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Biafra’s forgotten children.

The claim that Gabon’s president Ali Bongo is actually Nigerian has shone a spotlight on a subject not many were aware of, that of the children airlifted out of Biafra, and Nigeria, some never to be reunited with their families. Now they are adults.

 In his latest book titled Nouvelle Affaires Africaine (New African Affairs), French writer Pierre Péan claims that Gabonese president, Ali Bongo is not actually from Gabon and that he is of Nigerian heritage. He claims that Ali Bongo was adopted from the secessionist state...
of Biafra during the bloody Nigerian Civil War by Omar Bongo, the now deceased previous Gabonese president and father of Ali Bongo.
Pierre Péan’s charge led Ali Bongo’s opposition to demand a DNA test from the president. Péan also claims that Bongo presented a forged birth...
certificate during the 2009 elections & that the elections were rigged, stating that the real winner was Andre Mba Obame.
Ali Bongo’s heritage & background has become a serious issue of contention for some, & has led to protests in Libreville over Bongo’s legitimacy as president.
According to the Constitution of Gabon, no one born to foreign parents can be president. It should be clear that these are all unsubstantiated claims. Ali Bongo ascended to the presidency in the 2009 elections, following the death of his father Omar Bongo who was President of...
Gabon for almost 42 years.
The drama of Ali Bongo’s background is having an indirect effect. It brought the spotlight on an issue that many people (Nigerians included) aren’t aware of: the issue being the transport of children out of Biafra to other African countries during the..
Nigerian Civil war.
(Western coverage of the Nigerian Civil War began a trend in reporting of famines and wars in Africa that we are yet to be rid of: anonymous half-naked individuals with no voice of their own, weak and emaciated with hollowed-out features, kids with extended...
stomachs, etc.)
As part of the strategy taken against Biafra, Yakubu Gowon and the Nigerian military implemented a blockade that stopped food and medicine getting into Biafra. The Nigerian military government intended to starve Biafra into defeat. The blockade affected the most..
vulnerable: the elderly and children. Thousands of children died from starvation and malnutrition. At one point, an estimated 1,000 children were dying daily. In fact, visages of the war to the world outside of Biafra were images of heavily malnourished and distended bellies of..
kwashiorkor-stricken children. These images created a rallying cry for action and humanitarian relief.
Humanitarian relief efforts from Western Christian groups and non-governmental organizations (NGOs) became paramount for the survival of Biafrans.
Empathetic groups coordinated and worked together to deliver food and medicine to Biafran civilians in an effort to save innocents, risking their own lives in the process. Many were cut down trying to circumvent the blockade enacted by Nigeria.
These were clandestine flights and secret missions taken out in the darkness of night in an effort not to alert the Nigerian military. This was known as the Biafran Airlift.
While it is widely known that these humanitarian missions occurred, what isn’t as widely known is that...
many orphans and malnourished children were airlifted out of Biafra to relief camps in various African countries. Most of the children were airlifted to relief camps and feeding centers in Gabon, Ivory Coast, and Sao Tome.
Many Biafran children were nourished back to health in these camps.
Sadly, following the war, the Yakubu Gowon admin did not take the steps to return these children back to their families. It was simply not a priority for the Nigerian govt and their displacement is not discussed.
It’s like it never happened. Displacement of the Igbo people from the war in general is not discussed. It’s a hot button issue the Nigerian government refuses to acknowledge or address, even today.
Prior to the onset of the civil war, thousands of Igbos were killed in Anti-Igbo Pogroms across Northern Nigeria. Millions more fled, abandoning homes, businesses and employment in order to survive. They were all displaced. This was why Biafra wanted to secede from Nigeria.
The United Nations High Commissioner of Refugees (UNHCR) was able to identify 3,911 children who were airlifted out of Biafra. They were returned to their parents, surviving relatives and foster families in the event that no blood relatives remained.
Despite the herculean efforts by the UNHCR, there are still scores of children unaccounted for. In addition, the identity and complete numbers of children who died in the relief camps, those who were abandoned in their host countries and those who were too young to identify...
themselves is not actually known. To date, many Igbo families don’t know what became of their children or if they even survived.
The US based non-profit group Igbo League has undertaken the task of identifying and, if possible, reuniting these children – who are all adults now –
with their loved ones. The project is known as the Echezona Project. The Echezona Project aims to identify all parties involved in the Biafra Airlift program in order to create a database of all the children taken to relief camps.
Their goal is to cross-examine their compiled database with the UNHCR’s database of the children who were returned to their families. In addition, locating burial sites of children who did not survive in the relief camps is also part of the agenda, so that DNA analysis can be...
conducted in order to at least bring some closure to many families.
While the Igbo League is a fine and noble organization, in an ideal world a non-profit should not be leading the movement to reunite these children (now adults) with their families, Nigeria should.
Like many things in Nigeria, the government has failed to address issues affecting its own citizens. Those who don’t learn from the mistakes of the past are bound to repeat them. Is Nigeria learning? Will Nigeria remember Biafra’s forgotten children?
Probably not in this lifetime. Lest we forget, it was a Nigerian govt that tried to starve them all to death in the first place. Acknowledging the existence of the forgotten Biafran children would mean that the Nigerian govt would have to acknowledge her war crimes as well.
Culled from https://t.co/hfwZCEx08S

