My name is Ijeoma M. Njoku and I live at Aba, Abia State of Nigeria. Last week, I saw what appeared to be the dead body of a man lying on the road by Bata bus stop here at Aba. I wasn't sure whether he was dead. The man opposite my room at the lodge where I live hasn't been home in a few days. Last night, I saw another man in the company of two women enter his bedroom. I did not return their greetings as I found it queer that strangers would be entering my neighbour's bedroom in his absence. The rooms are self contain. We live in a 36 single room building and due to strange happenings in the yard I decided to keep my distance from my 'neighbours.' Honestly, I didn't know the young man quite well. We might have exchanged greetings once or twice beyond which I gave him and others a long distance. I didn't know what he did for a living. I heard other tenants call him Mr Sylvester. I don't understand these strange things and I hope there's no relationship between this possibly missing neighbour and the event of last week. What's our duty when we find an accident victim on the roadside? What does the law say? What do citizens know about their responsibility towards each other? As I pondered on these questions last weekend, I thought of Dim Chukwuemeka Odumegwu-Ojukwu's book, Because I Am Involved. I had meant to write a commentary on the book but I hadn't brought myself to doing so earlier. What's the connection here? Let me start with the poem from which the title of the book emerged:
No man is an island, entire of itself;
Everyman is a piece of the continent, part of the main;
If a clod be washed away by the sea, Europe (or Africa) is the less;
As well as if a promontary were,
As well as if a manor of thy friends or of thine own were;
Any man's death diminishes me, because I am involved in Mankind
And therefore never send to know for whom the bell tolls;
It tolls for thee.
I had bought Chinua Achebe's There Was A Country in 2012, and after reading his "personal history on Biafra," I decided to read other texts on the topic. Naturally, I have lived the realities of being Igbo, "the rebel" who had wanted to secede from Nigeria having been born into an Igbo home. This non fiction from Achebe was my first encounter with a personal story on the Nigerian-Biafran war told by a public figure and writer. I had read Chief Arthur Nwankwo's story on a similar topic some years ago. But none had struck me with great detail for nuances like Achebe's encounters of the war. Anyway, that same year I bought Ojukwu's Because I Am Involved and Obasanjo's My Command. For several years to come, I could not bring myself to read either book. However, barely a little over a year ago, I decided on Ojukwu's book. It was quite an ordeal to read the book. I have struggled with emotional and financial distresses in recent time that reading books has become a torturous punishment that I would give to myself. I lacked concentration, will and zeal to pursue my ideals and read new literature. Oyinbo would call this clinical depression. I termed them the blues. Mine in the last few years has been a life poised to overcome obstacles one day at a time.
Eventually, I dragged through Because I Am Involved, moribund as I was. I wasn't particularly counting the days but it must have been a year since I began to read this book till completion earlier this month. My laziness had nothing to do with the lackluster or disenchantment of reading a boring piece of literature. To the contrary, I was majorly buoyed down by the lack of learning that I have come to associate with Nigerians because what was preached in 1989 (when the author first published his book) was topical in 2018. Haba! I had to rouse myself from many days, weeks, and even months of depression to pick up the book each time. I am, however, glad that I developed a critical mind to my assimilation of the contents of this masterpiece. I became a neurotic somnambulist, engaging myself on debates on many a debate on why Ojukwu said this or that. Who did he think he was to be so open about his distaste with the state of Nigeria? Who did he think he was? Did he jinx us? Haba! I had to check quite often to the publication and revision dates to decide if I was actually reading a book or a national daily. Despite my fatigue in completing my reading, I made notes on arguments and lessons I had gleaned from it. For anybody interested in an academic piece, I apologize forefront. I have been in a scholastic comatose, so to speak for nearly a decade. My brain is borrowed from the universe. In fact, I have no idea whose brain I have been using since 2011 when I had abandoned the USA to return home to entropy. But if you are merely interested in honesty and simplicity without acute use of theories, then read on: I shall not call this a book review either. Lord! That would be a Herculean task to do. I can't honestly do a book review now. I have been out of the loop of things for nearly a decade just like that. What I have kept sacred though is my love of learning. I love learning. I don't always do much with my learning but don't always trust that you know what I know. I shall write these notes and lessons according to the writer's order of arrangement in the book; introduction, parts and chapters. I shall not be repeating much of what has been said but I think that direct quotes are essential. Hence, to fully follow me you need a copy of Because I Am Involved to read for yourself where have made notes or learned a lesson or two.
Introduction: Unto the breach dear friends
Ojukwu called this book a compilation of his public utterances since his return to Nigeria from a thirteen year exile in Cote d'Ivoire. Public utterances? That is important to note. Laugh out loud...haha. Like my infamous tweets on Twitter @njoku_ije?
Note: Public utterances are important. Save them because Ojukwu notes that language of public utterances might change but the substance must not change. At least he wants the readers to see his that way.
Ojukwu urged for a "conscious diffusion of ethnicity as the true beginning of nation-building." BIAI pg. ix. He also urged true unity as an alternative to war and that a confederal structure would barely hold the union together. I understood this to mean that confederation would weaken the state and defy its unity of purpose.
Ojukwu burnt his British passport as a symbol of patriotism in 1960. Did he regret it many years afterwards especially before and after the Nigerian civil war? Like Professor Wole Soyinka threatened to (and probably did) tear up his US green card over the ascension of Trump as the president of that country? Are our leaders wont to make personal decisions in haste? Do they regret such? For Ojukwu, did his birth of twins in London signify patriotism? Would his act have consequences for their own British citizenship? These are of course personal questions but they have community significance.
To be continued....
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