Uli Airport is a symbolic shrine, which remains the height of
Blackman's greatest technological achievement to date. The wonder of
Uli Airport is yet to be matched by Blackman anywhere in the world.
The Airport and its structures have been deliberately left to decay,
so as to attempt to obliterate the memory of an Igbo symbol of
technological advancement, military superiority, resistance and
survival. Had Igbo Day been held at Uli as scheduled earlier, its
significance would have been almost impossible to express in words, in
terms of its symbolicness and what Uli Airport represented and
represents to Ndi Igbo.

Uli Airport the story goes was completely built from scratch by mostly
Igbos. It was a military cum civil Airport. While supply aircrafts
hovered overhead, the Airport below was said to be in pitch darkness
and at the right moment the runway lights would come on momentarily as
aircrafts come in and land. The aircrafts were said, according to
legend, to taxi along runways, which terminated underground or into
the trees, thus shielding them from enemy air-to-ground fire.
Meanwhile, federal airforce jets hovered overhead strafing at every
and anything in the pitch darkness below. It was said that any of the
several run ways hit by a bomb or rocket was repaired immediately
within minutes to enable the next supply aircraft hovering low
overhead to land. The supply aircrafts often had to circle flying low
above the trees for hours, evading federal airforce Migs and jets.

Uli Airport became the Igbo lifeline during the economic blockade,
Biafra having become landlocked and surrounded. Uli Airport was of
such importance or indeed of the most singular importance to Biafra
and to Nigeria, so much so that the federalists landed a marine-borne
invasion force at "Oguta II", which was only about 20 - 30 odd
kilometers to Uli, so as to bring the Airport within artillery range.
Uli was so indispensable to the survival of Ndi Igbo, so much so that
His Excellency General Ojukwu personally commanded the Biafran forces
that defended "Oguta I" and liberated "Oguta II" within three days of
the landing of federal forces in the area. I was a kid then and I
vividly recollect seeing General Ojukwu and his convoy drive past
towards Oguta. We were waving, cheering him and the troops being
rushed to Oguta as they filed along singing, some on foot, others on
vehicles and tractors.

One group of troopers went singing:

Gowon exclaims distraught - 'Ojukwu' o, Ojukwu' o
Ojukwu has won the war
Ojukwu'o, Ojukwu'o
Ojukwu has won the war
I shall kneel before Ojukwu, plead forgiveness
I am defeated, my army routed' ...

A second batch of soldiers rent the air stamping their boots on the
earth, singing:

My mother begot me - a soldier of the bush
My father begot me - a soldier of the bush
As though dead bodies without limbs,
Helpless, the bushes our home
Mosquitoes feast on my soldier, "Iworiwo"...

The third group of commandos would sing in answer:

My mother, don't you worry
My father, don't you worry
If I happen to die in the battle field
Never mind, we shall see again

My sister, don't you worry
My brother, don't you worry
If I happen to die in the battle field
Never mind, we shall see again

My uncle, don't you worry
My auntie, don't you worry ....

One of the only serviceable tanks captured from the federalists was
also deployed in the battle for Oguta. In deed we watched a live
deadly game of "cat and mouse" between the lone Biafran tank and
several federal airforce Migs and jets, as the aircrafts tried every
maneuver their battle plan in a bid to destroy the tank, pursuing it
along Orlu - Okwudor -Awo-Omamma Road, part of Owerri - Onitsha Road
between the Awo-Omamma - Amiri- Otulu -Mgbidi section and along Mbgidi
- Oguta Road. We had to often scurry for cover as the jets kept firing
rockets upon rockets and cannons indiscriminately along the road on
siting the tank and the vehicle would dock in and out from the woods
along the road, first rushing down to Oguta and then back afterwards
rushing towards Orlu.

The battle for Oguta was all about Uli Airport. The federal side was
desperate, a desperation that was reflected in the manner it deployed
the Airforce in that battle. Neither vehicles nor people could move
safely along any of the roads or nearby towns as the federal Migs and
jets were strafing and rocketing anything that moved. The sight of so
much devastation and death of so many innocent civilians, including
children remains etched in our memories, who witnessed the events.

