It’s often said that a
lie told so many times, if unchallenged, may – in course of time – begin to
pass for the truth. One of such is the terrible lie, institutionally purveyed
since the end of the Civil War, to the effect that Igboland is landlocked or has
no access to the sea. The purpose of this essay, therefore, is to debunk
this lie with some simple historical and topographical evidence that are even
in plain view, if you care to dig or do some physical explorations of your own.
*John Nnia Nwodo President General, Ohaneze Ndigbo |
Suffice it to say that
it is a profound tragedy that entire generations of the immediate post-War
Igbos never bordered to check but seemingly accepted this brazen institutional
falsehood, largely intended to taunt the Igbo and put them down. A few
that knew it to be false just didn’t care anymore. And that History was banned
since the end of the Civil War made it worse, plus the fact that most people
don’t take physical Geography that serious anymore, otherwise they would have
known that Abia, Imo and Anambra States have varying short-distance paths to
the Atlantic through Imo, Azumiri and Niger Rivers.
It’s not really rocket science, as you can easily confirm this if you know how to read Google Earth; or conquer your fear of swamp snakes and walk through these areas on foot. There are also many other hardly explored waterways and slithering tributaries, including the remote reaches of Oguta Lake and Oseakwa River in Ihiala (Anambra State) that meandered through Igbo-delta wetlands to the Southeastern ends of the Atlantic waterfront.
It’s not really rocket science, as you can easily confirm this if you know how to read Google Earth; or conquer your fear of swamp snakes and walk through these areas on foot. There are also many other hardly explored waterways and slithering tributaries, including the remote reaches of Oguta Lake and Oseakwa River in Ihiala (Anambra State) that meandered through Igbo-delta wetlands to the Southeastern ends of the Atlantic waterfront.
These rivers have
varying lengths of short navigational paths to the Atlantic, and in some cases,
are far shorter nautically (and even on footpath) than the Portharcourt,
Calabar and Ibaka seaports are to their side of the Atlantic. Many of these
pathways, including particularly the ones from the outer reaches of Imo and
Azumiri Rivers terminate at the Atlantic at no more than 15 to 30 Nautical
miles to the beachhead. To put it in lay language, one nautical mile equals 1.8
kilometers. Thus, the contiguity of Southeast (not even the greater Igboland)
to the Atlantic is less nautical miles than the Atlantic is to the seaports in
Calabar, Onne, Ibaka, Lagos and Portharcourt. If you discount the territories
excised from Igboland during State creations and the damnable boundary
adjustments, it will be far less.
To be sure, Ikwerre land or Igweocha which bears the greater portions of the
Portharcourt seaport was dredged up to 50 miles to the Atlantic front through
the Bonny River. Onne seaport was dredged up to 60 miles to the Atlantic
and Calabar seaport was dredged some 45 nautical miles to the Atlantic. Ibaka
seaport is about 30 nautical miles to the Atlantic and the Lagos seaports
dredged up to about 50 nautical miles to the Atlantic. Compare all these to
Obuaku in Abia State, which is only 25 nautical miles to the Atlantic from the
confluence of Imo and Azumiri Rivers, of which Azumiri, on its own merits, lies
not more than 30 nautical miles to the Atlantic beachfront. The less obvious
one is the little-known Oseakwa River in Ihiala (Anambra State) which is mere
18 nauticals to the Atlantic, all with its 65 feet of natural depth, unarguably
comparable to no other River in Nigeria. Additionally, what is geopolitically
known as Igboland today is far smaller than what it was and legally supposed to
be.
As far back as 1856, Baikie – one of the earliest and credible Geographers of ancient Nigeria, had this to say – “Igbo homeland, extends east and west, from the Old Kalabar river to the banks of the Kwora, Niger River, and possesses also some territory at Aboh, an Igbo clan, to the west-ward of the latter stream. On the north it borders on Igara, Igala and A’kpoto, and it is separated from the sea only by petty tribes, all of which trace their origin to this great race” (Baikie, William Balfour, published with a sanction of Her Majesty’s Government in 1856).
As far back as 1856, Baikie – one of the earliest and credible Geographers of ancient Nigeria, had this to say – “Igbo homeland, extends east and west, from the Old Kalabar river to the banks of the Kwora, Niger River, and possesses also some territory at Aboh, an Igbo clan, to the west-ward of the latter stream. On the north it borders on Igara, Igala and A’kpoto, and it is separated from the sea only by petty tribes, all of which trace their origin to this great race” (Baikie, William Balfour, published with a sanction of Her Majesty’s Government in 1856).
But with that infamous post-War abandoned
property policy and the egregious institutional injustices in boundary
adjustments and the widespread anti-Igbo gerrymandering, Igbos physically and
psychologically lost hold of their vested ancestral lands, all to the point of
not caring anymore about their historical contiguity to the Atlantic, which
their ancestors beheld and called ‘Oshimiri’ (The Great Sea). The
psychological beat-down and gang-up got so bad that some of the descendants of
these Igbo ancestors (nearest to the Atlantic and now lying outside Southeast)
are no longer sure whether they are Igbo or not. The worst injustice was in
1976 when the Justice Nasir Boundary Adjustment Commission made a serious and
targeted agenda of carving out core Igboland territories into some neighboring
States of the South-South. But they didn’t quite make an absolute success of
it. They missed the southernmost Southeast lands that possess Rivers that
meandered through slices of Igbo-friendly South-South territories and ended up
at the Atlantic, thus unwittingly placing Igboland and its right of access to
the sea under the canons of customary international law.
As it stands,
international law of the sea guarantees Igboland (whether it remains Nigerian territory
or not) unhindered access to the nearest sea (in this case: the Atlantic)
peacefully by the many short-distance rivers, waterways and tributaries that
originated from Igboland but ultimately washed into the Atlantic through
contiguous South-South territories. For avoidance of doubt, there’s
particularly the Obuaku confluence in Ukwa West (Abia State) that flows through
Ikot Abasi in Akwa Ibom State before expanding out and washing into the
near-reaches of the Atlantic. And the River Niger which ultimately joined
the Atlantic through a vast network of hardly explored creeks and mangrove
swamps that abut the Bight of Bonny in the South-South.
Nigeria is subject to the International Law of the Sea and is therefore bound to abide by its provisions, should the need arise in a scenario of persistent sovereign oppression of an identifiable indigenous group within Nigeria. The others are the United Nations Treaty of the Sea and the African Union Treaties and Conventions on the Sea, including particularly the African Charter on Human and People’s Rights, which Nigeria ratified and domesticated in 1983. The pertinent provisions are mostly embedded in the copious provisions relating to the collective economic and commercial rights of indigenous peoples lying within the Treaty nations. Ndigbo are undoubtedly an indigenous people presently lying within Nigeria. So, international law will surely come into play if a conflict arises out of Nigeria’s persistent institutional resistance to granting a seaport to Igboland.
Nigeria is subject to the International Law of the Sea and is therefore bound to abide by its provisions, should the need arise in a scenario of persistent sovereign oppression of an identifiable indigenous group within Nigeria. The others are the United Nations Treaty of the Sea and the African Union Treaties and Conventions on the Sea, including particularly the African Charter on Human and People’s Rights, which Nigeria ratified and domesticated in 1983. The pertinent provisions are mostly embedded in the copious provisions relating to the collective economic and commercial rights of indigenous peoples lying within the Treaty nations. Ndigbo are undoubtedly an indigenous people presently lying within Nigeria. So, international law will surely come into play if a conflict arises out of Nigeria’s persistent institutional resistance to granting a seaport to Igboland.
*Ejimakor wrote from Abuja.
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