BURIED FOR 50 YEARS: BRITAIN’S SHAMEFUL ROLE IN THE BIAFRAN WAR

It is a good thing to be proud of one’s country, and I am – most of the time. But it would be impossible to scan the centuries of Britain’s history without coming across a few incidents that evoke not pride but shame. Among those I would list are the creation by British officialdom in South Africa of the concentration camp, to persecute the families of Boers. Add to that the Amritsar massacre of 1919 and the Hola camps set up and run during the struggle against Mau Mau.

🧵 The northern and western regions of Nigeria were swept by a pogrom in which thousands of Igbo were slaughtered.
But there is one truly disgusting policy practised by our officialdom during the lifetime of anyone over 50, and one word will suffice: Biafra.

This referred to the civil war in Nigeria that ended 50 years ago this month. It stemmed from the decision of the people of the eastern region of that already riot-racked country to strike for independence as the Republic of Biafra. As I learned when I got there as a BBC correspondent, the Biafrans, mostly of the Igbo people, had their reasons.

THE MEETING THAT STOLE A NATION: HOW THE ABANDONED PROPERTY ACT WAS BORN

Port Harcourt, Late 1975.

The Nigerian Civil War had ended five years earlier. The guns were silent. The Biafran flag was lowered. But for the Igbo people, the battle was far from over. The new war was no longer fought on the blood-soaked fields of Enugu or Nsukka. It was a quiet war, fought in offices, courtrooms, and government houses.

In a nondescript room inside the Rivers State Government House, a secret meeting convened behind closed doors. The ceiling fan hummed relentlessly as a group of men gathered around a heavy wooden table strewn with maps, legal documents, and property claims. They were about to forge a legal instrument that would devastate the Igbo people for generations.

🧵 At the head of the table sat Navy Commander Alfred Diete-Spiff, then the young and ambitious Military Governor of Rivers State. With him were key figures who would shape one of Nigeria’s most painful post-war legacies:

Justice Ephraim Akpata, Chief Judge of Rivers State

Colonel Anthony Ukpo, liaison officer from the Supreme Military Council

Dr. Okoi Arikpo, federal advisor and Foreign Minister

A Yoruba constitutional lawyer from Lagos (name withheld for privacy) tasked with drafting the legal framework

Senior civil commissioners and property officials from Rivers and South Eastern States.

For those saying Tinubu designed and handed the template for Lagos, please read and digest.

From Lade Bonuola, founding editor of The Guardian Newspaper:

I have restrained myself from getting involved in this kind of controversy. This was why I made a strenuous effort from being drawn into the brickbat between Bayo Onanuga/Dele Alake on the one hand and Arise News on the other despite pressure on me to say something. “Oga, this is shameful, won’t you say something to guide us?” I resisted the pressure. The drive for political power in this clime has no respect for anything. Not for honor, nor anything with the tinge of sublimity! You will be hailed for calling black white and white, black, even on the platform of journalists who are not just observers but chroniclers of developments and events. How can anybody say LASU was a glorified school? Oh, really?
The Metro line was stopped by the Buhari junta, not by NPN!

What NPN attempted to do was to stop the establishment of Lagos Radio and Television. The Shagari Administration sought to vest the Federal Radio Corporation of Nigeria with the power to establish and operate state radio stations. The Nigerian Television Authority was to set up at least one television station in each state of the Federation. They said states setting up radios and TV would amount to the proliferation of broadcast stations. They did not know the person they were dealing with—someone who for years was the President of IPI, the founder of the Nigeria Guild of Editors, the founder of Newspapers Proprietors Association, (NPAN); founder of NIJ, managing director/editor of the Nigerian Tribune, one who led the media in battles with the military as well as irresponsible civilian administrations. Jakande fought it and was victorious. His administration was therefore the first state government to own a TV station in Nigeria.

