Abstract
Since 2015, there has been renewed agitation for the creation of the Republic of Biafra. This article focuses on one of the two organizations involved in that struggle: The Indigenous People of Biafra (IPOB, the second being the Movement for the Actualization of the Sovereign State of Biafra, MASSOB). The Federation of Nigeria, inaugurated on 1 October 1954 under the Lyttelton Constitution, which became operational on that date, has been assailed by a plethora of centrifugal pulls and secession threats since 1950. While many of these threats were resolved politically and at round tables, a few had involved armed confrontation the most famous being the 7 July 1967 to 15 January 1970 Civil War that caused pervasive dislocations and inter-generational trauma. In this article, we argue that four and a half decades after the failure of the attempt to establish a Republic of Biafra, the IPOB is whipping the corpse of Biafra back to life. The paper examines some of the peculiar features of Nigeria's federalism that had made it unusually secession-prone and afflicted by centrifugal pulls. We conclude that while the lack of elitist support and 'federal might' might quash the IPOB and avert an immediate assault on the country's unity; without a well entrenched policy of inclusiveness and belongingness of the country's diverse ethnic nationalities, Nigeria might have to fight 'wars of unity' cyclically and indefinitely.
Recommended Citation
Ojo, Emmanuel Oladipo and Samuel, Osadola Oluwaseun
(2018)
"Nigeria's Federalism and the Threat of Secession: The Case of the IPOB,"
Journal of African Policy Studies: Vol. 24:
No.
1, Article 4.
Available at:
https://ecommons.udayton.edu/joaps/vol24/iss1/4