The discussion going on in this forum about genocide against the Igbo in Biafra has never been held by the leftwing nor by the rightwing of the Cockroach despite calls from the likes of Soyinka, Ekwe-Ekwe, Achebe, Nzimiro, Madunagu, and scores of foreign writers. There is no other society in which 3.1 million people would be killed in 30 months of state-sponsored mass violence without thorough historical debates by intellectuals to take positionds beyond academic exercises around definitions and the clarification of concepts. When murderous African intellectuals mention Biafra and the genocide against the Igbo, it is often to deny that it took place, or to suggest that the Igbo asked for it, or to warn that such a discussion is against national interests. No one has boldly claimed that genocide is a good thing that should be visited on his or her own national group.
In the summer of 2013, five political parties from Nigeria held a town hall meeting in London. A presidential aspirant from one of the parties asked the audience to identify the major problems facing Nigeria and the possible solutions. One problem identified was that Nigeria killed 3.1 million Igbo people during the 30 months of the Nigeria-Biafra conflict but that the state and the politicians have not expressed any apology or offered any atonement to the survivors. Was any of the political parties present ready to commit to offer such a national apology and offer reparative justice to the survivors if elected into office?
Incredibly, a governor who was representing his party at the town hall while aspiring to run for the presidency answered that the killing of the Igbo was in retaliation for the killing of the leaders of other regions by military officers of Igbo descent during the January 1966 coup. He went on to say that other military coups by military officers have killed or overthrown leaders from other regions and yet no genocide has been visited against their ethnic groups as retaliation. He concluded that the Igbo had been punished enough for their foolishness but he did not offer any apology or promise any atonement to be offered to the survivors should he be elected president.
The main problem with this ideological support for genocidism is that it is widespread among literate elites in Nigeria. So long as the elites try to justify the unjustifiable killing of 3.1 million innocent Nigerians because of their ethnicity, for so long would the conscience of Nigerians be brutalized to the extent that mass violence would be seen as normal. Genocide is a crime against humanity because injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere. The violent seeds sowed against the Igbo are being reaped in mass killings across the country. When the rain falls, it will not fall on one man's housetop.
The rationalization of genocide as justifiable because there was a coup led by Igbo officers has been denied by a Yoruba leader of the coup, Ademoyega, in his book, Why We Struck. There, he revealed that the coup was motivated by the need to stop the mass violence that plagued the Western Region. Their plan was to seize power, release Awolowo from prison, and impose him as the Prime Minister. Most of the coup leaders came from the old Western Region where Awolowo was the Premier and where his policy of free education was popular.
The Igbo officers who were involved in leading the coup were also mainly from the old Western Region but the coup involved officers from all over the country. Moreover, the coup was foiled by Igbo officers who arrested the coup plotters. Finally, the mass killing of the Igbo started in Jos in 1945 and continued in Kano in 1957 long before the coup of 1966 due to what British officials fabricated as the fear of Igbo domination just because the Igbo led the struggle for the restoration of independence. No other ethnic group matches the Igbo in their support for a united Nigeria given the way the Igbo migrate to other parts of the country and given the fact that the Igbo have voted for Northerners, Westerners and South-Southerners for president in large numbers even against Igbo candidates but no other region in Nigeria has reciprocated by voting for an Igbo presidential candidate in large numbers.
The legal definition of genocide by the UN has its uses as a deterrent to dictators, fascists and terrorists. Charges of crimes against humanity can be brought against leaders of genocidal regimes. However, even when such leaders are successfully prosecuted and punished, such legal interventions are merely symbolic because there is no punishment that could fit the crimes of genocide. It is not possible to jail or execute everybody who is implicated in acts of genocide. The vast majority of the perpetrators will always be forgiven such crimes against humanity. That was why Nelson Mandela and Desmond Tutu preferred the Truth and Reconciliation Commission to punitive justice.
