CHAPTER ONE
1.0     GENERAL INTRODUCTION
It is undeniably clear that coming across any written work with this kind of topic stirs up numerous varied notions in people’s minds. The views of an Igbo man who comes across this topic is bound to be different from that of a European. So will it also be, with any member of the external world not directly affected by this topic.
One might see it as a liberation philosophy, another might see it as an attack on what is European, and another still, might see it as a defensive means applied to transfer the responsibility of the ills found in Igbo land to the European world. None of them can be said to be wrong in his particular opinion unless an explanation of the authors import has been relayed to him and he persists in his stand. For this, it becomes very necessary that at this early moment, a brief explanation of what this topic is aimed at be presented to the reader so that he does not jump to hasty conclusions even before reading this.
1.1     BACKGROUND OF THE STUDY
The Igbo tribe of Nigeria today experiences so much political, economic, and social crisis both within itself as a tribe and with the other tribes with whom it makes up this one nation called Nigeria. Most of these crises so much affect the Igbos to the extent that they often see themselves as a marginalized tribe in this nation. This has led to their consistent clamor for a Sovereign state of their own (Biafra), not minding the fact of the failure of its first realization attempt during the early days of Nigeria’s independence.
Looking at the present socio-political situation of the Igbos in this multi-tribal nation, one will discover that a greater percentage of the hardships they are facing in their own God-given land cannot be ascertained to have its place rooted in nature. They seem to be man-made, willingly or unwillingly caused, knowingly or unknowingly arrived at. Most of these problems can be said to be aftermaths of some past experiences of the Igbo man both within the confines of his fatherland and outside. It must be acknowledged that the Igbo man has been more at peace with the world around him in the absence of a Nigerian nation than today when he has been forced into a national union with some other tribes. This goes a very long way to prove that some causes of the Igbo mans socio-political predicament can be vividly traced to the period of his being a part of this 'Lugardian' amalgamated nation called Nigeria. If this can be said to be so, then her days prior to this amalgamation, especially within the colonial era, when she was being pushed into acting in a way she does not really accept must have played a major role in the many problems she so suffers today.
1.2     STATEMENT OF THE PROBLEM
The Igbo man of today finds himself faced with so much socio-political difficulties in his co-existence with the other tribes that make up this one Nigeria. For this, he so much longs for secession; he longs to have a sovereign state of his own, which will have all its affairs self-piloted and which will have him as its sole controller. He longs for the sovereign state of Biafra where he will be free from the present days’ ‘regrettable Igbo predicament in Nigeria characterized by humiliation, manipulation, and marginalization’[1].
A look at the socio-political problems of the Igbo man of today, which has produced in him such longings as these, reveals the fact that the colonial amalgamation of the Nigerian nation has a bigger part to play in it. This implies that the Igbo man’s contact with the European world has a hand in such situations and that it is not just a problem caused by the other tribes with whom he shares this one nation. We the Nigerians also have a hand in it, no doubt. It is based on this fact that this work sets out to expose the present socio-political conditions of the Igbo man, tracing it back to his early life without this colonial amalgam called Nigeria, to see how the Europeans in their contact with the Igbo tribe could be said to have caused a problem for the Igbos of today.