970 SA.
March 4, 2002
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