There was the little angel - Obiageli. She was barely three and
beautiful - a kind of innocent beauty you would see once and would
always remember for the rest of your life. On the third day of the
battle for Oguta we were all about and around at "Okwelishi",
Awo-Omamma and the neighbourhoods around it, still cheering the troops
passing to and fro, when the Migs thundered in, screaming past, as low
as the roof tops. Everyone dived for cover. Then the rockets came
whistling in, and the cannons and machine gun fire rained bullets on
every inch of earth on its path. It sounded like death and it smelt
like death, the flashes like thunder, the ordour gunpowder-like but
ominous and sinister, the booms and bangs that followed. You wake up
if you are lucky dazed, but for a while you wander about not knowing
where you are nor what has happened around you. Then you feel hands
grab at you, carrying you and running, then slowly you break into
tears crying, terrified and fearful that the jets might come again,
then you hear all the wailing around you, you open your eyes and you
see all the blood and devastation around you. Obiageli was decapitated
and she was only three - a beautiful little angle. However, she died
so that the Oguta battle would be won and Uli Airport would be saved
to keep Ndi Igbo alive for as long as it was necessary to guarantee
their survival. That was what happened eventually.

After Obiageli was killed, all the children and women in our
neighbourhood were evacuated into the thick bushes adjourning both
banks of the Njiaba River. Those great banks of the Njiaba River has
always provided succor and protection to our people in their most
trying periods from time immemorial. Njiaba, by the way is a god. The
presence of this god is manifested in its child, a species of pythons
called "Eke Njiaba". It would not bite nor harm anyone of us, its
children but its bite is known to be deadly to humans elsewhere. In
our neighbourhood and elsewhere in Igboland where the god Njiaba is
worshiped, it is an abomination and sacrilege to kill 'Eke Njiaba".
Should one be killed inadvertently, then the killer must be cleansed
of his or her abomination as specified in custom and tradition, which
included performing full burial rights for the "Eke Njiaba", as though
it were a titled man and an "Nze na Ozor". Whoever killed an
"Eke-Njiaba" must bury it as if it was human. The people children of
Njiaba had no responsibility when the python died of natural causes,
but the wrath of the gods where said to be visited on the community,
bringing bad omen and calamitous events, if a human, having killed an
"Eke Njiaba" failed to perform the cleansing rites in accordance with
tradition. The community reacted accordingly and woe betide that
person who committed such sacrilege and abomination.

But we the children and the women were given succor in the bowels of
the bushes of Njiaba. We would shudder at times from hearing the booms
and bangs of war and always from the screaming and thundering Migs
overhead above the trees that lined the bowels of Njiaba, but we were
safe and we knew it because nothing could touch us while in the
protection of our gods. We would catch fish and crayfish in the
stream, we would swim and bath in the waters, we would roam the bushes
hunting rabbits and squirrels and our mothers and sisters were happy
and proud of us for every kill that we brought in to enrich the common
pot of soup. Our fathers were also happy for us but were somewhat sad,
bemoaning the fate that is befalling their children. We were the war
children, we were child-men and child-women, boy-men and girl-women,
we were force-grown to do the things adults do because we had to
self-preserve and survive. We were the war children, boy-men and
girl-women and many of us actually carried and used "setimas" and
SLMs", threw grenades, died and survived in the trenches and battle
lines as the adults did. Many more of us died like Obiageli, others
out of hunger and kwashiorkor, not from the direct instruments of war,
but from the blockade. They would hug each of us boys and yell out our
aliases. Then, they called me "Asaweze", meaning one man who would
take over seven men's palaver, he who would climb the iroko tree
bare-handed. We were all a bit of, sort of happy again in some way, at
least we could smile again for a while, notwithstanding our pains, our
loses and our deprivation. Njiaba in this regard also helped us in a
way to save Oguta and thus Uli Airport.