End. #Nigeria #NigerianHistory #Biafra #NigeriaBiafraWar #NigerianCivilWar #Igbo #Biafrans

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How do you guys feel about a little bit of history this Monday evening?

Oh, today's Tuesday. I seem to be slower than the times. Is it because of my addiction to history? 😂
Let's journey to South Africa. The Zulu Country with the setting in mid 18th century.

Mkabayi Kajama The Zulu Princess

Shaka Zulu was a great warrior and king of the Zulu in South Africa. His story has fascinated historians, who have tried to figure out the aspects that drove him to be the conqueror he is known today.

It is well known that he died in 1828 at the hands of his brothers, but what many do not know is the role of Princess Mkabayi Kajama in his death. The rebel Zulu princess would work to ensure Shaka become king, and then plot to have him killed.

One of the most powerful women in history, Mkabayi was cursed from birth. She and her twin sister, Mmama, were supposed to have been killed at birth, as superstition stated that twins were bad luck.
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The Amazons of Dahomey.

It is noon on a humid Saturday in the fall of 1861, and a missionary by the name of Francesco Borghero has been summoned to a parade ground in Abomey, the capital of the small West African state of Dahomey.

He is seated on one side of a huge, open square right in the center of the town–Dahomey is renowned as a “Black Sparta,” a fiercely militaristic society bent on conquest, whose soldiers strike fear into their enemies all along what is still known as the Slave Coast.

The maneuvers begin in the face of a looming downpour, but King Glele is eager to show off the finest unit in his army to his European guest.
As Father Borghero fans himself, 3,000 heavily armed soldiers march into the square and begin a mock assault on a series of defenses...

designed to represent an enemy capital. The Dahomean troops are a fearsome sight, barefoot and bristling with clubs and knives. A few, known as Reapers, are armed with gleaming three-foot-long straight razors, each wielded two-handed and capable, the priest is told, of slicing...

a man clean in two.
The soldiers advance in silence, reconnoitering. Their first obstacle is a wall—huge piles of acacia branches bristling with needle-sharp thorns, forming a barricade that stretches nearly 440 yards.
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Later today, I'll be tweeting on the origins and history of the Ika people of Anioma. Please turn on notifications if you're interested.

The Origins And History Of Ika People of Anioma.

Ika communities mostly comprise the following: Agbor, Owa, Umunede, Mbiri, Abavo, Orogodo, Otolokpo, Igbodo, Ute-Okpu, Ute-Ugbeje, Idumuesah, Akumazi, Ekpon (Edo State), Igbanke (Edo State), Inyelen Edo State).

The Ika people are specifically located in the North-West of Delta State but some like Igbanke, Inyelen and Ekpon are presently located in Edo State.
Other Ika communities found in Edo State are Owanikeke, Owa-Riuzo Idu and Igbogili.

Specifically, Ika people occupy Ika North East and Ika South Local Government Areas of Delta State and a land area of about 117.45 square kilometres. Since the 2006 population census did not stipulate the official figure for ethnic groups, the total population figure of the Ika..

people remains officially unknown.
The dialect of Ika people is Igboid group (Williamson, 1968). This according to him is because it has no noticeable difference from the general Igbo language spoken within the Anioma area only weak phonological and lexical difference separates..
FOR LATER READ
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The story of Aare Ona Kakanfo Afonja, and the fall of the great Oyo Empire is absorbing. If you're interested in this beautiful history of pre-colonial south western Nigeria, keep a date with me later tonight. 🙏🏾

The Kakanfo and fall of Oyo Empire.
Thread.
Of the 14 Kakanfos so far, the tenures of three of them who were military commanders considerably impacted the history of, first, the Old Oyo Empire, and by extension, the rest of Yorubaland.