The Justice Oputa Commission in Nigeria tried to approximate the TRC but President Olusegun Obnasanjo underfunded the commission and refused to publish the recommendations. An official version is available online. In it, there is evidence of the demand for reparations to be offered to the survivors of the Igbo genocide. The same Oputa Panel on Human Rights Violations in Nigeria contained documentation of mass violence against other communities in Nigeria and those other communities have been offered billions of naira worth of compensation while amnesties have been offered to militant groups in different parts of the country. Although no evil should be compared with other evils to see which one is the biggest evil, there is no reason why the Nigerian state would offer reparations to communities that have suffered mass violence at the hands of state officials but refuse to do so to the Igbo who suffered the foundational genocide in postcolonial Africa.
In other words, one resolution that would bring everyone together on this issue is to demand that the Nigerian government allocate funding for the study of the genocide against the Igbo and for atonement to be offered to the survivors in the interest of all Nigerians. Such reparative justice may not satisfy everyone but it is more likely to help to heal some of the wounds while serving as a teaching moment for the rest of the country to emphasize that all African lives matter all the time. No one would lose any personal privileges when Nigeria finally admits that what was done to the Igbo was evil and takes steps to end the marginalization of the Igbo since the end of the war.
If Yakubu Gowon had committed a fraction of what was spent to wage the genocidal war towards the rehabilitation of the survivors after the initial stage of the genocide, there may have been no civil war. A percentage of what the corrupt politicians steal every year from the public purse could meet the budget for a symbolic admission of wrong-doing and cover atonement for the Igbo who do not obsess about revenge or anger but have relied on their own efforts to rebuild their communities in record time. It is the ones who committed the genocide against the Igbo who still preach Igbophobia and issue expulsion threats against the Igbo, deport them from other parts of the country, or ask why they themselves are now being targeted for mass killings by their allies with whom they committed genocide against the Igbo?
Intellectuals do not have to wait for the genocidal state to take action before initiating a body of work on conceptual clarifications, theory building and scholar-activism so that we can convincingly say, never again would millions of fellow Africans by killed or targeted for elimination by state-sponsored forces while the murderous intellectuals riding on the leftwing or the rightwing of the Cockroach maintain what Soyinka condemned as the 'awful silence.'
Biko
On Tuesday, 1 January 2019, 9:19, "Kissi, Edward" <ekissi@usf.edu> wrote:
HAPPY NEW YEAR, FRIENDS!!!
Glad to be back. But while away, I followed the interesting conversation on various issues here including the ongoing discussion on Biafra and genocide. I recall that this issue has come up in this Forum before. I remember my contribution to it and Kenneth Harrow's as well. I have resisted the urge to offer a thought until I read Gloria's scenarios, and her instructive counsel that we fully understand the concept of genocide (and I would add its genealogy) before we conflate it with war crimes and other crimes against humanity.
I tend to agree with Gloria because "conceptual conflation"--- the appropriation of the word "genocide" as a descriptor of all forms of mass killing, without any careful distinctions, because of the word's emotive force and the moral and legal claims it grants victims----continues to undermine the study and understanding of genocide.
Gloria's scenarios warrant reflection. They imply, accurately in my view, that not all mass murders rise to the conceptual threshold of a genocide. Not least is that war crimes and genocide are not the same, conceptually, although they have the same outcome. They lead to death and cause suffering and trauma to the direct victims and their descendants. Medical doctors do not conflate two or more different diseases that cause suffering and call all of them by one name that grabs public attention. And the study of genocide should not be reduced to an intellectual exercise in mortality statistics. It is not a body count concept. Thus, Gloria's scenarios and advice are consistent with the many issues Martin Shaw discusses in his book What is Genocide?
Finally, let me add that the 1948 UN definition of genocide was the result of a political compromise between the United States, France, and Britain on one side, and the Soviet Union, Poland and Iran on the other. For students of genocide studies, the UN Genocide Convention is not the sole authority on what constitutes genocide. Even in recent cases of adjudication of the crime of genocide, criminal tribunals drew upon other social science concepts of genocide. In fact Ethiopia, the first nation to sign the UN Convention, redefined Article 2 of the Genocide Convention in its Penal Code of 1951. The Ethiopian concept of genocide is, therefore, much broader, and includes protection of political groups, than the UN Convention that does not protect or criminalize the destruction of an armed political or secessionist group. The Soviet delegation insisted on the exclusion of protection for political groups in the UN Genocide Convention. But, can a state or non-state group convert real ethnic or religious groups into political enemies to be destroyed? Yes, but as Gloria suggests we need to "identify the variables."
