Aladimma Epistle 2012

Being An Epistle To The Igbo Worldwide By The Igbo Caucus Of The Lower Niger Congress, Republished 28th January 2022

Editor’s comment:

This Aladimma Epistle – a rescue pathway even though addressed at Igbo Nation, also applies to all other indigenous Ethnic Nations of the South and Middle Belt for the problems they each face come from the same source.

It is a complete reproduction of the key Aladimma Epistle which can also be found on the website of the Lower Niger Congress, in the Archives section. I make no apologies for its length. Even though first written nearly ten years ago, the solution for what ails Nigeria is here described, and it is better to read a “long” solution (and take it up), than not to do so, and thereby condemn ourselves to remaining for long, and suffering the problem for long.

Without further ado, here is the information-packed, and hope-giving Aladimma Epistle, which provides a framework for not just Igbo Nation, but all others who seek their inalienable right to Self-Determination, to follow.

ALADIMMA was first published 30 May 2012

By Lower Niger Congress

PREAMBLE

As Nigeria wobbles in the throes of what seems its terminus and as the various federating blocs continue to explore options for their political future, a research-based review of the odyssey of the Igbo in Nigeria from inception to date intended to birth an action plan for societal reconstruction of Ala-Igbo, anchored on the pristine Igbo value system, was discreetly undertaken by a younger generation of Nd’Igbo under the code-name, ALADIMMA, over a 12-year period. That initiative has not only diagnosed the Igbo question correctly but has attracted a considerable mass of adherents with the clarity, commitment, courage and capacity to drive the change process required to completely re-engineer the Igbo society within a reconfigured political structure and though youth-driven, ALADIMMA had the privilege of working with a select few of the older generation including Dim Chukwuemeka-Odumegwu Ojukwu, Chief C.C. Onoh and one other person who is still contributing. The trio gave their all to the Project.

As dictated by the wider constitutional dimensions of the Project, ALADIMMA reached out to other ethnic nationalities, co-suffering with the Igbo in the failed British experiment we call Nigeria such that in blocs of cohesive formations, they are in consensus, working out constitutional arrangements that would peacefully ease out the current imposed constitutional order which is the source of the nightmare Nigeria has become for its peoples, including the Igbo. The ALADIMMA ideal, in time, evolved into an organized movement, quietly coordinating the Igbo arm of the LOWER NIGER CONGRESS (LNC, an initiative to federate the peoples of the former Eastern and Mid-Western Region into a prospective LOWER NIGER FEDERATION in readiness for the inevitable constitutional reconstruction of Nigeria).

BASIS OF INTERVENTION

It is an open secret that the Nigerian war against Biafra did not end in 1970. Battlefields merely shifted to other fronts; post-war asset seizures, targeted infrastructural decay, glass ceiling in public service and remotely-orchestrated electoral heists which enthrone mainly societal renegades in power, all render Igboland the jungle it has become.

For the Igbo, the constitutional regime in place today (the so-called 1999 Constitution), is basically a codification of the terms of conquest by Nigeria and its foreign sponsors, to permanently control the war booty (one-Nigeria) via a carefully choreographed constitutional order in which a contrived political majority, created by imposed states and local government structures, arrogantly preside over the lives and assets of a numerical majority who are now a negligible political minority (the Igbo), with a 68-item Federal Exclusive Legislative List which firmly put in the hands of the contrived political majority, absolute control of the levers of development and governance. The so-called States are mere administrative appendages groveling at feet of an almighty Federal Government, constitutionally forbidden and incapacitated from doing many things including generation and transmission of electricity, internal security (police), railways, ports, highways etc; all the 68 items.

This is the exact opposite of the federal basis upon which Nigeria became one country at independence as each of the then federating units had its own Constitution and developed at its own pace using its own resources and contributing towards the upkeep of the center (Federal Government) for the limited functions jointly delegated to the center. All that changed in 1966 by the military intervention in governance. The negotiated Constitutions that defined Nigeria were sacked and replaced by a series of Decrees culminating in the Decree 24 of 1999 which is now called the ‘’1999 Constitution’’. Nigeria under the current constitutional order thus represent a master-servant reality, worse than the apartheid constitutional order in the then South-Africa.

ALADIMMA REJECTS THAT NIGERIA DEFINED BY THE 1999 CONSTITUTION.

