January 30, 2005
Ojukwu to IBB: You’re overrated ...on 2007
An interview given to Sun Times by Dim Ojukwu. Feel free to comment.
Ojukwu to IBB You’re overrated ...on 2007
By Eric Osagie, just back from
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Ikemba Emeka Odumegwu-Ojukwu |
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Ex-Biafran
leader, Ikemba Emeka Odumegwu-Ojukwu,
has fired a scud missile at former military president, General Ibrahim Babangida (rtd), and all those clamouring
for his preidential comeback in 2007: IBB does not have what it takes to turn things around.
In an exclusive interview with Sunday Sun at his
However, he had kind words for the man IBB shore
aside in a palace coup on
"There are no glue attaching pounds or naira notes to him even after being
head of state," Ojukwu said of General Muhammadu
Buhari (rtd).
Ojukwu also spoke on personal issues including his wife, one-time winner of the
Most Beautiful Girl in
Who is Emeka Ojukwu? How would you
describe yourself? Some say rebel leader, others describe you as son of a
billionaire. And then, you are also Oxford-trained historian?
They are all correct. I will add to that. I am that army officer that every
Nigerian officer would want to be like, but hasn’t the courage to be. The thing
that differentiates me from the army officer, the general and all of them, is that I have the courage of my convictions. And you
see today, I walk into any barrack, all of us get saluted because they
recognize us, but my salute is more proudful. Because they really go that extra inch [to stiffen to action].
Your life seems to me to be one of
perpetual rebellion. You rebelled against your father to become a soldier, you
rebelled against your fatherland…you are unorthodox, when you are supposed to
be conservative, going by your wealthy background.
How did you come
about that streak?
There is one thing you didn’t add. I also was educated. It is education that
heightens your perception. It is education that sharpens your commitment. Rebel? Yes, I suppose you can call it that if for example,
my father were a thief, and because I wanted not to be a thief, I wanted to be
a lawyer, I would be a rebel, wouldn’t I? So, the thing is the epithet rebel,
is so easy and in the Nigerian sense really, I wonder who is a rebel? I never
rebelled against any army officer. No. I indicated an opinion and defended that
opinion. That was all. Rebel? No. I have never plotted
a coup against anybody in my life.
So, you
never plotted a coup all the time you were in the army?
No. Certainly not me. My training didn’t permit that. If I can remember, as an instructor, I always say to my students
that as young officers, the cadets, that sooner than later you will be
confronted with this dilemma. Your nation will appear to be in chaos,
you will find yourself with the arms in your hands paid for by the nation. I
won’t tell you what choice to make. That’s not my duty. But I want you to
remember at all stages that when you mount a coup de tat, the stakes are very
high, only as high as the gallows when you
lose. That is it. And I have always lived by that. You can try it, but if you
fail…
You were at
Yes, I was.
How did
I had a world view before going to
I understand
that you didn’t pay as much attention to your studies as you ought to. Am I
correct?
I don’t think you are correct. The only thing is that I did not become a swat.
But do my studies, I did. I passed my exams, didn’t I?
You came
back from
Yes, I did everything. I was a product of my generation too. In fact, I always
say to our friend, Prof. Wole Soyinka,
we are of the same generation, and I say ‘Please, please, don’t call me wasted,
because we are not really wasted. I don’t spin English words as much as you do,
but if I am asked, my generation is a pregnant one.’ Because, we’ve been very
pregnant from the time we became adults, and
Beyond civil
war and all that, in this country you are also regarded as one man who married,
perhaps, one of the most beautiful women in
I will get very angry if you say ‘perhaps’ one of the most beautiful women.
Without any doubt, I have married the most beautiful woman
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on the
continent of
How did you
do it?
[Laughs] There must be something good in me that you don’t see.
How did you
pull that coup. Certainly, that was one coup you
plotted?
Oh, my God, I plotted it. Yes!
What do you
do with your spare time, when you are not playing politics?
I try to read. My eyes are not so good. I am working on a system where I would
be read to, and buy more books on the CD. But, actually, the thing to
understand is that my hobby today is APGA. That is my
hobby. Looking at it, can we make it better, fulfill
the aspirations of our people and so on.
2007 is
around the corner, will you run for presidency?
2007 is around the corner, am I going to be alive?
Finally, what
are the things you used to do, that you no longer can?
The first one is that I can’t drive anymore, and that actually I miss. Second
one, responsibility makes it that I can’t go chasing like all young men. And
that again, I regret. You said something earlier, that I had fun in
That is the prisonyard of fame?
Yes.
So, fame can
be a prison?
It is a prison. It is not ‘it can be’. It is a prison.
You can’t
walk down your streets and no one mobbing you?
I can’t. That’s why I have a big dog, sometimes to keep people a little bit
wary.
Have you had a
fulfilled life when you look at the totality of everything.
Minor regrets here and there, things you wished you will do differently if you
had a second chance?
I find this a question which demands so much. But let me answer it. My father
will be very happy today wherever he may be, somewhere in paradise, I expect. I
wish I had taken his advice and had become a professional lawyer. We quarreled
over that. He wanted it and I said no, I decide for myself. I’d study history.
So, I regret that. I wish I had taken his advice.