The three Kakanfos were Afonja of Ilorin, Kurunmi of Ijaye, and Obadoke Latoosa of Ibadan. The last two of the 14, who were civilians and honorary holders of the title nevertheless impacted the history of Yorubaland, and also the entire Nigerian nation.

Aare-Ona-Kakanfo Afonja:
In the mid-1700s, around 1750 and thereabouts, a powerful Oyo warrior was growing in stature; a man called Afonja. His father was Laderin. Laderin himself was the son of Alugbin, who himself was the son of Pasin.

Alaafin Majeogbe ruled Oyo from 1754 to 1770, and was succeeded by Alaafin Abiodun same year. Abiodun was on the throne for about 19 years, until 1789 when he was murdered by his own son, Aole.
Aole became Alaafin, and ruled from 1789 to 1796.
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President Muhammadu Buhari’s romance with Niger Republic has become an affront to the national interest of Nigeria. When he was sworn-in as an elected president in 2015 he went to Mamadou Issoufou’s presidential palace in Niamey, Niger Republic, to celebrate.

They gave him the reception of a conquering Fulani warlord: a white horse and sword.
I found that curious. How can a Nigerian leader celebrate his electoral victory in a foreign country and not Daura, his supposed hometown in Nigeria?

Answer has since been provided through Buhari’s policy actions in the past 5+ years. We have since learnt that Buhari is a first-generation Nigerian whose father, Ardo Adamu Buhari, a duck seller, had migrated from Niger, settled in Nigeria and married a Nigerian woman, Zulaihat.

The borders defined by the European colonial masters mean nothing to typical Northerners. When you hear that Nigerian borders are porous, what it really means is that there is no intention in the minds of Northern Nigerians and their elite to create an effective barrier between..

them and their kith and kin in the neighbouring countries of Niger, Chad and Northern Cameroun. Meanwhile, the Southern borders are strictly monitored (within the limits permitted by the selfish interests of corrupt Customs and Immigration officials).
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BJP is planning to undertake 'Rath Yatra' in Delhi's riot-affected areas to seek donations for Ram Temple on Feb 1. In 1990, L.K. Advani had launched Rath Yatra from Somnath to Ayodhya.

This thread covers the large scale killing which took place during the Yatra and it's impact.

Between April 1989 and April 1990, 262 people died in Gujarat, mostly were Muslims. In October 1990, days after Advani’s yatra began, 41 were killed in Ahmedabad. The same month, 52 were killed in Jaipur, 20 in Jodhpur, 33 in Lucknow, over 100 in Delhi, 37 in Assam,

[1]


18 in Patna and 165 in Hyderabad. Also in October, a pogrom against Muslims in Bhagalpur, Bihar, saw 960 killed in which 900 were Muslims. In November, 31 were killed in Agra, again mostly Muslim and 13 in Indore. In Dec, 60 were killed in Karnataka and 134 in Hyderabad.

[2]

Many parts of India remained tense for long periods of time. Between April and May 1990, three riots in Kanpur killed 30; between May and November 1991 more than 50 were killed in Varanasi. In May 1991, 26 including 24 Muslims were killed in Vadodara.

[3]

In October 1992, 44 were killed in Sitamarhi. On 6 December 1992, immediately after the Babri Masjid was destroyed, pogroms against Muslims broke out in Surat where 200 died, of whom some 95 per cent were Muslims. In Bhopal in December, 143 were killed.

[4]
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THREAD

1)
Newsweek — #Iran has sent deadly "Shahed-136 suicide/kamikaze drones" to the Houthis in #Yemen. These advanced UAVs are deployed to the Houthi-controlled northern Yemeni province of Al-Jawf.

More reason why the West should not appease Tehran.
https://t.co/gtNDCGbtQs


2)
#Iran has long provided drones to the Houthis

March 22, 2017
“… seven Houthi Qasef-1 drones and one drone engine recovered by forces from the UAE. Six of the drones were captured in October on a known Iranian smuggling route that runs through

3)
US to designate #Iran-backed Houthis in #Yemen as a foreign terrorist org (FTO)
https://t.co/ILBCg3Pfvs

Iran’s IRGC long funded/armed/trained/provided for the Houthis.

