Seventy-eight years of controversy has come full circle; a new vista of controversy is already launched into orbit like a satellite, to circle our lives in widening gyres, to define and confine the perimeters of our arguments, to shake with utter violence our very perception of things. Ojukwu lived in controversy. If he saw through to earth from the back of beyond, he would be mournful if his passing didn’t throw us all in unmitigated contention.’
Welcome to the opening paragraph of The General of the People’s Army, the latest entry into the Ojukwu book war of 2012 triggered by the demise of General Emeka Odumegwu-Ojukwu, the leaders of the ill-fated Republic of Biafra on November 26, 2011. The 500-plus page volume was ‘unleashed’ yesterday, February 22, appropriately on Ash Wednesday when Christians the world over atone for their misdeeds and to chart a new course. It’s edited by Chuks Iloegbunam, currently of the Government House, Aso Rock, Abuja, former Chief of Staff at Government House in Awka, and later as Communication Adviser, as well as a weekly Perspectives columnist with the Sunday Vanguard, Lagos.
Two weeks ago, another book was released, simply titled Ojukwu, edited by Ray Ekpu, formerly of Newswatch magazine. Back on February 4, Professor ABC Nwosu, former Minister of Health and a Biafran soldier volunteer, sensationally told Saturday Sun newspaper that he was working on the memoirs of the late Biafran leader, who he claimed gave him documents to this effect. For years, the late Ojukwu promised to release his memoirs, but it never happened. There may also be a few other claimants to Ojukwu’s ‘authentic’ unfinished memoirs.
The most popular photograph of Ojukwu in full military uniform (minus the cap) on May 30, 1967 declaring the birth of the Republic of Biafra graces the cover of Ekpu’s book, while Iloegbunam chose the ‘warlord’ camouflage photograph of Ojukwu in the jungle. The editors and their helpers and collaborators deserve praise for producing these well-edited and technically fine books in less than 30 days. However, I prefer The General of the People’s Army.
The contributors in Ojukwu are military protagonists in the war (Ojukwu, Gowon, Effiong) and three Newswatch writers. The politicians’ bias and the subjective editorialisations by journalists from the same ‘house’ often stand in the way of the finer aspects of the book. They preferred ‘attacks’ instead of ‘pogrom’ in reference to the 100,000-plus innocent Igbos (including over 200 Igbo military officers) butchered in the North in 1966. Ojukwu is always ‘their’ this, ‘their’ that, which beclouds the Nigeria in his politics. The only exception is the chapter by Ebere Onwudiwe, ‘My Biafran Experience,” in which he breathlessly narrates his war effort in the Biafran air force. It’s worth the cost of the book.
I have a piece in Iloegbunam’s book, but that is not why I like it. In Chapter 1, Iloegbunam lays out the central themes of the book in ‘The Meaning of Emeka’ – the search for a just and fair Nigeria where every individual and group will be guaranteed of safety to pursue their God-given talents. The rest of the book is a celebration of the diversity of opinions and depth that provides an incredibly rich picture of Ojukwu.
Chapter 2, ‘Obituaries in the international media,’ situates Ojukwu and his politics as a global phenomenon, and aptly opens with an essay by Richard Dowden, director of the Royal African Society, London, who notes that ‘The history of the war and its causes is not taught in [Nigerian] schools and until Chimamanda Adichie’s novel Half of a Yellow Sun there was no written memory of what happened.’ He hopes that ‘Perhaps with the death of Ojukwu that will change.’ The chapter ends with a piece by the veteran chronicler of West African-European relations, Kaye Whiteman, who talks about Ojukwu as ‘destiny’s child’ and the lessons of Biafrans’ ‘noble and courageous resistance.’
Chapter 3 comprises four ‘Editorials in the Nigerian press,’ while Chapter 4 comprises eleven published interviews of prominent Nigerians, following Ojukwu’s death. It also includes two interviews of Ojukwu himself, and of Colonel Joseph Achuzia (‘Air Raid’ among Biafran soldiers) who was imprisoned for seven years after the war, despite the ‘no victor, no vanquished’ slogan. The man who later became secretary general of Ohanaeze Ndigbo warned that ‘Ojukwu’s death [is] not end of Biafran Dream,’ a theme echoed in the interviews with Ralph Uwazurike, the founder of the Movement for the Actualisation of the Sovereign State of Biafra (MASSOB).
Chapter 5, captioned ‘The Love Birds’, comprises three previously published stories and interviews that provide a deeper insight into Ojukwu the lover, husband, father and in-law; while Chapter 6, ‘Tributes’, opens with Ojukwu’s tribute to Major General Johnson T. U. Aguiyi-Ironsi on the 20th anniversary of the Supreme Commander’s assassination. There are 39 other tributes to Ojukwu, including two childhood reminiscences of what Ojukwu meant to Biafran children by Ikeddy Isiguzo of the Vanguard and yours sincerely.
Chapter 7, ‘Biafra and Aftermath’ is for the history buffs. It contains Ojukwu’s May 30, 1967 declaration of the Republic of Biafra speech, the awe-inspiring Biafran National Anthem, ‘The Land of the Rising Sun,’ the June 1, 1969 Ahiara Declaration (The Principles of the Biafran Revolution), and the surrender speech of Major General Philip Effiong, Chief of Staff of the Biafran Army on January 12, 1970.
The General of the People’s Army ends with a piece by Kanayo Esinulo, Ojukwu’s media aide during the years of exile in Côte d’Ivoire, who describes how Ojukwu’s home-coming in 1982 emboldened ‘individuals and groups that were afraid to mention Ojukwu’s name in public since January 1970 … to come out of their holes like termites.’ His burial, his second-home-coming, is sure to be even more liberating of not just Igbos, but every Nigerian who believes in ‘The Meaning of Emeka.’
