Dear Nnamdi Kanu,
We have never met. I only know
you by reputation and I have had cause in the last year to write on your
activities within the public arena and offer my own views about you, your
persona, and your interventions in the Nigerian debate. I sincerely hope you
would get to read this letter wherever you may be, that is assuming you are
still alive.
Your father’s house was recently
invaded by the Nigerian military (surprised you don’t have a house of your
own!). We were later told that you simply disappeared into thin air, along with
your parents. The murderous Operation Python Dance II that was unleashed on Igboland by the Federal Government of Nigeria has since become a subject of national interest. Many people have proclaimed that you have been killed, abducted and that many members of your family and movement – the Indigenous People of Biafra (IPOB) have been wasted. Some people said you were called The Lion, but when trouble came, you were the first to run away from the zoo.
You had boasted that you will deal with any invading force from Abuja. You also said it would be “Biafra or Death”. But when death came calling in the shape of Operation Python Dance II, your enemies insisted that you should have waited. Don’t mind them, oh. I have defended you in another piece where I argued that it is probably better to run away so you can live to fight another day. Of course, it is not every revolutionary that runs away.
Che Guevara died in the struggle,
and Martin Luther King, Patrice Lumumba, and so on. Nelson Mandela was jailed
for life, but he lived to tell the story. In your case, the way the Nigerian
state has been carrying on, it is clear they don’t want you to tell any more
stories. You have been charged for treason. You have now been labeled a
terrorist. Your organization has been proscribed, and labeled an enemy of the
Nigerian state. A week after soldiers stormed your state, neighbourhood and
home, the Nigerian Air Force began to drop its men from helicopters all over
Igboland. They call it show of force.
I guess all of that is to let you
and your men know that wherever you are, the Nigerian state is determined to
hunt you down. If you are on land, they will grab you. If you hide in the
skies, the Air Force will bring you down. And if you hide in the seas, the
Nigerian Navy and the Amphibious Brigade of the Nigeria Army will fish you out.
Officially, we have been told that you and IPOB are worse than violent herdsmen
and the Boko Haram who have killed thousands of Nigerians in the last year
alone. The Boko Haram has been declared the fourth most violent group in the
world, but the Nigerian government insists that you pose a greater threat. In
fact, a government spokesperson sounded as if there is a secret plan in place
to give herdsmen and the Boko Haram national honours.
There is probably something that
the Nigerian government and state actors know that we do not know. You were
dealing with the charge of treason, now there is the additional allegation of
terrorism. Don’t ever deceive yourself that if you get arrested again, you’d be
released, except perhaps you change your identity and claim that you are now a
herdsman or a member of the Boko Haram. There may be many people who have
Nicodemus access to you who may be telling you to come and confront the Nigerian
state. That is how Nigerians sweet-tongue people to their death. I am sure that
by now, from your hiding place, you would have learnt some lessons.
The Nigerian state may be against
you, but the people you really have to fear are the same people you claim to be
leading, that is the same people who used to call you messiah and who followed
you about, kneeling before you and kissing the ground on which you walked. Of
what use is a change-agent without committed followers? Of what use is a
revolution without the people’s buy-in? Of what use is an ideology without
foot-soldiers? The moment the Federal Government activated Operation Python II,
most of the people who used to support you have gone completely silent. The
Biafra Secret Service is nowhere to be seen. The Biafra National Guard threw
away its uniform. Some of those boys who used to wave the Biafran flag and wear
the Biafran cap have thrown them away too. One or two persons are still issuing
statements on behalf of IPOB, but even those statements sound like they were
issued from business centres. Your own kinsmen have called you a tyrant and an
opportunist. Many of them have written social media pieces advising the Federal
Government to deal with you, because you don’t listen to advice. They even say
you are not a true revolutionary but a gold-digger.
In all manner of ways, the
Governors of the five Igbo states are using you to play politics. They have
declared IPOB an illegal organization. They are openly abusing you. All the big
men in Igbo land are as quiet as the dead sea. Igbo traditional rulers have
refused to support your father who is their colleague. Some of them have in
fact asked the Abia state Governor to withdraw his certificate and staff of
office and appoint another person in his place. Even the big men who signed
your bail documents have refused to defend you. You used to boast about
international support for the Biafran cause. It has been said that the
government now knows some “treasury looters” and international groups who are
funding you and that IPOB accounts have been traced to some countries,
particularly France. The French and the Turkish promptly distanced themselves
from you. But the European Union and the United States spoke nicely. America
says IPOB is not a terrorist organization and America will know.
But the Nigerian government that
may not know half of what America knows is insisting that it is now a crime for
anybody, even as young as five years old to identify with Biafra, regardless of
the Constitutional right to the freedom of speech and association and the right
to self-determination enshrined in the UN Charter. Indeed, it would appear as
if the Nigerian Government has been able to break the spine of your movement,
at least for now, and certainly, the way things are, the November 18 election
in Anambra state will take place – with or without you. If anybody expected
that there would be a massive protest in the South East over the treatment that
has been meted out to you, that has not quite happened. All the markets in the
South East are open; Igbo traders across Nigeria have moved on with their
businesses. Life is so normal in the South East, the Nigerian military is
dancing and beating its chest.
