DESTINATION BIAFRA

Destination Biafra can be classified as historical fiction. E~ilecheta assures the reader:

The episode that was Biafra happened. But the major characters here are fictional and have been chosen to portray the attitudes of many countries .and individuals to the Biafran war. People like them may have existed, but those in this book are all conjured up by my imagination to suit the message this work carries. '

The message is loud and clear. Peacc must prevail. Wars are wasteful, disruptive and

shatter the very foundations of civil society. Victory in war might be appetizing to

the male ego, but women, hapless, helpless children and the old suffcr the worst.

Men die, but life goes on and the women left behind have to bcar the brunt of it and

cany on. Women must assert themselves, inaugurate the reign of peace, help stabilize

society such that men live and let others live in peace. To achieve the ideal, people

must be taught to rise above the narrow, parochial, divisive loyalties oftribe, religion,

region or language.

All religions, "isms" and ideologies profess belief in the essential oneness of

mankind. Yet, many conflicts are triggered off either by opposing interests or

misunderstandings among various races, ethnic groups, tribes, people subscribing to

different religious persuasions, castes, creeds, regions and languages. The Nigerian

civil war is one such conflict. Nigeria is a multi-religious, poly-linguistic nation.

Further, there is the tribal divide to complicate matters. The Hausas, numerically

1. Emecheta, Buchi. "Author's Foreword". Destination Biafra. London : Heinemann Publishers. 1994. p.vii.

larger and Moslem by faith are the major tribe. The lgbos are mainly from the East of

Nigeria and are by and large converts to Christianity. The third major tribe, the Yorubas,

Christian by faith are from the West. And there are a few other small, numerically not

significant sub-tribal groupings too. Nigerian society is a pluralistic society, a

conglomerate of a number of tribes, creeds, cultures and religions brought together

in a loose federation. Corruption, graft, greed, frustration, cynicism, obsessive

materialism, moral depravity, promiscuous indulgence in sex, extravagance, political

machinations, tribalism, ostentatious display of wealth and power result in social

unrest, envy and revolt rigged elections, blatant political manoeuring to hold the

reigns ofpower, clash of personal egos of leaders disrupt the loosely woven fabric of

life and culminate in a well-meant but ill-defined military coup against the civilian

government.

The junta hits upon a name for the new Nation. It is to he called Biafra, after

thename ofoneofthe old lost kingdoms of West Africa. Since it is yet to be achieved,

they temporize and agree to Chijioke's suggestion,

I would rather say our destination is 'Biafra', ..... I think this country needs a military respite, and so to Biafia we will go. Destination Biafra!2

The Sandhurst trained Nigerian military officers are themselves a divided lot

because of their tribal and religious backgrounds. Suspicions rule the roost and

apprehensions abound. This ideological common bonding has the potential to get

eroded anytime.

2. Ibid., p. 57

The junta coup is successfully carried out. All Nigeria rejoices at the fall of

the compt, kleptomaniac and elitist civilian government of the federation. Most of

the political leaders are eliminated in a ruthlessly planned and executed military

operation, but some of the major Ibo political leaders escape capture and summary

execution. The men inhniform seize power and a military government under the

leadership of Brigadier Onyemere is set up. To stem the tidc of divisive regional

tendencies the military government abolishes the regional governments and proclaitns

Nigeria a unitary state. The top leadership in the military being more Ibo it is suspect.

Fears that the government was Ibo rather than national causes unease and resentment.

The British, the former colonial masters, are back at their work. Thcy have their eye

on the rich oil resources ofNigeria. They play their subtle game of "divide and rulc".

They stoke the fires of discord to get control of the oil wealth. Popular resentment

that a unitary state might mean Ibo domination leads to rioting in the North and

ultimately to a Haus supported army coup. Unitary state is broken up and to twelve

regional governments are proclaimed. The regions are so dcviscd that most of the

oil-rich areas are outside the bounds of Ibo control. The reversion to regionalism

rcverses the process of unification. It subverts the very ideal of Riafra. Communal

riots break out. Thousands of citizens are slaughtered, hundreds of thousands are

wounded and maimed and violated, their homes and property looted and burned.