Yes, I have had a fulfilled life. I enjoyed everything I have done. I enjoyed
my time as an administrator. Oh, I was at the best when I was an
They still
don’t accept you are a Nigerian?
No!
Why hasn’t
Actually, a lot of Nigerians, when they look at themselves are much less than
they pretend to be. The only advantage they can call upon in dealing with me is
the advantage they can summon is by presenting me as a non-Nigerian. They will
always throw that up.
Of Babangida, Atiku, Marwa and the others, who would you rather support for the
presidency in 2007?
Nobody is in the race yet. No party has fielded a candidate yet.
Would you
support Babangida?
You know I hesitate in answering this question. I am not usually tongue-tied… I
like Babangida as a person. He’s been quite good to
me. But I don’t think he’s got the exceptional qualities necessary for a head
of state of
Atiku?
I really don’t know him.
Buhari?
I like him. If for nothing, I like him for what appears to be his integrity.
Here is a man, he has been head of state. I look
around him, I don’t see any glue that attached pounds
notes or naira notes glued to his body. I see certain simplicity in his way of
living, lifestyle.
Some people are
predicting that 2007 will be bloody, some are seeing revolution. What do you
see?
I see peace. I believe actually that the more difficult year is the one we have
just entered [2005]. I think for 2007 to come, we should have resolved so many
things between 2005 and 2006. Revolution? Nigerians
are too soft-hearted for revolution. They will talk about it. And if there is
any music in the night club where they dance revolution, they will dance to it.
And if there’s fashion called revolution, they will wear it. But to come out to
the real, hard revolutionary struggle, forget it. As the Yoruba will say fi mi sile o!
Posted by judeolisa at 06:58 AM | Comments (0)
January 08, 2005
The World According to the Mexican Sorcerers
By Paulo Coelho
The great majority of spiritual traditions present in the Americas before Columbus’s arrival, has managed – by some miracle! – to preserve its roots. In other words, they were stronger than the civilizations which were here, and which soon succumbed to the conquistadors. Among them, Mexican shamanism, which is still practiced by many local tribes, is one of the most widely studied; various anthropologists have carried out serious studies about the way in which the sorcerers understood God’s presence and their spiritual search. Here are some of the aspects of this understanding of the universe, drawn from various sources:
The great majority of spiritual traditions present in the Americas before Columbus’s arrival, has managed – by some miracle! – to preserve its roots. In other words, they were stronger than the civilizations which were here, and which soon succumbed to the conquistadors. Among them, Mexican shamanism, which is still practiced by many local tribes, is one of the most widely studied; various anthropologists have carried out serious studies about the way in which the sorcerers understood God’s presence and their spiritual search. Here are some of the aspects of this understanding of the universe, drawn from various sources:
1) The Absence of the Personal Story
In order for magical rites to pass from generation to generation, the sorcerer (shaman) must forget all he learned before his initiation into magic. According to tradition, a man or woman who is tied to his past, will in the end allow himself to be governed by his parents’ way of thinking, or that of the society in which he lives. This is why all those who are initiated choose a new name and seek to free themselves from their memories, both good and bad.
2) The Process of Forgetting
In order to abandon the story he lived in, the sorcerer spends months on end remembering in detail each of the events of his life. Some traditions require him to spend hour after hour speaking out loud to a glass filled with water, reciting everything which happened at each meeting with each person; thus, the experience is removed from the memory and enters the water – which is then thrown into a river. In this way, the head is left “empty,” and can begin to be filled with new things.
3) Interior Silence
Once free of his old thoughts, the sorcerer concentrates on his inner silence, and waits for the spirits to begin telling the true story of the Universe. This silence, together with the absence of memories of the past, gives the sorcerer the sensation of total freedom to understand a new world.
4) The Web
When he begins understanding his new universe, he enters a sort of trance, and “sees” that everything around us is a giant web of luminous fibers, all linked – in other words, it is a unique object, and part of the same energy. Sometimes, these luminous fibers are condensed in an egg shape, and this means that there is the soul of a human being. (Carlos Castaneda explains this vision very well in his book A Separate Reality).
5) The Encounter with Power
Looking at his own “egg of light”, the sorcerer notices a point, which must join with the luminous fibers capable of conducting the energy of power. This energy, although it can be used by the sorcerer, cannot be manipulated – he must know how to gently lead it to his apprenticeship. Approaching this pointing of joining up is the most difficult work during initiation, and requires silence, meditation and perseverance.
6) The Negative Energy
Some of these fibers of light conduct destructive fluid issued by other sorcerers – who seek not knowledge but control over the souls of others.
7) The “Disturbance”
There is always an event in our lives which is responsible for the fact that we ceased to progress. A trauma, an especially bitter defeat, an amorous disappointment, these all lead us towards a cowardly attitude, and we refuse to go on. The shaman, during the process of forgetting his personal history, must first free himself of this “disturbance point.”
According to Mexican sorcerers (and also, curiously, to some Buddhist thinking), death enters through the region of the navel. At this moment, the “egg of light” disintegrates, and the fibers which were there blend with the energy of the universe, until they regroup again in a new form.
Posted by Administrator at 07:18 PM | Comments (0)