Dec 30—Missile attack on Aden airport. Yemen gov holds Houthis


4)
#Iran provides at least $360 million, ballistic missiles, other ordnance, technology and training to the Houthis in

5)
The Houthis recently claimed responsibility for a missile attack targeting Saudi Arabia’s Aramco oil
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On this day in 2007, the bomb blasts in Samjhauta Express killed 68 people including 44 Pakistanis. The immediate investigations revealed irrefutable evidence about the masterminds. In this thread, I would share some Indian newspaper clips which covered the investigations.


1. Lt Col Prasad Purohit, a serving Indian army officer, was arrested for terror conspiracy in the Malegaon blast case. He was the co founder of Abhinav Bharat, a right wing Hindu organisation. He admitted that he was the mastermind.

(The Times of India, Pune, 7 November 2008)


2. Lt Col Purohit met Pragya Thakur on 5 Oct 2008 to tell her that "Our People" had carried out the killings in Orissa, burnt down two churches and also carried out the Malegaon blast.

(The Indian Express, Pune, 24 Nov 2008)

Ironically, Pragya is BJP's MP today.


3. During his narco analysis test, Lt Col Purohit told officers that Praveen Togadia was responsible for the “Samjhauta Express Blasts”. He asked me to find out from Dr Dev, how much RDX was remaining after the blast.

(Pune Mirror, 19 Nov 2008)

4. In his narco analysis test, Lt Col Purohit gave sensational information that he supplied explosives for Ajmer and Malegaon blasts at the instance of Mahant Dayanand Pandey.

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At the same time, due to their non-registration and taking health measures, there is a spread of the pandemic.

In addition, they had created a special internet platform to broadcast live the arrival of boats in #Lesvos and other #islands of the Eastern Aegean in order to "push" the Coast Guard not to prevent their entry into our country.

These are the conclusions of a second secret operation - with the codemame "Alkmini 2" of https://t.co/1BCe7Y74Fz. with the assistance of NIS against #NGOs that are active in our maritime #borders and which is revealed by "To Vima", with the presentation of relevant documents.
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We're kicking off the Irish National Integration Conference this morning, with the first of 9 migrant-led discussions on Irish identity & integration, beginning with: INTEGRATION - LEARNING FROM THE PAST, LOOKING TOWARD THE FUTURE.

#INIC2021

@BriKi


CEO of @immigrationIRL @BriKi, kicking things off with his call to 'truly see the true diversity of Ireland 100 years on'.


Chair of the @immigrationIRL Board, Dr Roja Fazaeli, now delivering opening remarks for the conference, acknowledging the huge contribution of immigrant communities to essential services in Ireland through the Covid-19 pandemic. 🙌

Roja - Institutions such as direct provision continue to disfigure Ireland as an inclusive place to live... Ireland still has a long way to go until we're a fully inclusive society. We want to build a country where no one is left behind.

We're delighted to welcome Minister @joefingalgreen now to deliver the key note address for our opening session. Minister O'Brien was a past team member of the @immigrationIRL, and is now Minister of State with special responsibility for Community Development and Charities.
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Remember: Just because an idea is old doesn't mean it's good.

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5 star RSI Strategy by @VishalMalkan

Unconventional approach of 60-40 RSI and range shift concept.

According to him,
whenever the market is bearish,
it won’t be able to cross 60,
and whenever in a bullish trend,
it won’t be able to cross 40.

Like & Retweet for Maximum Reach.

So, instead of the 70-30 Relative Strength Index,
we will use the 60-40 range for the RSI indicator for this strategy.

When the
Monthly and Weekly RSI>60,
& when the RSI takes support at 40 in the daily chart,
it may bounce back and most probably it will not go below 40.

If a bullish candle is formed at the 40 RSI level,
the prices may bounce back, and one can enter the stock.

The stoploss can be placed at the low of that bullish candlestick,
and the target can be the 60 RSI level.

When the
Monthly and Weekly RSI<40,
& when the RSI takes resistance at 60 in the daily chart,
it may bounce back and most probably it will not go above 60

If a bearish candle is formed at the 60 RSI level,
the prices may bounce back from there, & 1 can enter the stock 4 shorting

The stoploss can be placed at the high of that bearish candlestick, and the target can be the 40 RSI levels.

#banknifty

This range shift concept can be applied in any timeframe,
whether intraday, daily,weekly, etc.
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