the Biafra Story (1969) (32 page)

One organ that has put up a remarkable record has been External Service of the B. B. C., notably the Africa Service. Throughout the whole war listeners and some contributors to the Africa Service were astounded by the number and variety of the misrepresentations of the situation presented by these programmes. Editorial-type comments were liberally mixed with what were supposed to be factual news reports from Lagos, and within a short time most, white and black, living in Biafra and tuning in nightly to the B.&C., became convinced there existed a strong pro-Nigerian bias in the coverage of the story.

Graphic accounts were related of things alleged to have happened in the heart of Biafra which had not happened, towns were described as having fallen to Nigerian troops long before the Nigerian soldiers actually entered them, and some farfetched speculation was attempted apparently on the basis of little more than gossip or the over-optimistic hopes of the Nigerian authorities. For example, there was speculation after Colonel Ojukwu (a devout Roman Catholic) had gone into a week's Lenten retreat in 1968 that he had fled the country or been the victim of a coup; and on another occasion an alleged popular demonstration in Umuahia in favour of Chou En-lai was described. Neither had a vestige of truth.

The overall effect appeared to indicate to an uninformed listener that the Nigerian case was wholly right, while that of Biafra was wholly wrong, and more misleadingly for a listener elsewhere, that Biafra was permanently on the verge of imminent collapse Throughout this time the reportage of the External Services fell consistently far short of the standard of journalism expected of the B. B. C. and which indeed the B. B. C. claims to be its own.

The effect was to cause widespread disgust among the Biafrans and equal disenchantment among the British living in the country. For the former at any rate the editorial attitude at Bush House towards Biafra was explained by the fact that the annual budget of the B. B. C. External Services was not met by the British licence-payer, but by an ex gratia payment from the Treasury through the Foreign and Commonwealth Office.

One notable exception was the file of dispatches sent from Nigeria by Mr. John Osman, the B. B. C Commonwealth Correspondent; a skilled and conscientious reporter, Mr. Osman gave objective and balanced reports, and was subsequently expelled from Port Harcourt by Colonel Adekunle in a remarkable display of the latter's violent temperament.

Chapter 15. Conclusion.

AT long last the scale and the outlook of the Nigeria-Biafra war have aroused the disquiet not only of the humanitarian groups but of powerful governments who belatedly see the dangerous perspective ahead. They are coming to realize that the situation contains elements of peril not only for Biafra, but just as much for Nigeria and for the rest of West Africa.

Now the talk is all of a search for a peaceful solution, and those who in their time did their utmost to support the idea of a purely military solution are unconvincingly protesting they have been in favour of a negotiated peace all along.

So 1ar as Biafra is concerned, their position is not complex. They have said since the start of the war that they viewed the problem as being a human one, and consequently not susceptible to a military solution but to a political one. Their offers of a ceasefire have been unrelenting, possibly because they have largely been on the receiving end of the war. But whatever their motivations, they are in favour of an end to hostilities and a negotiated peace.

It is in the mood of the Biafran people that one comes up against the main difficulty on that side. They left Nigeria possessed by three sentiments: a feeling of rejection, of mistrust of -the Lagos Government, and of fear of extermination. To this has now been added a fourth emotion, more intractable, more profound, and consequently more dangerous. It is the emotion of hate, pure, keen and vengeful.

Some of those now talking of peace, notably in Whitehall, seem under the impression that nothing has changed over the previous eighteen months. On the contrary, everything has changed. It is not a question of the growth of the 'army of penpushers' into a redoubtable military machine, nor the recent access to larger quantities of arms. It is the mood of the people who have watched their entire country shattered and despoiled, their children waste away and die, their young men cut down in thousands. Concessions one could have had at the start of the war, had a firm stand been taken and mediation offered, are no longer available. It is possible that in midsummer 1967 one could have saved at least a Confederation of Nigeria with enough economic cooperation between the consenting partners to have offered all the economic advantages of the Federation. It is doubtful if this is now possible, at least in the short term. It is useless for men in charcoal-grey suits to talk of the benefits of a single, united, harmonious Nigeria, and to express mystification that the Biafrans do not want it. Too much blood has flowed, too much misery has been caused and felt, too many lives have been thrown uselessly away, too many tears have been shed and too much bitterness engendered.

