The flag of the Republic of Biafra - Courtesy of Wikipedia
A history missing
I was born just
before the first military coup in the fledgling Federal Republic of Nigeria, far away from the
madding cacophony and chaos that presaged the breakdown of order, the massacre of Igbos
in the North and the civil war.
We returned to
Nigeria, in the year the civil war ended, my parents excited and ready to
participate in the new Nigeria led by the military leader Yakubu Gowon, whose
surname became the reconciliatory acronym of Go On With One Nigeria.
The history of
Nigeria that I did in school ended just after Nigerian independence and took off again
after the end of the Civil
War. It meant we as Yorubas
from the South-West of Nigeria could choose wherever we wanted to live in the
country, as we first set up base in Kaduna and then in Jos.
The stories that informed the reasons for the turmoil in the Western Region, the
corruption and misgovernment that led to the first and second military
coups of 1966 and the swagger of Chukwuemeka Odumegwu Ojukwu were just the subject of folklore.
Making history obvious
The closest I came
to appreciating what happened in the Civil War was in the photographs taken by
Peter Obe, in a book titled, Nigeria:
A Decade of Crises in Pictures (Paperback) which contained iconic and
haunting photographs of the Republic
of Biafra during the Civil War.
Enter, Half of a Yellow Sun (2006)
by Chimamanda
Ngozi Adichie, a novel that apparently wove the realities of Biafra into a
human interest story of everyday lives and how people were affected by the war.
I never read the
book, but I have just returned from watching the Half of a
Yellow Sun film showing in just one cinema theatre in Manchester.
Having read and
watched reviews of the film, it had somewhat prepared me for possible
disappointment, but there was a compelling need to see for myself.
Half of a fading sun
The film was well made, the acting superb and worthy of great accolades, but I am not sure if what is said of the novel did translate properly to the screenplay that became the template for the film.
I cannot say that I
learnt anything I did not already know of the Republic of Biafra apart from the
visual representation of the geographical landmass that constituted Biafra.
The flag of Biafra,
composed of a horizontal tricolour with the yellow glow of a rising sun was as
optimistic as the braggadocio of the man that led the secession from Nigeria,
but one can safely say the sun had already set on Biafra from the get-go.
A warped history
Whether much could have been done to have the original coups more encompassing that it did not seem like an Igbo coup in a futile power grab can be the subject of extensive debate, but the birth of Nigeria as an independent country was as flawed and fractured as it could ever be.
There probably was
never a golden dawn of Nigeria beyond the speech
that the Prime
Minister Abubakar Tafawa-Balewa gave on the night we gained independence on
the 1st of October, 1960.
A privileged view of the war
However, back to
the film, the narratives were unusual and somewhat foreign in my view, as it
revolved around two highly educated daughters and their love and family lives.
Thandie Newton playing
Olanna with her love interest Odenigbo played by Chiwetel Ejiofor, and
her sister Anika Noni Rose as Kainene with her American
husband Joseph
Mawle as Richard.
I did not recognise
the songstress Onyeka Onwenu for her part as Odenigbo’s mother; times do mature the visage of those one once knew so well, decades ago. Since, I am not a Nollywood fan, the
other actors were just actors.
Half of a Yellow
Sun in the movie was the Biafran War from the perspective of the very
privileged and well-connected in the early 1960’s.
An unfamiliar Nigeria
Throw in
infidelity, a love child, an adoption, an interracial marriage and the luxury
of being able to pack a bag and drive off in a car when trouble came close, and
this became a very different Nigeria from that of those who did see suffering.
The violence and
tragedies in the film cannot be said to have done justice to bringing life to a
history very few Nigerians born after 1970 know anything about.
Yet, there were two
characters that found opportunity by being in privileged surroundings, Ugwu the
houseboy who witnessed much, said little and had the benevolence of being sent
back to school where at the end of the film we are told became a writer and
Baby, the love child who was accepted by Olanna as her daughter and eventually
became a medical doctor.
Just a good film
I do not know if
the film was to spare us the gruesomeness of the war or it was more intent on the
love soap opera at the expense of the war.
Yet, the mind of Odenigbo was interesting enough about his revolutionary zeal and his fearful view of Nigerian identity as was the capitalist machinations of Kainene as a profiteer in the war, who in one of her runs went missing and was never seen again.
A good film in
general, but not one to do Nigerian history at a leisurely pace with sweet popcorn
and Pepsi Cola.