We also had romance, the innocent child-romance of the child-boys and
child-girls of war. The child-boys would contest amongst ourselves for
the attention of the most beautiful child-girls in town. We were all
attending the wartime primary school and kindergarten, which was
hidden inside the woods, under tatched roofs, palm trees and irokos.
The ground rules were simple. Whoever presented the largest quantity
of pear, oranges, mangoes or the current seasonal fruit to the
child-girl in contention, lay claims to being her "make-believe
husband", until the another competitor surpassed that feat. So you
could be a "husband" today and seize to be one the next week once
another competitor has outdone you. Both the boys and girls accepted
and respected the rules. In the bush square where we all gathered, the
boys would indicate whether they were contesting for Julie, Cordelia,
Apolonia, or any of the many beautiful daughters gracing our blessed
land. Poor parents and neighbours; they paid dearly for our love games
because we had to harvest their economic fruits piecemeal without
authorisation. You couldn't seek your parent or uncle's permission to
use up the family fruit-trees for such love games. We had sneak out
with a salt bag in hand, in the heart of a heavy tropical rainstorm
and thunderstorm, harvesting as much fruit as we needed, while the
rest of the family sat in the comfort of the fireplace enjoying roast
pear and maize. You then hid your love-war chest (the bag of fruits)
in the bushes near the school. Often some folks specialised in finding
another's hidden war chests and appropriating them for their own
purposes. There wasn't much we could do about it, but anyone who was
caught in the act of war chest finding was shamed and disqualified and
they would cry for days after, pleading to be allowed back into the
game.

And "Electric", one of the child-boys was a very tough competitor. So
was "Toronto", "Orantu" and "Mawa". We were all always in awe of
"Electric" because he would often strip sacrifices offered to the gods
of all its coins and valuable goods and nothing seemed to happen to
him. He still lives today, married, with children. Many of the boys
took the names of the then war heroes as their aliases to improve
their chances and their popularity. One preferred to be called
"Owuatuegwu", the other "Achuzie", yet another "Nzeogwu", "Col Nwawo"
etc. On the day of the lover's competition, we would all gather in the
bush square during school recess where all the competitors display
their presents before the particular girl in whom they have interest.
The judgement and decision was swift and in public view. Everyone
would clap and break into songs coined with the name of the wining
competitor and his new girl. Often many a girl sulk for weeks when
their preferred boy failed to win, but she would wear the tag for a
while, for that was the rule respected by all. Each time I won a wife
the girls would often sing:

Ooooh Holy Ghost, Ohoooho,
May "Asaweze" come into my embrace,
Ohoooho.

And the song coined with my alias became quite a popular amongst my
female peers at the time. We were in war and dying in large numbers
every second that passed, notwithstanding, the war children lived life
to the fullest the best way they could. We would cry in pain and
hunger but we created cause for ourselves to smile, sing, dance and
love.

No one ever sulked for long after loosing a love competition. We had
too much in common and we were too busy doing adult things to worry
over luxuries. We had farm and home renovation exchange programs. All
the boys and girls would go to a party's on a scheduled day and help
out with tending their farms. It could be bush clearing, or cassava
harvesting or just weeding. We all took turns at each other's farms.
Some who had tatched roofs needed help to mend them. Others who had
zinc roofs on their houses also needed help to cover the rooftop with
palm fronts so as to camouflage them against air raids. We tended and
harvested the farms, fetched water and firewood, we did all that our
fathers would do, so we could all survive. We fed the Biafran Army,
contributing food cultivated by the children of war.

In the bushes, we continued to shudder at every boom and bang, some
from bombs and rockets, others from the artillery battles raging at
Oguta and elsewhere from the direction of Owerri. At that time we were
children but we could tell every weapon in use by the combatants from
the sounds they emitted and we could judge the progress of the war and
the location of the frontline by how far the exploding artillery
shells sounded. We could for instance distinguish a mortar sound from
that of an artillery shell, a buffer sound from a rocket and a bomb, a
machine gun fire from a cannon and a "setima" from an "SLM", "Mark 4"
and "LMG". We kids became so expert in the affairs of state to the
extent that we no longer worried when the adults ran out of
home-recharged batteries and it became impossible to listen to Okon
Okon Ndem of Radio Biafra and also Radio Togo. Those were the only
good sources of pro-Biafra news in those days.

