2 FEB. 2019 SPECIAL BROADCAST BY IPOB LEADER MAZI NNAMDI KANU ON BOYCOTT OF 2019 PRESIDENTIAL ELECTIONS.
1. IPOB did not invent the notion of ‘Boycott’ of elections as a tool of civil disobedience. Boycotting elections is as old as any civilization built on institutional injustice.
2. We should remain determined in our resolve not to participate in any election exercise that would further entrench the system of impoverishment and the quantum institutional injustices levied against Biafrans in the geographical area currently known as Nigeria
3. To vote is to endorse the fraudulent 1999 Constitution that is – in all its provisions – skewed in favor of the Caliphate and against Biafrans and the other indigenous nationalities in Nigeria, especially south of the Benue River.
4. This fraudulent constitution is the precursor to the fraudulent elections that will take place on February 16. Both must fall because they don’t represent freedom, they suppress it; they don’t promote progress, they retard it. And they are the source of much unhappiness in the land. It time for our people to learn from the experiences of those amongst us who have slaved for Nigeria with nothing to show for it, especially in the present government. Participating in the previous elections have not benefitted us. So, what makes you think this very one on February 16 will? Can’t you see how trapped and unhappy Amaechi, Ogbonnaya Onu, Onnoghen, Emefiele, Kachikwu, etc. look at them to understand how impotent they appear in a system that continues to reel out injustices and humiliation to their own people while they feel powerless to even speak out against it.
5. This very election will once again give you an Executive President that will do as he wishes simply because the Constitution has given his part of Nigeria the absolute majority of States, LGAs, Senators, House of Rep members; and the leave and license to come to your land and appropriate your resources as he bloody well wishes. Is this what you want for yourself? Your future, your children? If this is not what you want, then don’t vote. Sit-at-home and your vote will be counted as a Referendum, rather than as acquiescence to self-injustice. It was once said that “nobody can discriminate against you without your consent”. The same arguments being canvassed now were deployed exactly 4 years ago to justify the removal of Jonathan but almost everybody is unanimous in their acceptance that things have gotten far more worse than they were in 2015 because the institutions that underpin the electoral process is fraudulent.
6. In apartheid South Africa, the efficacy of boycott found eloquent expression in June 16 1976 Youth uprising in Soweto. South African youths got tired of being taught and instructed in their schools in a language that wasn’t their mother tongue. A language of repression. They extended this Boycott of schools to boycott of elections. Before then, they had been applying soft resistance in their demand to be taught in their mother language, but all their efforts fell on deaf ears. It was only after the June 16, 1976 Soweto uprising that the world joined them in their demands, and the rest is history. Apartheid became history and Nelson Mandela’s 27-year incarceration achieved nothing for the oppressors. Our people must learn to think long term rather than pretending that collecting 5,000 Naira to sell your PVC is passport to happy living. Any day we learn to be more resolute and strategic in our demands, estchewing all forms of temptation to succumb to the needs of the stomach first, we would liberate ourselves from this bondage called Nigeria.
7. Time and again, Boycott, historically has proven to be a necessary tool of both active and passive resistance. I need not mention other nations, which in the recent past, had applied boycott as a means to expressing and achieving their demands for freedom. In my previous broadcasts, I had mentioned some of those nations but suffice to say that in all of those nations the result in the end was victory. Nigeria’s experience with election Boycott in 1964 tells the same story but they have banned History and thus won’t teach you that in schools. Those in Yoruba against me in Nigerian media won’t tell you that Chief Obafemi Awolowo used boycott of elections to achieve his goal in the west. They also won’t tell you that it’s Referendum (called a plebiscite in this case) that brought about the creation of an autonomous Midwest region of Nigeria in 1963, and before then – the unification of the former Sarduana Province of Cameroon (where Atiku came from) with Nigeria, and part of Southeastern Nigeria joined Cameroon. All through a Referendum, and heavens did not fall. It was that referendum in the northeast that enabled Atiku Abubakar to become a Nigeria otherwise he would be a Camerounian today. Why is it that the same process that made it possible for Atiku to become a Nigerian instead of a Camerounian cannot be extended to me as a Biafran?
8.. We must realize that at this point in our struggle and for this boycott, mobilization in all sections and within all nationalities in Biafra must be seen as a major part of our project; and this should involve our professional groups, the academia and our general populace. Our boycott of the presidential election is an indirect Referendum and therefore should be considered a major assignment between now and the night of February, 16th 2019. Nothing can be more powerful than the human spirit; especially when they come together as one in pursuit of the same goals and ideals. We must always keep our eyes focused on the bigger picture not fleeting short term considerations. Africa is mirred in poverty and deprivation today because we are docile and always putting the immediate needs of our stomach first. Any day we realise that almost developed country in the world at one point or the other rose up to be counted and overthrew their corrupt order, not through military coups but by popular uprising of ordinary man and woman, the existing corrupt order in Nigeria will be swept away to pave the way for freedom, human development, end to misery, pain and poverty. My only concern is if our brain is capable of understanding this.
