Because of the troubling picture of our country at this time, I believe that the nations, or at least the largest nations, of our country, should speak up now. I hope that some will.
Some force must rise up to try and save this country from self-destructing. Individual eminent Nigerians at home and abroad have shouted and screamed, and some of the most influential persons in the world have stood at our gate, or even come into the house, to sound desperately serious warnings and admonitions. None has made much difference.
Since independence, we Nigerians have willfully and stubbornly built a superstructure for disaster. Now, we seem determined to reap at last the fruits of that disaster. No serious discussion is taking place concerning the disastrous superstructure. A National Conference recently made some recommendations, but those recommendations hardly feature in the on-going presidential campaigns.
At the same time, because the superstructure built for Nigeria has raised the stakes of presidential authority irresistibly high, contestants for power and their chief backers seem resolved now to trample down all barriers and to break all legitimate bounds in order to reach the presidency. Violent clashes are being enacted on the campaign trails. Terroristic threats are sounding from many directions. And preparations for mayhem and war are being more or less openly carried out. From some actions that we have seen in the past week, it seems that, when the storm of actions finally comes, even governmental agencies (such as the Nigerian military and police) will be fully engaged in fully partisan, and unlawful, mold against some Nigerians or groups of Nigerians.
Many leading politicians obviously think that once their side wins the presidential election, all of Nigeria’s trouble will end. But from the way things look these days, such political barons may be grossly deceiving themselves.
I repeat therefore, let some of the main nations of our country speak up now. They owe the historic debt of speaking out clearly and boldly now. They need to speak up above the cacophony of politicians’ voices.
Of these nations, I am fairly confident of the desires of one – namely my own Yoruba nation. We Yoruba are strong believers in Nigeria – in a Nigeria that is stable, prosperous and advancing towards greatness in the world. We are united in the strong belief that the only way to achieve such a Nigeria is to abide by principles. We are sure that nothing of great or permanent value can be achieved without seeking strength through reasonable and well-considered principles. We came to these beliefs from our 1000-year history of living in orderly kingdoms and thriving cities and towns. Ends desired and sought by individuals and groups in a polity must bow to the polity’s high principles of stable order, otherwise disorder and chaos will result. Every Yoruba child grows up knowing these things.
Looking carefully at Nigeria from that perspective, we Yoruba have always been sure about the principle to employ in organizing Nigeria. That principle goes as follows: Because Nigeria is made up of many different nationalities, Nigeria should be organized into a rational federation, according careful respect to the various nationalities. If there is to be order and prosperity, this position is not negotiable. Our most prominent fathers in Nigerian politics in the late 1940s, the group in Egbe Omo Oduduwa, stated the principle very soundly. Then one of their captains, our father Awolowo, wrote books and political statements to make it clearer and clearer throughout his life. There is hardly any prominent Yoruba alive today who has never made at least some little contribution to the statement of this principle. We Yoruba may be spread out into many political parties, yet we are all certain that, for Nigerian peoples to live harmoniously together in one country, and for Nigeria to be stable and successful, Nigeria must be ordered as a reasonable federation.
Whenever the government of Nigeria has convened any kind of national conference, members of the Yoruba elite, though belonging to different political persuasions, have always come together to produce proposals based on the same principle for presentation at the conference. A leading Yoruba intellectual in the Diaspora once put it simply as follows: “The simple answer to the question “What do the Yoruba want?” is this: The Yoruba want a Nigerian state which respects its multinationalcharacter and gives adequate recognition to the inviolability of its federating nationalities, no matter how small or big, a Nigerian state that promotes equal justice for all its citizens and makes a sacred commitment to the secularity of its character…The Yoruba have always wanted a Nigeria that practices and is committed to the principlesof true federalism”.
This is the only way to make the peoples of Nigeria live in reasonable harmony together, by giving each people some leeway to manage much of its unique needs and concerns in the Nigerian federation – so that each people will thus be able to make its own kind of contribution to the overall progress and prosperity of Nigeria. This principle is not directed at hurting, and it cannot possibly hurt, any of the peoples of Nigeria. On the contrary, it is a principle that can be very beneficial to every Nigerian people and to Nigeria as a whole.
At the 2014 National Conference, some of the main details of the Yoruba Position were presented as follows:
1. Make Nigeria’s existing six zones into regions – with minor boundary adjustments to make sure that none of the nationalities in Nigeria shall be split up between regions.
2. Re-adjust the balance of powers between the federal authority and the regions – so that the regions should have more powers, more resource control and more funding than hitherto to promote and implement development. This would shift the burden of development mostly to the regions while assigning sufficient power and money to the federal government to direct the commanding heights of the Nigerian economy, regulate interstate relations, defend Nigeria, and speak for Nigeria in the world.
3. The regions should control the development of their resources, with the federal authority charging taxes thereon. In revenue allocation, more should go the regions than to the federal centre. Revenue generated by a region (such regional business taxes, sales taxes, etc) should belong to the region. Most of the VAT derived from a region should return to the region.
4. There should be a federal police, regional and local police. Police functions are, by nature, rooted in their localities.
In summary, we Yoruba nation want a Nigeria that works – a Nigeria of harmony among peoples, of regional and local virility, of progress in development, and of constantly improving quality of life for all citizens. We Yoruba are not used to living in poverty; we are depressed to be part of a country that is wracked by instability, constant conflicts, terrorism, poverty, hopelessness, and fears. We are displeased that the central issue of a well-structured federation is not occupying the central place it deserves in the ongoing presidential campaign.
We hereby state our minimum demand. Let the candidates know that our assessment of their views in this matter will determine how much of our votes they will get.