No one in Biafra now has any illusions about the behaviour of Biafrans if they ever again came to have Military sway over any of their present persecutors. Nor does anyone believe that a Nigerian will be able to walk unarmed and unescorted among Biafrans for a very long time to come. The only possible consequence of a militarily enforced 'unity' now would be total military occupation apparently in perpetuityj with its own inevitable outcome of revolt and reprisal, bloodshed, flight into the bush, and famine. The incompatibility of the two peoples is now complete. , The voice of the Biafran people is the Consultative Assembly and the Advisory Council of Chiefs and Elders, and they are unanimous on that. Colonel Ojukwu cannot go against their wishes - or on that topic their demands - no matter how much vituperation is thrown at him for intransigence, obduracy and stubbornness.

On the Nigerian side the position is more complex. For the Nigerian people have no voice. Their newspapers, radios and television stations are either Government-controlled or edited by men who know that outspoken criticism of Government policy is not the best way to health. Dissenting intellectuals like Pete Enahoro and Tais Solarin are either in exile, or like Wole Soyinka, in prison. The Chiefs, usually the best spokesmen of grass roots opinion, are not consulted.

It is interesting to speculate what would happen if General Gowon were obliged to follow the counsels on his war policy of a Consultative Assembly which included strong representation of the farming community, the academic community, the trade unions, the commercial interests and the womenfolk; for all these groups are presently showing increasing restiveness at the war policy. But General Gowon can dispense with consultation; recently he felt able to use firearms against demonstrating cocoa farmers at Ibadan.

The result is that the people of Nigeria are muted, and their real views cannot be known to the peacemakers, who must be content to talk with a small regime of men who are more interested in their personal careers than in the welfare of their people. The recent open invitation to the Russians to play a big role in the future of Nigeria indicates that this may well be so.

So far this regime has maintained its position that a military solution is not only feasible but imminent, and that a return to normality would be just around the corner after final victory. But the record of Enugu, captured over a year ago and still a smashed ghost town, does not give credence to this theory. On this position the Nigerian Government has stipulated that any termination of hostilities must be dependent on a number of conditions to be agreed by the Biafrans as a basis for negotiations. But the conditions themselves are so sweeping that they represent in fact all the points that the negotiations would have to be about, i. E., future nature of Biafra, terms of association with Nigeria, permissibility of a potential for selfdefence, etc.

The terms of their ceasefire are effectively the total and unconditional surrender of Biafra, to be delivered bound hand and foot into the hands of the Nigerian Government to do with as it wishes. It must be presumed that the Gowon regime has not abandoned its policy of believing a totally military solution can offer the final answer.

But in the face of this the danger grows. None of the policies hitherto adopted by the governments of the Western world has been successful in promoting peace. Most governments appear to have had more, preferring to accept British requests for a 'hands off' attitude, reminders that the Commonwealth is habitually Britain's sphere of influence, and assurances that it would all soon be over. The British Government's policies are in ruins; all the explanations and the justifications have been proved to -have been based on false premisses. Even the assurance that these policies would bring to Britain great influence with the Nigerian Government, which could then be used to bring peace, has fallen on its face. Far from having gained in influence Britain, once a powerful adviser in Nigerian affairs, has been shown to be now quite impotent. Ironically the war hawks whom British arms made powerful now feel strong enough to seek new friends while the Wilson Government, unwilling to admit this, has the courage neither to do something positive itself nor to withdraw its caveat to the other major Powers.

Only the Russians have gained from the present mess, being now in a position to move ever more strongly into Nigerian life. It cannot be presumed that they have the interests of the people of Nigeria at heart, for a continuation of the war is in their interest, putting the Nigerian regime ever more deeply in their debt.