What hunters see in the forest is enough to make children of men without balls blind. An ethnographic study of hunters in a wild called Ìgbẹ Alágogo conducted by a scholar at the University of Ibadan, Ayo Adeduntan, gave birth to the narrative. Ọláníyì Ọládèj̣ọ Yáwóọ̣ré had gone hunting one day and came face to face with a deer breastfeeding her young. Stupefied by this weird sight, an unusual dizziness pounced upon the hunter. But "an animal is pursuing me" is a disgraceful song that must never be sung by a man born to hunt. Yáwóọ̣ré quickly picked himself up and fought back with a dose of potent Ọfọ (incantation), one of the priceless assets he inherited from his father: “The ladybird beetle does not suffer from sight impairment…" Hunter dipped his hand into his cloak and brought out a phial, the content of which he then used to wipe his face. Now he can see! Now that he could see, he had very little difficulty making sumptuous meat of the deer. At home, hunter skinned his game and hung its hide to dry in the open. This is where the story starts to be sweet like a soup of deer meat.

The second day, a mysterious woman visited Yáwóọ̣ré and a conversation ensued. The mysterious woman then told the hunter: “I know you killed a deer. But you did because we wanted you to. Now, why do you show off with its skin? Why did you spread it out, pegged to the ground outside? You sure want to show the whole world that you it was that killed the animal. Were you the one who actually killed the animal or we gave it to you? Don’t you know spreading out the hide in the open that way is exposing our clothing to the mundane world?” Yawoore got the message. He made amends.

IF YOU ARE A NIGERIAN, WAKE UP FROM YOUR SLEEP AND READ THIS DISTURBING PIECE WRITTEN BY:

While the Igbo, Yoruba, and Fulani continue to quarrel over political crumbs and tribal pride, a far more dangerous and silent conquest is taking place across Nigeria. It’s not waged with guns or tanks—but with pen strokes, bank loans, and real estate acquisitions. If nothing changes, in fifteen years, the real landlords of Nigeria may not be Nigerians—they’ll be Chinese.

Across the South-West, Chinese nationals are purchasing land at an alarming rate. In cities and towns, Chinese investors are sealing land deals with little to no resistance. The very soil our ancestors fought to defend is being traded in quiet transactions, buried in legal paperwork and political indifference. At this rate, the day is coming when our children will be forced to rent their futures from foreign landlords. The Abuja-Kaduna railway gleams like a badge of progress, but few Nigerians know what lies beneath the steel and cement—a spider web of hidden loan agreements, sovereignty waivers, and debt traps. What was presented as development is looking more like a masterclass in quiet colonisation. China has made itself indispensable to Nigeria’s infrastructure: roads, railways, power plants, airport terminals—all courtesy of Chinese financing. But what are we mortgaging in return?

Investigations by The Streetjournal reveal alarming clauses tucked inside loan agreements—clauses that allow China to take over key national assets in the event of default. One such clause, signed under the Jonathan administration, practically waives Nigeria’s sovereign immunity. In other words, if we default, China has legal grounds to claim what it finances.

Nigeria is radicalizing the Igbo, one injustice at a time.

There’s something about persecution that does two things to a people: it either breaks them, or it makes them beasts of survival.

Ask the Jews.

For centuries, they were hunted, hated, and humiliated by empires. But they didn’t vanish. They evolved. They adapted. And today, the Jews are arguably the most powerful tribe in the world economically, intellectually, and politically. Ruthless when necessary.
They are unapologetic about their survival. Now, look at the Igbo.

A tribe known for industry, resilience, and brilliance. A people who just want to live, do business, and thrive. But Nigeria doesn’t want that. Nigeria wants control.
Nigeria wants submission. And the one thing the Igbo have never known how to do is bow.

And that’s the real issue.

Anambra North senatorial constituency comprises seven Local Government Areas (LGAs). These are: Anambra East, Anambra West, Anyamelum, Ogbaru, Onitsha North, Onitsha South, and Oyi. The contest to represent it in the election to the Senate in 2007 turned out to be memorable for all the wrong reasons. Voting in the election occurred on 28 April 2007. At the end of the contest, the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC), returned Joy Emordi, the incumbent senator and candidate of the ruling Peoples’ Democratic Party (PDP), as the winner. In the race for the party ticket which preceded the election, Senator Emordi beat out the challenge of a little-known member of the House of Representatives, Ubanese Alphonsus Igbeke. Having lost the contest for the party ticket, however, Ubanese promptly defected to the opposition All Nigeria Peoples Party (ANPP), which granted him the ticket to fly its flag in the contest for the election to the senate in Anambra North.

