Post-war Igbo economic dispossession

Following the end of the Nigerian Civil War which lasted from 1967 to 1970, the Nigerian federal and state governments implemented a series of policies and decrees that stripped the Igbo's of their substantial economic assets, property, and opportunities. These measures by the Federal government included a punitive currency exchange policy, property seizures specially in present day Rivers State, military dismissals, and exclusion from the benefits of economic reform legislation. Academic literature documents these policies as having structurally disadvantaged the Igbo in the post-war Nigerian economy.

After the war, the Federal government declared a policy of "Reconciliation, Reconstruction, and Rehabilitation" known as the 3Rs. General Yakubu Gowon who was the Head of State proclaimed "No Victor, No Vanquished" which he explained that no side won and no side lost and that the war was for the unification of the whole nation. Scholars have argued that implementation fell far short of these stated principles.

Background

The Nigerian Civil War popularily known as the Biafra war was fought from July 1967 to January 1970 between the Nigerian government and the secessionist state, Biafra. Estimates of total deaths from both nations range from one to three million people with Biafra suffering heavy lost in combat, famine and disease The war's central theatre was on Biafra land which includes present day Igboland, Ibibio land and others. The region's infrastructure, economy, and social institutions were severely damaged.

Before the war, the Igbo had established significant commercial and professional presences across Nigeria, particularly in cities such as Port Harcourt, Enugu, Lagos, Kano, and Kaduna. The anti-Igbo pogroms which occurred in northern Nigeria had already forced a mass exodus of Igbo's back to the Eastern Region, leaving behind their assets.

Policies

The £20 banking policy

All Igbo holders of pre-war Nigerian bank accounts were paid a flat rate of £20 (twenty pounds) regardless of the size of their pre-war deposits. The policy was administered under Obafemi Awolowo, who served as Federal Commissioner for Finance during the war.

Igbo account holders who had deposited thousands of pounds in Nigerian banks before the war received the same fixed sum as those with minimal savings. The policy was defended on the grounds that the Republic of Biafra had declared Nigerian currency non-legal tender in 1968 and introduced its own Biafran pound. Critics argued that the Nigerian government had an obligation to honour pre-war deposits and that the flat-rate payment was an act of economic punishment.

Abandoned property policy

The Rivers State government enacted the Abandoned Property (Custody and Management) Edict No. 8 of 1969 , which classified properties owned by Igbo residents who had fled Port Harcourt and other Rivers State cities during the war as "abandoned" and transferred their management to state authorities. Properties were subsequently occupied by non-Igbo residents and local government officials.

Returning Igbo property owners found their homes and businesses occupied. The Rivers State government defied federal directives to restore properties to their original owners. State courts consistently ruled in favour of occupants.

The federal government later enacted the Abandoned Property Decree No. 90 of 1979 under the Olusegun Obasanjo-led military government , which critics argued institutionalised the dispossession by formally extinguishing Igbo title to properties.

Former Rivers State Governor Rotimi Amaechi acknowledged this disparity in a public statement: "In the North, the Igbo who returned after the war were given back their properties, but here our people seized them and called them abandoned properties."

Military dismissals

Decree No. 46 of 1970 provided for the summary dismissal or compulsory retirement of Igbo military officers who had participated in the civil war on the Biafran side. This contradicted earlier assurances by General Gowon that all officers would be reabsorbed into their former positions. Many dismissed officers were also barred from employment in any corporation in which the federal or state government held an interest. Some remained in detention until the ouster of General Gowon in 1975.

President Obasanjo converted their dismissals into retirements in 2000 and restored them to their former ranks, more than thirty years after the fact.

The Indigenisation Decree of 1972

The Nigeria Enterprise Promotion Decree of 1972 required that certain categories of businesses operating in Nigeria be transferred to Nigerian ownership. The Igbo, still rebuilding from the devastation of the war and stripped of capital by the £20 banking policy, were uniquely disadvantaged in participating in the acquisition of enterprises made available under the decree. The benefits of indigenisation accrued disproportionately to other ethnic groups with intact capital bases.

Quota system and institutional exclusion

Academic and federal civil service quotas introduced in the post-war period limited Igbo access to universities and federal institutions. With Igbo-majority regions underrepresented in federal appointments and public sector employment during the military governments of the 1970s, the structural disadvantage created by the economic policies was compounded by political exclusion.

Suppression of war history

The Nigerian military government decreed in the 1970s that the civil war was not to be taught in Nigerian schools. Scholars have argued this prevented a national reckoning with the economic and human consequences of the war and foreclosed formal processes of reconciliation and restitution.

Igbo economic recovery

Despite the structural disadvantages of the post-war period, the Igbo demonstrated significant economic resilience. Drawing on their pre-war tradition of trade and commerce, Igbo entrepreneurs rebuilt businesses across Nigeria through informal networks, communal support systems (otu and oha associations), and rotating credit groups (esusu). By the 1980s, Igbo traders had re-established significant commercial presences in major Nigerian cities.

Scholars have cited this recovery as evidence of the strength of Igbo communal institutions rather than evidence that the post-war policies were benign. The recovery occurred in spite of federal policy, not because of it. According to Okwuosa, Nwaoga and Uroko, "All the interviewees agreed that Igbo people are naturally resilient because of their communal system, which helps them to stand out against all odds and challenges. The general agreement on this is not without variations." They also noted that "Every Igbo person has a divine genius or double in him or her – a personal god Chi, which helps the person achieve success in life."

Okeke, Ibenwa and Okeke (2017): further explained;

The essential role of Chi concept is seen in the Igbo proverb, which says Onye kwe, chi ya ekwe (when one says yes, his personal god says yes) … Chi is a force in Igbo social behavior, which is characterized by an attitude of man; every being is the architect of his own fortune.

This suggests that Igbo economic recovery was linked to their communal and spiritual traditions.

Legacy

The policies of post-war economic dispossession remain a source of grievance among Igbo communities. The abandoned property question in Rivers State has never been fully resolved. Successive governments have offered apologies but no systematic restitution.

The long-term consequences of the £20 banking policy, military dismissals, and indigenisation exclusion have been cited by scholars as contributing factors in the relative underrepresentation of Southeast Nigeria in federal infrastructure investment and institutional power.

In the words of Njoku (in Obi-Ani 2009) the people were:

Thoroughly demoralized, psychologically disoriented, materially impoverished and politically marooned. Their future appeared permanently blighted. To be Igbo became taboo, and some Igbo groups attempted to hide Igbo identity by disguising their Igbo name. (p. vii)

See also

• Nigerian Civil War
• Biafra
• Igbo people
• Yakubu Gowon
• Obafemi Awolowo
• Chukwuemeka Odumegwu Ojukwu
• Nnamdi Azikiwe

Further reading

• Obi-Ani, P. (2009). Post-Civil War Political and Economic Reconstruction of Igbo Land, 1970–1983. Great AP Publishers Ltd., Nsukka, Nigeria.
• Ojukwu, C. O. (1989). Because I am Involved. Spectrum Books.
• de St. Jorre, John (1972). The Brothers' War: Biafra and Nigeria. Houghton Mifflin.