Of private jets and the great commission

Serving God is not synonymous with poverty. It is not the plan of God that those who serve him should be miserable. Not at all, for, the bible at different points talks about prosperity as God’s will for us. But then, when the focus of serving God shifts from what God wants us to do to the pursuit of prosperity, there is definitely a problem. That is when pastors begin to select certain verses of the Bible to manipulate members to 'give'. You begin to see different names for different types of offerings. Emphasis on tithe and seed-sowing becomes the norm. Church members will then begin to give-not cheerfully- but because the pastor says that they are unlikely to progress without obeying. It becomes a religious ritual.

Remember the parable of the Good Samaritan? The priest and the Levite didn’t help a person in need because they were being religious. It will not be surprising today for Christians to ignore somebody in dire need because the money they have is for tithe-they have to obey religion. They have to give to the Lord. And who is the Lord? Matthew 25: 40 answers it: "The King will reply, 'I tell you the truth, whatever you did for one of the least of these brothers of mine, you did for me.”

Make no mistake about it, it is good to give. There is a fulfilment and joy that comes with giving, especially when it is for the true work of God. Tithing is good, seed-sowing is equally good and God will bless you whenever you do them-just as He will bless those who ignore these terminologies and give all-cheerfully- like the early Christians.  In the early church, they all gave-not through manipulations by Peter, Philip, Stephen or Paul. They gave all and shared together. There was no big man/ordinary man dichotomy (when the Hellenists complained of the marginalisation of their widows by Hebrews, it was immediately dealt with through the appointment of the deacons). Barnabas gave all freely and he was called ‘son of encouragement’.

But why did the early church give freely? Obviously, they saw that whatever they gave was being well utilised for the purpose of God’s work and to the glory of God. They saw that the less privileged were not dying of hunger but were being blessed through what they gave. They saw that their leaders, in truth and in spirit, were serving the Lord. Without a doubt, if Peter and other apostles were living flamboyantly ostentatious lifestyles with the money given to the Lord, the laity of the early church would have expressed concern.

I find it difficult to understand why people sometimes argue that Christians should not bother about what the pastor does with the Lord’s money. Why not? If we have huge welfare fund in my church and I see poverty around me in the church why shouldn’t I be concerned? Many will defend such by telling us that the Bible says in Luke 6: 37 that we should not judge. But the bible also says ‘You shall know them by their fruits’ (Mathew 7:16) and that we should ‘test the spirits to see whether they are from God’ (1 John 4:1). In other words we can indeed know whether what any of us, including pastors, is doing the right thing or not.

When a full time pastor starts living as if he is in competition with fellow pastors, there is a problem. That is when we begin to have ‘my church-is-bigger-than-yours’ mentality. At that time, going outside the church to seek the lost souls will no longer be important. Of course, our churches should be conducive and comfortable for worship. But my point is that we shouldn’t be flaunting its size or beauty. The church building is not as important as bringing the lost souls into His fold. Today, there are huge cathedrals across the World (especially Europe and America) that barely have worshipers. The great commission is not for us to remain in the church and talk about how big our church is. It is for us to look for people of all creeds and races and tell them about the gospel of Jesus.

And we do not even need a private jet for this. You can start from your school, your workplace or even at the gym. The argument that we need a private jet for evangelism is untenable. It is, in fact, a ruse; blatant ego-tripping. But if those whose pastors are into ‘private jetting’ are happy with it, so be it. But saying that it is for evangelism is wide of the mark, for, most, if not all the times, members of the evangelism units of these churches-who indeed do the evangelism-do not get to have the private jet experience. Today we are glorifying God for the good works of Mary Slessor in Eastern Nigeria. But for her, we probably would have continued killing our twins. She did not come with private jet to Nigeria. She came with the gospel and love via a passenger boat. And she indeed made huge impact.

