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60 years after, Yoruba re-examine their common destiny in Ibadan

Prominent Yoruba leaders gathered in Ibadan, the Oyo State capital, last Thursday to review their stake in Nigeria and came up with a charter of demand in line with their aspirations as common people, BISI OLADELE reports

N 1955, the House of Chiefs, Parliament Building, Agodi Ibadan played host to prominent Yoruba sons and daughters from across all walks of life who had gathered to discuss issues affecting their common destiny.

Drawn from across Yoruba land, the leaders, at the end of their discussion came up with demands that they believed would protect their interest and put the country, then still under colonial rule, on a fast development lane.

Exactly 60 years after, leaders of the present generation of Yoruba have taken the same step, suggesting that the issues of the last six decades were yet to fade away.

It was the same city and the same venue. Only the conferees were different. Yet, the gathering was for the same purpose: which way forward for the Yoruba nation in Nigeria?

Convened by the revered retired army general, Alani Akinrinde,Yoruba leaders converged for a summit to discuss issues affecting Yoruba nation in all spheres of life in Nigeria. As it was in 1955, the leaders, who cut across all professions, included traditional rulers, youths as well as Yoruba in Kwara and Kogi states. And the host was the Oyo State Governor, Abiola Ajimobi.

Attendees include governors Rauf Aregbesola of Osun State and Ibikunle Amosun of Ogun State: Amosun was represented by the Secretary to the State Government, Mr Taiwo Adeoluwa; Socio-political leaders such as Chief Ayo Fasanmi; Senator Olabiyi Durojaye and General Akinrinade (rtd); erudite lawyers including Chief Niyi Akintola (SAN); and Oluwarotimi Akeredolu (SAN); academics and technocrats including Professors. Akin Oyebode; Bunmi Ayoade and Dr Goke Adegoroye; traditional rulers including the Olubadan of Ibadan, Oba Samuel Odulana Odugade 1 who was represented by High Chief Eddy Oyewole; the Akarigbo of Remo, Dr Adeniyi Sonariwo and the Aseyin of Iseyin, Oba Ganiy Oloogunebi; religious leaders including the Bishop of Ekiti Diocese, Felix Ajakaye and Chairman of Muslim Community in Oyo State, Alhaji Kunle Sanni; top politicians including former Osun State Governor, Prince Olagunsoye Oyinlola and former Ekiti State Governor, Kayode Fayemi.

Through various presentations, the leaders reviewed salient developments in the last 60 years in Nigeria, especially as they affected the Yoruba and took a common position.

Setting the tone for the talk shop was the host, Governor Ajimobi.

In his welcome address, he highlighted the strategic importance of the city of Ibadan in the political history of the Yoruba across ages and stressed that the venue was as apposite as the time for the summit.

•Gen. Alani Akinrinde (rtd) and Oyo State Governor, Senator Isiaq Abiola Ajimobi

Ajimobi said: “Permit me to express my profound pleasure and appreciation at this unique opportunity to address the great sons and daughters of Yoruba land here gathered. Again, talking about historical significance, this great chamber – the House of Chiefs – for those who were old enough to know its political history, has hosted great men and women of renown in Yoruba land, at various historical junctures. As history would someday record that, at a critical period of our people’s lives as this, we gathered here today to dissect the way forward for the Yoruba in the Nigerian federation, so also did the Obafemi Awolowos, Samuel Ladoke Akintolas, Adekunle Ajasins, Bola Iges, to mention a few, gathered inside this House of Chiefs, innumerable times, to brainstorm on the future of our people. Indeed, today, I feel as if I am addressing the crème de la crème of Yoruba land at the 1951 Yoruba national conference held here on the soil of Ibadan.

“Distinguished ladies and gentlemen, we do not need anyone to remind us of our rich ancestry and wide geographical contours. We are an ethnic group that spans Southwestern Nigeria and Southern Benin in West Africa. According to the CIA World Factbook, we constitute over 35 million people in total, majority of our population found in Nigeria. These statistics confirm us as one of the largest ethnic groups in Africa. Indeed, we share borders with the Borgu in Benin; the Nupe and Ebira in central Nigeria; the Edo, the ¸san, and the Afemai in mid-western Nigeria. The Igala and other related groups are located in the northeast, and the Egun, Fon, Ewe and others in the southeast Benin. The Itsekiri who live in the north-west Niger delta are cousins of the Yoruba, even though they maintain a distinct cultural identity. You could find a significant Yoruba population in Ghana, Togo, Ivory Coast, Liberia and Sierra Leone, (where you almost cannot find a difference between them and the Saro and the Creole).”

The governor recalled that so many Yoruba have done Nigeria proud as pace setters in various noble careers which partly accounts for why Yoruba have always been in the driving seat in developmental efforts of the country.

His words: “We have a rich political history as Yoruba people, which is apparently linked to our early education, civilization and exposure to western education, far earlier than any other ethnic conglomerate in the country. Christopher Alexander Sapara Williams (1855–1915), a son of Yoruba land, was the first indigenous Nigerian lawyer who was called to the English bar on 17 November 1879. Sir Samuel Layinka Ayodeji Manuwa, (1903–1976) was a pioneering Nigerian surgeon, and was the first Nigerian to qualify to become a Fellow of the Royal College of Surgeons (FRCS), having graduated from the University of Edinburgh in 1934. He was one of those whose efforts led to the establishment of the University College Hospital here in Ibadan. I can mention them on and on.”

Ajimobi consequently deplored the alleged marginalization of the nationality in Nigeria in recent times, particularly in the current political dispensation.

“It will interest you to note that, in the wheel of power at the centre, there are only two Yoruba people. Indeed, out of the 50 most powerful men and women in the executive, legislative, judicial and even security components of power in Nigeria, there are only two Yoruba people. These are the Chief of Staff to the President, whose choice was almost an afterthought and the Accountant General of the Federation. Never had the sons and daughters of Oduduwa been treated with such ignominy and disregard by a country their forefathers shed their blood to make a shining sun under the heavens.

“In the present political configuration at the federal level, not only are we totally vacant, in spite of our rich political evolution and profound political traits in Nigerian politics, in cases where Yoruba are ever underscored, the worst of us are promoted to lead the best of us. The Machiavellian tactic of dividing us to effectively rule us is on the upswing and they promote an understanding of Yoruba leadership that is laughable and warped in the least. In the same vein we must examine the role being played by that biblical god of money, Mammon, in the fate of Yoruba sons and daughters, especially vis-a-vis the recent violence unleashed on Lagos by the Odua Peoples Congress (OPC). Was that violence part of our Yoruba culture for which we are known by the rest of the world?

