The biafran war may have come and gone but to the victims of the war, especially the people of Asaba, delta state, the pains and agonies as well as the scars left by the war have created a permanent box of memory inside of them. To them, October 7th, 1967 was a day they had continued to rue and will forever do so for generations to come. It was the day soldiers of Nigerian 2nd division under Murtala Muhammad, Ibrahim Taiwo and Ibrahim Haruna carried out one of the worst crimes against humanity in human history.
The Nigerian troops had entered Asaba on the 4th day of October, 1967, in pursuit of Biafran soldiers who had earlier crossed Ore after taking Benin and dislodging Nigerian troops there. But because the Biafran soldiers had blown the Niger bridge to make it impossible for the Nigerian side to pursue them, Mortala Muhammad and his boys simply settled in Asaba where they started going from house to house killing people of the town who he accused of aiding the Biafran soldiers.
On the 7th day, after the house to house killing had gone on for days, the leaders of the town, in a bid to convince the Nigerian troops of their loyalty and support, summoned their people to come out in the street. Hundreds of men, women and children had obeyed the summon and came out, mostly dressed in ceremonial white attire, singing, dancing and chanting "One Nigerian" to the hearing of Muritala and his boys. But the moment they got to the Ogbe-Osewa village square where the Nigerian troops were gathered, the soldiers separated the men and teenage boys of 12 years and above from the women.
Orders were shouted. And the men and boys were pelted with bullets. At the end of the bullet festival, not less than 700 people of Asaba lay lifeless. There were dead bodies everywhere. Most of them were later buried in mass grave while the Nigerian troops still occupied the town afterwards, hunting down men and boys who escaped the Oct. 7th massacre and raping and forcefully 'marrying' off women and young girls.
Today, the war criminal, Muritala Mohammed is celebrated as a national hero even in death. Only in Nigeria! After the Asaba massacre, people living across the river were constantly threatened with the Asaba treatment should they help the Biafran soldiers in anyway. And because man's first rule is Self Preservation, some of them started cutting off ties with the Biafrans. Niger Delta leaders were told by Nigerians that the Igbos only wanted to dominate and enslave them just so they would take over their oil. And they swallowed this tale.
After the war which Biafra lost, the Nigerian state came up with demomc policies to further humiliate and impoverish them. And even though Effiong, a non Igbo was Ojukwu's 2nd in command in Biafra which proves that Biafra was not for Igbos alone, Nigeria believed it was engineered by the Igbos. So the demonic after-war policies were targeted at the Igbos. Your only chance of escaping the devilish policies like seized properties, seized job, seized monies in the bank etc was to cut off every ties with the Igbos.
In a bid to survive, some Igbos from across the river --Ikwere, Delta, etc-- started denying their Igbo ancestry. Towns and streets in Port Harcourt bearing Igbo names were renamed and the original Igbo names hugely corrupted. Full fledged Igbo men and women with Igbo culture, Igbo name, Igbo food, Igbo everything including language, would look you in the face and tell you, "Aburo m onye-Igbo" just for purpose of self preservation. Some Niger Delta communities seized Igbo properties in a bid to prove their loyalty to Nigeria. And so, the seed of rancour, strife and enmity was sown between brothers and neighbours who are not enemies and have absolutely no reason to be enemies.
The trend continued and was inculcated into children born after the war all through the period of 47 years and still counting. And because, the murderous Nigerian state removed history from school curriculum, the younger generation of some Igbos across the River who only heard their parents tell them they were not Igbos without knowing what informed the denial now strongly believe what they heard from their parents. And the fear of Igbo domination, enslavement and coveting their oil is still very much alive among many people in the Niger Delta even as I write this.
The biggest tragedy of this whole thing is that some scions of the victims of the Asaba massacre are not angry with Nigeria for murdering their fathers and brothers and raping their mothers and sisters. Rather, they are angry with the Igbos whom they blame for everything. On the other hand, in the Niger Delta, the Fulani Oligarchs have always owned the oil there. They have hanged notable sons of the region and made the environment uninhabitable for the people. They live in opulence with monies from the Niger Delta oil while the Niger Delta people live in penury. But criminally funny enough, some Niger Delta people are more concerned with the fear that the Igbos might dominate and enslave them in future than they are about the fact that the Fulani Oligarchs are not just currently enslaving them but equally killing their sons and daughters and making it impossible for their future generations to have a place to call home.
Some Igbos on their own are not even helping matters with their arrogance and the condescending tone with which they talk about these people. When a people have been given the impression that all you want is to dominate and enslave them and you go ahead to use lines like "all these small small minorities sef", "all these hausa/fulani slaves, who is begging you to join Biafra?" etc. You are not exactly showing wisdom. You don't have to beg anyone but you certainly need to apply tact, wisdom and diplomacy in everything you do. And you've got to take a crash course on how to build alliances.
Meanwhile, both the Igbos of the 5 SouthEast States and their siblings from across the River and the Niger Delta people are victims, with a common oppressor; The Scions of Danfodio. But strangely, they are busy fighting amongst themselves rather than channelling all their anger towards their common oppressor. Apart from the artificial division and enmity created by Nigeria during and after the war, there has been no known record of any clash between the Igbos and their brethren and neighbors from across the rivers.
Over 3 millions Igbos were killed by mostly hausa/fulani soldiers during the Biafran war. Hundreds more are still being killed and bathed with acid by the same people. Ken Saro Wiwa and 8 other Niger Delta Chiefs were hanged by the Hausa/Fulani. The oil wells there are virtually owned by the same Hausa/Fulani. Even the Asaba massacre was presided over by 3 Hausa/Fulani soldiers. I am now left wondering: Why are these common victims finding it so hard to realize that all their pains and sorrows plus petty differences and artificial division and enmity are created by one dark-hearted common enemy who seem well sophisticated in the art of using Divide and Rule to weaken his opponents before subjugating them?
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