Overcoming history

By Kingsley Moghalu
Recent events in Nigeria indicate that we are held captive by our historical past, yet we disdain history so much, or are so afraid of its truth, that it was removed from the national curriculum. We need to confront our history and use it as a basis to create a new tomorrow for our country.

History is important as a keeping of record. But its most important function for a country is to let us know where we are coming from. Drawing on the lessons learned in that journey, we are guided as to where we should be going.

For this reason, the progress of all great nations has been driven largely by a sense of history. China has risen to global dominance in the past 40 years because the country is keenly aware of its historical glory as the ancient Middle Kingdom at a time in history when the western countries were relatively backward.

The Chinese were later defeated by Britain in the Opium Wars of the 19th century and had to cede Hong Kong to the British. Britain had a two-century long reign as an imperial global power. For the Chinese, the humiliation of this era of their history rankled. They were determined to reclaim their place in the world. Today, China rivals the United States in global dominance and has long overtaken Britain.

Japan, also an imperial power at the time, attacked Pearl Harbor, Hawaii in the United States on December 7, 1941. This event dragged the US into World War II. All Americans know President Franklin Roosevelt’s reaction to the attack with the famous words “This day will live in infamy”. The Pearl Harbor attack united America as a nation like never before. Japan, its imperial power decisively defeated when the Americans dropped atomic bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki, became a pacifist country after World War II. Memorial Day is a major public holiday in America, celebrated in memory of the country’s fallen soldiers. History as nation-building.

Barak Obama and history
More recently, history came full circle when Barack Obama became the first black President of the US. That has not turned America into a “post-racial” society, but it was a moment that symbolized the country’s possibilities as a nation.

History can be uncomfortable. Relations between Japan on the one hand and China and South Korea, on the other, are tense because of history. The Japanese imperial army invaded China twice in the first half of the 20th century, massacred 600,000 Chinese and raped another 20,000 Chinese women in the famous Rape of Nanking. During Japan’s harsh colonial rule of Korea between 1910 and 1945, the Japanese imperial army’s extensive use of Korean “comfort women” as sex slaves has left relations between Japan and South Korea deeply ambivalent despite a formal apology by Japan decades afterwards. Inside Japan itself, the country finds it difficult to confront its history and the war crimes it committed.

Then there is the mother of all uncomfortable histories, the Holocaust of six million Jews by Nazi Germany during World War II.

Back home in Nigeria, we are yet to come to terms with our history. The consequence of this is that Nigerians are hood-winked with narrow and incomplete interpretations of history in the service of vested interests that keep us divided as a people, prevents us from building a united nation, and keeps incompetent politicians in power.

The four most important points in our national history in this context are (a) the Amalgamation of the Northern and Southern Protectorates in 1914, (b) the 1951 regional elections in Ibadan in the Western region, (c) the January 1966 coup d’etat, and (d) the Nigerian civil war of 1967-1970. These four events and their consequences have held us captive and prevented us from moving forward because they have been interpreted in ways that have weakened national unity and influenced the selection of subsequent leaders in our country at the national level.

The nation-building responses to these events, from my own perspective, should be as follows: Yes, the Amalgamation was done for the economic interests of the British colonial masters, but this does not mean that Nigeria cannot successfully become a nation if we chose to build one going forward.

January 1966 coup

The January 1966 coup was a tragic and unconstitutional attempt to subvert democracy by some military officers. If I were a northern Muslim, I would feel aggrieved by the killing of the Sardauna of Sokoto, Sir Ahmadu Bello and the Prime Minister, Tafawa Balewa. But we should know and remember that this was not an “Igbo coup”. It was an act by individual military officers that included those of Igbo and non-Igbo origin. Igbos as a group were not involved in planning what was an exclusively military affair, and therefore should not as a group bear responsibility for the actions of individuals acting in their individual capacities.

Besides, the coup was effectively frustrated by military officers of Igbo origin — General Aguiyi Ironsi and Col. Emeka Odumegwu Ojukwu. The 1966 counter-coup was equally unfortunate, and the killing of Ironsi was also a grievous act. More important, the pogroms of Igbos in the North were horrendous crimes, a disproportionate response to the January coup. Igbos, especially affected families, are understandably saddened by the loss of their loved ones in such circumstances. We all need to confront these historical facts with a sense of humility and collective regret rather than chauvinism, and we need to heal and move on.

The respected politician Paul Unongo said in a recent interview that the act of cross-carpeting instigated by Obafami Awolowo’s Action Group that robbed Dr. Nnamdi Azikiwe, an Igbo, and his NCNC party of the latter’s victory in the parliamentary election in Ibadan in 1951 to become the Premier of the Western Region, was what introduced tribalism big-time into Nigerian politics. OK. Certainly, this political crisis aggravated tribal consciousness.

But did it create it? I think the British had already structured and managed Nigeria in a manner that made ethnic and religious differences very pronounced, but perhaps not yet enough to stop the cross-ethnic appeal of the savvy and nationalistic Zik or the popular Fulani man Umaru Altine, who won elections twice as the Mayor of Enugu in the 1950s. True, some British colonial contraptions have failed. But some have survived.

The civil war.

And then there was the civil war. There are conflicting interpretations of what led to the war. It is clear that a combination of the pogroms of Igbos in the north and the failure of the Aburi Accords were two main reasons. But the war happened, millions perished and Biafran secessionist groups are now, 50 years later, ascendant. This is a nation-building failure.

Our response should be a constitutional restructuring and a greater focus on equity and inclusive governance that both address the genuine concerns of groups that feel marginalized.
We must confront our history, but utilize it as a tool to build our future and not as a divisive wedge.

History should and must be taught in schools, else we are building a country based on a lack of knowledge that is important for nation-building. The most important mindset, however, is to approach history as a series of lessons learnt, and to believe that our future can be bigger and better than yesterday.

These histories happened, but they must not now become destiny. They cannot be. My personal life and experience bears this out to me. My first job was given to me by a man from Akwa Ibom State, Ray Ekpu of Newswatch in the late 1980s. I went abroad for post-graduate studies in a prestigious university in the US with a scholarship that a great Yoruba man and our former Foreign Minister, Prof. Bolaji Akinyemi, personally intervened to help me secure.

I was appointed Deputy Governor of the Nigerian central bank in 2009 on the recommendation of Sanusi Lamido Sanusi, now the Emir of Kano. The last time I checked, he is not an Igbo. We should be careful not to let the mistakes of our history blind us to the possibility that we can build a nation more united and prosperous than we have today.

The post Overcoming history appeared first on Vanguard News.