Word: ibos
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Dates: during 1970-1979
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...Nigerian civil war four years ago this week, the Ibo people of rebellious Biafra feared that defeat would bring genocidal vengeance from the victorious Nigerian army. Instead, the Ibos are prospering as citizens of a federated Nigeria. The credit goes in large part to the young head of state, Major General Yakubu Gowon, who decreed a policy of "no victor and no vanquished" after the savage civil war that took at least 1,000,000 lives...
Even the opportunities for such standard tropical pursuits as swimming and sunning are limited. Both Kyona and Ibo beaches-the only ones anywhere near the capital city-have limited facilities. In addition, they are a spine-snapping one-hour trip from Port-au-Prince over roads that are hopelessly rutted and potholed. In fact, Haiti's poor roads virtually confine all but the hardiest tourists to the capital city and its environs...
...estimated as high as $10 million, an amount equal to one-third of the national budget of Haiti, and has probably secreted much of it abroad. Cambronne's commercial interests included monopoly control of Haiti's fruit exports and lumber production, a large coffee exporting firm and Ibo Tours (a travel agency that dominated Haiti's lucrative quickie-divorce market for Americans). He has also trafficked in narcotics and was the silent partner in a firm that paid poor Haitians a pittance for their blood and then resold it at a huge profit in the U.S. Last...
...strongest character in the narrative is the Jefferson Davis of this civil war, Emeka Odumegwu Ojukwu, the sophisticated and somewhat theatrical Ibo colonel who led the Biafran revolt. But the real hero is Yakubu Gowon, who eventually succeeded in holding the country together...
...military coups had ravaged Nigeria in 1966. The first, led mostly by Ibos, aroused anti-Ibo feeling that ended in the massacre of some 10,000 Ibos throughout the country. The second brought Gowon, a 32-year-old northerner, to power. As military governor of the Eastern Region, the Oxford-educated Ojukwu was too proud and too ambitious to recognize Gowon as head of state. Instead, following the massacres, he began to arm the East-and proceeded to use the Ibos' fear of genocide to stir up the phenomenal Biafran war effort. Gowon warned him sadly, "If circumstances compel...