Northern and South Eastern
Governors are holding meetings and congratulating each other. You turned 50
yesterday, apart from a few messages on social media, everywhere was quiet in
the South-East. If this had been a month ago, the crowd that would have
gathered at your doorstep would have stretched from Isiama Afara to Afikpo, and
the cakes you would have received would have been uncountable. Rochas Okorocha
recently got 27 birthday cakes, presented by 27 women, representing the same
number of local governments in Imo State, you probably would have received a
cake from every local government in the entire South East!
Since your disappearance there
has also been little talk about self-determination or Biafra among Igbos. The
sound of the narrative is gradually changing. There is more talk these days
about Igbo marginalization, and the need to appoint Igbos into offices. One prominent
Northerner from Kaduna has since gone to Chatham House in the UK to say Igbos
should not complain about marginalization when they didn’t vote for President
Buhari in 2015, and that it is foolish for any Nigerian to expect to reap where
he or she did not sow. Nnamdi, you’d be surprised that appointment-seeking
Igbos will mobilise your people, including your followers, to vote massively
for the same people who are currently hounding you, in 2019. You can be sure
this will happen. In fact some people are already boasting that the only way to
have peace in Nigeria is to make an Igbo man President or Vice President in
2019. While you were shouting “Biafra or death”, some people were eyeing the
business and political side of things. Every proposed revolution often runs
into its own contradictions.
But don’t worry. It may be
fashionable now to criticise Nnamdi Kanu but the wisdom of the mob is not
always the best guide. I sincerely hope that you are alive, and that you’d not
end up as an Abogunrin. Not every man has the opportunity to witness what life
would be like after his own funeral. Treachery is one of those unsavoury
ingredients of the change process. The deserters of the cause would claim they
prefer to survive. The coffin maker prays fervently for business but he would
never wish that his own family members should die. But take heart, hope is not
lost. The fire that you have lit will continue to burn. Your struggle speaks
directly to the subject of the national question. You have reminded all and sundry
that Nigeria remains a troubled country and that there are many unresolved
issues. Every effort has been made to kill your voice, and your movement, but
the ideas that you have forced out of the cupboard will continue to resonate.
The good news also is that there
are Nigerians in diaspora who have taken up the struggle. They went to
demonstrate at the 72ndUnited Nations General Assembly in New York and on the
streets of London. Your friends, FFK and Ayo Fayose are still standing by you.
There are many others out there who also do not agree that you are a terrorist,
even if they do not agree with your methods and rhetoric. You have also exposed
the hypocrisy of the Igbo elite. You have exposed the desperation of the ruling
class. Don’t let your head swell, though. If I must tell you the truth, you
over-acted. Too much acting dey spoil cinema. You paid too much attention to
ceremony. You were obsessed with your own heroism.
As you read this piece and
reflect on your life at 50, let me remind you of the following statement which
you made on August 27, 2017:
“Where we are is Biafra land. Aba
is the spiritual capital of Biafra land. We started in Aba in 2015 at CKC. That
day, heaven authenticated our move that IPOB will restore Biafra and that’s
what we have come to do. We died in Aba at National High School. They shot and
killed us in other places in Biafra land where they were protesting for my
release. As our people rest in the grave, we’ll never rest until Biafra is
restored. I don’t care what they say in Abuja. I don’t give a damn what they
say in Lagos. I’m a Biafran and we are going to crumble the zoo. Some idiots
who are not educated said that they’ll arrest me, and I ask them to come, I’m
in Biafra. If any of them leaves Biafra land alive, know that this is not IPOB.
Tell them what I said. Tell Buhari that I am in Aba and any person who comes to
arrest Nnamdi Kanu in Biafra land will die here. I’ll never go on exile I
assure you. Some people talk about restructuring, are we doing the
restructuring of Nigeria now? Are we doing fiscal Federalism? Are we doing
devolution? What we want is Biafra! Forget all the nonsense they write about
us. We are not slowing down and no man born of a woman can stop us…”
Words on marble, Mazi Kanu, these
are strong words on marble… Whatever happens, the fight of the python and the
lion is a defining moment for Nigeria.
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ReplyDeleteWe still have old fools in land....is this an advice,a threat or someone telling the world how stupid he can be?.. Even if ipob is been declared a terrorist organization,them that are behind the declaration knows the truth but no problem because no one lives forever...woe to those that calls evil good and good evill...TIME TIME TIME...JEE GWAA PHARAOH NA UMU ISRAEL GA ALARIRI....Abati,politics and Nigerians.
ReplyDeleteso therefore, Ali Kelechi Samuel is not humble and not well-trained.. why am I not surprised?
DeleteIt takes a humble and well-trained person to listen to the advice of the elders.👂
ReplyDeleteHe has forgotten so quickly that even the strongman late ikemba told everyone that Biafra can only be achieved through a meaningful dialogue not by insulting, threatening, killing and kidnapping people
ReplyDelete