Even women are not spared. They are subjected to torture, brutal outrage and murdcr.

In the aftermath of these bloody massacres, secessionist sentiment gains strength

amongst the Ibos. For three years Ibos continue their fight for Biafra under severe

strains of a failing economy, fast depleting stocks of food, near empty amoury and

flagging morale. The British exploit the situation again. They bring in arms and

ammunition to the Nigerians and offer through the Red Cross a scant supply of food

and medicines to the Biafran Ibos. As the war drags on, disillusionment grows in

Biafta and the current head of the Biafran Ibo government setup, Chijioke, an Oxford

educated, Sandhurst trained, rich and aristocratic Lbo, is accused of prolonging the

conflict for no valid reason. Comrades in arms are on a collision course. Dissenting

voices are ruthlessly silenced. The fall of Biafra is imminent. The Nigerian army

makes rapid inroads into the heart of the Ibo land. Chijioke flees and Biafra sunenders

unconditionally. The dream is broken.

Though the Nigerian civil war is now a matter of history there are many novels

on the theme, each of which gives an insight into the great tragic conflict. I.N.C.

Aniebo's short story, In the Front Line published in the Sunday Times of Nigeria

on 17th May, 1970 is probably the first piece of fiction to come out on the Biafran

war. It deals with the various experiences of the secessionist movement with the war

as its backdrop to the human drama. Another important work on Biafran war is Flora

Nwapa's Never Again, which recounts the capture of her hometown Oguter on the

banks of the Niger, by Federal troops. It portrays the evils of war and propaganda in

wars. John Munonye's A Wreath for the Maidens, S.Okechukwu Mezci's Behind

the Rising Sun, Elechi Amadi's Sunset in Biafra, Ekwensi's Survive the Peace,

Eddie Iroh's Forty Eight Guns for the General, Emecheta's Destination Biafra,

Chinua Achebe's Girls at War and Other Stories and Wole Soyinka's The Man

Died are some ofthe wellknown works based on Biafran war and its aftermath. The

Nigerian civil war is the main theme of these works. The chaotic political situation

which might explode any moment was already hinted at. There was dissatisfaction

with the new African political kingdom before 1966. Wole Soyinka raised serious

questions as early as the inception of Nigerian Independence with his A Dance of

the Forests and later lashed out satirically in The Interpreters and Kongi's Harvest.

There was Gabriel 0kara7s The Voice, prophetically denouncing the political

corruption and there was Achebe's astringently bitter caricature in his, A Man of the

People.

Buchi Emecheta excelled all these writers in presenting the war situation in

her novel Destination Biafra. Though she has presented many events ofthe war, the

horrible deaths and the brutality of men, the salient feature of her narrative is that it

moves round the women characters. The sufferings and tortures the Igbo womcn

face in the hands of the army is pictured effcctivcly. Debbie Ogedemgbe is the chief

protagonist in the novel. She is the most powerful and daring female character, next

only to Adah Obi in Emecheta's novels. It is out of patriotic zeal and not for personal

causes that she joins the Nigerian army. In a way, Debbie is Emecheta's alter ego.

Emecheta is African first, Nigerian next and an Ibo of Ibuza through tribal ties. It is

the Pan-African sentiment that informs Emecheta's character and it is this quality

that she has imparted tb her creation, Debbie.

This moving and totally involving novel uses vivid fictional characters to

dramatize one of the most haunting episodes of recent history. It is set in Nigeria in

the eventkl years leading from independence, to military coup, to the tragic tribal

disturbances that gave birth in the late 1960's to the republic of Biafra and bloody

civil war that followed. It videographically traces the Nigerian Civil War, the fateful

period of the military coup and the ethnic disturbances that led to the birth of the

republic oEBiafra. The chiefprotagonist ofthe novel is a woman, Debbie Ogedemgbe,

Oxford-educated daughter of a corrupt, wealthy minister from a minority community.