The agitation for a renegotiation of Nigeria through a Sovereign National Conference is met by plain obduracy, typified by Ibrahim Babangida’s doctrine of ‘SETTLED ISSUES’ to rudely remind all the agitators for change in Igboland and the rest of Niger-Delta that the terms of the Nigerian Union were settled in the battlefields of Biafra which claimed over 3.5 million lives. It is like ordering the Igbo and the Niger-Delta to shut up, keep quiet and remain in their enslavement or risk being killed again. This confirms that the current Constitution is the victory charter of Nigeria over the peoples of Eastern Nigeria, legitimizing the confiscation of their sovereign rights and assets. The ACF by an advertorial in the Daily Sun of February 3, declared that “the terms of our Union and those by which the Nigerian Federation are run have been well defined in our Constitution”. ALADIMMA says to ACF: We have not discussed. That unilateral definition will not stand.

In tow, Crown Prince Mohammed Buhari recently proclaimed that if he is not coronated in the 2015 electoral round, blood will flow. This position was promptly supported by the 19 Northern Governors who despite being of the PDP, queued behind the Buhari position, openly ridiculing, intimidating and humiliating President Jonathan. The ACN, which is in open merger talks with Buhari’s CPC also agree with Buhari. The map of that alliance resembles that of Nigeria in August 1967.

In searching for the source of the arrogance displayed by our conquerors, ALADIMMA’s probe into the past led it to the Mission Statement and Battle Script of Sir Ahmadu Bello to his lieutenants in the North, one week after Independence in October, 1960 where, in celebration of a different kind, he declared to them that:

“The new nation called Nigeria should be an estate of our great-grandfather, Uthman Dan Fodio. We must ruthlessly prevent a change of power. We use the minorities of the North as willing tools and the South as a conquered territory and never allow them to rule over us, and never allow them to have control over their future.” Parrot Newspaper, 12th Oct 1960.

The reason for the Sardauna’s celebration was laid bare by the recently declassified official records of the British Colonial enterprise in Nigeria, containing evidence of the massive manipulations by which the British created a political majority from a phantom numerical majority, permanently enslaving Southern Nigeria by constitutional gerrymandering. In all, what the British did in 1960 was to cleverly transfer the suzerainty (the right of a country to rule over another country), which it had enjoyed over the territory, Nigeria, for over a century to a favoured local agent, the Fulani, packaging same as independence. Thus, while the rest of Nigeria celebrated what they thought was the full restoration of their sovereignty, the truth was that they had merely transited from external to internal colonialism, Animal Farm style! The attempt by Biafra to get truly independent saw the British leading their local agents to ruthlessly crush the attempt. The Ogoni, Ijaw, and the Yoruba have each tasted of this ruthlessness. We hold nothing against Britain as they merely did what was then in vogue.

The 1999 Constitution, which represents the full implementation of the 1960 Sardauna’s feudal Battle Script today, vests that same suzerainty in the ruling class in Nigeria while the sovereignty of the peoples remain banished in chains. That is why the political office holders are not accountable to the people just like the white minority of South Africa were not accountable to the oppressed black owners of the land, and until we dismantle the apartheid-like 1999 Constitution, we will remain slaves while the politicians who rape the land barren are legally put beyond reach for sanction by absolute immunity. We cannot have democracy under such a Constitution just as was the case in apartheid era South Africa since no matter how ‘free and fair’ elections may be, the fraudulent ownership and control structures in the Constitution already substantially exclude the Igbo masses and those of the Niger-Delta, even if one of their own gets to the seat of power.

It is evident that by the deliberate sustained actions and manipulations of those who do not wish us well, spanning many decades, Igboland is today desolate; bereft of basic infrastructure; saddled with a polluted value system in which Nigeria rewards the very abominations Nd’Igbo abhor; a compromised security situation in which kidnapping which carried capital punishment in traditional Igbo society has been planted and nurtured into a booming business in Igboland since the first case in which a sitting Governor Ngige was kidnapped by a serving Assistant Inspector General of Police, Raphael Ige. The list is endless and only a lunatic of an investor will prefer to head East. All these were a continuation of the war on the East.

