TO ALL BIAFRANS,

All Biafrans who are alive today owe the life they are living to these great unsung heroes of the Biafran War years. Biafra’s War veterans are the greatest source of pride, dignity and inspiration to all Biafrans alive today; they are literally live-givers. They are the reason that any Biafran is still living today. So, all living
Biafrans anywhere today owe them their very existence and will always remain grateful.

Biafra War was a Nigerian project; to cleanse itself of all traces of every Biafran.

Looking back on the War years certain battles are considered as very remarkable and are supposed to remain in the collective memory of all Biafrans for all time. One of those battles was the Abagana Battle. It can almost be regarded singularly as the battle for the very soul of Biafra.

Incidentally it is the villain of the battle that can easily be associated with the Abagana Battle, Murtala Mohammed. He was the debased sadist who led the Nigerian troop to that battlefront. On the Biafran side there was no singular person to be associated with that battlefront because it was considered by Biafrans as a decisive battle that must be won. And win they did because Biafra’s military commanders in various fronts saw to it that the victory happened for Biafra. They sent re-enforcements as they became necessary and did not spare anything until they defeated the enemy.

The reason for this display of solidarity by the rest of Biafran military commanders was the contents of the miles and miles longs of eighteen-wheeler trucks and petrol tankers that the sadist monster Murtala Mohammed had loaded in those trucks and tankers. They contained horsewhips, hundreds of thousands of gallons of petrol and every kind of torture equipment and instruments. They were headed for Biafra’s hinterland. Murtala’s intention was that since he was sure of victory, he would then employ those torture instruments on the conquered Biafrans. The plan was to kill off every adult male and female in Biafra starting from the age of seven and up and with the petrol burn every town and village in Biafra. The tons and tons of horsewhips were to be used to flog and control the very young children that would be spared. The sinister plan had leaked out to Biafra, on purpose, to strike fear into the heart of Biafran civilians, hence the rallying of the
various Biafran troops to Abagana to help stop the dastard plot.

One of the details of the plan among others was to kill off all the adults and send the very young children to foster homes and completely wipe away every trace of Biafra’s languages and culture. Nigeria’s hatred of Biafrans ran and still runs that deep. An officer in Nigeria’s army Benjamin Adekunle put it in a very graphic language when he told the German journalist, Randolph Baumann of Stern Magazine in the now infamous interview of August 18, 1968 that in Biafra they (Nigerians) shot at everything that moved and everything that did not move.

Nigeria’s genocidal program on Biafra was and still is indiscriminate and total. They never made any secret about it. The man Olusegun Obasanjo who was an officer in Nigeria’s army never hid his absolute hatred for Biafrans and his rabid intention of wiping them out. He has consistently carried out campaigns to drive home what he means ever since. Take the case of Odi and Odiama of 1999 and the Onitsha raids and killings as recent examples.

It is important to remind everyone who is alive today as a Biafran that whatever he or she is today is only because some people gave their lives, their wealth, their limbs and other body parts and comforts to make it possible for him or her. And for every act of kindness there ought to be a corresponding show of gratitude by the beneficiaries. This is true even in the lower animal world.

What we are saying in this place is that the gratitude that the survivors of Nigeria’s Genocide on Biafra owe Biafran veter