Destination Biafra is a bold and daring departure from the normal

domestic preserve of most fictional works of African woman writers. It is packed

with a vibrant panorama of action and emotion. One can read this as a historical

novel. Emecheta is successful in encapsulating and presenting almost all the major

issues, incidents and every bit of news from twelve years of Nigeria's tumultuous

politics and civil war. Like a historian she records all the major events - elcctions,

independence celebrations, coups, diplomatic wrangles, battlefield mayhem, havoc

wrought by war on villages, starvation deaths, rescue opcrations et ul. One can visualise

and relive the various incidents that happened during the war while reading the novel.

Emecheta presents them in a realistic manner. She was not an eye witness nor was

she an active participant in the struggle. Emotionally involved in what was happening

in her native land, she has avidly collected material, collated it and with the gift of

her imagination transmuted the whole into a moving talc. Shc has said in her foreword

to the novel:

For me this book, like my novel Second Class Citizen, is one that simply had to be written. I was not in Nigeria during this war, but was one of the students demonstrating in Trafalgar square in London at the time. I have triedvery hard not to be bitter and to be impartial, especially as 1 hail from Ibuza in the Mid-West, a little town near Asaba where the worst atrocities of war took place, which is never given any prominence. Records and stories have shown that Ibuza, Asaba and

other smaller places along that border area suffcred most, but we are glossed over, not being what the media of the time called the Igbo heartland.3

It is a statement of her anguish and the sense of despair she felt at the humiliations

that the Ibos in her native place were subjected to. Her roots are in Africa, in her

Nigeria, in Ibuja. Memories haunt and cause pain, and cannot be erased. Emecheta

is magnanimous enough to say, "Yet it is a time to forgive, though only a fool will

f~rget" .~

While Destination Biafra is historical fiction in its conccption with its

component elements of power-play, political intrigues, Machiavellian tactics, unrest

and uprisings of all kinds, its main focus is the human aspect, the people, especially

the weaker sections like women, children and the aged.

Debbie, the central character, the one who had suffered the most and the one

whose psyche is singed by the traumatic experiences she had gone through is made

to present this tale of Destination Biafra. Her tale gains authenticity as it is a personal

record offered for our view. Debbie is individualistic and conscientious. Highly

educated, politically conscious, idealistic, ready to don the military uniform to play

the part of man, even willing to disown her own corrupt father, she is different from

the male conception of a traditional African Woman. She is not servile and subservicnt

like her female countelparts to many in comfort and "breed and bleed till menopause".

Her indomitable courage and will to assert her autonomy are remarkable. Such women,

3. Ibid., p. vii.

4. Ibid., p. vii.

in the tradition bound African society are courting trouble. In the words of Alan

Grey, her English lover, she is,

Slim and pretty, but arrogant. She was intelligent, nice to be with but independent. She was too English for his liking. If he was going to be native, he might as well do it properly. The way hc saw it, people like her were building themselves big identity probhns.'

She is too independent a girl to be a good wife for Alan as a wife, because she does

not follow the tradition of the much mythicized African woman. Through her,

Emecheta puts forward a new type of woman. Thc traditional African woman is

replaced by an individualistic, asscrtivc, diehard fighter for a cause. Dedicated to a

cause she believes to be noble. Debbie proceeds along the stipulated line of action,

alone. Her ambitions do not revolve around the dual conccpts of marriage and

procreation. Shc objects to the idea of being exhibited as an educated, acco~nplishcd

puppet in the hands of her fathcr at Chijioke Abosis' marriagc reception:

If her parents thought they could advertise her like a fatted cow, they had another thing coming. She would never agree to a marriage like theirs, in which the two partners were never equal. Her fathcr always called the tune. She did not hate him. On the contrary, she loved both her parents very much. It was just that she did not wish to live a version of their life - to marry a wcalthy Nigerian, ride the most expensive cars in the world, be attended by servants. ... No, shc did not want that, her own ideas of independence in marriage had no place in that set- up.6

Debbie's familial and social surroundings constantly remind hcr that she is a woman.

5. Ibid., p. 36

6. Ibid., p. 44

She is no virgin and she is not mad for maniage and the protection it assures a

woman.

In Destination Biafra, 'war' is used as a metaphor of survival. At the literary

level, the novel explores the political and historical implications of the Biafran war,

At the metaphorical level, it is Debbie's private war against the rigid traditions and

customs of the society, which grant neither superior nor alternative space to the African

woman to act on her own. Debbie rejects and rcfuscs to follow the beaten track of

circumscribed life of domesticity like her mother.

