There Was a Country: A Personal History of Biafra

Her tenderness for a son

She soon would have to forget. . . .

The air was heavy with odors of diarrhea,

Of unwashed children with washed-out ribs

And dried-up bottoms waddling in labored steps

Behind blown-empty bellies. Most mothers there

Had long ceased to care, but not this one;

She held a ghost-smile between her teeth,

And in her eyes the memory

Of a mother’s pride. . . . She had bathed him

And rubbed him down with bare palms.

She took from the bundle of their possessions

A broken comb and combed

The rust-colored hair left on his skull

And then—humming in her eyes—began carefully to part it.

In their former life this was perhaps

A little daily act of no consequence

Before his breakfast and school; now she did it

Like putting flowers on a tiny grave.1

Life in Biafra

The Nigeria-Biafra conflict created a humanitarian emergency of epic proportions. Millions of civilians—grandparents, mothers, fathers, children, and soldiers alike—flooded the main highway arteries between towns and villages fleeing the chaos and conflict. They traveled by foot, by truck, by car, barefoot, with slippers, in wheelbarrows, many in worn-out shoes. Some had walked so long their soles were blistered and bleeding. As hunger and thirst grew, so did despair, confusion, and desperation. Most were heading in whatever direction the other was headed, propelled by the latest rumors of food and shelter spreading through the multitude like a virus. Refugees were on the move in no specific direction, anywhere, just away from the fighting. As they fled the war zones they became targets of the Nigerian air force. The refugees learned to travel nights and hide in the forests by day.

The international relief agencies started responding to the growing humanitarian challenge quite early in the conflict by establishing food distribution centers and refugee camps. There were many Biafran refugee camps dotting the landscape, from Enugu in the north to Owerri in the south, during the thirty-month conflict. Many held between a few hundred and a few thousand people. At the height of the war there were well over three thousand such centers and camps, a great number but woefully inadequate to the actual need.1

These camps were often hastily constructed tent villages set up beside bombed-out churches, in football or sports arenas, or in open fields in the forest. They uniformly lacked electricity, running water, or other comforts. Occasionally, the more established camps had sturdier shelters on the premises of abandoned schools or colleges, or built near freshwater streams or little rivers. Those were few and far between. Most had rows of mud huts and palm raffia roofs built hastily by the inhabitants themselves. They were occasionally fenced in by the international agencies, which placed guards on the camp perimeter to monitor movement in and out of the area. The relief agencies often hoisted their flags to indicate to the Nigerian officers that they were in neutral zones that should be protected from assault. That did not always keep the Nigerian troops from raiding these “safe havens,” or even from bombing them.

Life in the camps varied in quality. Some of the better organized camps provided water, shelter, food, basic health care—mainly vaccinations for children against the most prevalent diseases, and treatment of common bacterial infections—and education. Other camps could only be described as deplorable, epidemic-ridden graveyards. In these camps the combination of poor sanitation, high population density, and shortages of supplies created a bitter cocktail of despair, giving rise to social pathologies and psychological traumas of all kinds—violence, extortion, and physical and sexual abuse.

—

My siblings and their families returned to my father’s house in Ogidi from various parts of the country. My family did too: Christie and my children at the time, Chinelo and Ike, left Port Harcourt for my family’s ancestral home.

My village is about six miles from Onitsha, the commercial hub of Eastern Nigeria and the location of the largest market in West Africa. Onitsha is also where the famous Niger Bridge is located, and so it serves as the entry point for all travelers entering the East from points west. The close proximity of Ogidi to Onitsha meant that we were in the eye of the storm, as it were, right at the border of the conflict. We were so close to the war zone we could hear the sounds of war—heavy artillery fire, bombs, and machine-gun fights.2

By the time I left Lagos to join my family in Ogidi, there were rumors that the Nigerian army was not that far behind. Casting my mind back, I am surprised at how little pandemonium there was during the early stages of the conflict. Families casually began to move deeper into the countryside to prepare for the inevitability of war.

Food was short, meat was very short, and drugs were short. Thousands—no, millions by then—had been uprooted from their homes and brought into safer areas, but where they really had no relatives, no property; many of them lived in school buildings and camps. The Committee for Biafran Refugees, understandably overwhelmed, did what it could. I found it really quite amazing how much people were ready to give.

Beyond the understandable trepidation associated with a looming war, one found a new spirit among the people, a spirit one did not know existed, a determination, in fact. The spirit was that of a people ready to put in their best and fight for their freedom. Biafran churches made links to the persecution of the early Christians, others on radio to the Inquisition and the persecution of the Jewish people. The prevalent mantra of the time was “Ojukwu nye anyi egbe ka anyi nuo agha”—“Ojukwu give us guns to fight a war.” It was an energetic, infectious duty song, one sung to a well-known melody and used effectively to recruit young men into the People’s Army (the army of the Republic of Biafra). But in the early stages of the war, when the Biafran army grew quite rapidly, sadly Ojukwu had no guns to give to those brave souls.