9.. My people, we have the moral and religious obligations to make these sacrifices for our future generation; lest they blame us for our inactions. That we are standing under a shade today is possible only because somebody some time ago planted a tree.
10. If you take the recent experience of Justice Onnoghen and others before him, you will understand that what is unfolding before us today is a grand agenda that is at least 200 years old. It is the grand design of the Caliphate founders, going all the way back to Uthman Dan Fodio. It is a grand design that the gallant heroes of the January 15 1966 Revolutionaries tried to stop. It is a grand design that has been at the centre of the trouble with Nigeria. This is the grand design that confronts us as Biafrans today. This is the grand design that must be defeated for the Black man everywhere on the planet to finally be free because it is true that “in Biafra Africa died” this also means that in Biafra, Africa shall resurrect by the power of Almighty Chukwu Okike Abiam (Nke puru ime ihe nile)!
11. It is no secret that Jubril, a.k.a. Buhari is the arrowhead of the unfolding grand design of the Fulani to dominate the whole of the Sahel region. If anyone is still in doubt as to this design, the recent rally in Kano by Jubril-Buhari that had two serving Fulani governors from Niger Republic attending should clear it up. It has never been about Nigeria but about what the Fulani want. What are the implications of the activities of Jubril-Buhari for the sovereignty of Nigeria (the Zoo)?
12. Yoruba land, as we know, extends into Dahomey in present day Benin Republic, and even to parts of Togo where incidentally they speak Yoruba as a language. Can anyone imagine the angst that would have accompanied the alliance of mainstream Yoruba politicians with their counterparts in Benin Republic and Togo? All hell would practically have been let loose! Ironically segments of the Yoruba media is once again shamefully acquiescing in this situation!
13. Fulani are being allowed to get away with these excesses because they have managed to subdue all Nigerians but not we Biafrans. Nigeria has effectively become a Fulani caliphate before our eyes. The undue influence of Yoruba Muslims in the affairs of Yorubaland will mark the end of them as a great race. They have not learnt from history – the Afonja/Janta-Alimi saga. The Abiola humiliation. Ironically, most people hardly learn from history even though history could easily repeat itself.
14. We know that what the Fulani want (as they have been commanded) is to dip their Koran into the sea. They want to plunder the resources of Biafraland like an invasion force, while enslaving everyone. Having overpowered most of Nigeria and brought them to their heels, Biafraland is the final target they have set their sights on as the only subsisting obstacle to their grand design.
15. They are therefore converging on Biafraland like vultures. The vast hydro-carbon deposits in Biafraland is seen by them as their gift from their great grandfather, Uthman Dan Fodio, and their God. Luckily for them, the so-called South-South political leaders are so naive that their impotency and misguided antagonism towards the Igbo has paved the way for complete caliphate domination of the Bight of Biafra.
16. But everyone must go back to history and learn from it. Historically, the Fulani are enslavers. They had historically enslaved Black people for the benefit of the Arab slave traders. They had also historically raided numerous peace-loving communities and sent them into enslavement in the trans-Atlantic slave trade for Europeans. They are very poised to continue in their old ways till this very day. The Hausa, Yoruba, and several other ethnic groups, who have progressively lost their lands to the Fulani, can all learn from their history if they desire freedom.
17. But freedom flows through the veins of every Biafran from historical times to present times! That is one covenant that we have with the Almighty Chukwu Okike Abiama! That is why it was Biafrans who took it upon themselves to liberate enslaved Africans during the era of slavery in the Americas. That is why you cannot discuss any topic of liberations and attempted liberations during the enslavement of Africans in the Americas without talking about the Biafrans who led these liberation efforts. That is why Haiti could not be free until a Biafran, Dutty Boukman (an Igbo Dibia), led the Haitian Revolution – a revolution that engendered the second independent country in the Western Hemisphere (second only to the United States) in 1804, leading to the eventual independence of the whole Latin America (with Biafran Haitians fighting in all those wars). That Biafrans liberated Haitians and other South Americans was why Haiti recognised Biafra.
18. Remember that, by 1804 the Fulani were enslaving other Black People and also taking over their lands, especially the Hausa. Biafrans at the same period were making sure that wherever Black people were being enslaved, that they were liberated and regained their freedom with dignity. In one sentence, while the Fulani enslaves Black people, Biafrans liberates them. This truism has never changed. In fact, this truism is one of the guiding logics of present-day IPOB self-determination activities.
19. Freedom is the overriding value of Biafrans, culturally and historically. Freedom is what we offer the wonderful men, women, youth and children of Biafra today. Freedom is what we offer the numerous ethnic groups, who are still trapped in the Zoo (called Nigeria) today!