The Biafian war draws both men and women into the militia and the armed

forces. It is an opportunity for the committed and patriotic women to express their

potential. Debbie and her close friend Babs Teteku seek to join the army. Their

education and determination provide them the courage to exercise their 'choice' against

the wishes of their families. Their good friend Chijioke Abosi is the only man who

does not laugh at their desire to join the army. Debbie is grateful for this, but is

surprised at the obvious male bias in his response.

........ It'll be exwemely difficult .... I'd gladly take you. Debbie - it would add glamour to our regiment.'

Girls lend glamour to the m y but it is little realiscd that they have the grit too to

fi~lfill their assignments. As per the political calculations of the new military bosses

she could be a handy tool. It is her best friend Chijioke Abasi again who suggests the

7. Ibid., p. 55

idea that Debbie in the army could be a useful hostage, if nothing else. He says:

You know that girl Debbie Ogedemgbe? Well, she came to me weeks ago wanting to join our army, but I hesitated. Now I don't see why she shouldn't join us, especially with her education and her connections with the white officers in our national army. We need arms, a lot of arms. Thmugh her English boy friend (Alan Grey) she could see that we have a more than adequate supply. Even if we don't use them, the mere fact that they are there should prevent the type of sectarian uprisings we have been having re~ently.~

Debbies are welcome into the army for they could be held hostages to keep

the British, the former colonial masters, under check. Her admission is ratified by the

Brigadier, Onyemere, with the remark.

If she can be a useful tool I don't see why we should not use her and others like her."

She is glad to enlist, little aware that she is but a ploy, a decoy and a gambling

counter for men to use her for their own ends. It is a man's world and a woman could

be of use to them. The Biafran army uses her; the I-lausa General Moho uses her.

Alan Grey uses her and even Chijioke uses her. At last she understands the deceit

practised against her and rebels with due revulsion.

When Debbie undertakes a mission from the Nigerian Government to travcl

to Biafra to persuade the rebel leader Abosi to end the war, she is not singled out for

this task because of her superior diplomatic skills. She is chosen to negotiate with

9. Ibid., p. 66

Abosi solely because he had been in love with her before she became involved with

her English lover Alan Grey. She finds to her discomfiture that neither her official

status as a.govemment deputed negotiator nor her military uniform is a protection

against insults, threats and physical molestation. On her journey to Biafra, Debbie is

raped twice by the ~ i ~ e r i a n and Biafran soldiers. After all, she is a woman, an easy

prey to satisfy the male's lust. The enemy in this case is neither a Nigerian nor a

Biafran but man of any persuasion. Gang raped and wounded deeply in her psyche,

Debbie is each moment made aware of her femininity. Brave woman that she is and

committed to the noble cause of saving her people from the horrendous blood bath,

she carries on her mission.

In patriarchal society, men do work out their frustration and anger on women

and children. But the men in Emecheta's novels seem to be strangely weak,

dehumanized and headstrong in contrast.

Debbie seems at times a misfit in the company of the women she travels with

on her way to the B i a h capital. She often has to camouflage her ethnic identity in

order to escape too many enquiries. She wavers helplessly between allegiance to her

culture and her aspiration for freedom and self-fulfillment.

Debbie is so thoroughly Europeanized in her make up that she feels disgraced

that she cannot carry out the basic function of an African mother, when she has to

carry a baby on her back. She offers to help one of the toddlers but only with great

difficulty she manages to securely tie the child on her back, so that the watching

soldiers mockingly ask her:

What type of women is Africa producing? This one can't even back a baby. How will you cany your own child when you have one? Her type will push hers in that keke thing they call a pram, another woman put in. Debbie made light of it. But as she walked down that dry road in that heat, with the weight of the child almost breaking her back, it struck her that African women of her age carried babies like this all day and still farmed and cooked, all she had to do now was walk, yet she was in such pain. What kind of African woman was she indeed?'"

