Nnamdi Kanu’s Radio Biafra has to do with overt expression of constructive or creative dissatisfaction and disillusionment arising from lopsided development, domination oppression and injustice against the South-South and the South East in the last forty-five years. Kanu may simply have attempted to wake the National and State Assemblies up from their slumber and insensitivity.
In setting up radio Biafra Nnamdi Kanu may have simply resorted to the peaceful use of conversation in the resolution of social conflicts. Kanu may have contrived this means of communication to beat the democratic pretensions of this undemocratic Nigerian state. Nnamdi is not unaware of the affectations of the Nigerian state where the constitution allows for rights one can only exercise at ones own peril (suo periculo). The people of the North East today know that the 1999 constitution of the Federal Republic of Nigeria (1999 CFRN) allows for freedom of religion and association. Yet they merely constrain their freedom by embracing any religion other than Islam. The war in the North-East today is a price the people of the North-East must pay for their wholesale acceptance of Christianity. Every Nigerian knows this fact. The world also knows the fact.
Politics and good governance are praxis-oriented. Politics is driven by the law of saying and doing. A good politician is not only expected to do things right , the politician must do the right things. Often Mr. President has ignored this “law of saying and doing”. If President Buhari’s thoughts are the basis of his words, then he is thinking rightly, though acting wrongly. I have watched President Muhammadu Buhari intently since he came to power, this time through the ballot box. Mr. President’s integrity narrative as quixotically espoused and popularized by Alhaji Lai Mohammed the honourable minister of information, cannot whittle down the authority and integrity of the experience of the people of the South-South and the South East concerning their frosty relationship with the Nigerian Sate and members of the National Council of States.
Mr Femi Fani Kayode narrated beautifully the traumatic experience of the Ibos in his script titled Nnamdi Kanu and cry for Biafra. When there is a difference between what a man says and what he does , then integrity has lost its meaning. Nigerian leaders have been living the lie canvassed in the preamble to the 1999 CFRN.
The closest effort Nigerians made to give themselves a constitution was during the 2014 sovereign National conference. President Muhammadu Buhari is supposed to go ahead to implement the provisions of the 2014 National conference after ratification by both the senate and the House of Representatives. But because there is an unconscionable air of solipsism in the behavior of Mr. President he does not care a hoot about the national conference document though billions of naira were spent to organize and convene the conference.
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Inspite of the APC change leitmotif things have refused to change, old ways refused to give way to the new. The executive has swallowed up the legislature by scourging its leaders. The legislature cannot argue on its knees. Not even legislators from Delta State , South- East and South-South have demurred the gunning down of four Ibo men like wild buffalos. Who knows, another program may be in the offing. When you rationalize the extant insensitivity of the legislature in the face of this wanton killing of unarmed protesters you begin to ask! Is our democracy no longer deliberative, are we no longer guided by the doctrine of rule of law, freedom of movement, freedom of association, freedom of speech, freedom of thought and freedom of religion? Four Ibo men have been shot like wart hog, not even a voice is raised from the legislature in protest. The bible is right when it asserted that these shepherds are not shepherding the flock. They are shepherding themselves. The bible says that the good shepherd lays down his life for the flock. But the shepherds of the South-South and South East are passive participants in the Assembly of the Ethnic Nationalities of Nigeria. The councilors traditional chiefs, ministers and governors are the first to give up the people on their way up. When the lion or the wolf comes to devour the flock, the governor is the first to flee to renounce and give up the flock to secure or save his position.
Nigerian leaders particularly members of the retrogressive National Council of States could not find solution to a forty five year old problem. This is a shame! Those who were born long after the war have begun to feel the scourge of oppression and injustice. They have begun to relive the experience of recorded history. What most of these youths read from history books has become validated by their own experience.
I am shocked that inspite of the senators, assembly men and governors representing the South-South and South-East, none of them came up with the type of defence proffered by Femi Fani Kayode (read Kayode’s socio-analytical mediation in Vanguard 25th October 2015, p35 titled Nnamdi Kanu and cry for Biafra). The leaders of the South-South and South-East want to save their positions as governors, senators, councilors, chairmen and assembly men. None of them can open his mouth to tell President Muhammad Buhari that what is required in a situation of disagreement is not confrontation but communication. An internal disagreement between brothers, people of the same nationality, calls for jaw-jaw, not war-war. From the history of the Boko-Haram war, we can discern that dialogue and other conflict resolution mechanisms are better embraced before the outbreak of hostilities. President Buhari should note that Nigeria cannot afford another war when it can be avoided.
The members of the senate and house of representatives are supposed to restrain the executive arm of government from decimating Igbo youths. The executive should stop gunning fellow Nigerians down as if their lives do not count for anything. The Assembly men should convene a fact-finding meeting with the restive youths from their consistency to find out what the matter is. When the representatives get back to the parliament, they will move a motion for the discussion of the problem of their people.
Curiously the permissiveness in the society has permeated the legislature and the judiciary. When something is going wrong in the society the judiciary and the legislature just sit back like spectators until the bubble bursts.
The repressive and reactive methods of policing freedom are what gave rise to Boko-Haram where dissent is driven underground. From experience we can see that an uproar is better than a whisper . But why should a problem of this magnitude be swept under the carpet each time it crops up in the last forty five years.
– Uwalaka, a public affairs analyst, wrote in from Lagos
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