Our fathers devised a means of recharging alkaline batteries, which
they needed in order to listen to Radio Biafra and Radio Togo. We were
in total blockade and unless you where close to the leadership
hierarchy, you could not gain access to such imports as a battery. The
adults would soak the discharged batteries in some solution. I am
uncertain what the solution was, but some of my mates rumored then
that it was a salt or acid solution. The soaked batteries were then
spread out in the open and sun-dried. When they load them again into
the radio set, the radio would sound as loud as if the batteries were
new. They would do this several times over before the battery was dead
for good. We would inch ever closer to the adults as they listened to
the radio, to hear news about the Oguta and other battles then raging
on. The batteries were sun-dried recharged, the radio dilapidated but
all the same, they gave us hope that Oguta and therefore Uli Airport
would be saved.

In those days, my uncle "De Anyadi" was alive and well. We used to
call him "Radio Togo" because he often ran out of batteries and on
such occasions, he would always come home from work in the evenings to
tell us the current news from Radio Togo. Once, he came home from work
and announced that he heard from Radio Togo that the federal airforce
planned to drop a gas bomb on Biafra, which would kill every living
man or animal. He said that this was planned to occur in exactly three
days time. There was consternation and despair in the entire village
and town. The news spread like wild fire and there was panic and
sadness everywhere. The people's moral was as low as it could ever
get. Just then my uncle came back from work the following day to
announce that he had heard again from Radio Togo that there was an
antidote to the federal gas bomb. We all listened and he said we
should burn wood and gather as much charcoal as possible; grind the
charcoal into powder and wrap the powder up with a piece of cloth,
just like a filter. When the federals begin to drop this gas bomb, we
should soak the charcoal filter in water, hold it over our nostrils
and breath through it. There was a near stampede to cut down and chop
up all the dead and dried trees around town. We boys worked like hell
with our fathers and seniors to cut up enough wood while the girls and
women gathered them, so as to burn up enough charcoal to make this
life-saving filter for everyone. When three days passed and no gas
bombs were dropped on us, my uncle became known as "Radio Togo". There
was another uncle of mine also renamed "Radio BBC" because he often
came home with very skeptical news about the progress of the war.
Thankfully, my uncle "De Anyadi's" gas bomb news did not come to pass,
but his charcoal filter technology gave us hope and courage that we
would live to see the battle for Oguta won and Uli Airport saved.

Not a single federal soldier who set foot on Oguta went home alive.
They all perished - including some who came with family, livestock and
supplies in several supply ships in the armada that invaded Oguta.
Many perished where their ships were sunk. The federal side risked and
lost so much in that operation because they wanted Uli Airport at all
costs. Ndi Igbo threw everything at them because Uli was our lifeline
and last hope. The defeat of the federalists at Oguta left a monument
which remains at the Oguta lagoon until today - the carcasses of the
sunk federal ships are still there. Anyone who visits home should try
go and see for themselves. General Ojukwu himself lead the operation -
that was how important and strategic Uli was and is to Igbos.

Then the federal airforce came with a new method. They would drop a
round fluorescent light and suspend it in mid air. This light shone
like a moon. It was midnight and sometimes the first hours of the
morning but you could pick up a pin or needle over a fifty or more
kilometers radius from the almost daylight generated by this
artificial moon. You would be in pitch darkness, either sleeping or
simply because the oil lamps had to be put out to avoid federal jets
that fired at any trace of light, and suddenly it was daylight from
this strange moon hanging over from the sky in the direction of Uli.
The first time it happened it was share panic and every one, old and
young scurried into the bushes and the trenches. I say panic because
we as children could sense the disquiet amongst the adults and the
share confusion and pandemonium that reigned at the first appearance
of this strange moon. Then the bombs, rockets and buffers (buffer was
the Biafran anti aircraft guns used at Uli) would start to boom for
what seemed like eternity and slowly the moon would die. Within
minutes of the silence of the guns, the supply aircrafts hovering low
all across the horizon would again begin to land at Uli. I heard the
roar of every aircraft that landed at and took off from Uli and the
deafening and terrifying boom and bang of every aircraft that crashed
into the woods. I was only a child a few kilometers away from Uli.
Most nights you would come out and watch these huge metal birds with
large wings hovering so low over the roof you had think it would
uproot the house with it like an eagle would lift a prey. But these
were no birds of prey, they brought us food, medical, military
supplies and life, but you were scared all the same, least they
crashed onto the roof. After all, they flew in pitch darkness, low,
almost hugging the trees, with federal jets ruling the heights,
strafing, and rocketing any trace of light. They also had to keep away
from ground fire from the buffer guns. I still wonder how those pilots
flew those planes then.