“These are some of the issues that this Assembly must address today. Indeed, the title of this conference should be, to borrow the title of a piece written by that great columnist and former editor of the Nigerian Tribune, Ayo Ojewumi, Where Do We Go From Here?

“We must collectively resolve whether we want to continue to remain in the current servitude under the PDP or liberate ourselves from the shackles on our feet. A proposed government in which we have been offered the vice presidential slot holds a great hope of tomorrow for us and our children and nostalgia of the past where we participated effectively in shaping the destiny of our nation.” He said.

Taking the microphone from him, the convener, Akinrinade, expressed satisfaction with the turn-out of Yoruba leaders, saying it was an example of the way Yoruba can easily forge a common front against injustice.

He also highlighted the qualities and values of the Yoruba and thereafter rolled out the quality of leadership Yoruba desired.

His words: “We, the Yoruba, are too sophisticated to follow one leader or adopt one political belief. What is required of us is to share a common development aspiration and values much more than what obtains now in the present Nigeria. We cannot afford a leadership that is absent of developmental foresight, that lacks innovative thinking and is not capable of producing the right responses and answers to the challenges of multi-ethnic and multi-cultural politics in the country…

“For us Yoruba people, a Nigerian leader must be ready to make the necessary sacrifices and imbibe core value-laden attributes. The national leader that Yoruba people want and would support should subscribe to a body of beliefs based on our perennial and tested values of honour, dignity, integrity, industry, patriotism, which are encoded in the concept of Omoluabi. The leadership the Yoruba want should be the body of men and women who are believers and are ready to live according to the tenets of Omoluabi and work for its continuous propagation and effectiveness. It is this body of values that should guide us in the process of who we vote for in the 2015 general elections, not corrupted endorsements.”

Akinrinade also condemned the protest by members of the Odu’a People’s Congress (OPC) in Lagos, describing it as “an open threat to our space, a society that is naturally and cultural embracing whose receptive nature is now being abused…”

He then called on the Yoruba to use their votes in the coming election to choose the right leaders and reject wrong ones.

In their presentations, experts also X-rayed the plight of the Yoruba nation in Nigeria and proffered solutions

Speaking on the topic: ‘Development Challenges to Nation Building,’ Professor Akin Oyebode emphasized the need for the Yoruba to re-invent their leadership position. He said the rights of the Yoruba people should not be allowed to be trampled upon by impostors.

He lamented that the Yoruba delegates to the National conference held last year were unable to liaise with delegates from other regions to promote their agenda due to sitting arrangements and other logistics challenges.

The erudite scholar, therefore, urged Yoruba to press for a constituent assembly that will adopt fundamental laws leading to adoption of a new constitution.

He rounded off his presentation by stating that Nigeria would not break, hence there is no need to canvass for Odu’a Republic.

In his own presentation, legal luminary, Chief Niyi Akintola (SAN) emphasized that marginalization of Yoruba is real, as according to him no Yoruba is occupying any of the first 14 positions in the country in spite of their population.

Akintola called for a change within a credible legal framework.

In his own presentation, Professor Bunmi Ayooade, who represented the United States (US) based Odu’a Foundation, expressed worry over the state of the Yoruba society, because, according to him, the Yoruba have surrendered leadership in the country.

Stating that the minority of excellence is always superior to the majority of mediocrity, Ayoade called on the region to shun invitation to trade the future of the Yoruba people.

“There is danger in making Nigeria irrelevant to the Yoruba.” He said.

Speaking in the same vein, a technocrat, Dr Goke Adegoroye, who spoke on the topic: “Marginalization of Yoruba under the Current Dispensation,” posited that Yoruba is the single largest ethnic group in Nigeria accounting for 22 per cent of the total population.

In his own opinion, the third position should be ceded to the Yoruba once the first and second positions go to other regions.

But he said as at today, Yoruba cannot even come to the topmost leadership position in many federal arms, agencies and parastatals, including military and para-military agencies.

Prince Bambo Ademiluyi, who spoke on: “Re-industrialization of Southwest,” called for concerted efforts to ensure that the region, which was once the industrial hub of the nation, regains its position.

In his own comment, Oyinlola posited that Yoruba will achieve more once they are able to come together as one, irrespective of party affiliations.

Senator Anthony Adefuye also elucidated on the marginalization of the Yoruba, saying only seven out of 49 principals of unity schools in the country are Yoruba while there are only eight Yoruba among the 67 chairmen of parastatals in Nigeria.

Senator Durojaye called on Yoruba to be firm and resist intimidation on the Election Day by going out to vote for the right candidates.

Chief Ayo Fasanmi described as “a shame” the endorsement of President Goodluck Jonathan by the Afenifere.

He said: “I’m saddened by all I hear on radio in recent times. Those endorsing President Jonathan are on their own. We know who to vote for and that is Buhari.

Fayemi said the gathering was not for politics but for the interest of the Yoruba. He faulted claims that APC governors did not support the National Conference, saying the governors sent delegates to the confab.

Fayemi also recalled that five Southwest governors met Jonathan over the once deplorable state of the Lagos-Ibadan expressway but that he did nothing in spite of the promise to do so. He said they (governors) gave him the alternative of jointly undertaking the project but that he declined. Fayemi said Jonathan did not attend to the road until it became very shameful.

“When you add this to other complaints, you will see that the current government does not like the Yoruba.” He said.

He added that part of the recommendations of the confab could be implemented now but that the Jonathan administration won’t do it because of insincerity. He said devolution of power is part of the APC manifesto to achieve that.

When he took his turn, Ogbeni Aregbesola said Yoruba have never benefitted from mainstream politics. “We know our leaders. We know those who led us yesterday but who have compromised today. True Yoruba leaders are here, not only one governor going about like a stray man.” He said.

The governor charged Yoruba to take their rightful leadership role in Africa but pointed out that they can’t be the light of Africa by collecting money and compromising standards and values.

Calling on the elders to call the OPC to order, he said Yoruba as a nation agreed not to fight one another again by the 1886 accord in Oke-Imesi. “Tell OPC that money will finish.” He counseled.

He explained that under the current administration, the country is losing 400,000 barrels of oil per day, the value of which he put at N155 billion per day.

According to him, the sum is equivalent of what Osun State earns in allocation for four years.

In a further analysis, Aregbseola said the amount will total N3.56 trillion in four years, the amount he said could build 2,000 kilometers of one-lane road in each state of the federation or 1,000 model schools in every state, each of which could accommodate 1,000 pupils.

