The Biafra You Already Know
The Biafra story is like those kind of stories you have heard like a bazillion of times but yet, don’t get the direction of the sway; just the regular story and side-talks when the pro-biafran and anti-biafran gets into one bus and an argument springs up. So I decided to do a little research on my own, for my own good, and also thought I should share it with you. This still doesn’t contain everything, but hey.
In 1960, Nigeria became independent of the United Kingdom. The northern region of the country was made up of Muslim majority, while the southern population was predominantly Christian. Furthermore, Nigeria’s oil, which is its primary source of income, was located mainly in the southern part of the country. Following independence, Nigeria was divided primarily along ethnic lines with Hausa and Fulani in the north, Yoruba in the south-west, Igbo and Ijaw in the south-east.
In January 1966, a military coup occurred during which 30 political leaders including Nigeria’s Prime Minister, Sir Abubakar Tafawa Belewa, and the Northern premier, Sir Ahmadu Bello, were killed. It was alleged to be an Igbo coup because Nnamdi Azikiwe, the President, of Igbo extraction, and the premier of the south-east, Michael Okpara, were not killed.
In July 1966, northern officers and army units staged a counter-coup. Muslim officers named a General from a small ethnic group (the Angas) in central Nigeria, General Yakubu “Jack” Gowon, as the head of the Federal Military Government (FMG). The two coups deepened Nigeria’s ethnic tensions. In September 1966, approximately 30,000 Igbos were killed in the north, and some Hausas were killed in retaliation in the eastern regions.
Biafra, officially the Republic of Biafra, was a secessionist state in eastern Nigeria that existed from the 30th of May, 1967, to January 1970.
The inhabitants were mostly the Igbos who led the secession due to economic, ethnic, cultural and religious tensions among the various peoples of Nigeria. Other ethnic groups that constituted the republic were the Efik, Ibibio, Annang, Ejagham, Eket, Ibeno and the Ijaw among others.
The declaration of secession made war not inevitable but imminent. At the dawn of 6 July 1967, the first bullet was fired signalling the beginning of the gruesome 30 months civil war and carnage, brothers killing brothers. Preparations for war had already been set in motion on the Nigerian side by May 1967. All the soldiers of Northern, Western, and Mid — Western origin had been withdrawn from the East and redeployed.
On the Biafran side, preparation for war was put into high gear as soon as the troops of non — Eastern origin withdrew from Enugu in August of 1966. Thousands of people poured in for recruitment. Training was embarked upon both for officers and soldiers who were mainly lecturers and university students. Before the outbreak of hostility, the Eastern Region had no sufficient arms since all the soldiers who returned to the region did so without their arms while the soldiers who were withdrawn from the East departed with their weapons. What was left of the Nigerian Army at Enugu barracks amounted to about 240 soldiers, the majority of them technicians and tradesmen and not all the soldiers had weapons. However at the outbreak of the war, the Eastern Region had succeeded in securing arms and ammunition from France, Spain and Portugal.
In mobilizing the people of Nigeria, the Federal Government had to make the war look a just cause to stop the disintegration of the country and in doing this a slogan was invented “To keep Nigeria one is a task that must be done.” Even the letters of the Head of the Federal Government, GOWON was coined to read “Go On With One Nigeria” and became a very strong propaganda.
At the Diplomatic level, the Federal Government mounted a serious campaign to dissuade other countries, particularly the super powers, the USA, USSR, and the United Kingdom from recognizing the secessionist. The war was painted as an adventure by an individual. The government in Lagos continued to represent the entire country in the international organizations where a very strong propaganda was mounted to continue to portray the war as one to re-unite the country. This made it possible to win the support of the super powers and to continue to discredit Biafra. Through this support, Nigeria was able to import more arms and equipment from all over the world to prosecute the war. In order to show that she was prepared for a peaceful solution to the conflict, Nigeria continued to participate in peace talks organized by the international community.
Realizing the importance of the support of the civil populace, Nigeria embarked on an elaborate psychological warfare. “To keep Nigeria one is a task that must be done” became a very popular slogan. Leaflets discrediting the Biafran Head of State, encouraging the Biafrans to lay down their arms with a promise of non-persecution, were regularly dropped in the East.
Women were not left out in the scheme of things. Women were trained in intelligence gathering and how to infiltrate into the Nigerian side. Women Voluntary Service was formed to assist in educating the women of Biafra on the cause of the crisis, keeping women informed of developments, rehabilitation of war casualties, setting up of nurseries, orphanages, civil defense corps, and provision of cooks for the troops.
The Biafrans knew that the odds against them was immense and that their survival depended on the amount of external support they were able to muster. The Biafrans, through many of their people abroad, mounted a very strong campaign and propaganda for the recognition of Biafra by the international community and for the purchase of arms and equipment. This powerful propaganda paid off by her recognition by countries like, Tanzania, Zambia, Gabon, Ivory Coast, Haiti, covert support by France and double dealing by countries like West Germany, Spain, Portugal, Switzerland, Sweden, Republic of Dahomey, Sierra Leone and secret importation of arms and ammunition into the region.
