INVESTIGATION| How pro-Biafrans silently built current force

When in the 90's an Okigwe, Imo State born Indian trained lawyer named Ralph Uwa­zuruike started a rather tongue twisting organization called Movement for the Actualization of the Sovereign State of Biafra (MASSOB), even those who believed in what he was doing found it uncomfortable openly mentioning the Biafra in MASSOB: as far as the Nigerian establishment was concerned, that word with whatever it symbolized was dead and buried, perhaps never to resurrect. But, it says a lot about the ability of the Nigerian State to solve the socio-political, even existential, problems that confront it that some 20 or so years after Uwazuruike's MASSOB was formed, Biafra has become front page news again in Nigeria. OFFOR ONUKWUWE reports that the path to this movement was paved with patience, hard work and perseverance.

 

Origins The recent struggles for Biafra started with Chief Ralph Uwazurike, who formed MASSOB, Movement for the Actualization of the Sovereign State of Biafra in the late 1990s. Although Uwazurike sought a pacifist path to achieve Biafra, a new movement arose to address the loopholes found in MASSOB, which most pro-Biafrans refused to embrace because they felt that it was being hugely manipulated by Uwazurike for personal interests.

 

Branches The many composite organisations working for the emergence of Biafra did not start in one day. Each of these groups was formed by its leaders, who, finding their goals similar to other groups', decided to work with them. Organisations like Bilie Human Rights Initiative (BHRI), Biafra Zionists Movement (BZM), Biafra Restoration Movement (BRM), Indigenous People of Biafra (IPOB), Biafra Organisation of Freedom Fighters (BOFF), and Biafra Council of Elders (BCOE) are just a few of the groups who have joined Chief Ralph Uwazurike's MASSOB in the fight for self determination.

 

Despite the overwhelming popularity of Radio Biafra today, an array of other media outfits have been working like RB and they include Biafra 24, Biafra Radio, Voice of Biafra, Ekwenche, Biafra Voice International, Biafra TV, Biafra Herald and Biafra News Network.

According to Madam Eberechukwu Anigboogu, former Women Leader of IPOB worldwide, the organisations actually decided to unite in 2012 at a meeting in London to work together as a unit. IPOB became a common front for the pursuance of their goals. It was also in 2012 that 

 IPOB and Radio Biafra got their registration in London to function within the tenets of law.

 

The Biafra Council of Elders plays an advisory role to the other branches, who would always return to the Council to give account of their activities periodically.

Bilie Human Rights Initiative (BHRI) is the legal and human rights arm which files suits to pursue a legal means towards achieving the freedom for which the organisation was formed.

 

Ekwe Nche is a research institute formed in Chicago by pro-Biafran intellectuals. It is a not-for profit organization committed to research in Igbo history and culture and to the re-establishment of Igbo sovereignty through peaceful means. Ekwe Nche is a term in Igbo which means "clarion call." The organization is engaged in a wake-up call to Igbos in Nigeria to rise up to the challenge of Igbo oppression in the country and to the Igbo nation worldwide to recognize and live up to their Igbo heritage. Ekwe Nche is made up of Igbos and their descendents from all parts of the world, including the U.S., Cuba, Jamaica, the West Indies and other Caribbean countries, and Nigeria. It was formed in 1996.

 

Style The IPOB had designed a very comprehensive system of government which they hope to put into use if Biafra is realized. They termed it Ohacracy. A whole book has been written on the Ohacratic system of government. Termed Ohacracy: The undercurrent of Africa centered nationalism and written by Chukwudi Okeke-Maduno, the book defines Ohacracy and recommends it as a better ideal to western democracy, which it sees as a crude form of the natural and older ohacracy, which is natural to Africa and Africans.

 

According to Osondu Iroegbu in his book, A Plea for Ohacracy, Ohacracy is the practical conception of societal order and governance in which the community determines the praxis of the socio-political life of the people, while taking into account basic individual and group peculiarities. The term Ohacracy is derived from the Igbo term oha, meaning community, assembly, and the suffix cracy, (kratêein, to rule, govern, organize) as in democracy.

 

Ohacracy etymologically defined means rulership by the Oha, the community members. Ohacracy is democracy in an African context. In other words, it is the viable African species of contemporary institutional democracy. In it, followership is as important as leadership. In it, leadership is neither a one-man show nor a matter of hierarchical or aristocratic machination. In it, there is the solidarity of decision and implementation of decisions by the members in matters that affect the members. In it, the Oha is the central focus. The Oha is a community of individuals and the individuals are individuals in Oha. Oha nwe madu"The community owns the individual." Ohakwe if the community allows. Each nation in Africa forms the locus of an Oha.

 

"Specifically, it takes into account the African identity and values," the book further eplains. "It builds on African experience: its history, circumstances and contemporary situation. It is a realistic articulation in view of a positive future. This is why Ohacracy defines the modus operandi of socio-political life: that the community sets out how we govern ourselves. All forms of dictatorship, military rule or dominion by a group, class or region is automatically ruled out. 

 

All will agree that it is only those we have chosen ohacratically who will govern us. Anybody that is not chosen by us must go. It also determines the modus vivendi of our communal life: that the basic individuality of the persons shall be respected.

 

"The basic individualities are those givens of each person (ends, duties and rights, e.g., choice of profession), that make a person flourish. Particular talents and group values like language, cultural artifacts and socio-moral values have to be integrated within the general run of communal development. These, however, must not threaten the existence of the community as community. The individual will grow and develop, but in community."

 

Activities Every year, since 1999, all pro-Biafrans across the world hold a memorial service in honour of those who died during the war as well as those who are killed during demonstrations. The event, aptly termed "Biafra Memorial Day" holds every May 30 and has gained resounding popularity as thousands of people march the streets of major cities in the world.

 

Anigboogu told The Authority that the Memorial started in 1999 in Lagos, with MASSOB.

Nnamdi Kanu, who is the director of Radio Biafra in an earlier interview told our correspondent that over 60 million families constitute pro-Biafrans organisations, scattered across some 88 countries the world over.

 

The Memorial Day is an addition to the civil disobedience, which holds periodically. This was also instituted by MASSOB, where pro-Biafrans are told to stay away from their businesses to show that they are not happy with the government of Nigeria. They usually obey.