Rounding off the meeting, the Vice Presidential candidate of the APC, Prof. Yemi Osinbajo, commended Yoruba for their patience in the face of Federal Government’s weight of opposition. He advised them to keep standing by the truth as usual, stressing that victory was sure in the forthcoming election.

Representatives of Yoruba in Kwara and Kogi states also made comments while the Itsekiri were represented by Rita-Lori Ogbebor. The Olu of Warri also sent a representative, Chief Sunday Rewane, to the summit as they identified with the Yoruba. Ogbebor said Itsekiri migrated from Ijebu and will continue to identify with the Yoruba who stand tall with right values.

A communique was issued at the end of the summit, detailing the charter of demands of the Yoruba in Nigeria.

Also at the summit were Oyo State Deputy Governor, Chief Moses Alake-Adeyemo; former Ekiti State Governor, Otunba Niyi Adebayo; industrialist Chief Kola Daisi; Chief K. O. Latunji; Senators Sola Adeyeye, Bayo Salami and James Kolawole; former Minister of Aviation, Professor Babalola Borisade; National President, Central Council of Ibadan Indigenes (CCII), Chief Bayo Oyero and former Vice Chancellor, Obafemi Awolowo University, Professor Wale Omole.

Others include former Military Governor, Mid-Western Region, General Samuel Ogbemudia; Chairman, Ibadan Elders Forum, Ambassador Olu Saanu; Chairman, Afenifere Renewal Group (ARG), Hon. Wale Oshun; Alhaji Tajudeen Olusi; Prof. Adebayo William; Director General, Development Agenda for Western Region (DAWN), Mr Dipo Famakinwa and the Group Managing Director, Odu’a Investments Ltd, Mr Adewale Raji.

Also in attendance were the Bishop of Ekiti Diocese, Felix Ajakaye and; Chairman, Muslim Community in Oyo State, Alhaji Kunle Sanni.

Traditional rulers present include the Eleruwa of Eruwa, Oba Samuel Adegbola; the Soun of Ogbomoso, Oba Jimoh Oyewumi, who was represented by Chief Samuel Otolorin; Oba Kolawole Sowemimo of Owode-Egba; the Onigboho of Igboho, Oba John Bolarinwa and the Onijeru of Ijeru who was represented by Chief Elijah Popoola.

March 25, 2015
National Confab, not Yoruba agenda

A Constitutional lawyer, Dr Tunji Abayomi Tuesday said all those pushing for the implementation of national conference report in yoruba are mere “deceivers”.

He said the national confab has no yoruba agenda, recalling that it was the human rights group that championed the idea of national conference in 1998.

According to Abayomi, who is also a chieftain of the All Progressives Congress (APC) he was the one who wrote a letter to the then head of state, Gen Abdulsalam Abubakar (rtd) entitled “the logic of national conference” where the idea of the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) was mooted.

He said “for a national conference to have a legitimate constitution arising from the people themselves and secure the approbation of the people, it should not be a conference of appointees of any president where over N12billions of Naira was expended without any justification.

“We did not subscribe to a national conference where President Jonathan who has only one vote in any election that of next Saturday will appoint 140 people without the consent of those they are representing”

Abayomi said the National Confab held last year was “a legal and constitutional failure because of being held without the backing of law or constitution as should have been expected from the National Assembly that was vested with power to give approval.

The legal practitioner said “if Jonathan is going to execute the National Conference report, what he should tell us is how he is going to do it; we yorubas are enlightened, it is not just sufficient for him to talk to us, but to speak to us logically. People like Governor Mimiko have no record of dependency; their words cannot be depended upon”.

He maintained that there is no way Jonathan can execute National Confab report without the input of the National Assembly.

“Is the report going to be forced on Nigerians without a law and when the President is not a dictator or how is he going to do it, those yoruba traitors pushing for implementation of the Conference report should stop embarrassing our race,” he said.

March 24, 2015
Jonathan and the Yoruba

There is an eerie rendezvous between love and politics. And we have seen this in the past few months, especially in the past two weeks. They woo, they enact rites of affection and play chivalry. They cajole, beg, spend, date, hate the rivals. They exaggerate their own graces and reify their own sacrifices and extol even their generosities.

The one with the big bulbous nose remoulds himself as the Adonis, sculpted with the delicacy of divine patience. The short man is actually taller than he seems, and the limping fellow is nothing but a hunk of swagger. Yes, like the world of romance, the bride is supreme. Even when her cooking is awful, you ask for more.

In a sense, other ethnic groups in Nigeria must envy the Yoruba. They have become the bride of the season. But this is not new wisdom. The Yoruba have always illumined the path for the nation. When they do well, so does the nation. They are our conscience. In the First Republic, the collapse of the Western Region foreshadowed our descent into the dark scythe of war. Not long after the prophecies of Chief Obafemi Awolowo, the Second Republic fell. June 12 was a theatre of the Southwest.

In this republic, are we surprised that the same region holds the ace? In development, Awo patented many firsts envied by other regions.

Hence President Goodluck Jonathan has been playing the suitor-in-chief among the Yoruba. For the Yoruba he became a Christian, playing the roving evangelist from church to church. He also became an Ifa adherent, bowing for prayer with obas. He became a dollar merchant, bedecking politicians, obas and all sorts of hustlers. He turned a tourist, visiting different parts of Lagos, so much so that over 2,000 policemen were deployed for his service. He opened the city to criminals and robbers had a field day at Lekki. So, his visit had its toll in blood as the robbers lapped up some dear lives.

He was also a tribalist. While courting the Yoruba vote, he incited the non-Yoruba against them. He said INEC was discriminating against non-indigenes on PVCs, as though he had the statistic. Even if he did, it was not the way leaders of unity spoke. But he didn’t have the statistic, and the INEC REC had shown the claim to be apocryphal.

This same President wants the Yoruba to forget easily that he deployed soldiers to menace the inhabitants of the city in the cauldron of the subsidy showdown. He encouraged his kinsmen and followers to abuse Lagos as a citadel of spoilt brats. He neglected the city and even the region without a major landmark achievement in six years. He used condescending language at Ife a few months ago with a raft of Yoruba renegades who hosted him. He said, “ I will take care of the Yoruba.” What does that mean?

Did Governor Babatunde Raji Fashola, SAN, not ask him to confer a special status on Lagos? Did he not sneer at what the governor of example said with an outlandish parable about his uncle who spends his money in Lagos? Can we forget that?

