Understanding Igbo-Yoruba Unhealthy Rivalry (3)
Published on November 6, 2012 by pmnews ·By Abdul-Rahoof A. Bello
The Nigerian infant nationhood was threatened especially when political leaders in the opposition became the object of humiliation and incarceration by a government jointly formed by the NPC/NCNC.
These were some of the cumulative events which culminated in the unfortunate civil war. The issues further worsened the unhealthy rivalry between Dr. Nnamdi Azikiwe and Chief Obafemi Awolowo, the two political leaders from the Igbo and Yoruba ethnic groups respectively. One of such political disagreement between them was the failure of the AG/NCNC alliance after the 1959 general elections that ushered in the independence. Secondly, Dr. Azikiwe’s complicity in the political gerrymandering of the Western region in the guise of creation of Mid-West in 1963, which was intended to reduce the political sphere of influence of Chief Obafemi Awolowo in retaliation of the 1952 ‘carpet-crossing’ episode. Thirdly, the animosity also manifested in the Second Republic when Dr. Nnamdi Azikiwe bowed out of the proposed alliance between his Nigerian Peoples Party (NPP); Chief Awolowo’s Unity Party of Nigeria (UPN); Great Nigerian Peoples Party (GNPP) led by Alhaji Waziri Ibrahim and a faction of the People’s Redemption Party led by governors Balarabe Musa and Abubakar Rimi of Kaduna and Kano respectively.
These synopses of variables were stimuli for the actions and inactions by both sides before, during and after the civil war. In the light of this, it would be unfair to draw a conclusion on the allegation of ‘hatred of Igbo’ that was levelled against Yoruba in particular, and Nigerians in general in Achebe’s book. Therefore, it is pertinent to examine the following questions:
• Dr. Nnamdi Azikiwe was the President of the Federal Republic of Nigeria when the emergency rule was declared on the West and the political leaders of the region, especially, Chief Obafemi Awolowo, were hunted, humiliated and incarcerated in 1962. What role did he play?
• Why was the January 15, 1966 military coup so bloody and sectional in execution, which political analysts believe that “even if the coup had been planned with the best of intentions, its outcome looked patently to the other ethnic groups, particularly in the North and West, like an Ibo conspiracy” (See Oyediran, 1979:27).
• Why would Gen. Aguiyi-Ironsi, another Head of State of Igbo ethnic extraction, reject the pleas by Yoruba Leaders of Thought to release Chief Obafemi Awolowo from Prison?
• Why did he refuse to bring the January 15, 1966 coup plotters to justice?
• Whom did he (Gen. Ironsi) consult before he truncated the federal structure through the unification decree No. 34 of 1966, thereby imposing unitary-federalism on the country? Was that not one of the reasons for the May riots in the North?
• Was it not true, the claim by Gen. J. J. Oluleye (1985:33) that in pursuance of the Ibo ambition which gave birth to the unification decree and making some highly unbalanced promotions in the Army in favour of Ibo officers who got appointed to key commands and political appointments as prefects?
• Was it not true that the sectional colourations of the coup provoked the counter-coup of July 29, 1966 in which no single military officer of Yoruba stock participated? As Dudley (1973:132) observes, “The Ibo were attacked not because they were Ibo but because the name Ibo had become more or less synonymous with exploitation and humiliation. It was essentially an attack on a mental stereotype. The attack that led to the exodus of the Ibos from the North and even the West back home”. Ahmadu Kurfi (1983:38) corroborates this, when he posits that, “the clarion call in line with the general mood in the North during the disturbances was Araba or Aware (Hausa word for ‘secession’)”.
• Why would Col. Adekunle Fajuyi, the then military Governor of the Western region have to surrender his life in defence of his Commander-in-Chief who was Igbo?
• Why would the author not acknowledge the role played by Prof. Sam Aluko, Prof. Wole Soyinka and Dr. Tai Solarin in Ojukwu’s life during and after the war?
• Why would Igbo not appreciate Col. Victor Banjo, a Yoruba military officer, who defected and fought gallantly on the side of Biafra only to be killed by his Commander-in-Chief, Col. Odumegwu Ojukwu on a trumped up charge of treason?
• Why would the author fail to commend Yoruba’s hospitality towards Igbos living in Lagos and in other Yoruba towns unmolested during the civil war? He could not have forgotten that Chief Phillips Asiodu was one of them while Messrs Tony Igwe and Obisia Nwakpa were busy playing music and soccer in Lagos without let or hindrance.
• Were Igbo properties in Lagos not protected for them until the end of civil war? How else would Yoruba have loved Ibos?
• Why was the Biafran army advancing towards Lagos, capturing Benin City, almost capturing Ore (now in Ondo State) before checkmated by the federal troops?