 

THERE WAS A COUNTRY: Deconstructing Achebe’s 'lies' (I)

Regular visitors to Nigerian internet discussion forums and social networking sites know that there has always been a cyber war between Yoruba and Igbo cyber warriors. Almost every issue-positive or negative-is tribalised. The two groups are filled with scoffers. An eminent Yoruba leader dies, Igbo cyber warriors pour invectives on him and vice-versa. A Nigerian of Igbo extraction achieves a rare feat abroad; Yoruba cyber warriors go lengths to belittle the achievement and vice-versa.

The only time the two groups would reach a consensus is when the issue is the non-performance of the ruling Peoples Democratic Party or the barbarianism of the extremist group, Boko Haram.  Indeed, a first time visitor (with little or no knowledge of Nigeria) to any of these forums will think that Nigeria is all about the Yorubas and the Igbos.

Not surprisingly, the recent release by iconic novelist, Chinua Achebe, of his civil war memoir, There was a country, intensified the cyberwar. The master story teller blames the late sage and Yoruba legend, Chief Obafemi Awolowo, for the starvation to death of a huge number of Biafran children during the war.

Achebe writes: “It is my impression that Awolowo was driven by an overriding ambition for power, for himself and for his Yoruba people. There is, on the surface at least, nothing wrong with those aspirations. However, Awolowo saw the dominant Igbos at the time as the obstacles to that goal, and when the opportunity arose – the Nigeria-Biafra war – his ambition drove him into a frenzy to go to every length to achieve his dreams. In the Biafran case it meant hatching up a diabolical policy to reduce the numbers of his enemies significantly through starvation — eliminating over two million people, mainly members of future generations.”

Achebe’s narrative, not surprisingly, infuriated the Yoruba group and a good number of them turned into emergency researchers and historians, using the Internet and the print media to disseminate counter narratives aimed at absolving the most venerable Awolowo from Achebe’s accusations. Old Awo’s interviews were excavated to exculpate him. His associates, even those who betrayed him at some points, went mad, describing Achebe as one of Nigeria’s greatest liars. Some even called for Achebe's head.

Many fly-by-night literary critics dismissed the memoir and its style as the worst of Achebe’s literary works. It did not matter to them if book and its style had been lauded by some of the world’s top names in literary criticism. Their Igbo counterparts used the same combination of media to stoutly defend Achebe’s position, reinforcing his narrative with many of their own ‘well -researched stories based on historical facts’.

In the midst of this cyber war, the Yoruba group exhumed a big one that was sure to bolster their position that Awolowo was not guilty as charged.  It was a letter of resignation by Biafra’s publicist, Robert Goldstein, published in the Morning Post of Lagos edition of August 17, 1968. In that letter, Goldstein claimed that his conscience had led him to resign from his job as Biafra’s publicist considering that Biafra’s leader, Odumegwu Ojukwu, was deliberately prolonging starvation to win world’s sympathy and support.

Goldstein wrote:  “It is inconceivable to me that you (Ojukwu) would stop the feeding of thousands of your countrymen (under auspices of world organizations such as the International Red Cross, World Council of Churches and many more) via a land corridor which is the only practical way to bring in food to help at this time. It is inconceivable to me that men of good faith would try to twist world opinion in such a manner as to deceive people into believing that the starvation and hunger that is consuming ‘Biafra’ is a plot of Britain, Nigeria and others to commit genocide”.

To the Yoruba group, it was eureka! Comments like ‘the truth can never be hidden' were not in short supply. Many of them thanked God that Awolowo had finally been absolved while Achebe and his colony of liars and losers had been given a technical knockout. Indeed, that resignation letter got the social media buzzing. It trended like hot akara balls.

Without any shadow of doubt, Goldstein’s resignation letter spoke volumes. It must have derailed what was left of the Biafra’s ‘propaganda’ train. It is based on that letter and people’s readiness to stand truth on its head in order to defend a member of their tribe that I am writing this piece. I feel that we will be doing our country a lot of good as we trudge toward nationhood if we began to remove our tribal goggles when looking at issues. We should stop defining truth and justice on the basis of who is involved. I am worried that injustice will become justice to the Igbo when a Yoruba has been cheated and vice-versa.