This is romance, Southwest zone. Jonathan has turned the Yoruba into his bride. This is cynical romance. He knew that if the election took place in February he would have been trounced dizzy. So, he decided to dollarise the campaign, to buy love. He “pieticised” the hustings, making himself an evangelist of all religions, and a faithful of none. For Islam, he rather asked the leaders to come to him at Aso Rock. But his men are parading phony Muslim leaders in the Southwest, too, as endorsement of Jonathan. Who else championed this than the whitlow of the West, the Mimic Mimiko of Ondo State. And Vice President Sambo, in the name of votes, described the PDP as the Muslim party after he and his Presidency with such foul mouths as Fani-Kayode had said APC was the Muslim party. Sambo listed all the major positions in the party and said the PDP is more Muslim than APC. Have we ever in our history had a more divisive era than that of Jonathan? He wants tribes and tongues to differ and the brotherhood of faiths to stumble.

When bad leaders are emboldened, it is often the fault of the people. It is particularly true of President Jonathan. If he can go to his very home and say I have not done much for you, and he is hailed, our democracy must wail. The people see how tons of naira has gone unaccounted for and his immiserated people say, he is our son, so let him do it. The currency has tanked. For the first time in a generation, many states cannot pay civil servants salary, including states of his region. He rolls out antediluvian trains as a 21st century marvel. He claims he rebased the economy, believing the illusion that he gave us Nollywood and other areas of the economy. They were only now recognised. They were always there. He commissioned a power plant and darkness still overwhelms the people of Lagos. He should compare that with Governor Fashola’s fulfillment of the Oyingbo market dream. He promised it and he fulfilled it. Oyingbo is not just a market; it is history, it is a monument in the people’s imagination and a mainstay of folklore. Ebenezer Obey sang it into eternity: “Oja Oyingbo omo pe enikan o wa o…”

Bad leaders like Jonathan try to abolish the people by killing their dreams. According to a Reuter’s report, a poor woman from Otuoke says this man has done nothing for her except a big university that is far away. He has established universities without a sense of economics. All the money in those new universities would have been used to expand the existing ones, and admit more students and recruit more staff and research centres. He sets up an almajiri school and his wife mocks them in public.

Bad leaders abolish dreams by turning the people into their own image. Hence playwright Bertolt Brecht in a famous poem asserted that the leaders had lost confidence in the people. So they would dissolve the people and elect another people. Some thinkers say that good leaders make good people, bad leaders make bad people.

But it is not so simple. The people have a way of emboldening the tyranny and imbecility of bad leaders. They do so by encouraging them when they misbehave. When a leader encourages contracts to militants and the same government says theft is on the increase, we wonder. If he approves of violence in Rivers State and says nothing when an OPC runs riot in Lagos, we agree that he is a despot cloaking as democrat. It means that when he says he loves the Southwest, he is a suitor without love. He is encouraged by the uncritical support among the Ijaw and the Igbo to think that if he does not perform, the Yoruba will also support him. Love does not define us but we define it.

In his play, the Iceman Cometh, Nobel laureate Eugene Oneil’s main character kills his wife because she continues to forgive him. The woman is dreaming of a perfect husband and hopes that someday her forgiveness will pay off and he will be the man of his dreams. He kills his wife and kills the dream. Both the killer and victim cannot pursue the dream. The people commit suicide when they don’t give leaders standards, and the leaders kill the people’s dreams.

If a Jonathan who promised Enugu-PH road, second Niger Bridge, et al, gets support for unfulfilled promises, why would he not renege if he is voted in? It is that logic that has made him think he can bribe his way into victory in the Southwest.

If he can kill the Igbo and the Ijaw dream, why not the Yoruba, so he can stay in office. That is romance, Jonathan style. It is fatal romance, a kiss of death to the Nigerian dream.

March 23, 2015
Meet DORIEN JACOB, the Dutch who sings in pure Yoruba

Married to a Yoruba man notwithstanding, listening to the gospel music album of Dorien Jacob, a woman from The Netherlands is a pleasant surprise. Not only are the songs in Yoruba, they are presented with faultless modulation. She spoke to VICTOR AKANDE about this and more.

Please give us a little background of yourself.

My name is Dorien Jacob; I’m originally from The Netherlands. My husband, Abiodun Jacob, is a Yoruba man, and we are blessed with three children. I play music and have been singing in choirs from a really young age.

How did you meet your husband?

We met in Holland.

What really spurred you to learn Yoruba language?

I picked it up over the years, but besides that, I always tend to pick up languages easily. Yoruba people in the Diaspora love to communicate in the Yoruba language rather than English. To enable understanding or enable a conversation, I needed a certain understanding of the language. When I showed interest and talent, my husband started to teach me more and more.

Which came first; learning to speak Yoruba language or learning to sing in Yoruba language?

It is funny because I can’t actually speak Yoruba fluently but I can understand most conversation. I do sing it fluently.

How easy or difficult was the learning of this language, let alone the right intonation?

By God’s grace, it does not take me long to grasp a song or a new melody. I did need time to be able to sing along with the African rhythm and drums as back home in The Netherlands we only ever sang along with a piano.

What could have helped your quick grasp of the Yoruba intonation; the music notes?

It will only ever be the grace of God. And my husband teaches me.

How well accepted is your music abroad?

Very well. We thank God that our music has gone internationally. I have been all over Europe, America and Nigeria

What are your plans to market the songs in Nigeria?

At the moment, we are still looking for a truthful marketer in Nigeria. Unfortunately, there are a lot of marketers with empty promises.

Why gospel music?

That is what God called me to do. Apart from, that my life has always been within classical and church music. I believe we have an obligation to God to spread the Word of God all over the world. Besides that, I have always sang gospel music and would not want to do anything else because that defeats the purpose where God called us to.

Apart from your husband, who are the other people who have helped you in your chosen line?

No support other than first of all God and secondly my husband

Do you also play live music?

We play live within churches, events, weddings and burials.

What is the composition of your band like?

We have our own band in the UK; saxophonist, drummer talking drummers etc.

Do you play any special instrument?

I learned music through playing the flute from when I was about 10 years old. I taught myself how to play the guitar. I have had violin, piano lessons and have been taught how to read music.

Is any of your kids toeing your line?

The kids love music. My daughter loves to sing and dance whereas my son can drum and dance.

Is this your first album?

Yes, it is.

What are the other plans in the pipeline?

By the grace of God, our next album will be out soon.

What are the other things you do apart from music?

I work full time as a specialised fertility nurse manager.

Is music a hobby for you or a career?

