AFP photo
By
Awesu Olaniyi Williams
To quell a fire you must use a force effectively greater than that of the fire itself. Hence, water and oxygen are bad choices in putting out a fire.
IPOB started a fire of blackmail and intimidating rhetoric. The zoo must be brought down to its knees. Abuja must be burnt down if the Rabbi was ever arrested, the president’s head chop off.
No, father will condone the presence of a prodigal son who threatens to chop off his head, while still alive, under the pretentious guise of youthful exuberance.
Like a game of chess, aswift manoeuvre happened. The python dance came. Boys threw stones, the other party went about throwing live rounds; such slippery vileness by masquerading python dancers.
Knowing full well how the world hates genocide or interpretation of ethnic cleansing, IPOB was outsmarted when the Terrorist tag was squarely decorated on its neck. Suddenly, they became a social leper that, no foreign government wanting to deal with a designated terror organisation.
What happens to the letter they wrote to Britain, America, Russia, France and Israeli governments; as it stands sane countries never negotiate with terrorist groups. Irrespective of how the tag came about, it’s part of international ethics. You don’t go around picking sides in another man’s domestic fight, lest you get burnt. What a bad day to go to market it seems.
On the home front where the foot soldiers are, the south eastern governors were genuflecting and begging for a dialogue while the supreme leader held them by the jugular. Suddenly their testicles came by courier with the Operation Python Dance. The IPOB group was swiftly proscribed, the meandering nail finally nesting on the coffin. A legal framework in place to check the excesses of IPOB was ultimately hatched and delivered at both State and Federal level.
A child that brings home maggot infested wood must not be surprised when lizards and flies come home to party. The rodent’s hole has been dug, the boys are running back; the Biafran flag hanging in the trail of departing viagra induced misguided fleeing foot soldiers.
Beyond ethnic cleavages, Nigerians, especially south easterners, must be grateful for the quickness in arresting the near ugly scenario while at the same time calling the military to justice on extra judicial killings, as the case may be.
A marauding Boko Haram has still not effectively been taken down. If the IPOB menace had been left festering it could have snowballed terribly with various army insurrections at the same time overwhelming the government. With the likelihood of Boko Haram renewing her caliphate desires like ISIS in the North East, IPOB and its national guard are fomenting further secessionist agends in the east and domestic crimes like kidnapping and armed robbery obstructing governance in the south west.
It is undoubtedly a big deal that this effectively overstretches and demoralises federal troops with proper funding problems quelling the crisis in the midst of a recession. Failed states like Somalia started on a path like this with the Ogaden war just like Biafra in this case the belligerent was her neighbor Ethiopia, before secessionist agendas fuelled by ethnic cleavages blew it out of proportion. Truly, a stitch in time saves nine.
‘War is hellish,’ George Patton screamed. Though a northern reprisal has been effectively curtailed at the moment with Plateau declaring a dawn to dusk curfew, October 1st seems weeks away. Who knows if disgruntled northern elements fuelled by ethnic jingoism and mistrust might still go ahead with a supposed reprisal against south easterners in the north.
Sadly, not everyone with an Igbo name tacitly supports the madness of the Indigenous People of Biafra agitation. These, seen by Nnamdi Kanu, are worse than infidels, ‘imbeciles’ the exact word he called them.
After the python dance and terror listing, only time will tell the remnants in the Pandora’s box. In theory sympathisers are drawing parallels between Umkhonto Sizwe of Apartheid South Africa to Biafra, effectively putting Kanu’s terrorist tag alongside those of Mandela. Hmm. Let it be noted Mandiba called for the sweetness of a Rainbow nation not by calling dissenters cows, the imbecile has done by the accidental freedom fighters in our homestead.
At the end how the mighty has fallen from celebrity status weeks ago with hordes of followers like locusts to a common terrorist. Life can indeed be unfair. Truly, bridge burns table turns life continues.
Awesu Olaniyi Williams
Awesu Olaniyi is a 24 year old, second best graduating student of Political science education from Lagos State University where he won various regional and national awards for public speaking and environmental advocacy. He is currently a freelance writer, LGBT discussant and aspiring M.sc student of political science. He can be reached via [email protected].
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