KANSAN Comment
Editor-in-Chief Ron Yates
Editor-in-Chief Ron Yates
Editorial Editor ... Alan T. Jones
News Editor ... Joanna Wiebe
Edition Editor ... Don Westerhaus
Sports Editor ... Robert Kearney
Horrorstory
The world has-tried to close its eyes and forget the pictures and written accounts of starving babies and old people—it has tried but Biafra still lingers on.
Biafra—a 20th century horror story.
The world has buried itself in other crises in Vietnam, Czechoslovakia and the Middle East—but Biafra has outlasted them all.
Its death rate is rising, despite the help of private and international relief agencies. The solution to the war between a splinter group of Ibo tribesmen and the federation of Nigeria seems unsolvable.
The world and its supposedly unifying agency, the United Nations, have resolutely looked the other way. But Biafra, like one of Edgar Allen Poe's haunting wraiths, lingers on, tickling consciences here and there.
Can Biafra succeed in its revolt and if the tiny nation could win independence would there be any way it could stay alive in a turbulent Africa?
Does Nigeria and all of Africa's hope for a stable government rest in its ability to unify the small tribes, including the Ibos into a viable whole?
Or is there an in-between way of compromise?
Thorny questions demanding much deliberation—and problems only the two countries involved have the real right to decide.
But meanwhile, thousands die each day in this so-called civilized age.
And the nations of the world keep eerie silent vigil as they watch the relief planes they have helped to send be shot down before reaching the starving people. (AMS)
Letters
To the Editor:
Biafra conflict seen as religious
In the Feb. 18 Kansan, an article appeared on the Biafra-Nigeria crisis by Mr. Pete Miner, and I would like to answer it.
His friends in the U.S. were totally unaware of his predicament. All communication from Nigeria was stopped—we didn't hear from him for almost a year.
When he came home for his last leave in the spring of 1967, he brought with him pictures of his ruined church—and told us about a politico-religious war between Moslem and Christian, similar to the situation between Moslem and Hindu which brought about the separation of India and Pakistan.
When the rioters were through with the church, they wrecked the house, but they left without getting to the upper story.
I cannot speak, as he can, from personal experience, but I have a friend who can. He is a Catholic missionary to Nigeria, whose name I prefer not to mention, since he is presently in that country.
He said the Ibos were predominantly Christian, educated at Christian missions and taught European languages and English. Some were sent to European and American schools for further education. They returned to their homeland and, by reason of their superior education and their ambition,
This priest has been working in Nigeria for at least eight years. He is presently stationed at the University of Nigeria, which is in federal territory. We have not heard from him since Dec. 1967.
In late 1965 or early 1966, he was the pastor of the Catholic mission at Gusu. His mission was destroyed by rioting Moslem Hausa tribesmen. His church, a cement-block structure, was damaged almost beyond repair. The statues were pulled down and broken; the altar was defaced-urinated and defecated upon. The windows of the church were broken.
The priest was in the rectory, guarding the entrance to the upstairs section of the house. Terrified Ibo women and children were hiding there, guarded by the missionary, who had a shotgun.
became its highest native officials.
Please understand—I don't say all Moslems or all Hausa are guilty of these criminal acts. Nor do I say that the Ibos are guiltless. But I think this civil war should be treated as a religious war, more than as one of politics. And, as such, I support the separation of the states of Nigeria and Biafra, the same sort of separation of state that ended a similar civil war in India and Pakistan.
I also support the programs
aimed at supplying the Biafrans with food, primarily because of the publicity surrounding the starving people, but mainly because I support their cause.
I also agree that America should maintain her posture of non-involvement, because we are over-extended in our foreign policy now. Besides, I think the American people can achieve as much on a volunteer basis as the government can using the funds of taxpayers like Mr. Miner, who may not wish to contribute.
(Mrs.) Elaine Hull
For a stable Nigeria
To the Editor:
The ethics of the ivory tower and media confusion as to substantive vs. procedural protest sometimes combine to hinder understanding of the news. A case in point is the recent Nigeria Symposium and UDK coverage of it. The walkout of a panel member, a KU professor, was emphasized, without explaining that his action was on behalf of a point of procedure: that anyone having pertinent information should be allowed to convey it. The key word is pertinence. The profession of a college teacher isolates him from the literate but non-intellectual currents of opinion. For on a country-wide basis, discussion of the Nigerian situation is extremely one-sided. While the dangerous consequences of African disintegration do not make headlines, pictures of hungry babies do. Too many people are reacting to a small portion of the facts.
The African continent is suffering from agrarian backwardness, lack of capital, insufficient transportation, reactionary interference, and great power expansionism. Small would-be states such as Biafra cannot hope to accomplish technological improvement. They must first be united into economically productive units. Neither they nor the larger states can hope to attract investments
in time of instability. The Biafron rebellion is slowing progress not only in Białra, but in the whole of Nigeria. The rebels are exploited in this by states with vested interests in Africa. France fears any large organized country which could compete with her in the franc zone. Portugal and South Africa fear that the example of a strong African state would encourage external resistance to their regimes. Finally, the new expansionist states, such as Russia, Germany, and the U.S. can carve out spheres of influence only as long as no African nucleus state exists.
The cause of the Biafrans and all other Africans can be furthered by Americans. But pittances to the Biafra Relief Fund are not the answer. The war will continue until a strong federal government is established in Nigeria, and until the powers reach an understanding about Biafra. Military aid, to suppress anti-Ibo elements, and economic aid, to restore war-torn areas, must be given to Nigeria. Diplomatic pressure should be applied to hostile states. In the case of Portugal, especially, the indirect use of NATO armaments, furnished mainly by America, must be stopped. And policy-makers must be taught that Biafra is part of Africa, and should be treated as such.