As God has given us forward so speedily it has become more than just a hobby. But we have to be honest here and I think a lot of musicians will agree with me that it is very hard to live on playing gospel music alone. People abroad don’t appreciate gospel music as much as in Nigeria and they don’t like to pay for music. So, yes, it is a career, but part time.

Apart from learning Yoruba language, what other aspects of the culture do you know?

I have been imbedded in the culture for a while now and very familiar with the culture, including preferences/ habits and values.

How would you describe inter-racial marriage from your own experience?

It becomes more and more normal abroad. When we got married, it was less common, so it came with its trials. The advantage of an inter-racial marriage is that you can combine the best of both cultures and pass it on to the children. Our children know how to behave and show respect in both our families and are aware of the differences. This helps them in later life and helps them to have an open mind for different cultures and habits.

March 22, 2015
Yoruba ‘ll vote for performance, says Akinrinade

The Convener of Yoruba Peoples’ Assembly Lt-Gen. Alani Akinrinade (rtd) has said that Yoruba will always vote for performance in general elections.

He said the purported endorsement of President Goodluck Jonathan by selected Southwest leaders may not achieve the desired result because the people are educated, sophisticated and politically conscious.

Akinriande lamented that the ‘Yoruba Agenda,’ which encompassed the legitimate demands of the Yoruba in the six Southwest states, Kwara, Kogi, Edo and Kwara, was rejected at last year’s National Conference.

Giving reason for the collapse of the agenda, the former Chief of Army Staff said many delegates could not comprehend great ideas.

The elder statesman, who spoke with our correspondent in Lagos on the state of the nation, said selected Yoruba leaders in the pan-Yoruba socio-political group, who have endorsed President for a second term because of his promise to implement the conference report, have misled Yorubaland.

He said, while the Afenifere leaders have the right to personally endorse the President, they cannot speak for Yorubaland at this critical time.

The civil war hero reflected on the proposed deployment of troops for election purpose, saying that it is counter-productive. He said soldiers are needed more in the Northeast region to fight terror and liberate the abducted Chibok girls.

Akinrinade also reflected on the challenges that will face the winner of the presidential election. He said the next President will inherit a divided country, a comatose economy, soaring unemployment, grave security challenges and corruption in the corridor of power.

The former Minister of Agriculture said the warning by Americans on disintegration should not be discarded by wise Nigerians. He said the doomsday can only be averted by a leadership that can rise to the occasion.

Flaying Yoruba leaders for misleading the people on the outcome of the National Conference, he said the conference did not favour the Southwest region.

Akinriade also lamented that the region is still being marginalised by the Federal Government, adding that nothing has changed, except the appointment of Brig-Gen. Jones Arogbofa as the Chief of Staff to the President.

On the conference report, he said: “There are certain things that are sacrosanct to the Yoruba people. For instance, when we talk about true federalism, you don’t just do it on paper. All the elements that go with it like derivation, fiscal federalism, you must have responsibilities. Where are the powers which will be used to discharge the responsibilities? You don’t give me a state police and say that there is a national police being paid for by the central government, which people are free to use. But, if I want a state police, that I must pay for it myself. That is not a fair way to organize federalism.

“The major issue is that we wanted a government that is more accountable to the people, a government that is close to the people. It is the parliamentary system that gives that kind of atmosphere. There was no reasonable discussion, not to talk about the merit of it. It was not the kind of assembly that I like; when you are given three minutes to talk.”

Akinriade said the Yoruba Assembly will remain committed to the Yoruba Agenda and continue to raise public consciousness about its objectives.

He said the Ibadan meeting has led to a re-awakening in the Southwest.

Akinrinade said Afenifere chieftains were not speaking the mind of Yoruba when they endorsed the President for a second term. He said:” It is difficult to explain in a non-offensive way. There are challenges in Yorubaland. There are group of people who sold us for pittance. They misled us by trying to move us into what they call mainstream politics. All those who stood against it became their enemies. “There are all sorts of things going on around town about some of our eminent politicians, which people don’t want to recognise. But, I believe during this hours of need in Yorubaland, some people stood up and did very well. If not for them, we should have been in the mainstream politics of Nigeria and that is not a very good idea. It is full of corruption, almost brigandage and we cannot accept that for the Yoruba people.

“There is this group that says they endorsed the Presidency of Jonathan for another four years. You can do that anytime, but you cannot do it on behalf of the Yoruba people. You don’t have to do that for me. I don’t believe that everybody in Yorubaland would like to support Jonathan. We have always been broad minded people who can think and decide what they want. You have to convince them about it. I am not convinced that the so-called elders were now looking at the Yoruba agenda viz-aviz what we went to do in Abuja and what the results are.”

March 20, 2015
The Yoruba and the impending Nigerian situation

Nigeria’s presidential election campaigns of 2015 have developed into unprecedented confrontations. People holding extreme positions insist that their positions are irreconcilable, whip up the language of war, brutalize one another on the campaign trail, and accumulate sophisticated weapons for a final showdown. In the history of mankind, the accumulation of weapons has an almost irresistible logic and finale of its own: those who accumulate weapons almost always end up having to use them.

Nigeria seems now to be about to reach the absolute bottom of the filthy slope that she has been descending determinedly and uncaringly since independence. Countless Nigerians at home and abroad, and countless citizens of a world that is increasingly worried about the impending disaster in Nigeria, have spoken, counseled, entreated and begged. But the captains who guide Nigeria have defiantly insisted on more concentration of power, and more concentration of resource-control and management – all in a country of heterogeneous nationalities. They are hurrying to construct more and more structures that are designed to minister to, and that do excite, the greed and other ignoble passions of man; they are designing more and more interference in, and pollution of, the basic processes of governance. For Nigeria, the hens are now about to come home to roost.

I fear that those who are now beating the drums of war in Nigeria will soon stand condemned before the court of history for the rivers of blood they will soon cause to flow, for the families they will cause to lose loved ones, and for the mothers they will cause to weep for the loss of their children.

As the feared storm gathers, Nigerian peoples will be hit in different ways. I have seen, and I have been part of the struggle through, many of Nigeria’s self- brewed storms since 1960, but I have never been as fearful as I am today for my Yoruba nation. By providence, history and culture, we Yoruba are a large and strong nation. By the time we were forced into Nigeria in 1914, we had had an enviable 1000 years of urban civilization, with a rich and sophisticated economy, and eminently well-structured, enabling and stable governance. We have therefore had, as a nation in a Nigeria of many nations, a lot to impart towards orderly, stable and successful governance. And in fairness, we can proudly say that we have done quite a lot – to persuade Nigeria to tread the path of orderliness, sustainable federal structure, modernization, and focused dedication of rulers to the improvement of the quality of Nigerians’ lives. In my younger years in Nigerian politics and government, my kinsmen and I used to serve with untainted pride, motivated by the realization that we had, as a nation, the duty to help our multi-nation country to walk in the path of decent governance. None of that has really worked – and Nigeria goes its own way towards its own destiny.

