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Barnes in Commonthe magazine of Churches Together in Barnes
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Forgiveness, Nigerian-style,
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Nigeria's highly combustible mix of more than 250 ethnic groups with a mainly Moslem north and a largely Christian and animist south has been a recipe for violence, dissent and corruption since independence from Britain in 1960. Apart from a relatively few periods of civilian government, the country has been ruled by generals or, as now, by a retired general from an army that will not countenance any split in the territorial integrity of the Nigerian federation.
The frustration of the few generals to actively seek a return to civilian rule, often to be confounded by electoral chaos, sometimes surfaces. "I have more than 100 million people. Most want democracy but no two of them agree on the kind of democracy," General Ibraham Babangida told me before abortive polls in 1993. In this atmosphere, it would be reasonable to believe that "forgiveness" was not a word high in Nigeria's politico-military lexicon, especially after the 1967-70 Biafran war of secession that claimed nearly one million lives and threatened a permanent split in Nigeria.
But on November 29, 1992, forgiveness was on public display when President
Babangida told the two main protagonists in the Biafran war –
both of them former army friends – it was time to shake hands.
The ensuing handshake between General Yakubu "Jack" Gowon, federal president
and military commander during the conflict, and Emeka Ojukwu, who led
the renegade state of Biafra in the oil-rich south-east, was cheered
by 400 people in Lagos's National Theatre after a book launching ceremony.
But behind the handshake lay tantalising questions. Could a few beers in an army officers' mess have averted the Biafran conflict that had grabbed world attention with images of mass carnage and despair? What do two former friends talk about after leading opposing sides in a brutal war?
On the first question, Ojukwu, an outspoken and charismatic former army officer, was in no doubt. "If it had been left to Gowon and me there would have been no fighting and they would probably have drunk it out in the mess with a number of bottles of beer," he told me a few months before the handshake. "There were no drinks and the rest is history. I believe dialogue should have continued but there were forces in Lagos at that time that did not see the usefulness of continued dialogue. Now we are both back in Nigeria there have been times that these forces manipulated us again to some extent."
Ojukwu, now 73, and Gowon, 72, spent considerable time outside Nigeria
after the war. Ojukwu fled to Côte d'Ivoire where he lived for 12 years
and Gowon went to England after he was deposed in a coup d'etat in July
1975.
During my time as the Reuters bureau chief in Nigeria, Ojukwu (real
name Chukwuemeka Odumegwu Ojukwu) and I formed a friendship based on
respect and hilarious stories of times remembered at the same British
public school.
Ojukwu, who had at least spoken privately to Gowon by telephone during their fairly frequent separate trips to Paris and London, called me the day before the public handshake and invited me to his colonial-style Lagos home. "Tomorrow, Jack Gowon and I are going to be asked by IBB (Babangida's initials) to shake hands in public. We will be sitting at opposite ends of the top table at the book launch. I don't know what is going to happen. Later, we are due to sit together at a football match. What is Jack going to talk about? He will have to start the conversation. He was the victor. What he says will probably determine whether we can be friends again."
In the vast National Theatre auditorium the next day, I found Ojukwu sitting in the front row of the stalls with most of Babangida's cabinet in the row behind. "This is awful," said a concerned Ojukwu. "Jack Gowon will be sitting on the stage facing me down here. This is not as it should be."
When the book launch ended, Babangida, followed by Gowon, walked towards Ojukwu. The handshake took place, witnessed by all those in the auditorium.
The next day Ojukwu quoted to me Gowon'7;s first words to him as: "Emeka, this country is going to the dogs. If only they had followed my last five-year economic plan." Ojukwu was astounded and disappointed. "After all the water that has passed under the bridge, he had to talk about his economic plan!" It was evident that the relationship was unlikely to return to that of their days as young army officers.
However, the main point remains that these two proud leaders were willing and able to shake hands in front of hundreds of their own kinfolk for the first time since Nigeria's current civilian president, retired General Olusegun Obasanjo, took the Biafran surrender in 1970. A very public display of forgiveness.
By African standards, an outsider would be right to ask why Ojukwu was not executed after the war. "When I left for Côte d'Ivoire, I was no longer a threat," was his simple answer.
And how did Ojukwu know he had been defeated by Gowon's forces in 1970? "When our French-supplied armoured cars were pierced by bullets supplied to the federal side – by France!" he said.
The title of the book at the book launch event eludes me now. But that act of forgiveness will remain forever clear in my mind.