By Madu Bright Alwell

In my life I have always had a fond spot in my heart for the truth. Quite often, though the best points in my life come to me suddenly in the middle of the night.

Over the course of my life, my views have often clashed with those who peddle injustice, hate and trade in falsehood and bear false witnesses.

While I did not contribute to the independence struggle of the previous generations, no one understands my pain and conflict the genocidal civil war brought upon my family and collectively the Ndigbo ethnic origin.

I had always expected a collective conscientious argument about relevance and reintegration of the Igbo but it has been something quite different. A collective silence and plot against the Igbo at the detriment of other tribes at whatever cost to them, only to speak up when and eventually the injurious order are punted their ways and regions.

The actions of some men of the northern extraction– the Gowon’s, Buhari’s, Jerry Useni’s, Yakkasi, Ango Abdullahi and Junaid Muhammed’s has always troubled me. There are many fine men and women in the north and I admire them. Some of these men, most especially, Mr. President, Muhammadu Buhari seems to bear an inherent and deep-seated hatred of the Igbo. This class of characters and actors is the living embodiment of the social evil against which I had struggled for so much against in my career.

These men exhibit a total lack of fidelity to the truth, justice, fairness and the common good.  They contaminate good deeds that bind us all together as decent human beings. These men and many engage in high conspiratorial feints against common decency man owes to one another. A typical example is Mr. Buhari alleging in a unilateral dim version of an “alleged meeting with the late Ikemba in Katsina” and most recently Gowon’s naked lie on who caused the civil war.

Silence doesn’t frighten me. A believer knows that silence is not an absence, but a presence – a cloud out of which, since time immemorial, God has spoken to those who will listen.

We must discuss the reasonable issues to unite Nigeria and move her forward and I believe that in a composite nation, unlike ours as before the law, there should be no rich, no poor, no high, no low, no vanquished, no victor, no Igbo, no Yoruba, no Hausa but a common country, a common citizenship with equal rights and a common destiny.

Unfortunately, this is not the case in Nigeria. It is rather a naive belief. This is a case and cause for courageous citizens to speak up against the exclusion, maltreatment, inequality and depraving injustice meted against my ethnic clan – the eloquent and industrious Igbo.

Every action and inaction of this current APC regime and Mr. Buhari against Ndigbo can be described as contemptuously distrustful, and their alleged ‘good intentions’ towards Ndigbo can only be summed up as speculative, cynical and of brazen propaganda.

The actions and inactions of Mr. Buhari do not make any sense to me. His misdeeds go far beyond 2015 to present because of his past intolerance and hatred of Ndigbo.

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There is something about good versus evil. There is something about truth – that truth crushed to death will rise again. You can always count on that. Buhari is the man that says he would ensure fairness to Ndigbo. He is the same one, upon his return from his taxpayers funded medical jamboree England ordered the army into the peaceful South East and the army slaughtered defenseless IPOB members and citizens who were not even members.  He is the man that has excluded Ndigbo in all prominent appointments. He’s the man that ordered the troops to kill defenseless Ndigbo’s in Anambra, Aba, Isiala Ngwa Junction and Umuahia because as the Commander in Chief, he ordered the troops to lay siege to Ndigbo.

This man Buhari cannot and should never be trusted by the Ndigbo nation. He was a chief participant of the bloody slaughter during the Civil War. He is a guardian of division and suppression of Ndigbo and no northerner at the helm of Nigeria leadership has ever dealt from the bottom of hate deck towards Ndigbo as the man, Mr. Buhari.

While I am not attempting to trivialize the holocaust, but Buhari’s actions against Ndigbo is comparable to crimes like the Third Reich and the apartheid. I have been to Yad Vashen, no one goes away from that unchanged.

We are now witnesses to the attempted conspiracy to intimidate our beloved senator, Ennyinaya Abaribe.  We were witnesses to the prolonged attempted and unsuccessful civilian coup in Abia State against Dr. Okezie Ikpeazu, the governor. We also have seen the withdrawal of the security personnel of the Anambra governor, Mr. Willie Obiano. We, Ndigbo must unite under a common cause and choose a young, competent and visionary leader birthed in a clear sense of direction before 2023, that should be a man that has empathy for his fellow citizens.

This means we must assist young courageous men in a clear birthed sense of direction to emerge in the affairs of governance in Igbo land.

We must ensure transparency in electing new generation of Igbo leaders, there will only be justice in Nigeria and Igbo land when those who are not injured are as outraged as those who are.

One of the key common components of Christ’s teachings is the insistence that all good men owe each other a duty of good conversation by which we do to others as we would like to be done unto us. It is a duty of us all willingly coming together regularly to discuss mutual interests and to ensure that our fellow citizens live out the rest of their lives like we all wish,  as no one stays permanently on this earth- we all must render an account of our deeds to our Maker one day.

Finally, while I must admit my affinity for the candidate of my party- the PDP I must concede that I do not have any horse in the Anambra gubernatorial race and I wish all the candidates the best.

I must use this opportunity to appeal to all our brothers and sisters in IPOB to come out and vote. When we vote, our voices are heard.

I believe in a restructured United Nigeria. I must also use the opportunity to task all governors of the South East to collaborate to ensure development in our region and most especially with my dear Governor Ikpeazu in rebuilding Aba, once the industrial and business hub of the South East. He continues to do well and I do not have any doubt in his ability to elevate Abia and Aba to the highest heights.

Alwell, lawyer and politician is President, Allegiance Council For Higher Heights and wrote in from Abia State.