In addition to this, Oluleye (1985:p.xvii) submits that the Nigerian Army was Northern-dominated to the magnitude of 70% in both cadres, officers and other ranks. This structural dilemma of the Nigerian Army as an integral part of the body politic, made it difficult to be completely free from the influences of politics in the country. Gen. Ironsi was blamed for reneging on his promise to bring the January coup plotters to justice and to worsen the situation the Ibos in the North were engaged in taunting the Northerners in public over the killing of Sir Ahmadu Bello. Oluleye (1985:32-33) posits:
Every Ibo person paraded himself as Ironsi. Unwittingly, the Ibos displayed the photograph of Sir Ahmadu Bello, the Sardauna of Sokoto, in awkward position with his head under the jungle boot of Major Nzeogwu. It was displayed in homes and shops of the Ibos. Where people did not notice the photograph, they would invite their attention to it. To the Northerners they usually said, ‘You see your papa under the foot of Major Nzeogwu’.
At this juncture, it is important to consider some factors responsible for Yoruba’s decision to join the task of defending the unity of Nigeria during the Biafran challenge despite the avowal by Obafemi Awolowo that the West would not stay should the Ibos be forced out of the federation either by act of commission or omission. This conditional statement was misconstrued by many Igbos (except Odumegwu Ojukwu) to mean that the Yoruba leader had promised to unconditionally secede immediately after declaration by Biafra. Contrary to widely held belief, Obafemi Awolowo did not make the pledge at the meeting he held with Ojukwu but at the meeting of Yoruba Leaders of Thought at Ibadan in May 1967.
Foremost, the Igbo lost the excellent opportunity to have Yoruba fully on their side when Igbos in position of authority failed to see the wisdom in releasing Obafemi Awolowo from prison by popular demand. The claim by Odumegwu Ojukwu that he released Chief Obafemi Awolowo cannot be true because he could not have held Awolowo hostage for almost six months if he had been ordered by Gen. Ironsi to release the political prisoner. Again, the federal government jailed Obafemi Awolowo, it stands to reason that only the federal (not regional) authority could order his release, which was done by Yakubu Gowon with state pardon seven months later.
Secondly, the presence of soldiers of northern origin in the West and Mid-West certainly put Yoruba in a quagmire to express either solidarity or play neutrality as threatened by Obafemi Awolowo. The issue of ‘soldiers of occupation’ in Yoruba land was a serious concern and was discussed at a meeting held with Ojukwu by Yoruba Leaders of Thought at Enugu on May 5, 1967. Back home, Gen. Oluleye, J. J., (1985:49) explained how Chief Obafemi Awolowo made futile efforts to get the Nigerian soldiers of Northern origin (soldiers of occupation) replaced in the Western and Mid-West regions by soldiers of Yoruba origin. He states:
The Chief listened with rapt attention till I concluded. He was highly enraged, he flared up and said, ‘You boys don’t want to die for us. I can show you on the map many routes apart from Jebba that can be used’. At this stage, I took over from him and said, ‘I did not enlist in the Army to die for Yoruba cause. I enlisted in the Army to die for the cause of the nation if it is justifiable. There is nothing you can teach me about map reading, as I have been a Mortar Officer for the past four years.’ As he listened to me, I asked him further whether he had the barracks where to put them if they came or, whether they will be put in the same barracks with the troops he didn’t want and whether there were arms and ammunition?’
Under that situation, Yoruba’s hands were tied, however, Obafemi Awolowo assured the Ibos and Easterners of safety in the West and Mid-West. The transcript of that recorded statement of May 6, 1967 is as follows:
Nobody can tell when life will be lost, but I think, speaking the minds of the entire people of Western Nigeria and Mid-Western Nigeria, that if anybody can at this stage take the life of an Ibo man or an Easterner, or if any outstanding Easterner loses his life by the act of someone elso, the Western Region and the Mid-Western Region will take it as the end of Nigeria. I can give that assurance on behalf of Western Nigeria and Lagos (See Awo, 1981:p.iii).
In this regard, it is left for the Igbos to dispute that Obafemi Awolowo and, indeed, Yoruba did fulfil this promise in the face of pogrom and abandoned properties before, during and after the civil war. It was a fact of history that Awolowo led a campaign in the Western Region against any attempt to kill the Igbos during that unfortunate period, which accounted for why no Igbo man, woman or child was done to death by the Yorubas (see Ajuluchukwu, M.C.K). This has also been affirmed by Chukwuemeka Ezeife, former Anambra State Governor (January, 1992 – November, 1993) when he states that ‘another fact, not often mentioned, was that more Igbo landlords, on return from the war, received rent for their property in the West than from any other part of Nigeria (See Vanguard, Saturday, October 13, 2012, p.13).
•Bello is of the Political Science Department, School of Arts & Social Sciences, National Open University of Nigeria.
Comments
Post a Comment