National Issues
The Incoherent Method By The IPOB And The LNC -By J. Ezike
Sometimes, unconventional systems of arrangement do not excite that traditional sense of standard procedures and normal practices which the society prescribes as the “coherent method” of observing daily rituals according to an established order and a structured thought. And any action that transcends beyond the conventional system and contradicts the established order upheld as “sacrosanct” suffers the immensity of contempt.
The society with all its “coherent methods” puts controls on our minds and shapes our attitudes with restrictions. And we find ourselves unwilling to explore the vast options within our reach, to adopt unconventional systems of arrangement in resolving contemporary issues on ground. And the idea of a one-way approach in scoring desirable consequences within any context of human or societal development is a myth that takes pleasure in delimiting the profound, transcendental potentiality of exploration.
The nature of humans from a social standpoint is evident in the light of exploration. History has shown compelling events of the consistent search for uncommon solutions to the pressing needs of a people within a society. By that I mean; the adoption of what would easily be
Technology which is technically a synonym for “Human Development” is a desirable consequence of the “incoherent methods” institutionalized by certain people within an organized society who are not completely driven by the established order and the conventional systems that controls their minds.
The society forms the people, the people forms the nation but the system deforms them all. In order words, the system is the final decider of the common practices, laws, rules, regulations, doctrines that controls the society, the people and the nation.
I am an Igbo by origin. I am not defined by the Nigerian system that deforms my identity with the institutionalized principle of territorial demarcation. I mean the principle that draws a racial gap between an Igbo indigene of Imo and an Igbo indigene of Abia through what is defined as State Creations. A system of arrangement so articulate in its political intention to “deform” the natural order, to draw an imaginary line of difference in the minds of both indigenes who by “natural order” are same people of same origin but controlled mentally by the “coherent methods” upon which their existence and fate is determined. Thus, both identical worlds are conditioned to view themselves as distant relatives. Same principle of territorial demarcation applies to the Igbo indigenes of Ebonyi and Enugu…
I am a thinker and a revolutionary one for that matter. I believe with a strong conviction that it is a dreary employment of thoughts to proclaim “freedom” without “practice.” And I defend what I believe to be outside the space of an established order that contravenes the “coherent methods” of practicing freedom. It was the American writer William Faulkner who said; “We must be free not because we claim freedom but because we practice it.” The “incoherent method” of self-determination by the IPOB, as largely berated and scorned by a “selective minority” is from a perspective of revolutionary response, a utility of “practicing” our ideology and “exploring” our limited options outside the space of an established order.
The one-way approach to freedom is an awesome myth, especially when we sleep deep in that realm of fantasy that oxygenates our patience with an “expectant waiting” for a bestowment of a referendum date by an intergovernmental agency whose principal actors are historical “authors” of the established order and the “coherent methods” that has in the past and present scored in quick successions, lotteries of “lucrative wars” through the system that continues to deform the so-called “Third World.”
I have no desire to believe forever in the “coherent method” that conjures with a compassion contaminated by bias, an unthinkable, lopsided and imbalanced order of priority that dehumanizes a people and a society based on race, gender, religion, beliefs and ideologies. We may wait forever but, forever may never be enough for the system driven by an established order, to “bestow” an equality of rights and prerogatives to a people whose lives are devalued and positioned at the rock-bottom of humanity. It was the 32nd President of the United States of America Franklin Roosevelt that said; “In the truest sense, freedom cannot be bestowed; it must be achieved.”
So within that reality, the “incoherent method” by the IPOB is by far a viable option in the face of a system that would rather consume Nigerians in order to save Nigeria. It is within this context that our freedom must be achieved. And my agreement with Franklin Roosevelt’s submission that, freedom in its truest sense CANNOT be bestowed, brings to the fore the necessity of an “incoherent method” in the pursuit for freedom.
I choose not to be comforted by the system that commands a slavish compliance to the established order that deforms my truest identity. I have no quarrels with divergent opinions and I have no gospel to impart but rather to resonate with the “incoherent methods” “unconventional systems” and “radical opinions” adopted by certain groups and individuals as regards the upcoming presidential elections scheduled on the 16th of February which by consequence of necessary freedom is structured for a referendum exercise.
However, I strongly suggest, like I have always done in the past, that the “principal bodies” in the quest for self-determination and/or the realization of the ancient land of Biafra be “united” by same ideology. They must relinquish the “pride of indispensability” and forge a common front, a coalition, if this “incoherent method” must prove viable in the long run. No group or individual is superior in the quest for freedom.
I will end this essay with a thought-provoking statement by Professor Wole Soyinka, who happens to be one of the few intellectuals I respect in the geographical space coined Nigeria. I believe that his recent submission on about the February 16 presidential election is a tacit approval of the IPOB’s and the LNC’s “incoherent method” that forms a radical response to the conventional systems of arrangement. In his own words: “My position is simply that it is time for a totally new direction…”