Debbie is suffering from a cross-cultural conflict. Debbie defies but at the same time

reflects on her inability to fulfill the claims of traditional socicty on her. Yet her

journey goes on and she learns several things in the course of her journey in the

company of refugee Igbo women and children. This odyssey is educative. She grows

in her awareness of the problems of women and she reflects on the significant role

played by struggling women in the Biafran war and wonders whether the struggles of

the women would ever be recorded in public history.

Travails and tribulations she had gone through, and shared sorrows and

humiliations with other women impact on Debbie. Fear and pain are cathartic in their

effect. They bring in a radical change in her attitude to the other women. Inspite of

her education, culture and social status Debbie starts communicating frccly with

other women. The bonds between these women grow stronger as Debbie takes the

lead and decides the course of action for the group. All of them are cxposed to the

threats of war, male domination and fear of physical humiliation.

In the chapter "Women's war", Emecheta projects the incessant strife of the

women in a graphic manner. Debbie feels extremely alienated as Mrs. Madoko,

10. Ibid., p. 181

Dorothy, Ngbechi, Boniface and others try to cross a muddy creek:

They tried to laugh, but the sides of their mouths were so caked with mud that the movement of their lips sent pieces of disturbed dried mud flying. This triggered in Debbie memories of a face - pack - she had once applied when she visited a beautician in London. Now she tenta t i~el i~eeled mud from her face and felt the skin underneath. It was as smooth as it had been on that day many years before, when she had been on that day many years before, when shc had to pay a large amount of money to get the same effect. Now she paid nothing. She smiled, wanting to share the irony of it with the other women, but she could not, for she knew they would think her arrogant to bring up such topics when they were not even sure that they would live to sec the next minute. It was at moments likc this that Debbie really felt lonely, surrounded as she was by other women."

Debbie is a war victim like the others yet shc is not a passive sufferer

but an integral part of the peace mission. The attitude of the soldiers and other men is

the same towards all women. Dcbbie comes to know of the various facets of her

indigenous culture and the major role played by women in diffcrcnt situations. She is

struck by the poly-dimensional character of African Woman, her resilience, her diehard

attitude, patience and fortitude. The journey to Biafra is thus highly educative, for

Debbie.

Like Adah Obi in Second Class Citizen Debbie wants to transmute the various

strands of experience in herjourney to Biafra, into a novel. She had

recorded a1 this in her memory, to be transferred when possible to the yellowing scraps of paper she dignified with the name of manuscript. They had survived with her so far, because most of the incidents were

I I . Ibid, p. 201

written down in her personal code which only she could decipher. If she should be killed, the entire story of the women's experience of the war would be lost.12

She does not abandon her mission, but goes to England for more help and returns to

her country. She fails to bomb the plane in which Abosi leaves. The traitor to the

cause, the betrayer of the interests of his people, flees to save his own skin. She is

disillusioned. Even Alan Grey is a betrayer, a selfish British colonial. For him, African

life is expendable if it profits his interests. Sexual subordination is unique to an

African woman as she experiences sexual subjugation not only at thc hands of her

own men but also in the hands of the colonial masters. The African woman is thus

twice colonized. Alan Grey symbolizes the colonial domination. She fuses her anti-

imperialist ideology with her feminism whcn she says,

I see now that Abosi and his like arc still colonized. They need to be decolonized. I am not like him a black white man; 1 am a woman and a woman of Africa. I am a daughter of Nigeria and if she is in shatne, I shall stay and mourn with her in shame. No, 1 atn not ready yet to become the wife of an exploiter of my nation.. .. . ... Good bye Alan. I didn't mind your being my male concubine, but Africa will ncver again stoop to being your wife, to meet you on an equal basis, like companions, yes, but never again to be your slave. "

Alan grey is rejected firmly and unambiguously as the others of hcr country werc by

Debbie. Debbie's defiance of the colonial oppressor completes the process of her

emergence as a new woman. Throughout the novel she is engaged in a struggle to

carve out a space for herself, for the African woman. She is the apotheosis of the

12. &id., p. 212

13. Ibid., p. 245

'New Woman' in Africa. Her refusal to marry Alan recalls Ama Ata Aidoo's heroine

Sissie's rejection of the comforts of the West and the love of a black man who prefers

to stay in the West in the novel 'Our Sister Kill Joy.'