Those who hoped to score a cheap point with Goldstein’s letter failed to do a good research on the fellow. The guy was more or less a mercenary who was ever willing to work with the highest bidder. His whole interest was pecuniary.

What actually led to Goldstein’s resignation? It was the quest for more dollars. His associates said so. There was no doubt that Goldstein did a good public relations job for Biafra. This, however, did not go down with the Nigerian government and they looked for ways to buy him over, especially when Biafra was not meeting its financial side of the deal with him.

This was well stated in a story published by the Milwaukee Journal on August 14, 1968 with the title, ‘US publicist quits in fight with Biafra’. According to the story, during a press conference in Los Angeles in which Goldstein , who ‘was now convinced that one Nigeria is the only solution to peace’, announced his resignation, two of his associates, Howard Cogan and Martin Wesson, contended that his ‘actions were nothing more than a sell out for dollars’. The two guys exposed Goldstein when they revealed to journalists that he ‘had accepted $35,000 from the Federal Republic of Nigeria as part payment for his resignation and discredit of the Sovereign Republic of Biafra’.

The newspaper saw through Goldstein’s dodgy nature when it wrote: ‘Somewhat vague on figures, Goldstein insisted that he had gotten only $22, 000 from Biafra for expenses so far and that he had spent much more than that. He said he was renouncing all claim to his share of $400,000 due to him from the Biafran regime this Dec. 1. But he declared that he did not have ‘the foggiest idea’ of how much money he stood to lose.’

Nigeria’s complicity in Goldstein’s resignation was, however, tacitly revealed in the The Blade of Toledo’s report of the story on the same day (August 14, 1968). The newspaper reported that Goldstein told journalists that he was considering going to work for Nigeria but that he hadn’t been approached. The newspaper added, “later that day, the Nigerian Embassy announced that they have already fired another firm, Burson-Mar stellar Associates, to burnish their image here’. It goes without saying that the firing opened way for the engagement of Goldstein by the Nigerian government.

From these two stories, it is clear that Goldstein resignation was dollar-driven rather than conscience-driven. It will, therefore, be unfair for any person of goodwill to use the letter to absolve Awolowo from an unfortunate action which he never denied. In the interview he granted to journalists on the run up to the 1983 general elections, which was unearthed and reproduced in various newspapers and online news portals in the wake of Achebe’s book, he gave his reasons for sanctioning the starvation policy. The sage defended the action, saying that it was a well thought-out policy to stop Biafran soldiers from ‘stealing’ food meant for civilians.

What a sagely defence! So, the best and fastest way to stop less than 20,000 soldiers from feeding fat and continue fighting was to come up with a policy that would lead to the death of two million children.  How many tonnes of food could soldiers possibly finish given the amount of food that became rancid in Sao Tome and Principes following the starvation policy and the blockade? When you contrast Awo's defence with his now infamous and eternally self-damning statement: "All is fair in war, and starvation is one of the weapons of war. I don't see why we should feed our enemies fat in order for them to fight harder", you will see that the starve-them-to-death approach was more of a well-planned war strategy.

Obviously, the Nigerian government was not interested in whatever happened to Biafran children and civilians. In fact, its aim was to kill and destroy any movable thing in the Biafran territory. Benjamin Adekunle , who was the commander of Nigeria’s 3rd Marine Commando Division, confirmed it when he said: ‘I  want to see no Red Cross, no Caritas, no World Council of Churches, no Pope, no missionary and no UN delegation. I want to prevent even one Ibo from having even one piece to eat before their capitulation’ (See the 2010 publication: Executive Session of The US Senate Foreign Relations Committee -Historical Series-, Vol XX, Nineteenth Congress, Second Session, 1968, p. 1023)

David L. Koren, a former American Peace Corps member in Nigeria, also affirmed same in his book, Far Away in the Sky: A Memoir of the Biafran Airlift, which was released this year. He told of how Biafra’s Uli airstrip was consistently bombed by Nigerian aircraft whenever relief cargo was being unloaded, According to Koren, ‘The Nigerian Intruder, code named “Yellow Bar” or “Genocide,” persistently bombed the airstrip, sometimes as relief cargo was being unloaded, sending workers into crude bomb shelters...’