But, at this critical juncture, I seem to perceive that my strong Yoruba nation is caving in to the deleterious afflictions of Nigeria, and appears to be becoming incapable of even holding itself together and defending its own. The sheep has kept the company of the dog too long. In all directions in our nation, weakness whimpers pathetically. The once glorious guides and guards of the 1000-year excellence of Yoruba political culture, disregarded and neglected by their own people of today, have abandoned the parapets. Service to the self reigns – with the result that the rich now say “I am poor”, and the strong say, “I am weak”, all because they all are unwilling to give towards the strength and dignity of their Yoruba nation. Little groups mushroom to march out, but nearly every one quickly degenerates into a self-serving cabal, builds a meaningless wall around itself, and then masquerades as too sanctified to touch, or to work with, any other group.

Lone rangers dictate the tune of our national political life, and by their excessive and un-Yoruba presumptuousness, they provoke the emergence of detractors that become bent on fighting them to the death. In every political party, many influential Yoruba say, “We seek power, influence and wealth in Nigeria now; we will think of our Yoruba nation later”. The eagle that was fashioned to soar the heights now waddles in the mud ponds. The up-and-coming generation of bright youths is offered no vision or noble direction to hold on to.

This is our day of weakness. But, it is the way of nature and of human society to experience times of weakness. What is more important, and what we need to grab, is the certainty that our inherent strength, nurtured over a thousand years, is alive and intact, that out there, everywhere, the men and women imbued with that strength are countless, and that the immediate need of the moment is to prod those elements of our culture and fundamental philosophies that can waken and accentuate their strength. Coincidentally, I hear that a large conference of Yoruba leaders is meeting in Ibadan this day, and I hope that they will regard this column today as a message addressed to them.

First and foremost, we need to reawaken our common consciousness as one people – one people with a common national character and a common destiny – no matter what becomes of Nigeria. No matter what political party or group any of us may belong to, our membership of it is chosen by us, and is evanescent and changeable – whereas our membership of the Yoruba nation is God-ordained, unchangeable, and passes automatically to our offspring. And, thankfully, our Yoruba nation is an enormously proud possession.

Secondly, in the shifting sands of Nigerian politics, our only sensible and sustainable option is to revive and reemphasize our national ways and philosophies. From wisdom gathered for over a thousand years in our well-ordered communities, we know that it is not sensible or realistic that all of us should belong to one persuasion, either religiously or politically. The recognition of the right to choose is deeply ingrained in our culture; no Yoruba person disrespects the other because of difference of choice; and no Yoruba person, no matter how high, should claim that his partisan choice is the choice of all Yoruba. Even if (or rather, when) we come to have our own sovereign Odua country, we will have different political parties with members across our land.

Very importantly, neither of the two leading presidential candidates has ever been formally given the Yoruba agenda for Nigeria. We should appoint a delegation of leaders to put it in the hands of the two candidates now – and demand formal responses without fail. Then, we should urge all parties and candidates to respect the non-partisanship of our Obas, and to relate to our Obas with utmost respect.

Finally, we must explore all means to ensure that if, as is widely feared, violence happens to cap the coming elections, no part of Yorubaland, and no Yoruba person, will be involved or hurt in it. On the contrary, we must close ranks, turn such a situation around, and make it the dawn of our day of strength.

March 19, 2015
Yoruba descendants warn political gladiators against treachery

The National Association of Yoruba Descendants (Egbe Omo Yoruba) in North America has deplored what it calls the decision of some Yoruba leaders at home to mortgage their conscience “in this era of unprecedented political chicanery.”

Reviewing political developments in the country ahead of the coming elections, the group said it was “saddened that some of our elders and leaders who were on the pedestal of honour appear to have sordidly mortgaged their conscience in this era of unprecedented political chicanery.”

It accused such leaders of churning “out endorsements without empirical basis neglecting the poor state of our people thus insulting our sensibilities. Not in our name!”

It also condemned “the duplicitous efforts to use our people’s destiny as bargaining chip to rehabilitate those who have fallen into hard times or selfish struggle for Yoruba political hegemony. Such bargainers have subjugated our well being and collective patrimony to the transient gains of time.”

The Yoruba Descendants urged leaders to let the interest and well being of the people be paramount and all political considerations should keep this on the front burner, and reminded Yoruba elders, leaders and political gladiators to “be mindful of our political history and not underestimate our people’s resolve and will to resist any form of treachery.”

The group added, “Our golden era under Chief Obafemi Awolowo is a vivid reminder that until Nigeria reverts and adopts a true federal structure where the component units become free from the emasculating weight of a behemoth country which prevents our growth and progress, all the scheming for political power would come to nought. “

It asked all the parties seeking the votes of the Yoruba to “make a declaration and articulate a road map to restructuring Nigeria on the sacrosanct tenet of “True Federalism” since this was defeated at the profligate after-thought 2014 National conference.”

March 15, 2015
Between authentic Yoruba demands and what these elders are hawking around

How can these elders expect Yorubas to vote a man who treated them with unequalled disdain for all of his six years in office?

The name PDP Afenifere cropped up some two years ago when the Yoruba nation began to see the likes of  Iyiola Omisore, the forever wannabe-be governor  of Osun State –  attending  Afenifere meetings. But it has since got worse, with even Igbos now routinely attending, probably  bearing President Jonathan’s  election-related  gifts  or there to  attest  to  the  loyalty of  our elders to their new leader.  It doesn’t get more horrible for a proud Yoruba people.  And, for a certainty, the Ikemba  must be smiling in his grave; he who had wanted, but failed,  to make Col Banjo an Igbo viceroy in Yoruba land  when, during the Biafran war, he armed him to go conquer Lagos, now seeing  his Igbo brothers, Peter Obi and Udenta, resplendently seated, like conquistadors, at a once  revered Yoruba conclave. A single one of our Yoruba elders is yet to attend an Ohaneze meeting.

Could these elders have forgotten the Ore war?

A defining election is here with us, one in which the Yoruba nation must not permit itself to be obfuscated, especially by self-lovers who should ordinarily be our guarding lights. Unfortunately, a Pauline conversion, on an industrial scale, has since happened, and today, those who used to lead us are themselves now being led by a ‘youth’. Yet, however odious the situation, we still must be careful how we approach this delicate matter that fouls the mouth, but instantly adds salt; lest we be confused with that insufferable  PDP Goebbels, who  manufactures a lie, a day.

