incarcerating them indefinately or with threats of wiping them off the face of the earth and total and complete annihilation.
I am a man of peace and I believe that war is evil. It is the darkness that seeks the darkness. It is utterly repugnant and manifestly destructive.
It is a complete and total descent into madness, barbarism, hell, chaos and inhumanity.
Those that glorify it or encourage and endorse it any shape or form are either shallow, naive or simply insane.
It is the will and law of God to fight for freedom, equity and justice. Our cause is just. What we must NOT do is use violence or shed blood.
Yet despite this fundamental principle which I hold dear, one thing that I know is this: If, God forbid, there were ever to be any major conflict or war in our country again the Igbo would not be left to fight it on their own.
If, God forbid, there were to ever be a round two of our civil war I have little doubt that this time around the entire south and the Middle Belt would stand together as one against our common oppressors and those that kill and slaughter our people at will in the name of ethnic supremacy and faith.
I pray that it never happens and I hope that we either restructure the country or peacefully go our separate ways before it is too late.
Those that resist that course are playing with fire and are sitting on a keg of gunpowder.
When it ignites no-one will be left standing, no-one will come out whole and no-one will escape being amongst the victims of the cataclysmic and horrendous events that will follow.
What is even more revealing and brings home the true horror of what transpired during the war itself was provided by Mr. Anayo Johnpaul, a historian and public commentator. He wrote as follows:
“Shocking revelations of the hatred for Igbos and how the north used the Nigerian Federal troops and locals in the South-West and
North to commit genocide with the help of Great Britain and America during the civil war.
Permit me to share some excerpts from the confessions of the perpetrators.
“I want to see no Red Cross, no Caritas, no World Council of Churches, no Pope, no missionary, no UN delegation. I want to prevent even one Ibo from having even one piece of food to eat before their capitulation. We shoot at everything that moves and when our troops march into the centre of Igbo territory, we shoot at everything: even things that do not move”- (Benjamin Adekunle, Commander, 3rd Marine Commander Division, Nigerian Army to French Radio Reporter).
“All is fair in war and starvation is one of the weapons of war. I don’t see why we should feed our enemies fat in order for them to fight harder”- (Chief Obafemi Awolowo, Nigerian Minister of Finance, July 28, 1969).
“Until now efforts to relieve the Biafran people have been thwarted by the desire of the central government to pursue total and unconditional victory and by the fear of the Igbo people that surrender means wholesale atrocities and genocide. But genocide is what is taking place right now and starvation is the grim reaper. This is not the time to stand on ceremony, or go through channels or to observe diplomatic niceties. The destruction of an entire people is immoral objective, even in the most moral of wars. It can never be condoned”- (Richard Nixon, during the presidential campaign, September 9, 1968).
“Federal troops killed, or stood while mobs killed, more than 5000 Ibos in Warri, Sapele, Agbor”- (New York Times, 10th January, 1968).
“It (mass starvation) is a legitimate aspect of war”- (Anthony Enahoro, Nigerian Commissioner for Information at a press conference in New York, July 1968).
“Starvation is a weapon of war and we have every intention of using it against the rebels”- (Mr Alison Ayida, Head of Nigerian delegation, Niamey Peace talks, July 1968).
“The Igbos must be considerably reduced in number”- Lagos Policeman quoted in New York Review 21 December, 1967).
“One word now describes the policy of the Nigerian military government towards secessionist Biafra: genocide. It is ugly and extreme but it is the only word which fits Nigeria’s decision to stop international Red Cross and other relief agencies from flying food to Biafra”- ( Washington Post editorial, July 2, 1969).
“In some areas in the east, Igbos were killed by local people with at least the acquiescence of the Federal forces, 1000 Igbo civilians perished in Benin in this way”- (Max Edward Reporter, reporter on the ground – New York Review, 21 December 1967).
“After Federal forces took over Benin, troops killed about 500 Igbo civilians after a house to house search with the aid of willing locals”- (Washington Morning Post, 27 September, 1967).
“The greatest single massacre occurred in the Igbo town of Asaba where 700 Igbo males were lined up and shot as terrified women/children were forced to watch”- (London Observer, 21 January,1968).
“Federal troops killed or stood by while mobs killed more than 5000 Ibos in Warri, Sapele, Agbor- (New York Times, 10th January, 1968).
“There has been genocide on the occasion of the 1966 massacres, the region between the towns of Benin and Asaba where only widows and orphans remain, Federal troops having, for unknown reasons, massacred all the men”-(Paris Le Monde, 5th April, 1968).
“In Calabar, Federal forces shot at least 1000 and perhaps 2000 Igbos, most of them civilians”- (New York Times, 18th January,1968).
“Bestialities and indignities of all kinds were visited on the Biafrans in 1966. In Ikeja Barracks (Western Nigeria) Biafrans were forcibly fed on
