Success Damian:
Mrs. Nneka Chimezie, a business woman and real estate
consultant, is also a human rights activist.
Chimezie is the chairman of an Igbo Newspaper, Ekwe Kuo Amagbaa and national
coordinator, Igbo Women Forum, an organization that is affiliated to Alaigbo
Development Foundation (ADF).
Having X-rayed the Igbo nation Chimezie who is
popularly called Madam Pinto passed a verdict that what the Igbos need at this
critical period is unity.
She maintained that unity must come first before
agitation for either Igbo presidency, restructuring or Biafra.
“Right now I think what we need is unity among
ourselves. What you don’t understand is that we are on top of affairs in this
country, we are the backbone of this country; without us Nigeria is nowhere. It
is like we don’t understand the kind of power we wield in Nigeria. We allow the
press propaganda, the media to bring us down, to tell our own story. We allow
people to tell our history, we allow people to introduce us. So we don’t really
know the power we possess, our strength, our worth and Nigerians know our worth
and they don’t want us to know it.
“They knew that if we know our worth, if this people
can be this powerful, the best thing is to play them down so that they won’t
know their worth. For me, I think what we need is unity of purpose, unity among
us, respect for ourselves, love ourselves, and help ourselves, that is what we
need,” she said.
Chimezie advised the Igbos to go and develop their
home states “We need to go home and develop our own land, and make them come to
our own land, because we run things, we run things in Lagos, we run things in
Abuja, they all know it. If we don’t take our time and sit down and unite
ourselves, we are going to be destroyed over time, they are doing it already,
they have taken us out of white collar jobs, they have practically schemed us
out, and they are also looking for a way, they have not been able to penetrate
the business arena, but they will if we continue to play this I before others,
this selfishness, being individualistic, I think that is the weak point they
are using to destroy us, and allowing yourself to be used, being a saboteur,
stabbing your brother in the back, otherwise, in fact, if we unite ourselves,
Nigeria will beg us to rule them; they will ask us how did you do it?
She also spoke on the entrepreneurial and survivalist
ability of the Igbos adding that the significant milestone made by the Igboman
over the years through business is fast being ruined by politics “I think all
we need now is to unite, if our fathers could survive with two Naira, and
become what they are, what can we do with millions of naira that some of us
have, some of us have millions they don’t know what to do with it. There is
need for unity of purpose, I think politics has destroyed us more that it is
building us, if you watch Igbo land, the people that build Igbo land are the
businessmen, politics is destroying us, so much power is dissipated in politics
that everybody wants to go into politics, I think there is need for the elders,
if we even have them, to sit down and ask themselves this question, what do we
need, what do we need to do? Let us leave Nigeria for now, let us talk within
ourselves, how do we close our doors and settle our matter and then launch out
for Nigeria to see us? If our fathers can fight the war with nothing, what can
we do, but I think the war was more of internal than external, the war is more
within us than outside, so I have never seen any house that is divided against
itself and stood, a house that is divided against itself will never ever
stand.”
Chimezie said the problem of the Igbos is the problem
of division “I think the problem within us is more of the division among us
than the oppression we get from outside, nobody can oppress the Igbos, if you
know who an Igbo man is, no man can oppress and Igbo man, but it takes an Igbo
man to oppress an Igbo man. Watch whenever you see an Igbo man being pulled
down a fellow Igbo is under the table giving idea how it can be done.
“We are one man riot squad, too strong for Nigeria,
Igbos are too intelligent, too smart for Nigeria to place us where we are. I
think we are the ones marginalizing ourselves, cheating ourselves, maltreating
ourselves. Anytime we decide to unite, how do we unite? If you find your
brother being maltreated, even if he is wrong defend him outside, bring him in
and caution him. Yes it might be the right thing to caution him out there, but
that is not the language Nigeria speaks, must you be the one to speak the
language of due process, this is the way it should be done, while others scheme
out, we continue to fight, Nigeria doesn’t want it, it is divided along ethnic
lines.
“So let us go home, if you find your brother wanting
outside, defend him, then bring him in and caution, that is what others do,
because if we start, and when you see your brother aspiring for something stand
by his back, think that is our case point, that is our weakest point, if we can
be giving ourselves that support we needed, we don’t need 9jer, we don’t even
need the presidency, did we have presidency before we got this far?
“Let them keep their presidency, let us run things underground,
our dear president entered and felt he can finish our businesses in one month
just like they said they would finish war in two weeks, we just sit down and
watched them and we laughed, they made their polices, but we quickly adjusted
and begin to run things, so I think what we need now is unity of purpose, we
can unite and speak with one voice, we have so many pressure groups speaking
for us, these pressure groups should unite and speak with one voice, once they
see you speaking with one voice, I don’t think we can be defeated, Chimezie
emphasized.