Still digging into the past, ALADIMMA’s findings on the suspicion-ridden relationship between the Igbo and our Niger-Delta brothers show that the bad blood which our joint tormentors had capitalized on all these years to divide and rule us from afar, did not start with the civil war. We must recall that after victories in Regional elections a decade before the war, having been ousted by Awolowo from becoming the first Premier of the Western Region in the famous carpet crossing saga, Azikiwe went to the East and ousted Eyo Ita, an Eastern minority element who led the party to victory and who ought to have been the first Premier of Eastern Region. The bitterness engendered by that single stroke of political injustice was at the root of the attitude of the Eastern minorities (today’s Niger-Delta) in the bloody disputes of 1966-7 which became war. This bad blood was the biggest undoing of Biafra when it mattered most, but the first blame must rest squarely on Azikiwe and his henchmen who triggered it all. We still live with the retaliations to date at great costs in blood and material.

ALADIMMA hereby apologizes on behalf of our fathers to the peoples of the Niger-Delta for that wrongdoing that ruined the brotherly relationship we had from time immemorial and which was the reason Eyo Ita could be Leader of a Party that won elections in the then Eastern Region. ALADIMMA notes that even in the face of the unfortunate situation, a great number of gallant combatants from the Niger-Delta fought on the side of Biafra with all their might to the bitter end. They were killed in great numbers before and during the war. Families were divided to the point of fatality on the question of support for Biafra. The Asaba massacre by Murtala Mohammed troops stand tall in infamy in human history. It was not by accident that General Phillip Effiong was the second-in-command to Ojukwu who had the onerous task of surrendering in January 1970 to end the genocide. We also ask the Igbo who suffered terribly from what they considered the treachery of the Niger-Delta to forgive the past even for the sake of those who stood by us to the point of death and for our future.

On a happy note, ALADIMMA can proudly report that a younger generation of the Niger-Delta reviewed the entire history and have since resumed the full depth of unconditional brotherhood we had before ‘Nigeria’ intervened in the 1950’s. Some evidence of this can be found in the advertorials taken out by an organization by name NIGER-DELTA OCCUPY NIGER-DELTA RESOURCE in January in which the Convener, Ann Kio Briggs, called on the peoples of Niger-Delta to come home and join hands with the Igbo in ‘’strength, justice, brotherhood and truth, to face the obvious change that will come to Nigeria’’, since Nigerian conquerors had rejected one of their own, Goodluck Jonathan, as President. (Vanguard, January. 15th, 2012). The zealous Niger Delta participation in the burial of Ojukwu also shocked those who thought they had succeeded in dividing the Igbo and their Niger-Delta brothers. ALADIMMA and LNC have worked out a novel design to finally inter the ghost of ‘’abandoned property’’ in a manner that monetize outstanding interests whilst preserving existing titles.

IN RESPONSE TO NIGERIA’S CONTINUING AGGRESSION, ALADIMMA in cooperation with other forces of liberty, devised a 5-phased plan to dismantle and ease out the evil feudal constitutional order. The first 3 phases involved working out an alternative, building a consensus around that alternative by way of an informal referendum and the formal legal incapacitation of the 1999 Constitution. All these have been done by way of the PRONACO initiative which outcome comprehensively revalidated the ABURI ACCORD model by the Ethnic Nationalities at a Sovereign meeting (2005-2006), as the minimum condition for continuing in the Nigerian Union, failing which exit options will be explored.

The MOVEMENT FOR NEW NIGERIA (MNN) which is the implementation phase of the PRONACO outcome has carried out a successful countrywide informal referendum and in May 2007 launched the winding-up Suit against the 1999 Constitution on the ground of self-evident fraud, with Antony Enahoro, C.C Onoh, Dim Chukuemeka-Odumegwu Ojuwku, Bishop Bolanle Gbonigi, Prince Tanimose Bankole-Oki, Ralph Uwaruruike and Dokubo Asari as some of the Plaintiffs. To date, Nigeria has no answer to this fatal challenge on the sole legal instrument holding the Union together, and so the entrapped ethnic nationalities are at liberty to retrieve their sovereignties on their own terms, within or outside the Nigerian Union.