In essence, nothing is likely to break the present stalemate until the Nigerian Government has been brought to the view that its own personal interests and those of an undelayed ceasefire have become synonymous. This conversion of view can only be brought about by the sort of diplomatic initiatives that alone the Big Powers can make effective.

In the event of the desire for an early ceasefire becoming mutual, it would probably be necessary for the ceasefire to be supervised by a peace-keeping force, either a body of international composition, or preferably that of a Protecting Power agreeable to both sides. On this basis alone can humanitarian aid of sufficient scope to even dent the problem have a chance of success.

Once a return to normality had begun, protracted negotiations would be necessary to find a formula capable of bringing lasting peace. At present it appears impossible that any such formula could have a chance of success that is not based on the will of the people. This presumes some form of a plebiscite, at least among the minority groups, whose destiny has become one of the key features in the present war.

Few seriously think that a Biafran state confined to the Ibolandmow called by Nigeria the East Central State, cut off from the sea and surrounded on all sides by Nigeria, could have much chance of viability. And the Nigerians have made one of the pillars of their case the supposition that the non-lbo groups, inhabiting what Nigeria now calls the Southeastern and the Rivers States, were dragged into partition against their will by the Ibos. The issue having become so crucial, it must be tested.

So far it is General Gowon alone who declines to put the matter to the test, though it should be admitted that circumstances at present are hardly apposite to the holding of a plebiscite. Yet if one were held now, the advantage would he with Nigeria, for her army occupies the area, and millions of minority people supporting Biafra have become refugees in the unoccupied zone. All the same, conditions for a plebiscite would have to be created before it could be conducted in a manner other than one calculated to bring protests from one side or the other. Ideally such an operation would be supervised by the Protecting Power, with Federal Army garrisons quarantined in their barracks for the hours necessary.

Whatever the permutations and combinations, they are at the moment purely speculative and must remain so pending a ceasefire. But it is no speculation to assert that the way things stand at the end of 1968 the degree of incompatibility between the peoples east and west of the Niger has become so absolute that for the immediate future at least some form of partition will be necessary to prevent further bloodshed.

The longer this is delayed the worse becomes the situation, the deeper the hate, the more intractable the tempers and the darker the portents-, *

PostScript

DURING the first three months of 1969, the basic situation in Biafra scarcely changed at all. Both armies were still locked in bitter combat; the shortage of staple foods, according to eyewitness sources like Professor Jean Mayer of Harvard University and New York Republican Senator Charles Goodell, meant that Biafra was veering towards another bout of mass stawrvation; there was no change in British Government policy.

From a purely military standpoint the three months from 1 January to 31 March 1969 had shown some gains and some losses for the Biafrans. Throughout the first two months the Biafrans continued their new military policy of 'surround and by-pass', avoiding big conventional confrontations with the Nigerians except from prepared defensive positions when the Nigerians attacked, and confining their own attacks, to picking off isolated Federal outposts, harassing the roads used by the Nigerians as supply lines, and encircling the major concentrations. The encirclement of the 4,000 Federal troops in Owerri, achieved just after Christmas 1968, was maintained after heavy fighting along the main road leading from Port Harcourt to Owerri. During early February the Federal troops broke through the encirclement for five days and a number of lorry convoys managed to reach the troops at Owerri. Then the Biafrans re-established their control of the road, and the Federal garrison inside the town had to be maintained by air drops from Nigerian planes. Further east, around Aba, the technique was the same. On his return from Biafra in March Mr. Winston Churchill told the author that he had been driven by the Biafran Army to the village of Eberi, about ten miles southwest of Aba. The news came as something of a shook, for in late August the author had watched Williams, Erasmus and their thousand Commandos being driven foot by foot backwards out of Eberi, as Colonel Adekunle's Third Federal Division rolled remorselessly northwards, That the Biafrans should not only be back in Eberi, but be able to drive a foreign correspondent there in a truck, indicated that in one area they had quietly achieved a considerable advance of over twentyfive miles from their late-September positions.