History of West Africa






Biafra, 1967-1970



The name BIAFRA, on early maps up into the 19th century, is allocated to a stretch of land located in the south of modern Cameroon.

In the mid 1960es, in regions of Northern Nigeria, several 10,000 Igbos were massacred - the christian Igbos weree traditionally better educated; many Igbos held better-paid jobs than the Muslim Hausa.
The massacres caused the flight of about 1,000,000 Igbo from the predominantly Muslim provinces into the predominantly christian southeast.
In 1967, Lt.Col. ODUMEGWU OJUKWU proclaimed the secession of the southeast, under the name REPUBLIC OF BIAFRA. Biafra expelled it's non-Igbo population. The capital was ENUGU.
A war ensued with the central government, which was unwilling to accept the secession. In this war, Britain supported the central government, while France supported Biafra. The war ended with the central government's victory; Biafra was reintegrated into Nigeria in 1970.






EXTERNAL
FILES 		History of Nigeria, from Infoplease
The Biafran War, from Postimperial & Postcolonial Literature in English
CASCON Case NIB : Nigeria (Biafra) 1967-1970, by L.P. Bloomfield, L. Moulton
Biafra, from Airline History
DOCUMENTS Flag of Biafra, from Flags of the World
Coat of Arms, from Wappenlexikon, comment in German
Photo-essay of the Biafran War, by Philip Emeagwali, contains photos, banknotes, coins, stamps, document : Ahiara Declaration of 1969, poorly organized
Banknotes, from Ron Wise's World Paper Money
Image from Bilddatenbank Weltchronik.de : Genocide in Biafra, 1970
Coin of Biafra, from Joel's Coins, a commercial site, scroll down
Banknotes of Biafra, from cgb.fr
REFERENCE



This page is part of World History at KMLA
First posted in 2001, last revised on November 6th 2004

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