The 4th phase commenced June 30th, 2011 with the MNN Declaration which followed the post-election violent rejection of the same 1999 Constitution and democracy by Boko Haram at a time the 12 Northern-most States of Nigeria had adopted Sharia since year 2000 which is tantamount to opting out of the Nigerian Union. ALADIMMA posits that it is now practically impossible to retain Nigeria as one political Union since nobody can force those 12 States to abandon Sharia to embrace democracy/constitutionalism nor can anyone force the rest of Nigeria to embrace Sharia and abandon democracy/constitutionalism. The two are mutually exclusive and this leaves everybody with only one option: to accept that the Nigerian Union has collapsed and allow the peaceful exit of cohesive Units who, thereafter, work out new relationships.

By the infinite mercies of God, since that sole title-deed by which our sovereignty is detained by Nigeria, (the 1999 Constitution), has been exposed as a forgery and a fraud in court, (to the extent that Abdusalam Abubakar made it and lied that ‘ we the people’ did), and since the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples (UNDRIP), invest us (the ethnic nationalities) with an inalienable right to self-determination, ALADIMMA, working with its Project Partners, particularly, the LOWER NIGER CONGRESS, will within the said UN instrument, vigorously pursue the retrieval of our sovereign rights over our geo-space, in rejection of further perpetuation of fraud therein in the name of Nigeria.

Furthermore, in the aftermath of Ojukwu’s momentous exit, everybody confessed that Ojukwu was right in the bloody debates of 1966-1970, thus acknowledging both ABURI and BIAFRA as appropriate and legitimate responses. ALADIMMA now asks: if Ojukwu was right, is it right to keep Nigeria the unitary way we wrong-headedly and ruinously kept it all these 45 years? Having embraced the truth, is it not time to act on it by reworking the Union in a manner that restores the hijacked autonomies of the entrapped nations: either ABURI model (confederation) or ARABA (full independence for units).

In this cross-roads situation, the question on every lip was: where does the Igbo go from here? Even our enemies, as if in pity for a group of orphaned children, joined in asking this question which roughly translates to, ‘’where will these directionless Igbo go and who will lead them’’ since Ojukwu’s demise dramatically exposed a long-standing leadership vacuum in Igboland? In seeking credible answers, the first step will, of course, be to define what Igbo interests are in the Nigeria of today. The next will be to draw up an agenda and road-map to pursue those interests; the last would then be the question of who and who will lead the charge. The replacement for Ojukwu cannot be by clownish buffoonery.

It is in the light of the foregoing that ALADIMMA today steps forward to lead the task of total societal reconstruction of Igboland on the basis of the core Igbo value system which place truth above falsehood at all times; which place excellence above mediocrity; which reward hard-work and punish laziness, and which place merit above pedigree. We shall restore the traditional Igbo sanction system, to curtail the excesses of those who have become stronger than oha (the people).

In stepping forward at this time, ALADIMMA has substantially concluded its consultations with all segments of the Igbo society at home and abroad, particularly the grass-root populations, regarding what the strategic Igbo pursuit should be at this time in Nigeria - between going for Presidential power in 2015 and seeking to end the constitutional enslavement of the Igbo in Nigeria. An overwhelming majority of our people are in favour of the latter i.e going for liberty and not power under the current Constitution, and ALADIMMA intends to the lead them in that path.

If we go for power and miraculously succeed (the chances are simply nil as things stand), no doubt, a few people will make billions, probably in dollars, but the constitutional framework which enslave the Igbo will remain intact to enslave the rest of us, our children and grandchildren. While if we go for liberty and succeed (and success is now guaranteed in the face the aforesaid UN instrument and Nigeria’s dying 1999 Constitution), we immediately throw off the yoke of enslavement which has been around our necks for over a century, to our eternal benefit.

ACCORDINGLY, WE DECLARE THAT:

I)                    The best interest of the Igbo in the Nigeria of today lies in pursuing the constitutional unshackling of its people and not in pursuing the Presidency of Nigeria under the present Constitution nor will the creation of one more lame state alter the overall equation of our gross marginalization.

II)                  ALADIMMA completely agrees with the assertion of President Jonathan in Udi recently that the problems of Nigeria flow from its very foundations in 1914 and the manipulations around 1960 and that the solution to the intractable problems must be for us to go and find out what went wrong in those periods. ALADIMMA and its Change Partners have done just that. It is left for Government and other stakeholders to embrace the result.

