On August
1, 1966, after the collapse of last-ditch attempts by Nigeria's power brokers
to prevent the impending civil war, Lieutenant Colonel Odumegwu Ojukwu said
only one thing would make the rebels cease fire: "that the Republic of
Nigeria be split into its component parts; and all southerners in the North be
repatriated to the South and that Northerners resident in the South be
repatriated to the North".
On May 30, 1967, Oxford-educated Ojukwu declared Biafra an
independent state in the southeast of the country. On July 6, 1967, civil war broke out in Nigeria, which claimed more than a million lives
in just three years.
Fast-forward to June 2017. Irked by renewed secessionist calls
from the same Igbo ethnic group, a coalition of northern groups issued a notice, demanding
"all Igbo currently residing in any part of Northern Nigeria to relocate
within three months and all northerners residing in the East are advised
likewise".
Although made 51 years apart, those two statements are strikingly
similar. Since the first was followed by a war, there is real reason to worry
that the second could prompt another.
Last week's commemoration of the 50th anniversary of Nigeria's
civil war should have been an opportunity for Nigerians to remember the ills of
war and to vow not to let it happen again. Instead, the voices of secession
raged even louder.
Secessionist movement an indictment of past leadership
The resurrection of the clamour for secession five decades since
the civil war is simply the result of serial leadership failure in Nigerian
politics. When the war ended in 1970, Yakubu Gowon, then head of state,
promised to "build a nation, great in justice, fair trade, and
industry". But he and his successors didn't.
Although there is no evidence of efforts to specifically ignore
the plight of the Igbo, generations of corrupt and selfish leaders have entered
and vacated office with no real plan to rebuild the East from the ruins of war,
neither have they done anything for the insurgency-ravaged North-East. They
have been filling their pockets with public funds while ignoring a disenchanted
youth and growing anger.
Now, the Igbo youth is ready to do anything, including sacrificing
their lives, to actualise the dream of an independent Biafra. Some 150 of
them already died for this causebetween
August 2015 and August 2016. The series of military crackdowns on pro-Biafra
activists was a grave error by the authorities as it has spawned clusters of
bellicose Igbo youth who want to avenge their brothers' deaths. Anyone who has
physically met secessionist leader Nnamdi Kanu's apostles, or
read their viperous online comments, will admit that quite a number of them are
seething with rage that can only be thawed by the highest level of tact from
the government.
A referendum on
the preferred system of internal governance is crucial, even though recent
calls for fiscal federalism have come from politicians who are more
interested in cornering the nation's wealth than redistributing it for common
good.
The absence of that kind of tact is arguably the reason for the
escalation of the Biafra agitation in the last two years. After all, Kanu, the
face of the secessionist movement, was little-known until October 2015 when the
Muhammadu Buhari government arrested him and subsequently disobeyed court orders granting him bail.
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He was eventually released in April this year, but thanks to that
unlawful detention Kanu exchanged his freedom for undeserved martyrdom. Now,
what should have been an intelligent campaign for self-determination has been
entrusted to a man whose message is primarily driven by emotion and aggression.
'Nigeria's unity is non-negotiable'
The most important question regarding the secession of Biafra is,
of course, whether Nigeria's unity is negotiable. President Buhari has said it a
few times, and his vice - now acting - president, Yemi Osinbajo has reiterated it: Nigeria's
unity is not negotiable. According to them, secession is not and will never be
on the negotiation table.
The superficial argument behind this claim is that the Nigerian Constitution is unequivocal in its exclusion of secession when it states
in Section 2(1) that "Nigeria is one indivisible and indissoluble
sovereign state to be known by the name of the Federal Republic of
Nigeria".
But Biafra is not a fresh secessionist movement - it is a
50-year-old idea. And, regardless of the grave shortcomings of its current
proponent, a
50-year-old movement cannot be dispelled with a wave of the hand or by locking
up the proponent or brandishing the Constitution. The Nigerian government must
come up with an agreeable, realistic and practical solution to this problem.
In its ninth section, the same constitution provides for dialogue
on the possibility of amending Nigeria's indissolubility. But for this
amendment to come into force, not less than two-thirds majority of state and
federal legislators must support the move. So, instead of saying an outright
"no" to Biafra, Buhari and Osinbajo should remind the secessionists
of what they must do: lobby the legislature. Everyone knows the success rate is
negligible, if not nil, but good luck to them if they succeed.
A referendum on internal
governance
Importantly and urgently, Nigeria needs a
referendum. There is palpable public frustration with a governance structure
that allocates the lion share of the country's earnings to the federal
government while leaving states to scramble for crumbs. A referendum on the
preferred system of internal governance is crucial, even though recent calls
for fiscal federalism have come from politicians who are more interested in
cornering the nation's wealth than redistributing it for common good.
Now is the time to take the decision to the public court. Some may
criticise direct democracy as the "tyranny of the majority", but
there's no other option for a Nigerian state where the tyranny of the ruling
minority is monumental.
Neither history nor currency is on the side of Biafra. Only two
secessionist movements have ever succeeded in Africa: Eritrea from Ethiopia after 30 years of war, and South Sudan from Sudan in 2011 after 22
years of war - the latter still as war-torn as the pre-2011 Sudan. Herein lies
the lesson for Biafra agitators: Secession from Nigeria will not solve their
problems unless accompanied by conscientious leadership.
Nigeria, meanwhile, must go back 50 years to draw its own lessons:
These types of agitations can lead to war. If the south-easterners don't want
to stay, let them go. Fragmentation is a million times better than the
devastation of war.
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