In the increasingly convoluted context that Nigeria has become, it is not exactly bitterness that is passed like a heirloom from one generation to another of the Igbos of southeast Nigeria. A people famed for their independence and free spirit consider bitterness to be beneath their station. They consider any time spent on old wounds as a waste of time. They know that the miraculous recovery posted after the devastating Nigerian Civil War of 1967-70 could not have come about if time was spent on revisiting a wounded past rather than envisioning a glorious future.
But they sure know when to journey to the past, what to take with them, and what to bring back with them from such cathartic journeys. The Igbos are a people who know how to probe the past with a fine-tooth comb, not so much to scrape open old scars as to find the gold dust that will make the future glitter.
What a people have known, what has kept the fire that keeps them warm burning, is their collective sense of history and justice – their absolute conviction that though they have been given a seat at Nigeria`s tenuous table, without the impregnable security that comes from justice and equity, the eater would sooner than later become the eaten.
With the heavy metal of the 2023 general elections already suffusing the polity, the failure of the APC-led Federal Government to decisively address many of Nigerias most pressing problems has been cast into stark relief. For it is now clear beyond every attempt at obfuscation and obscurantism that in the last seven years during which Nigerians have been promised coals but given clouds instead, Nigeria has veered precariously close to the precipice. The principal prayer on the lips of those who genuinely love the Giant of Africa is that by the time Nigeria goes to the polls next year, there would still be something left of Africas most populous country.
As Nigeria has taken a battering from the blistering blizzard of chaos, sectional interests which scantily find a confluence in the national interest have been beaten mercilessly and ripped to shreds. The scramble of many Nigerians now is to protect their own interests along ethnic lines as Nigeria prepares to go to the polls. This is especially as it appears that those in power have not just lost touch with their own primary constituencies, but with reality as well. Of all the divergent interests, it is the Igbos of the Southeast, long accused of biting more than they can chew, that are most in danger of being left saddled with the short end of the stick at the end of the day. And this time as in previous times, it has something to do with the much coveted position of the President. When ethnicism has allowed, there has been some unanimity that the time has come for the Southeast to enjoy that which other regions have enjoyed. But at other times, it has seemed as it seems now that whenever the baby has been due for delivery, there has been simply no strength left to bring it forth with the midwives having exhausted themselves with petty squabbles and gossip.
It remains the elephant in the room. The logic is exasperatingly simple and sensible: since two out of the three major ethnic groups in Nigeria have had their time in the sun of Aso Rock with some even enjoying multiple sessions, it is beyond time for the only one left out to have a go. Unless that which is sauce for the goose is no longer sauce for the gander.
Between Nigeria and the Southeast, the relationship has been a difficult one. That decades-old wounds have simply refused to fully heal does not sit as the figment of the imagination of any troop of tribalists. The conversations between the Igbos and the rest of Nigeria have always been drawn, and with a lot of daggers. Thus, whenever the question arises as to who the cap fits to lead Nigeria, Igbo heads have been unpardonably overlooked even if they have proven to be some of the finest heads not just locally but globally.
Yet, there is no doubt and there can be none that the time has come for the two major political parties in Nigeria – the PDP and the APC- to dispel the notion that within their ranks are rank unholy alliances rankled and rattled by the thought of the Igbos getting what has become a holy grail to them.
Having recovered from the doom and gloom of the civil war to abundantly demonstrate that they can give as much as they get in all parts of national life, they boast people who can steer the ship of the country out of the storms the listlessness and lethargy of the last seven years have swept it into. But will they get it?
Politics has a lot to do with numbers and out of experience, Nigeria knows that no one region from the country can singlehandedly vote a candidate into office as President without the support of other regions. Nigerians also know that at the table of politics, everything is negotiable.
Thus, arguments that a particular political party does not enjoy strong support in a region are as hollow as arguments that Igbos are not prepared for the Presidency are hypocritical.
Also, the argument that other regions may not support a particular region comes off as a wad of lies. In Nigeria`s politics of arrangement, everything can be arranged. The question is whether those in charge are ready to do right by themselves once and for all or whether they will continue to futilely attempt to jump over the elephant in the room as they head to nowhere.
Kene Obiezu,
keneobiezu@gmail.com
