By Nze Nwabueze Akabogu (JP)
For the past four
weeks or thereabout, the nation had witnessed an unprecedented upsurge in the
massive non-violent demonstrations which has now reached a crescendo in the
agitation for the actualization of the sovereign state of Biafra
jointly led by MASSOB and the so-called Indigenous People of Biafra (IPOB).
The widespread
agitation throughout the South East region as well as some parts of the Igbo
speaking areas of the South-South region suddenly erupted in the wake of the
reported detention of the Director of the clandestine “Radio Biafra” based in
the United Kingdom, Nnamdi Kenu, who was reported to have been picked up by
security operatives on his arrival from London recently.
The MASSOB led by the
irrepressible Chief Ralph Uwazuruike had for many years been in the vanguard
for the actualization of the defunct Republic
of Biafra
Regrettably however,
almost forty six years after the disastrous conflict, all the contentious
issues that originally led to the unfortunate war had remained unresolved,
hence the current wave of agitations spearheaded mainly by the restive youths
who invariably had inherited the seeming lopsidedness of the nation’s political
structure as well as gross marginalization being suffered by the people within
the geographical entity known as the defunct Republic of Biafra or South-East
region of Nigeria to be precise.
The Nigerian nation
seemed to have lost the golden opportunity to put the dark period of the civil
war and its horrifying memories permanently behind her hence the nation had
failed to take advantage of the famous declaration of “No victor and no
vanquished” slogan to build a new nation through the adoption of a deliberate
policy of genuine reconciliation and re-integration of the Igbo nation into the
mainstream of the nation’s political system of governance.