Gloria's scenarios also underscore two critical features of genocide studies. One, genocides are not committed solely by states or national governments as Raphael Lemkin originally thought. Two, non-state entities such as armed rebel or secessionist groups can commit a genocide too. So we need to get a fine grasp of the concept of genocide before we use it.
One way to get that grasp is to look at the three major ways in which genocide is studied and understood.
1. Raphael Lemkin's original definition of genocide in his only book: Axis Rule in Occupied Europe. In it, the creator of the word "genocide" suggests that the crime can actually occur without a single individual killed or physically destroyed. He did not emphasize a body count (outcome) but rather process---a "coordinated plan of several actions" undertaken by a state to undermine "the essential foundations of the life" of a target group. Lemkin meant acts that included the destruction of a group's culture and the replacement of it with the colonizers' language and ways of life. This is Lemkin's original concept of genocide that the US, France and Britain feared and opposed and, thus, advocated for a legalistic concept of genocide based on specific and provable intent in a court of law. See the work of Leo Kuper for a grasp of how the international law of genocide evolved.
2. The idea of genocide in the UN Genocide Convention of 1948 and its narrow and strict focus on "the intent to destroy a group in whole or in part."
3. The many definitions of genocide proposed by scholars of genocide studies (including my own in "Obligation to Prevent," African Security Review, 2016). Although social science definitions of genocide such as Shaw's, Charny's, Chalk's and Jonassohn's, Stanton's, Stotten's, Kissi's, etc, do not have the force of law, they reveal the limits of the existing law of genocide as the site for the retrieval of adequate knowledge about genocide and the genocidal process.
I tend to agree with Gloria because "conceptual conflation"--- the appropriation of the word "genocide" as a descriptor of all forms of mass killing, without any careful distinctions, because of the word's emotive force and the moral and legal claims it grants victims----continues to undermine the study and understanding of genocide.
Gloria's scenarios warrant reflection. They imply, accurately in my view, that not all mass murders rise to the conceptual threshold of a genocide. Not least is that war crimes and genocide are not the same, conceptually, although they have the same outcome. They lead to death and cause suffering and trauma to the direct victims and their descendants. Medical doctors do not conflate two or more different diseases that cause suffering and call all of them by one name that grabs public attention. And the study of genocide should not be reduced to an intellectual exercise in mortality statistics. It is not a body count concept. Thus, Gloria's scenarios and advice are consistent with the many issues Martin Shaw discusses in his book What is Genocide?
Finally, let me add that the 1948 UN definition of genocide was the result of a political compromise between the United States, France, and Britain on one side, and the Soviet Union, Poland and Iran on the other. For students of genocide studies, the UN Genocide Convention is not the sole authority on what constitutes genocide. Even in recent cases of adjudication of the crime of genocide, criminal tribunals drew upon other social science concepts of genocide. In fact Ethiopia, the first nation to sign the UN Convention, redefined Article 2 of the Genocide Convention in its Penal Code of 1951. The Ethiopian concept of genocide is, therefore, much broader, and includes protection of political groups, than the UN Convention that does not protect or criminalize the destruction of an armed political or secessionist group. The Soviet delegation insisted on the exclusion of protection for political groups in the UN Genocide Convention. But, can a state or non-state group convert real ethnic or religious groups into political enemies to be destroyed? Yes, but as Gloria suggests we need to "identify the variables."
Gloria's scenarios also underscore two critical features of genocide studies. One, genocides are not committed solely by states or national governments as Raphael Lemkin originally thought. Two, non-state entities such as armed rebel or secessionist groups can commit a genocide too. So we need to get a fine grasp of the concept of genocide before we use it.
One way to get that grasp is to look at the three major ways in which genocide is studied and understood.
