What a 'Relief'!

Having been inspired by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie's wonderful novel 'Half of a Yellow Sun', and further by conversations with a Nigerian (Igbo) school friend, I began watching 'Nigeria war against Biafra 1967-1970' this morning on youtube.

A brilliantly balanced and insightful documentary, one line stood out for me in particular; "“Provided we have the world still reacting in sympathy to our plight... then we had hope. The relief agencies were our hope.” The quote was by General Chukwuemeka Odumegwu Ojukwu, the leader of the Biafran secession, and for me it says everything.

The news coverage of the Biafran (Southern Nigerians- Igbos) suffering was minimal in the UK. This was largely because the civil war was seen as a British cock up. Former British Colonial powers had forced together three separate tribes, each with huge amounts of pride and tradition, and called it Nigeria- the hope of 'Black' Africa.

The Igbo people of the South received the greatest colonial support in terms of education, and soon began to dominate jobs throughout Nigeria. This was resented by the relatively poor, and uneducated North, and soon the inevitable happened- the North rebelled. This rebellion wasn't in peaceful demonstration, or protest, but in Genocide- the killing of all Igbo people, and soon this resulted in the secessionist movement of Biafra, and the eventual civil war.

A David vs Goliath affair. The virtually unarmed Biafrans went about defending themselves from the well armed, British trained Nigerian army. It was Nigeria's wish to sell to the western world the story that the Biafran Secession was lead by only a few and not supported by the people of the South. The war was broadcast in England as a minor rebellion, which the British trained Nigerian army would stop within days.

There were a few 'westerners', however, who saw the suffering first hand and refused to accept that it simply wasn't going to be covered. These people went about showing the Biafran suffering to the rest of the world. Propaganda was used to shock aid agencies, and religious missionaries into action, and thus Biafra received some aid, and indeed some hope. It took these few 'rebellious' and passionate individuals to ensure Biafra wasn't ignored, and the people forgotten.

This brings me to the present day, and to current situations not disimilar to the Nigeria-Biafran war. You have The Congo- the troubles between DRC and the republic of Congo were generally initiated by a combination of the American supported dictator of Zaire, Mobutu, and an overflow of the Tutsi-Hutu conflict in Rwanda. Again all of these troubles come from a source initiated by colonial and post colonial western influence. In Sudan, the situation is similar, again stemming from a civil war, this time between the North and the South, again a post colonial battle, which also instigated the current Darfur conflict.

You see it all comes back to one thing, and that simply in my mind is western governments not acknowledging or trying to address past mistakes. How you can create an issue, and then fall back to the position that it is wrong for you to get involved seems ludicrous. It's like stirring up trouble between two rivals in a playground, and then not stepping in to calm the situation when it gets out of hand. The blood is on the hands of the stirrer no? The person whose misjudgment, and weakness it was to
stir up the battle in the first place. The person who inevitably was looking to gain out of the situation for himself, or in the case of colonies, for themselves.

In terms of where this fits in with the 'Real Way Down' and charitable work as a whole, it's simple. Using propaganda, as the Biafran's did, and many people do still today is a last resort. As General Chukwuemeka Odumegwu Ojukwu said, it is 'their hope'. Me and many people I converse with have grown tired of images of suffering children being thrust into our faces by charities, in a bid to pluck our guilt strings, and make us give to the cause. Not because we don't sympathise and want to help, but simply because what it creates is a detachment. What it has created over the years is the opinion in many westerners that 'Africa' is different; that Africa has suffering, and no hope.

What we intend to show with this project, and with future 'Patchwork World' projects is that this is not the case. We will drive to Africa, through Europe and the Middle East, and we will see suffering and hope going hand in hand in each place we visit. We will see people in London suffering and people in Africa suffering and people in Bulgaria suffering, but what will link them is not the suffering, but the hope. The hope these charities are bringing to people who suffer all over the world, and the hope in turn, that we as individuals can support.

I don't want to delve any deeper into the issues surrounding media control in this country and throughout the world. What I will say, however, is that with 'Patchwork World' we hope to create a network that not only brings together like minded charities, but also offers this freedom to news stories, and open discussion forums to ensure people have an ease of access to not only the issues, but also to the development of the solutions.

Sorry it was a rather chaotic and deep post today. I will write a more focussed update of the 'Real Way Down' project later today.

Thanks, and
'Peace by Piece'