I am a student of  history and learnt at the feet of the very best – Akinjogbin, Fajana, Anjorin, Afolayan, Igbafe, Omosini, not to mention the incredible duo of  Segun Osoba and Banji Akintoye, about  both of  whom I have written copiously on this column, these past ten years, beginning with the rested Comet. That was at the Great University of Ife, close on fifty years ago, and it is on that legacy I will leverage to shred this unprecedented attempt by so tiny a few – you can now count them on your finger tips – to mislead the entire Yoruba nation; a people with a history dating back thousands of years and a people you would never describe as foolish. Worse is it, that this is in a subterfuge aimed at corralling them to queue behind, unarguably, the most corrupt government in Nigerian history. After all, the essence of history is using the past to illuminate the present, and the future, so that mistakes are rendered negligible. How can these elders expect Yorubas to vote a man who treated them with unequalled disdain for all of his six years in office?

And how do I do this in a manner that will so resoundingly blow off the shibboleths they are ceaselessly hawking about, running from Akure to Ibadan, and herding thousands of our youth to Akure for no other reason than to socialise bribery, in the forlorn hope that these young people Jonathan’s government could not give jobs, will now give him victory in Yoruba land.  All I have to do is present to the sons and daughters of Oduduwa, their long standing  demands  for proper restructuring as contained in the YORUBA AGENDA  which I urge them  to  compare with the dead on arrival recommendations of the Jonathan Confab they now equate to a silver bullet for the myriad problems currently hobbling Nigeria. This will convince our people that these elders’ merchandise is nothing but a pig in a poke. Happily, we are too smart to be sold on the cheap, especially since we are well aware that, deep down, all this showboating is targeted at oil pipeline contracts and political rehab.

The Yoruba Agenda, 2005, represents the culmination of efforts and ideas which have been canvassed in Yoruba land since the agitation for a return to true federalism energised those seeking a solution to the perennial crisis of governance in Nigeria. After its adoption at a Yoruba Assembly, it was submitted to a meeting of the Southwest Governor’s Technical Committee and it formed the kernel of the report submitted to the 2006 National Conference which was aborted. Unlike any other document, it enjoys the singular attribute of having every stratum of the Yoruba nation making a contribution.

It contains some specific, and, immutable demands which you would think these elders ensured were incorporated in the recommendations, but for where? Among these are the following: a self-governing and autonomous region to mobilise the energy of the Yoruba for progress and development and to ignite their collective resolve for cultural renaissance, educational resurgence and social stability; a right for the Yoruba to live under a regional government within the Nigerian Federation with its own constitution and which will be the master of its own internal affairs.  One which will function as one out of six regional governments  which  will form the federating units in a federation operating federal and regional constitutions.

Naturally, the new federation will undergo structural changes which will touch on, among others, the scope and limits of the powers of the federating units; the form of government, revenue allocation and fiscal federalism which will ensure that each region can develop at its own pace; resource control, police and policing and a judiciary which will have a federal Supreme Court for strictly constitutional cases and at the regional level, the apex court will be the court of Appeal. Indeed, under these Yoruba demands, membership of the National Judicial Council shall be so representative that excessive power would no longer be concentrated in the hands of the Chief Justice of the Federation. The present archaic, unproductive, centralised, single and unified police system would be jettisoned for a system of federal and regional police.

The above are only some of the original Yoruba demands as contained in the Yoruba Agenda. Were PDP Afenifere to have based its endorsement of President Jonathan on their inclusion, or even only a majority of them, I could very well have elected to be their orchestra’s drummer boy.

But what is the testimony of Mr Femi Falana, SAN, who, like them, was a conference delegate but one you would never find running between Akure, Owerri, Delta, Ibadan or Abuja?  In an interview he granted The Nation newspaper and published on Thursday, 5 March 5, 2015, Falana said as follows in answer to the question: Can you be more specific  on the Yoruba Agenda at the national conference?: ”Frankly speaking, answered him, the Yoruba agenda was anchored on regional autonomy, restructuring, parliamentary system or Westminster model, fiscal federalism or resource control, unicameral legislature, a ceremonial president and a prime minister with full executive powers, a special status for Lagos State, state police and deletion of the Land Use Act from the Constitution. Those were the items which constituted the core Yoruba Agenda. The items were defeated in to-to at the confab. Of course, the establishment of State Police scaled through on the basis of the role of the civilian joint task force in the fight against insurgency in the Northeast region. I challenge the authors of the Yoruba Agenda to point to other items that were adopted by the Confab.  Indeed, the approval of State Police, we learnt, was not based on the initiators’ advocacy.  Falana went further to explain that the Confab made three types of recommendations on policy direction, statutory amendments and constitutional review which require the promulgation of over 50 new laws and amendment of about 80 existing legislations and that although some of the bills were prepared and submitted to the government, the President did absolutely nothing in the past six months except set up the Adoke committee to study the report. Or could our elders have forgotten that the legislature has a role to play in its implementation in which case they must have to endorse all the federal legislators too?”

Given the above, one can only conclude, like this column did last week, that this is all a poorly calibrated ploy to mask their support for a government which Chief Obafemi Awolowo, by whose name they swear, would never have touched with the longest pole.

I wish, therefore, to plead  with my Yoruba compatriots that while we continue to accord these elders all the respect they so richly deserve, a single one of us must not make the mistake of voting a man who has so ill-served the Yoruba race and Nigeria.

March 8, 2015
As the Yoruba reflect on this moment in history

Despite the age-old tradition that Obas should conduct themselves as supra-partisan leaders, the ruling party brazenly made some Obas to act in a partisan manner

It is an understatement to say that the Yoruba are already thinking about this period in the country’s history. The present moment is in many ways similar to what obtained in 1965 in the Yoruba region when Hubert Ogunde, the father of the Opera Mode in Nigeria, composed Yoruba Ronu. The use of ‘reflect’ in the title in today’s piece is the closest English translation of Ogunde’s use of Ronu. For Ogunde then, the Yoruba were at a crossroads in their region’s history and development and needed to do self-assessment and critique; audit the region’s political culture; and dream a-new about its future.

In his most evocative imagery, Ogunde then described the Yoruba society as a pace-setter and model for others, suddenly transformed into a football that everybody on the street kicks around for fun, all on the strength of the control of means of signification by a few Yoruba politicians in power or with access to power want to control the political destiny of the Yoruba .Ogunde was then preoccupied with the extent of political crisis and decline in the Yoruba region. Today, the decline in the region is more than political; it is also looking cultural and moral, given the character of participation of some Yoruba sons and daughters in the new campaign culture in the country.