Roy L. Whitaker Kansas City Senior
Kahane answers Biafra critics
lTo the Editor:
Permit me several comments on Mr. Miner's article (Feb. 18, UDK) on the Biafran tragedy.
1. Mr. Miner took to task those who wear "Keep Bifra Alive" buttons but whose knowledge of the Bifran catastrophe is limited. But he failed to state that the "symposium" held by the Nigerians, which he called "partially successful," was about the worst place to go to obtain relevant and true information on the subject.
In support of this, let me quote from the Kansas City Star editorial of Feb. 17: "At a symposium on the Nigeria-Biafra conflict, held in recent days on the University of Kansas campus, the principle spokesman for the federal [Nigerian] government in Lagos neither dealt fairly with the issues that sparked the war nor with its tragic consequences. What might have been a useful discussion of this complex situation became, during the Nigerian spokesman's time on the podium, an exercise in distortion.
"The representative of the Lagos government, Nigerian consul in New York, ascribed all blame for the country's calamity to the Ibo tribe of the former Eastern Region [what is now Biafra]. Now, he suggested, the leaders of the secessionist Biafra are no more than pawns in a Communist Chinese attempt to penetrate West Africa. But the most incredible article in his repertory was his assertion that there is, in fact, no mass starvation in the encircled Ibo heartland.
"The photographs of emaciated and dying children that have shocked the world should be discounted, he said, and suggested that the children pictured were really captives taken by retreating Biafran troops and starved
deliberately for publicity purposes. If what the federal spokesman said is true, then the entire world has been seriously mislead. If it is not, he is guilty of the most obscene deception.
"The weight of evidence leans strongly toward the latter. International relief agencies, religious and medical workers active in Biafran territory, several visiting U.S. congressmen and the day-by-day reports of reputable journalists of many nationalities—all testify that the agony of civilians in war-ravaged Eastern Nigeria has reached a scale to stun the sensibilities. Most estimates suggest that some 10,000 or more persons are perishing daily of starvation.
"If the spokesman from New York reflects accurately the view of his superiors in Lagos, there would seem little hope of a humanitarian breakthrough, let alone a political solution that would end the conflict itself. Denial of the human tragedy in Biafra will not make the world disbelieve its own eyes. It becomes
progressively clearer that nothing short of a non-political international emergency relief effort—conducted on terms acceptable to both warring sides, if possible, but conducted in any case—can prevent Iboland from becoming an open grave."
2. I would like to suggest to Mr. Miner that even those Keep Biafra Alive button wearers who are ignorant of the details of the nature of the Nigerian-Biafran conflict may well know, and be acting on, something which he either doesn't know or doesn't choose to act on, namely that for over six months now the mass starvation in Biafra has been on "... a scale to stun the sensibilities." This
appalling tragedy results from the blockade imposed by the Nigerian Federal Government, which goes so far as to attempt to shoot down food relief planes of the Protestant Church World Service, the International Red Cross, and the Catholic relief agency Carritas. Mr. Miner either doesn't know, or doesn't seem to care, that the Nigerians are using mass starvation of innocent children as a weapon of war.
3. In reply to Professor Knight's comments at the symposium, I would like to say that I agree with him, in that all things being equal, larger political units are more economically viable than smaller ones. But all things are rarely equal. (I assume Mr. Knight does not advocate immediate political union of, say, the U.S. and Latin America, precisely because other things are not equal.)
In particular, I think he will eventually have to face the fact that what has happened so far in Nigeria-Biafra makes a strong political union next to impossible as a satisfactory solution to the problem. But surely he would agree that most of the economic benefits of a strong political union can be obtained by some form of economic union, a commonwealth of some form, with local political autonomy for the various regions. If successful, an economic joint venture might well, over a period of time, lead to the political union Prof. Knight seems to favor.
I might add that such an economic commonwealth arrangement is acceptable to the Biafrans, but at the present time is not acceptable to the Nigerians. It is they, the Nigerians, who refuse a plebescite, who refuse a
reasonable cease-fire, who refuse to accept what may well be the best solution, namely an economic commonwealth.
4. Finally, permit me a brief word as to what the situation really is in Biafra, according to journalists and relief workers on the spot, as well as U.S. congressmen who have been there.
Best estimates place total deaths by starvation since last summer at well over one million, chiefly children. (Almost all Biafrain children have been seriously damaged by protein starvation.) The highest death rate was about 10,000 per day (in Oct. and Nov.). But by a tremendous effort, aided by contributions of Kansans (including those button wearers, Mr. Miner!), and by the use of planes recently obtained from the U.S. government by Joint Church Aid-USA (a joint relief organization formed in January by the church relief groups), the death rate was cut to about 1,000 per day. However, last week, the pilots who fly the Russian planes for the Nigerians started zeroing in on these U.S. planes, resulting in their grounding. If nothing is done, the death rate will go up to 10,000 per day, and even higher.
I urge Mr. Miner and Prof. Knight, as well as all those who are against the deliberate mass starvation of innocent civilians, to write to their President, their representatives, and their senators, indicating their desire that the U.S. do whatever is necessary to keep the relief planes flying to Biafra with life saving food, to end the starvation and killing, and to bring peace to that tragically war-torn part of West Africa.
Howard Kahane