The Numerous Dark Worlds Controlling Nigeria

Nigeria is the only OPEC nation where individuals, not the state, own oilfields. Nowhere else do national assets transition so seamlessly into private hands under the pretense of legality. But who are these individuals? And why is their ownership never questioned in court? Road contracts are inflated by as much as 5000%—a scale of fraud that should provoke outrage. Yet, no investigations follow. Who is orchestrating these crimes? Why are there no legal consequences for looting on this scale?

I offer my opinion on the coalition against President Tinubu's second term.

In 2027, Tinubu Won’t Win; The Opposition Will Lose

🧵 If economic health, social vitality, and the raw pulse of public opinion were the only indicators relied upon to prognosticate the chances of President Bola Ahmed Tinubu’s reelection in 2027, I would say with cocksure certitude that he is condemned to be a one-term president.

Not even the most hopelessly unthinking defenders of the Tinubu presidency can deny that his reign so far has been defined by unrelieved economic hardship, staggering inflation, a collapsing naira, and a deepening sense of despair among Nigerians. In other words, the objective conditions for his political repudiation are overripe.

Nonetheless, elections, especially in Nigeria, are not won on the basis of public frustration alone. They are won — or lost — on the strength of political organization, elite consensus, strategic emotional manipulation, and the ability to convert popular anger into electoral mathematics. Call those the subjective conditions of electoral triumph, if you like. And this is where the tragedy of the opposition begins.

Protest Against Marginalization of the South East in the CBN
@cenbank

A thread We, the umbrella body of South East Socio-cultural Associations in the diaspora, express deep concern and disappointment over the recent directorship appointments at the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN). A particular publication by Rufai Oseni, a respected columnist and TV personality, has brought to light serious allegations of lopsided and exclusionary appointments within the CBN. The article, which can be found here veonewsng.com/index.php/2025…  provides a detailed and well-researched analysis of these appointments.

The Tinubu-Wike alliance is not a political partnership; it is an unholy merger of ambition and ruthless pragmatism. Together, they have reduced Nigerian politics to a zero-sum, winner-takes-all game – a dangerous, short-sighted strategy that threatens democracy, economic stability, and national cohesion.

But while Wike plays the game for relevance, Tinubu is operating at an entirely different level. His moves are not reactionary; they are premeditated and calculated. Unlike his political allies and opponents, Tinubu does not play for survival – he plays for absolute control. What is his endgame? How does he intend to manipulate 2027? What will be the consequences for Nigeria?

This is not just a battle for power; it is a battle for the soul of Nigeria. And if history has taught us anything, it is that unchecked ambition often leads to self-destruction.

Unmarked Vans. Secret Lists. Public Denunciations. Our Police State Has Arrived.

🧵 “It’s the unmarked cars,” a friend who grew up under an Argentine dictatorship said. He had watched the video of the Columbia graduate student Mahmoud Khalil’s abduction. In the video, which Khalil’s wife recorded, she asks for the names of the men in plainclothes who handcuffed her husband.

“We don’t give our name,” one responds. “Can you please specify what agency is taking him?” she pleads. No response. We know now that Khalil was detained by Immigration and Customs Enforcement, an agency of the Department of Homeland Security.

Those of us who have lived in countries terrorized by a secret police force can’t shake a feeling of dreadful familiarity. “I never realized until this moment how much fear I carried with me from my childhood in Communist Romania,” another friend, the literary scholar Marianne Hirsch, told me. “Arrests were arbitrary and every time the doorbell rang, I started to shiver.”

Chief Tony Anenih Memoirs.

Abiola Invited Abacha To Overthrow Shonekan And Handover To Him After. - SDP Party Chairman.

🧵 “I was returning from one of such trips to a prominent Emir one afternoon when I heard from my car radio Chief Abiola calling on General Abacha to come and ease Chief Shonekan as he eased out Babangida, I was shocked.

I called Chief Abiola and asked for an explanation of what I had just heard.