Debbie most clejwly articulates her creator's political convictions. In fact,

Emecheta admits in an article entitled, "Feminism with a small 'f" that:

Being a woman, and African born, I scc things through an Afiican woman's eyes. I chronicle the little happenings in the lives ofthe African Women. I know I did not know that by doing so I was going to be called a feminist.14

Debbie is hesitant, anxious and doubtful about her decisions on several occasions,

like any other African Woman. But eventually she comes out successfully as a mature

person.

Destination Biafra sums up women's role in the political struggles of their

countries and Debbie Ogedemgbe, the chief protagonist and dominant character is

the most compelling example we have of thc New Woman in Africa. She embodies a liberating ideal of potentiality of a rich active and fulfilling hture for African Wo~nen, and it is an autonomous future she embraces, a future without men. I s

Debbie is the most outstanding heroic African Woman whose image in literature has

been almost invisible hitherto in African literature. We havc portraits of women offered

14. Emecheta, Buchi. "Feminism with a Small 'f." ed. Petersen,. Kirvten Hoist. Criticism and Ideolog~ : Second African Writers' Conference.

15. Frank, Katherine. "Women Without Men", Ed. Eldred Durovimi Jones , The Feminist Novel in Africa. P.29. Stockhome, 1986 P. 175.

by many writers. They are at best sketchy, short sighted accounts, which invariably

ignore or minimise the significant contribution that African Women had made to the

society. She is a the new woman. She is not disturbed by the thought that men [night

refuse to marry her. Chapter 14 - "Rcfhgees of the Darkening Night" and Chapter 16

-"Women's War" graphically chronicle the lives of women during war. According to

Roopali Circar

Debbie is Buchi Emecheta's favourite heroine, because in many ways she most transparently enacts her creator's political convictions. '"

Destination Biafra is of historical importance in the development ofAfrican

Writing by women. It is the most important feminist novel to date, stepping bcyond

the confines of domestic life to image the rolc women have to play in the political

struggles of their countries. It is almost a masculine undertaking, a hitherto unheard

of and unattempted "dramatic innovation in woman - authored fiction". Through

Dcbbie, Emechcta puts forward a new type of woman. The rural back-house, timid

and silent woman is replaced by an individualistic, assertive, die-hard fighter for a

cause. Given the occasion and the opportunity a woman can prove herself to be

better than a man. Debbies can no longer be dismissed out of hand as mere weaker

vessels. They can provethemselves. The civil war in Nigeria is the most representative

period when women emergcd as strong, triumphant survivors and fighters.

Debbie's individualism, ambition and resilience mark hcr as characteristically

different from other women. In her foreword to the novel, Emccheta tells the readers

16. Circar, Roopali. TheTiviceColonised- Women in African Literature. New Delhi : Creative Books, 1995. p.95.

that Debbie Ogedengbe is "neither Ibo nor ~ o r u b a nor Hausa - but simply a Nigerian."

This Pan-African character of Debbie makes her a true representative of the emergent

African Woman and by extension of all women in the situation of war.

Buchi Emechetak Debbie is a woman who refuses to be selfish, acts on her

own initiative and has a story to tell. She rejects the submissive role tradition has

reserved for her. Debbie in a way represents her author's feelings. Etnecheta herself

has said:

One critic asked me 'you have so much anger in you, how can you bear it? "well' I said I can't bear it, so I have to let it out on paper. l 7

Emecheta assaults, revises and reconstructs the iinage of the African Woman in the

figure ofher heroine Debbie. Her courage, resilience and fortitude during the turbulent

period of her life help her to stand up and face thc odds of life staked against her and

not sink and creep and crawl as women usually do. Mcn do their best to cast hcr into

the ditch. She survives and holds her head high above water. She is her creator's

alter ego, the brave new woman of Africa.

17. Emecheta, Buchi. "Feminism with a Small 'f'." ed. -Petersen,. Kirsten Holst. Criticism and Ideology : Second African Writers' Conference. Stockhome, 1986 P. 173.