III)                 ALADIMMA will in conjunction with its Change Partners, mobilize the Igbo and others who feel the same way to demonstrate their rejection of the current enslaving, feudal constitutional order by declining any further participation in elections conducted under the evil 1999 Constitution starting with the one of 2015.

IV)                To avoid anarchy, ALADIMMA prescribes that all those in power at all levels in the three arms of government should remain in office until the transition to a new constitutional order is completed, just like South Africa did when it had to transit away from the apartheid Constitution between 1990 and 1994.

V)                  Any Igbo son or daughter who decides to pursue public office under the current Constitution will by that act present himself or herself as an enemy of the people and will attract communal frown and sanction.

VI)                A 90-day window from the date of this publication will be open to extend consultations to those who may for one reason or the other, not have been reached so far and we invite such persons or groups to contact us. Sanctions will not commence until after that period.

ALADIMMA is guided by the example of Nelson Mandela and his compatriots, who, confronted with a similar evil, were honest enough to tell the blacks of apartheid era South Africa that their misery did not flow from people in power per se, but from the apartheid order which took their lands and rights away. They, by action, refused to validate it any further.

For the men of God in the land who constantly recommend prayers as the solution to the Nigeria that stands on the foundation of injustice and gross inequity, ALADIMMA wishes to point you to Bishop Desmond Tutu of South Africa, who faced with a similar evil, stood on the side of truth and fought side-by-side with the oppressed peoples of South Africa until the evil Constitution of apartheid was overcome. We have a Constitution that lied that we the people enacted our damnation; instead of joining hands with the peoples to uproot evil, many of us join hand with Gowon and the rest of the criminal band with much blood in their hands to pray for Nigeria that has become a criminal enterprise, whose Constitution creates and protects monumental corruption. As poverty and misery grind your flock, the masses to death, a choice has to be made now: to side with the truth or falsehood. Yes, we must pray but let us also declare the truth concerning Nigeria now.

Same goes for the lawyers in the land who clutch that evil Constitution and fail to tell the politicians the truth. Woe unto those doing this for when the crash comes, the blood of the innocent will be on the heads of those who helped conceal the truth. Mandela was an honest lawyer who chose to use his knowledge of the law to free his people. What are our lawyers doing?

In closing, we wish to commend the efforts of OHANEZE NDIGBO for holding the fort in the sociocultural arena. ALADIMMA steps in today to do the difficult non-partisan political bit. We also commend the sacrificial, pioneering efforts of MASSOB and its leader, Chief Ralph Uwazuruike in the quest for self-redemption. As Chief Uwazuruike steps into other roles beyond MASSOB, ALADIMMA notes that injuries may have been inflicted in course of the uncharted route of a liberation struggle such as theirs but we plead with all to forgive any such injuries as a sacrificial contribution for freedom. We also urge the MASSOB foot-soldiers to take advantage of the United Nations instrument legitimizing self-determination to reconstruct their struggle and halt further casualties in pursuing what is now the legitimate right of indigenous peoples everywhere in the world. Kosovo has moved from Serbia, South Sudan from Sudan, Scotland is awaiting a referendum to leave the UK.

With the experiences of the past and in readiness for the fall-outs of the impending change, ALADIMMA has worked out with LNC an offshore-based ASSET PROTECTION AND GUARANTEE SCHEME to ensure that Igbo assets and those of the rest of the LOWER NIGER will not be lost by the owners (at least in value), on account of any changes in Nigeria. Information on the modalities for inventory and other steps will be made public in the coming days.

ALADIMMA requests all Igbo groups, organizations and individuals who agree with our position on the Igbo priority to please speak up as quickly as possible so that we can demonstrate the majority support which our consultations showed. Phone calls, e-mails and visits to our website are platforms to register support for, or engage with our position. Persons and organizations interested in joining the movement or supporting it otherwise can do so online at:

 www.lowernigercongress.org

LONG LIVE NDIGBO WORLDWIDE! LONG LIVE THE PEOPLES OF THE LOWER NIGER!

Signed for and on behalf of the ALADIMMA Board of Custodians this 30th day of May, 2012:

TONY NNADI

NNAMDI OHIAGU

Editor’s note:

For updates on where things are now you can contact LNC on +234 810 056 9448. Also, please visit the LNC website mentioned in the Aladimma Epistle, and the NINAS Movement website at:

www.ninasvoice.org

(Edited by Ndidi Uwechue)