Biafrans with Nnamdi Kanu wrote:· ******Gabon, Haiti, Ivory Coast, Tanzania and Zambia if you must know Israel, South Africa, Portugal, Jamaica, France also supported Biafra****** These days, people don’t talk much about Biafra. Many probably have never even heard of it before, let alone know which continent it’s on and what happened there. During the 1960s, however, the name Biafra was a synonym for the horrors of famine and civil war, as much as the names Sarajevo, Srebrenica, Rwanda or Darfur are synonyms for atrocities committed during our generation. In 1967, the Igbo — a people in the oil-rich south east part of Nigeria who were Christianized by missionaries (like many areas in coastal Western Africa) — unilaterally declared their independence from Nigeria. The Republic of Biafra was witched from the start by the western world just be caused they are afraid that Biafra not only going to be a world power is also going to be the only true African federation; its independence was recognized by only five countries* but Biafra became a battleground on which dying imperial powers and their tumultuous successors fought one of the last proxy wars. France, which officially denied any involvement, sent arms to Biafra via Gabon and the Ivory Coast. France and Portugal, which controlled the nearby islands of Sao Tome and Principe, assumed that they could benefit from the break-up of Nigeria, a former British colony. Britain which had major oil contracts with Nigeria decided to back the Nigerian government. Meanwhile, Soviet Union, South Africa and Rhodesia all saw the conflict as a chance to increase their influence in the region. After initial setbacks, the British saw that Nigeria cannot defeat the Biafrans if left alone, because the Biafrans have already started manufacturing arms and ammunitions eg; the dreaded Ogbunigwe popularly called the Ojukwu Bucket, rocket launchers, converting caterpillars into armored cars, also converting cargo planes into war planes. The then Nigerian head of state Lt Col Yakubu Gowon who earlier said that the War will be over in two weeks swallowed his stupid pride and ran to the evil Britain to beg for arms. The British knowing fully well that the Biafrans will crush the Nigerians if left alone started supplying arms including war plane, the Russians joined in the supply of arms and war planes to the Nigerians while the Egyptians were contracted to flew the jets. When its obvious that all this forces combined together cannot crush the Biafrans, Chief Obafeni Awolowo persuaded Gowon to blocked Biafran from incoming food supply that they did and the Nigerian Army blockaded Biafra, cutting off food supplies. Western food aid was refused by the Biafra government, paranoid that it would have been poisoned, because the Biafrans had earlier dictated some poisonous substance in food supplies that came through Nigeria from the untrusted western world like Britain Russia and Egypt, the route for food aid would have opened a gap in the Biafran defence. What happened over the next three years was tragic, because it was all too preventable. It took a long time for the West to see pictures of Biafra; during the first six months of the fighting, few photographers managed to penetrate anywhere near the front lines. Yet, slowly reporters and photographers arrived, making Biafra the world’s first media famine. But the world could only sit and wait as more than one million people perished, mostly from starvation. With the pictures such as that of a hauntingly emaciated albino boy, Don McCullin introduced the world to the sight of children with stick-thin limbs and grotesquely distended stomachs, characteristic of protein deficiency — images which are to become all too tragically familiar in subsequent decades as famines happened in Bangladesh, Ethiopia, Uganda, and the Sudan. Biafra eventually collapsed. In 1970, its president, Lt. Col. Emeka Ojukwu fled the country with just one $100 bill, all that was left of the massive £7m personal fortune; the remainder having been spent on food supplies and arms to protect his country. Ojukwu was a Moses to the Biafrans for if not for him what the British planned was to eliminate all Igbo people from the age of two upwards through their partners in Nigeria Yakubu Gowon and Obafemi Awolowo. They have used all types of proper-gander to twist the truth but they forgot that the truth is the only thin that can set them free. Biafra seems to have faded into history, only God knows why, but I must tell you Biafra will rise again Biafra the only true African federation. ( Nelson Mandela)
Posted on: Sun, 23 Nov 2014 16:16:04 +0000
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