His reply was, “Mr. Chairman, I am very happy to have worked for you. You are a strong-willed man, but you see, if you want to go to Kano by road and you later decide to go to Kano by air, as long as you get to Kano, there is nothing wrong with that”.

At this time, the party did not know and I did not know Chief Abiola was having discussions with General Abacha who had promised him that if Chief Abiola supported, and if he, General Abacha, took over from Chief Shonekan today, he would hand-over the reins of Government to Chief Abiola the next day, and Chief Abiola bought the idea.

We later got to know that there were series of meetings in Ikeja where names of those who would serve in Abacha government were discussed and forwarded. When we found out that things were not moving well and that the interim government was a lame duck, I went to have a meeting with the then Secretary for Agriculture, Alhaji Isa Muhammed, and I expressed my disgust at the way the government was being run.

Nigeria's Triangle Of Incest

"No man's life, liberty, or property is safe while the legislature is in session."
- Gideon J. Tucker

🧵 A Governor Bola Tinubu of Lagos would not vacate his seat for anyone appointed illegally from Abuja - or from anywhere. If the heavens wanted to fall, he would ask them to fall. He would not go hide somewhere in his wife's handbag, and from the safety of his ghetto be issuing gutless press releases. If Abuja insisted on his suspension, he would mobilise the law and lawyers for eruptions of seismic proportions. He would ask the Supreme Court to determine whether the president could sack or suspend elected governors, appoint caretaker governors and take over the role of state Houses of Assembly. He would ask the apex court to reconcile this case with its earlier verdict which outlawed caretaker governments for one of our tiers of government. He would put everything he had into the mix; he would count the teeth of the tiger in Abuja. But Rivers is not Lagos, and Siminalayi Fubara is not Bola Ahmed Tinubu. The difference between both is the difference between courage and cowardice.

There is a royal family in Lagos called Oniru. In the earliest times when there was no Lagos and Eko knew its boundaries, that family owned all lands that house today’s Awolowo Road, the prime area called Falomo, Tafawa Balewa Square, the Independence Building, Island Club, Yoruba Tennis Club, et cetera, et cetera. Add Oyinkan Abayomi to that list, and, in addition to those places, input 18 other villages – all in pricey Lagos Island. The family that owned all those is the family that produced the new and contentious speaker of Lagos State House of Assembly, Mrs Mojisola Lasbat Meranda. Do not mind her surname; she is an Oniru. Her brother is the reigning Oba of their Iruland. She is a princess but being a princess is not enough for her to join the big league of Lagos. Her election as speaker by almost all her colleagues, means little or nothing. In the pantheon of Lagos politics, there is always one god whose one vote trumps a million ballots. In some places, you do not have to enter the grove before you become an elder; grey hair is enough. Not in Lagos. In Lagos, the godfather is the igbó’rò, the sacred grove that confers age, that vests authority in and breathes life into all figurines.

SENATOR AKPABIO: I CAN NO LONGER HOLD IT

🧵 I “kind of” like Senate President, Godswill Akpabio and his lovely wife, Unoma. She is Igbo, married to Akwa Ibom, so she also bears the name Ekaette.

When Akpabio was the Governor of Akwa Ibom State, I admired the couple so much. The two usually displayed their love for each other publicly. Unoma would use fan on her husband each time she was there and he was making a speech. Atimes, she would use a white handkerchief to wipe sweat off Akpabio as he read. Akpabio also reciprocated in kind. He did the same for her.

In five parts, thirteen chapters, six appendices, including an interview; a prologue and an epilogue, he sought to give a definite definition of himself. But, for me, the deepest insight into the person of General Ibrahim Babangida is not in his expensive book (it fetched him billions; I bought a copy for N40,000). The greatest revelation was at the launch of the book in Abuja. His comrade-in-arms and childhood friend, General Abdulsalami Abubakar, revealed that a cleric told them about 80 years ago that Babangida would one day be president of his country. Now, when you, a seer, tell a child that he would be king one day, the palace cannot be safe until the child becomes man and he becomes king – or he dies. We read exactly that in Shakespeare’s story of the Scottish General, Macbeth. Three witches tell Macbeth that he will be King of Scotland. Macbeth becomes impatient; he kills the reigning king and takes the throne. Because of the security of his throne, paranoia pushes King Macbeth to take other desperate measures. People die; civil war erupts, more people die. Darkness falls. Please, go back and read again your Macbeth.