Uli Airport was such a fortress that at a stage, the federal airforce
jets and their pilots contrived to jettison their rockets, bombs and
cannons at targets and bushes as far away as possible from Uli
Airport. And all the neighbouring communities, including mine paid
dearly in lost lives and damaged buildings, farms and economic trees.
That was how powerful Uli Airport was.

Almost every Igbo who survived as a refugee, every child who was
rescued from kwashiorkor and many who lived to tell the tale and to
continue the procreation of the Igbo race today, towards its destiny,
owed their survival to Uli Airport. Every grain of rice or corn meal
or garri gabon, every drip drop or tablet, every stick of stockfish or
other nutrients, every and each single bullet or gun fired by NdiIgbo
in self preservation and survival, at a stage was landed at Uli
Airport.

His Excellency, General Ojukwu left the embattled Biafran enclave
through Uli so he may live to fight another day, hence he is with us
today.

In the last days and hours of Biafra in January 1970, even when the
expedition force sent out probably from Uli Airport to blow up the
Njiaba bridge at Awo-Omamma so as to hold the advancing federal troops
there had been destroyed by federal troops who had crossed the bridge
much earlier than the Biafran forces could arrive and hold it, and the
whole of Awo-Omama and environs had been taken by the rampaging
federal forces, Uli Airport continued to fire mortars and shells in
the direction of Awo-Omamma where they thought the federal troops were
located. In this respect, Uli Airport is symbolic for firing the first
shot in defense of Igboland since the demise of Biafra. In a sense,
Uli Airport remained undefeated and unsurrendered. The airport smoked
even after the very last moment of Biafra and the federals could not
venture into its precincts until General Effiong and other officers
had ensured and guaranteed their safety.

There could be no better place and symbol of Igbo resistance and
survival than the vicinity of Uli Airport. Igbo detractors hate the
place, they had rather it was wiped off the maps, never to be
mentioned again. It was one place that was impenetrable and
undefeated, defiant to the last, firing shells and motors even after
Biafra had formally seized to exist. Egyptian pilots, Russian Migs and
British jets and military advisers could not stop Uli Airport - the
most sophisticated piece of engineering designed and constructed by a
Blackman anywhere, and which surpassed what many a Whiteman can ever
design or construct. Any other country that had proper values would
have turned Uli into a monument - tourist, spiritual or otherwise. The
Igbo Nation will ensure that Uli Airport lives forever.

What about the courageous pilots who continued to fly to Uli Airport
against all odds? There were not Igbo, but many of them perished
trying to save Ndi Igbo, either shot down by federal airforce jets or
ran out of fuel or crashed into the trees flying too low for hours
waiting for the federal jets to run out of ammunition. Part of the
reason many of those pilots kept coming, notwithstanding the risks,
was not only because they loved Igbos, but also because they had
confidence in Uli Airport. We have to rebury those pilots too.

Denying Igbos the use of such an edifice and symbol as Uli Airport as
a place to celebrate the remembrance of their war dead is the most
treacherous act that can ever be perpetrated against Ndi Igbo. It is
an act that appeases those who fail to appreciate the values of Ndi
Igbo and it is an act that diminishes the Igbo spirit and a
celebration of their survival and their triumph over adversity. That
singular act is sacrilegious and deserves appropriate punishment in
accordance with Igbo traditions and custom as laid down by our
ancestors, deities and gods.


Francis Nnamdi Elekwachi