The trouble with Igbo

I'm very sure that I can't speak for everybody but I know that the trouble with Igbo is treachery. I feel this treachery in every aspect of our existence, from the native, natural to supernatural. The Igbo feel that they are at war with themselves, the world and the cosmos. If he washed his clothes and it rained, his neighbour and/or enemy must be responsible for his ill luck. The Igbo must look beyond superimposing his reality in order to achieve peace.

How could a people survive when they are at home with everything that ridicules their own language? Nowadays, it's hip for Igbo students in secondary schools to skip taking the subject in the West African Examination Council supervised SSCE. In fact, many a student would celebrate earning a D7, E8 or F9 or better going off on a vacation rather earn a credit pass in the subject. Who cares? Is it not just Igbo? Or mere Igbo? I don't blame them. Who needs Igbo in order to become president of Nigeria, or a doctor or barrister? Abeg leave that matter for Matthias.

When it comes to examination malpractice, you know: every subject is cleared as passed. Alas! We have brilliant students who travel abroad but don't measure up to such lofty ideals. Perhaps it's the trouble with Nigeria, here, not just Ndigbo. It may just be that it's a unique strategy that yet yields its usefulness: killing you in order to acquire a new and special identity. We will one day find Igbo non-existent. Our sojourn in the north or west has left us mostly Hausa or Yoruba, respectively. And those who have not aligned with either tribe, we call the trouble with Igbo.

What's this menace called 'ministry', which has gained traction in Igboland even beyond Nigeria? People are stalked for other people's personal gain. Family has become 'informant' to outside forces who pride themselves on being close to 'the source.' Haba! Is this a good use of our identity and ability? I hate 'ekpere.' In fact, it's spying, full stop. I'm aware that it's prided as being the difference between success and failure. A great constant to every constant. People consult 'prayer warriors' before making serious decisions including marriage, career, contract, or any other personal issue. We trade secrets like it's now commonplace to know your neighbour's penis size. Is it by force to be in the know of other people's personal affairs? Gosh! It's safe to realize that the grapevine hold great secrets to the ongoing issues in a company, but should you know how much everybody in the company earned, and his/her spouses earned too? How much 'ministry' is gossip and how much is useful information? If the Ministry of Information is moving underground, we should know, please.

I don't how much Igbo is Anambra, but I find their exerting influence on other parts of Igboland unsettling. They are pushing their dialect as the go-to language of Igboland. In the future, he who used to be called 'nwa onye Igbo' will no longer be called Igbo. I don't want to bother with who's the real Igbo or what makes anybody the bona fide thief who should steal the other's identity. But as much of Aba (and perhaps other parts of Igbo land) has onye ekpere, we will one day lose our houses to 'onye ekpere.' This is mind bending, if not witch hunting, this ekpere fad.

I knew that a few of my schoolmates 'ekpere' since as far as nearly two decades ago. Many of them have attained societal successes in marriage, career and social migration. These have been achieved with manipulations, cunning and dubious means justified as 'ministry.' Just like that. There may have been deaths too because the prayer warrior decreed so. Who's this prayer warrior? He or she is anybody but plainly they are a network of idlers often self employed who live by their cell phones nowadays. Many have churches where congregations gather to bring information and goodies. I don't think that everyone of them is financially buoyant. Is this the new 'dibia anya nzu', the witch doctor? Look in, many of those ministers have had a native doctor in their family history.

The trouble with Igbo is that we cooperate a lot with evil. We are easily lured to sell us short and of course to sell others out. If we didn't sell slaves, I'd have shuddered at the height of imported treachery in this land. Nay! It's home grown, we are TRAITORS. We love and look to cause pain, to do harm. We are shameless prostitutes who judge others by our own standards who think others should live to our shoddy ideals. If you are hell- bound should your family come too?

Over a decade ago, I observed the NYSC with an Igbo woman, a graduate of UNN, who despite being over 30 years old and a mother of a 22 year old woman then, came to do her own 'corper.' Na husband she find come, I don't know. Whether na toto, she come lick, na she know. It was regrettable that she thought that it was her right as a Nigerian graduate to serve her fatherland leaving children behind. She was a total disappointment and a ridicule to service, especially since some of my coursemates at the University of Ibadan couldn't do the NYSC due to incessant ASUU industrial actions. I didn't want to suffer the fate of the whistle blower, I chose to mind my own business. To me, the corps was a set up with weird people, whom I now term prostitutes some of whom mightn't have been genuine graduates.

If these Igbo women had a problem with Nigeria, why make a mess of my experience just to score a cheap point? If Nigeria had to do an experiment why with mad and recalcitrant women? The trouble with Igbo is that they think money solves all problems. It solves a lot but not all. The military (Air Force here) provided a cover for these prostitutes, use them to impersonate me and cause trouble till date. Perhaps the military should rid itself of bad eggs who use female corps members to run a prostitution ring. Perhaps we should lift the age ban on NYSC to let everybody do service. Or not limit it to graduates of higher education. Whatever suits the greedy Igbo mind.

I shouldn't think the Igbo are the only trouble with you. Chinua Achebe doesn't think so in The Trouble with Nigeria. However, he does write about The Igbo Problem. We have a problem. Yesterday, it was slavery, corruption, civil war and the like. Today, it's ministry and people's rights to make a nuisance of poverty and privacy. It takes nothing to be born again even in the courts of affidavit. You are a problem in your own family if you don't change your own age. You become the elder of your older siblings who have multiple identities and age brackets. My NYSC room mate is probably in civil service, my junior by age. What is this Ndigbo, corruption or madness?

It's easy to think the Nigerian civil war is an ethnic war. It may have been a war of ego between military officers over prostitutes. You don't drag nations in the mud of personal vendetta. Whatever personal or career ambitions of military officers should remain in the barracks. Dragging 'bloody civilians' into it is a far cry from patriotism. Leave me alone! The trouble with Igbo is that they are willing traitors, subjecting themselves to blackmail and treachery for personal aggrandizement.

It was Ojukwu vs Gowon. It could someday become some Igbo vs Another Nigerian. And do we suffer victimhood equally and fairly? I don't believe in this Nigeria. I don't believe the NYSC is for national unity. I believe in a nation where there are no tribal extremisms and there are true nationalists not mere popular minions wanting power. NYSC serves Hausa and Yoruba tribal interests. An NYSC mate/colleague of mine was a visiting corper who was driven on and off the compound. To his credit, the school commandant had asked my weird group to leave but we begged to remain and serve with him.

Someday, NYSC will become voluntary so that we would quit our 'ashewo for food' life in the pretence of serving a fatherland. I'm not even excited for the future if the Igbo will remain this easily lured to treachery. If the children now make a mockery of their language, soon we will become ashamed of being called the ridiculous name - Igbo. What a successful project of ridding Nigeria of the Igbo problem by the Igbo.