1. Raphael Lemkin's original definition of genocide in his only book: Axis Rule in Occupied Europe. In it, the creator of the word "genocide" suggests that the crime can actually occur without a single individual killed or physically destroyed. He did not emphasize a body count (outcome) but rather process---a "coordinated plan of several actions" undertaken by a state to undermine "the essential foundations of the life" of a target group. Lemkin meant acts that included the destruction of a group's culture and the replacement of it with the colonizers' language and ways of life. This is Lemkin's original concept of genocide that the US, France and Britain feared and opposed and, thus, advocated for a legalistic concept of genocide based on specific and provable intent in a court of law. See the work of Leo Kuper for a grasp of how the international law of genocide evolved.
2. The idea of genocide in the UN Genocide Convention of 1948 and its narrow and strict focus on "the intent to destroy a group in whole or in part."
3. The many definitions of genocide proposed by scholars of genocide studies (including my own in "Obligation to Prevent," African Security Review, 2016). Although social science definitions of genocide such as Shaw's, Charny's, Chalk's and Jonassohn's, Stanton's, Stotten's, Kissi's, etc, do not have the force of law, they reveal the limits of the existing law of genocide as the site for the retrieval of adequate knowledge about genocide and the genocidal process.
Edward Kissi
From: usaafricadialogue@googlegroups.com [mailto:usaafricadialogue@googlegroups.com] On Behalf Of kwame zulu shabazz
Sent: Monday, December 31, 2018 11:03 PM
To: usaafricadialogue@googlegroups.com
Subject: Re: USA Africa Dialogue Series - Re: Unfair Asian Critiques of Adichie
Sent: Monday, December 31, 2018 11:03 PM
To: usaafricadialogue@googlegroups.com
Subject: Re: USA Africa Dialogue Series - Re: Unfair Asian Critiques of Adichie
Gloria,
That wasnt exactly my point. In my initial post regarding Biafra, I said that it seems to fit the UN definition of genocide. As a legal matter, one would need to produce evidence that Igbos were targeted for elimination. I then replied to Ken and suggested that a commonsense idea of genocide, as distinct from the formal UN definition, seems to have as it criteria the targeting *and actual elimination* of a people (This is speculative on my part. I cant say with any certainty how people understand genocide). As an example, I cited the indigenous people of the southwestern US who were targeted and wiped out.
All Black Lives Matter,
brother shabazz
Pronouns: African
On Dec 31, 2018 6:48 PM, "Emeagwali, Gloria (History)" <emeagwali@ccsu.edu> wrote:
"i must say it saddens me to see such deepseated dissension still today about whether the case of biafrawas one of genocide when so many people died under tragic conditions."harrow
Does Yemen not fit the above definition? Many died and are dying under tragic conditions.
The "Houtis" constitute a sectarian religious group with Shiite leanings, opposed to
the Sunni government faction and the Saudi camp..
If genocide is defined by a large body count in tragic conditions, Iraq in terms of the two Gulf
wars will make the list, too, especially given the difference in ethnicity of the belligerents - and the huge body count.
Was Biafra a target because of the ethnic identity of the people, therein, or because of its secessionist declaration - or both? Given the huge body count does this matter?
Kwame, Should we disqualify Biafra because there was no major reduction in the Igbo population, will that disqualify African American claims, too?
Scenario One
A small population of 1,000 people loses 800 members in the course of open warfare with people of the same religion and ethnicity. Let us say that this one was a border war, and that the other side may have lost as many. Does this qualify as genocide?
Scenario Two
A population of 1,000 people loses 800 members while fighting people of a different race, ethnicity or religion over a border dispute with no planned intention to exterminate on either side. Does this qualify as genocide?
Scenario Three
A population of 1,000 people loses 800 members while fighting people of a different race, ethnicity or religion over a border dispute with the intention to exterminate. Does this qualify as genocide?
This may seem to be an exercise in semantics by some but I believe we need to identify the variables
associated with the concept before using it. The other option, of course, is to declare all wars as genocide, given the fact that countless numbers of people die in the process.
GE
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