What Ogunde warned against in his Yoruba Ronu, a song that had been used generously by opposing parties in the current campaign, was a political leadership that appropriated the public means of mass communication to tell only the story of the ruling party and in doing so, insult citizens directly or indirectly. As we observed in this column last week, the dominant political culture of that period was summarised by the sentence: “We do not have the time to campaign about programmes; whether you vote for us or you don’t our party has won the forthcoming election.”

The intention of today’s column is not to query individuals or groups for exercising their freedom of association and expression. This freedom had been part of Yoruba culture for centuries and long before the advent of colonial political culture. In most Yoruba communities, there was the tradition of self-expression that allowed citizens to critique or even lampoon their leaders at the times set apart for rituals of rebellion and castigation of those with power over citizens, be they monarchs or chiefs or the economically powerful in the society, just as everybody was free to canvass for support for his or her candidates for office in the precolonial Yoruba polity. But the exercise of such rights in the traditional context, as it is in the modern context in other modern societies, also had rules of engagement. Deception or humiliation of citizens, particularly vertical figures in the society, was frowned upon.

The events in the last three weeks are reminiscent of what happened in 1965 when the ruling party in the region humiliated some of our Obas. Despite the age-old tradition that Obas should conduct themselves as supra-partisan leaders, the ruling party brazenly made some Obas to act in a partisan manner. Fortunately then, as it seems to be now, there were also many Yoruba Obas who chose to act in compliance with tradition: avoiding to identify with any of the political parties contesting the election. At the end, it was the citizens that voted. Not one Oba out of those generously suborned and those that were left as black legs and fanatics of the opposition party, was seen at any of the polling stations. But all the same, 1965 started the abuse and humiliation of Yoruba traditional rulers, even at a time when cultural and moral decline was not this self-evident.

Of course, the decline was accelerated and deepened by military dictators. During the many years of military rule, traditional rulers across the country were wooed and cultivated by dictators at the federal and state levels with the consequence that the institution became politicised more and more. Some Obas were encouraged to become contractors of the government and thus pushed into a situation where they could not resist supporting the government in power, regardless of the deleterious effect of its programmes. But generally, military dictators on the surface showed some respect to the Obas until the annulment of 1993 and in the years of Abacha’s rule of terror.

The last sixteen years of post-military rule appeared to have given traditional rulers the space they needed (and still need) to conduct themselves as statesmen and not as rapacious hustlers that some of them were deemed to be during military rule. But the event of a few weeks ago in many parts of Yorubaland brought the humiliation of Yoruba traditional rulers to an embarrassing level. Those who organised the campaign of President Jonathan in the north acted in a way to show respect for northern monarchs. President Jonathan visited individual Emirs in their palaces to announce his presidential candidacy and to repeat the accomplishments of his administration. In most cases, he asked northern Emirs to pray for him, instead of asking them to vote for him.

In contrast, Yoruba Obas were treated as government employees by those who coordinated the presidential campaign in the Southwest. Several Yoruba monarchs were herded and assembled to receive the president, not in palaces of individual monarchs as it was in north. Like school kids on excursion, Yoruba Obas were assembled outside their palaces to listen to the president’s campaign, especially his promise to de-marginalise the Yoruba region, if elected for another four years.

It is one thing to have or know monarchs that are rapacious enough to want to take any risk with their crowns. But it is another thing to treat many monarchs as if they are Warrant Chiefs who were created to facilitate colonial governance and thus owed their livelihood to the goodwill of colonial administrators. Whoever organised the presidential campaign in the Southwest was not fair to Yoruba monarchs for failing to encourage President Jonathan to visit the traditional rulers in their palaces individually, the way he did in the north. Summoning Yoruba monarchs from their palaces to a central place to listen to the president’s campaign is wrong and can be counterproductive. Many voters who still have respect for the institution of monarchy in the region may see the levity with which Yoruba monarchs were herded as a sign of continued Yoruba marginalisation, more so as this is already a dominant theme in the campaign of Yoruba Council of Elders and other groups.

Of all the elections I have observed in the country, I cannot remember seeing any Oba cast a vote. The electoral value of the Yoruba monarchs may not be as high as to deserve summoning them to a central place to listen to political campaigns of the ruling party or of the opposition party. Yoruba Obas themselves know this. No self-respecting Oba can come out openly to campaign for any political party or candidate. A few of them that may have the temerity to persuade their subjects in secret also know the consequence: loss of respect among their subjects.

It is churlish that the coordinators of the PDP campaign in the Southwest treated the Obas the same way they treated their subjects: ordinary voters that needed to be brought together to hear the candidate campaign. It is even worse that many monarchs left their palaces to listen to political campaigns. What tradition requires of Yoruba monarchs is for them to wait in their palaces for political leaders to visit them and bring to them whatever messages they have. Tradition also requires that the monarchs talk diplomatically to such candidates without making any overt commitment one or way or the other. Whatever may be the problems of individual monarchs and whatever specific politicians may know of individual Obas, traditional rulership in Yorubaland is an institution that still requires, like its counterpart in the north, respect from politicians.

March 8, 2015
Why Yoruba will reject Jonathan, by Southwest APC

The All Progressives Congress (APC), Southwest Zone, yesterday described last week’s summit by some Yoruba elders and Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) leaders as “the gathering of strange bedfellows”.

It said it was a futile effort to promote a bad product.

The party, in a statement by its Director of Media and Publicity, Ayo Afolabi, said those championing President Goodluck Jonathan’s cause in the Southwest are aware that they are in the minority.

The party listed reasons why Yoruba would not vote for the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) candidate in the March 28 election, saying he has squandered the confidence the Yoruba reposed in him since 2010.

The statement reads: “Those championing Jonathan’s cause in the Southwest know they are in the minority and that is why, despite purporting to be acting in Yoruba’s interest, they held a conference that was not open to the public.

“It is insulting and delusional for them to think they can decide for Yoruba people .

“Also, that Tony Uranta and Peter Obi attended a ‘Yoruba summit’ in supervisory role from the Presidency is another addition to the list of insults to the Yoruba nation from the Jonathan administration.

“Jonathan candidacy is unsellable. Southwest people will speak with their votes on March 28.

“As it was in 2010, when Nigerians were united across ethnic and religious divides against bad governance; so will it be on March 28 when they will choose Muhammadu Buhari.”

March 4, 2015