In fact, Keren described as inhuman the notion that starvation ends wars quicker. He observed: “Four decades after the Biafran war the causes and events of that time are forgotten.  What remains is an historical lesson, the idea that the Biafran Airlift was a mistake, that it caused many more deaths by prolonging the war, that a ‘quick death’ would have been the more merciful solution. In academic books about international aid, that doctrine is sated as fact without proof or discussion. 

“In international politics, the doctrine impedes the impulse to intervene in humanitarian disasters like Rwanda or Darfur. This Biafra lesson explicitly condones massacres, acts of war, and mass starvation of people by its government, as long as it’s done quickly. Instead of condemning humanitarian aid for keeping people alive too long, condemn that government which uses mass starvation to subdue its own people”.

In a review of the memoir in Peace Corps Worldwide (http://peacecorpsworldwide.org/pc-writers/2012/07/24/review-of-david/)on July 24, John Coyne, who was also an American Peace Corps member in Nigeria before the civil war noted, “What advocates of the let-them-starve doctrine need to do, says Koren, is talk to the children who without the nourishment supplied by the airlift would have died to force their government to surrender."

The starvation policy was unfortunate and wicked and trying to absolve a person who even confessed to being an author of the policy is even more wicked.What led to the death of over two million people is not what anybody should revel in. Vice should not become virtue when it is Uche and then become what it actually is when it’s Segun.What is condemnable is condemnable whether or not our demigods are involved. That's one of the ways to heal the painful wounds of the past and move forward in one accord as a nation.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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Travel and see

nnaEmeka Meribe

Everybody was moving towards one direction. Some were running while others were walking in a very fast pace, the kind of pace athletes taking part in the Olympics 10 kilometre walk move with. Within few minutes, everywhere became still and the quietness sent a chill up my spines. I was the only one left in the bus; fellow passengers ‘abandoned’ me. They all had left the bus and ran towards the same direction with the villagers. None of them talked to me, not even the driver. I was terrified. I had never found myself in such situation. I couldn’t have run with them as I didn’t know where they were running to. Besides, I couldn’t understand the language they spoke. None of them could communicate in English. At that point, ‘nunc dimmitis’ was the only thing on my mind.

And then a little boy, probably around nine years, appeared. He was carrying some ware on his head and at the same time running—to that same direction. My eyes followed him as he ran. But all of a sudden, he stopped, brought down his ware and knelt down.

It was around 1 pm that sunny Friday and I was in a rickety overloaded bus going to Kano city from Kabo local council, where my big brother was doing his National Youth Service Corp programme. A medical doctor, he was posted to Kabo Cottage Hospital for his primary assignment. He was the first resident doctor in the hospital, which was just upgraded. So, he was a big man. The villagers respected him. He was called Baba likita (Oga doctor). And because we look alike, many of the villagers would also call me Baba likita and I would wave them in return and move forward with speed—so that they would not realize that I was an impostor.

I had gone to Kabo to visit my brother as my school was not in session then. It was my first visit to Northern Nigeria. My brother had sent me on an errand to Bompai Police barracks, Kano city. That meant I had to commence a two-hour journey from Kabo to the city of Kano.

When we came to a point, between Dawokin Tofa and Rimin Gado local councils, the driver drove into a village and pulled up. It was there that everything changed.