There was no comparison between the strengths of the opposing forces in the Nigerian civil war. Nigerian Army (NA) was too formidable for Biafra, a ratio of 4:1. However each side knew the tactics the other side would employ since they all belonged to the same Armed Forces before the war.
The Biafran Army, realizing the odds against them decided correctly to go into defense. Taking the advantage of fighting on their own territory, they constructed fortified pill boxes on the enemy most likely avenues of approach, the major highways connecting the Eastern Region with the rest of the country. The Biafran army had gathered a lot of information on the disposition of the Nigerian army and made contingency plans to meet any incursion into their territory. They conducted training exercise code named “Exercise Checkmate” which was on the line Biafra Army hoped to fight. This exercise was so realistic that when the Nigerian Army started their offensive, they reacted exactly the way Biafran soldiers expected them to.
Biafra, despite her inferiority in manpower and war machineries held on for so long because her people believed in fighting the war which they considered a war of survival. On the same token, Nigeria won the war primarily because she was able to win the support of the populace who enlisted in thousands to reunify the country.
It is commonly said that an army fights on its stomach. Logistics also helped won the war for Nigeria. If the Biafrans had half of the resources Nigeria had, the story might be different. The Biafrans were better organized and managed the meager resources available to them more effectively.
During the war there were great shortages of food and medicine throughout Biafra, due largely to the Nigerian government’s blockade of the region. Anthony Enahoro, stated that “there are various ways of fighting a war. You might starve your enemy into submission, or you might kill him on the battlefield.” Obafemi Awolowo said, “All is fair in war, and starvation is one of the weapons of war and I don’t see why we should feed our enemies in order for them to fight harder.”
Many volunteer bodies organised the Biafran airlift which provided blockade-breaking relief flights into Biafra, carrying food and medicines in, and later provided means of evacuation for refugee children. On 30 June 1969, the Nigerian government banned all Red Cross aid to Biafra; two weeks later it allowed medical supplies through the front lines, but restricted food supplies. Later in October 1969, Ojukwu appealed to the United Nations to mediate a cease-fire.
After two-and-a-half years of war, during which over three million Biafran civilians died in fighting and from starvation occasioned by the total blockade of the region by the Nigerian government, Biafran forces under the motto of “No-victor, No-vanquished” surrendered to the Nigerian Federal Military Government (FMG), and Biafra was reintegrated into Nigeria.
You try to talk about Biafra, you end up talking about the war. It is even popularly called the Biafran war. The so-called “Rising Sun of Biafra” is set for ever. It will be a great disservice for anyone to continue to use the word “Biafra” to refer to any part of the East Central State of Nigeria. The tragic chapter of violence is just ended. We are at the dawn of national reconciliation. Once again we have the opportunity to build a new nation. On our side, we fought the war with great caution, not in anger or hatred, but always in the hope that common sense would prevail. Many times we sought a negotiated settlement, not out of wickedness, but in order to minimize the problems of reintegration, reconciliation and reconstruction. We knew that however the war ended, in the battlefield or in the conference room, our brothers fighting under other colors must rejoin us and that we must together rebuild the nation anew. All Nigerians share the victory today. The victory for national unity, victory for hopes of Africans and black people everywhere. We mourn the dead heroes. We thank Goodness for sparing us to see this glorious dawn of national reconciliation. We must seek diligence to do our duty, to contribute our quota to the building of a great nation; grounded on the concerted efforts of all its people and on justice, freedom and equality. A nation never to return to the fractious, sterile and selfish debates that led to the tragic conflict that has ended.
The surrender paper that officially ended the war and a newly reintegrated system was signed on 14th January 1970 in Lagos and thus came the end of the civil war and renunciation of secession.
The war had come and gone. The story of the war and what led to it has been told, is being told and will continue to be told. What seems to me a human tragedy all through ages is the inability of man to learn a good lesson from the past so as to avoid the pitfall of those who had gone before. There is also the innate and unconscious desire of man to remain oblivious of the lessons of the past. He hopes and believes that the past can be ignored, that the present is what matters, that no mistakes of the present can be as serious and grievous as the mistakes of the past. As a result history tends to repeat itself. However, there are exceptions of nations and men who had learnt from history to avoid collective and individual disasters or a repetition of such disasters. I feel confident that Nigeria must join the group of these happy exceptions (not like Brexit, on a national level) if we are to have political stability, economic progress, integrated development, social justice, and be the epicenter of African solidarity. Since the end of the civil war, Nigeria has made considerable progress in all these areas.
We are a nation already. All we have to do is make it work.
Peace!