In recent days, the United States has begun a major gutting of USAID, the agency responsible for administering foreign aid. Many Americans are celebrating this as a victory—finally, no more taxpayer dollars wasted on countries that, in their view, give nothing back. Elon Musk, the billionaire who only arrived in the U.S. at 24, went as far as calling USAID a “criminal organization,” declaring, “Time for it to die.” Donald Trump has labeled those in the agency as “radical lunatics.” American adversaries, eager to see the U.S. retreat from the global stage, have cheered them on. But the most ecstatic of all are everyday Americans, convinced that their country has been bleeding money for too long on nations that seemingly offer nothing in return.

🧵 It’s a tempting narrative. A compelling soundbite. The idea that the U.S. is simply throwing billions at ungrateful nations makes for good political theater. But peel back the layers, and this argument falls apart. Foreign aid is not charity; it is a business transaction, a diplomatic tool, and an economic strategy. It benefits the giver far more than the receiver. The problem is that ordinary citizens in donor countries, including the United States, rarely see how this system enriches their own economy, sustains their industries, and extends their country’s global influence.

A Nigerian lawyer, Kenneth Ikonne Esq., narrates his saddest experience in court. The story is about love and betrayal. It throws up the issue of DNA on the spotlight again, leaving the reader spell-bound. If you are able to control your emotions and manage a few drops of tears, then get on with the story below.

🧵 The scene in the courtroom of the Family Division of the Lagos State High Court, Ikeja, evoked deep pathos. The judge, a Lady, was sobbing. And so were the parties, the lawyers, and everyone else in that rattled courtroom, including me! It was at the hearing of a case instituted by me on behalf of my client, Dapo, against his former consort. Their relationship more, than thirteen years earlier, had produced a baby girl, but it did not eventually lead to marriage, even though Dapo had assumed full responsibility for the child’s upkeep and maintenance, and was at the time of the hearing bearing full responsibility for her schooling and upkeep at the very expensive Turkish – American secondary school at Victoria Island, Lagos! Dapo was well – heeled, a chartered accountant, and loved the child – his only child – dearly.

Nwanna, Many years ago, the General, Dim Chukwuemeka Odumegwu-Ojukwu spoke about the “Biafra of the mind.” Only a few, I think, understood him. Well, they say, only the deep speak to the deep.

But let me attempt here to tease out Dim Ojukwu’s prescription: the greatest proof of Igbo survival and aspiration must be to model, wherever Onye-Igbo stands, the ethos of innovation, excellence, ingenuity, and ability that marked the Igbo endeavor in Biafra. We must also use Biafra as the stepping stone to a higher vision of the Igbo place in the world. There is no single proof or evidence today that the Igbo of this generation are capable of transforming any nation to which they lay claim. I have looked; I have studied the Igbo situation, and I have listened to my Igbo kinsmen, and I think something is fundamentally wrong: the Igbo are trapped in a deadening hate, self-pity and nostalgia. It is the kind of nostalgia that is both defeatist and deadly because it continues to romanticize the past while the future speeds away.

The Igbo cannot wait until they achieve Biafra or a separate nation in order to build and secure Igbo land. Soon after the end of the war, Igbo survivors of the war, girded their loins and embarked on the work of restoration. With singular grit, they revived the economy of the East, and by 1979, just nine years after the end of the war, were ready to take on the rest of the nation again. We their children are a disgrace to the spirit of those men and women.

Two major projects were announced in Abuja last week: a polytechnic and a military barracks. Both were named after President Bola Ahmed Tinubu. I thought the president would say no to such fawning sycophancy. But no. He appears to love it. He actually sat and presided over the inauguration and naming of the barracks. A man goes to the stream to bathe and all maidens of the village struggle to be his wife or at least his mistress. That is the fortune of our president today; every loin scrambles for his hood. A sycophancy championship is afoot. If I were the president, I would be afraid and worried. Shakespeare’s Julius Caesar was offered the crown three times, and three times he rejected it. Yet, that gesture was used to consummate a conspiracy against him.