And so, when that little boy knelt down, I came out of the bus to explore my environment. As I walked towards the direction we came from, I saw a shop, which was not closed like others around. Whoever was in that shop must be different from the others, I had thought. As I walked down, I heard people in the shop speaking my language, Igbo. There and then, my mind found rest. I went into the shop, greeted them and bought a bottle of Fanta Orange to ‘cool down’. I then told them my story. They laughed and told me not to be terrified. “It was Friday,” they explained, “time for Jumat Service”. They told me that all those people I saw were headed for the mosque. It was the norm at that time every Friday.

As I walked back to the bus, however, I still saw that little boy. He was praying. I was touched. He knew that he was already late to the mosque, and he turned where he was into his prayer ground. He didn’t want to miss out entirely. That to me was virtuous. I learnt some spiritual lessons that day.

Since that time, I have moved around Nigeria. As a travel writer some years ago, I toured round the country. In fact, apart from Taraba, Gombe, Bornu, Adamawa, Ekiti and Bayelsa States, I have been to every state in Nigeria. And each time I travelled I learnt many good things about people from each part of the country and rid my mind of some of the stereotypes about them.

Many Nigerians do not travel around the country and this is one of our problems. That is why you hear some people believe that Igbos wake their father up in the morning by kicking them. Funny as this may sound, many of them believe it. I have heard some say that their ethnic group is the most accommodating of all ethnic groups in Nigeria. I usually laugh off the claim. How can one know how accommodating others are by staying put in one’s cocoon?  

While in Kabo I saw firsthand how honesty thrives among the ordinary Northerners. I had gone to the village market to buy foodstuffs, and after buying a bottle of groundnut oil (kili-kuli brand) from a young girl at the cost of N45 I offered her N60 and later N70. But she rejected the money and collected her oil. Both of us could not understand each other as she didn’t know how to say N55 in English and I didn’t understand what it was in Hausa. Our dialogue of the deaf lasted for over 20 minutes until I left to call the village barber, who incidentally was Igbo. Not that he was the only barber in the village but he was the only barber in the village who used electric clippers in his shop. The guy, whom I have forgotten his name now, had to help me out. When we got to where the young girl was, they spoke in Hausa and he told me to give the young girl N45. I marvelled at such honesty— because it is rare in Southern Nigeria.

My university education in Akwa Ibom State also made appreciate the Ibibios and the Annangs. Erroneously called ‘Calabar people’, the impression in the country is that they are unintelligent and thrive better as professional home helps. And that was the impression I carried into the University of Uyo. But I was later to discover that they are as brilliant as they are accommodating. Industrious young men and women are not also in short supply there. But a person who has lived in his village all along without visiting any place outside his geo-political zone will never know about others. He will continue to believe the bedside stories his equally ignorant mother told him about other people.

I used to associate Ijebu-Ode with juju and other forms of diabolism. And I think this was the perception everybody who grew up in Aba had of them. I remember then that anyone, who was suspected of having evil powers, was said to have got his powers from Ijebu Ode. And so the first time I visited the town, I was expecting to see a sleepy, unkempt town with many footpaths leading to shrines. But I saw neat, lovely and inviting town. I was, indeed, pleasantly surprised during that visit. I have few friends from Ijebu Ode and they are jolly good fellows.

It’s time we did away with some of these stereotypes about the different peoples of our nation. Travelling and living among other people will help us build a better nation. Regrettably, many of the times, those who have the courage to live amongst other people are envied when the start prospering. They are accused of a lot of things and given bad names just to pull them down—and most of the times, it’s all because of envy. I pray and hope that before long our nation will appreciate the benefit of healthy rivalry.

The security challenges in the North, unfortunately, will limit travel to that part of the country. But I do believe that sooner or later, the North would be safer. Many of my friends who grew up in the North will always say that that is the best place to live in the country and they look forward to returning to Kaduna, Jos and Bauchi.

‘Landlord, travel and see’ is a song by a Ghanaian band, Super 7. It will not be a bad idea to release a song titled, ‘Nigerians, travel and see’.

 

 

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