How Yakubu Gowon Caused The Nigeria-Biafra War
By Lawrence Chinedu Nwobu
Introduction:
One of the greatest enduring myths in Nigeria is the lie that Yakubu Gowon fought the Nigeria-Biafra war to keep Nigeria united, whereas in reality not only did Yakubu Gowon whose Northern region had originally intended to secede (Araba) after the July 1966 counter-coup cause the unnecessary war through his failure of leadership, his aim for fighting the war was never in the least a genuine desire to keep Nigeria united but purely because of Northern economic interests. The economic interests of the hitherto secessionist North became the principal reason for the volte face from secession to “one Nigeria” after the British government advised the Northern leadership of the economic disadvantages of secession. Thus unlike most civil wars where there is a genuine desire to keep the nation united for patriotic reasons, the Nigeria-Biafra war was an opportunistic war instigated by Yakubu Gowon and the North; not out of a genuine desire for a united Nigeria but for the selfish aims of British imperialism and Northern economic interests which remains the reason and reality of their presence in Nigeria to date.
Every conflict is dogged by lies and propaganda, but history always waits out the intrigues of war in the knowledge, that the truth; no matter how suppressed and how long it waits, will eventually prevail. In the midst of the historical lies and propaganda that trailed the conflict the long suppressed truth is beginning to find life. One emerging fact is the true causes/ intentions of the conflict and the fact that the conflict has by all accounts been considered a needless war. It is already deemed by some to be the most avoidable war of the 20th century. Unlike many unavoidable conflicts, there were many opportunities to avoid the Nigeria-Biafra war which needlessly consumed the lives of some 3 million people, entrenched an un-healing generational bitterness and caused severe social, political and economic dislocation from which the nation is yet to recover. Wars carry with them the worst of human tragedies and scars that endure for all time. It is an evil that must be avoided except it is absolutely necessary. ( Continues below….. )
Photo Above: Nigeria Ex-Military Head of State, Yakubu Gowon leaving after attending Late Nigerian President Umaru Yar'Adua's funeral in Katsina, Katsina State May 6, 2010.
In the case of Nigeria-Biafra; there was nothing that made the war in the least necessary. Nigeria as a nation never existed until the British colonialists patched up the contraption of disparate ethnic and religious groups into an unworkable nation to service her imperial interests. From the onset it was obvious Nigeria would be inhibited by her contradictions and consequently doomed to failure. Thus when the pogrom/genocide of 1966-67 demonstrated beyond all reasonable doubts the impossibility of Nigeria, the legal route under international law as enshrined in the United Nations charter was to hold a plebiscite or referendum to determine by democratic means the choice of the majority as it concerns self determination for Biafra.
That route would have solved the problem in a legal and civilised manner as “no war no matter how desirable for the purpose of keeping a nation together is justifiable.” It defies all logic and natural justice to kill people in other to keep them in a nation. It is like killing a woman’s children in order to forcefully keep her in a marriage from which she seeks to exit. Freedom and self determination are inalienable God given rights and nations must be constructed and preserved through democratic consent and not through the barrel of a gun. Any act otherwise, to forcefully create or preserve a nation without the democratic consent of the indigenous peoples is an act of colonialism. Every ethnic group within the Nigerian geographical expression ordinarily retains the same right for which we struggled for in
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