Is it really really twilight for Nigeria? - II

We are unpacking some of the real issues affecting Nigeria and leading to these calls for breakups beyond the noise. The first point being considered is this idea that because Northern ‘youths’ gathered in Arewa House Kaduna, then the whole north is behind them. That is untrue. I am also saying that we have heard much worse things from elements from the south of Nigeria. For example, Nnamdi Kanu requested for guns and ammunition at the Four Points Sheraton Hotel in Los Angeles in 2015. There was no way Sheraton would have known that he will use their venue for such an illegal activity, and they couldn’t even care less afterwards. He suffered no reprimands from them. This is what he said on that occasion:

“We need guns and we need bullets. To kill somebody is not a problem for us… Lugard killed people in bringing Nigeria together, so killing people to break it is not a problem… If they fail to give us Biafra, Somalia will look like a paradise compared to what will happen to that zoo (Nigeria)… If they do not give us Biafria there will be nothing living in that zoo (Nigeria)... nothing will survive there, I can assure you. I do not believe in peaceful actualization or whatever rubbish it is called. I have never seen where you become free by peaceful means”.

It is noteworthy that hardly anyone in his audience that day agreed with his position. A certain gentleman towards the end of the clip strongly suggested that rather than fight the Federal Government, the Igbo people should deal with their local issues. This means that an Nnamdi Kanu type probably never has the support of right-thinking people whom he purports to champion their cause. But the danger is that right-thinking people are in the minority. Nnamdi is worshipped today. So also might these new demagogues from the north whom we are giving national importance. 2. The maps of self-delusion The entire imbroglio has thrown up the challenges involved in forming a country. The Biafran advocates have drawn up a map of their dream nation, which includes most of Benue and Kogi States. They have since taken for granted that the entire Delta State (including the Urhobos, and the Itsekiris whose language is closer to the Yorubas), is part of Biafra. The entire Rivers and Cross-River states is part of their equation. Ditto Bayelsa with its deepsea oil fields. It seems however that they will have to fight several wars to actualize that map as we had predicted. In fact, the fight from those ‘minorities’ will be fiercer than from the rest of Nigeria.

The advocates of Oodua Republic also drew a map, in which the included their ‘junior brother’, Benin. They also carved in the Itsekiris of Delta State. At least one person - Don Pedro Obaseki - has spoken up on behalf of the Binis. ‘Forget it!’ he screamed. ‘Benin people are not and have never been Yorubas’. Just as Yorubas believe that Binis are their junior brothers, the Binis have it exactly opposite in their own history books.

For me, I’ve been telling romanticists who blame Lord Lugard for joining together disparate peoples into an ‘unholy’ union called Nigeria, that, that is how it is done everywhere. In the year 1900 there wasn’t anything near the kind of enlightenment we have today. Our societies were primitive. We were held as slaves on our own soil by these British people. We also held each other as slaves as we never tired of fighting tribal wars. No master asks his slave for his opinions. The white man did worse things to people with whom he shared the same skin colour.

Therefore most nations - if not all - are ‘geographical expressions’. What matters is what you choose to do with that ‘expression’ afterwards. I believe that Nigerians have mismanaged this union out of immaturity and mutual disdain. Sometimes I sit back and assume the role of an outsider and watch Nigerians speak. The sheer arrogance. The self-importance. The exceptionalism, made worse by religion and cultures that tell us we are meant to be better than everybody else! I believe that all of these issues we are throwing up merely show our shallowness. Meanwhile, civilization is defined as the ability to coexist in large cities. It is almost a truism that we don’t yet have that ability or paradigm. Most of us distrust anyone but ourselves. Tribal and religious differences merely provide us an anchor for that distrust and hate. The black man, the Nigerian, has to be forced to think greater thoughts. 3. Brothers’ war is the worst Meanwhile, it is true, that if we are as yet challenged in our abilities and willingness to live in large groups (otherwise defined as civilization), there is no assurance whatsoever that as our tribal countries grow we will not have issues. Psychoanalyzing the Nigerian problem reveals that at the heart of this is an inability to understand diversity. Among the Igbos is so much mutual discrimination. An Enugu man cannot become anything in Abia even if it is difficult for anyone to tell the difference between the two men save for a slight accent here and there. Even within a state, people are identified and restricted up to the village they hail from. So what we have is still the village mentality. Yet we are in the year 2017! The same can be said for every other ‘tribe’ in Nigeria. Sometimes one feels we should altogether abolish the concept of tribes, clean the slate and approach the future as modern men and women; citizens of the world, ready to play fair for humanity’s sake. I reckon that is where all these will end someday.

Managing the aftermath of splitting is another problem. India split from Pakistan in rancorous fashion in 1947, right at independence. Till today, neither countries grant visas to each others’ citizens. A man who lives in London, born of Pakistani and Indian parents, was denied visa by both countries. Denied by India because his mother is Pakistani, and by Pakistan because his father is Indian. Can you beat that? The two countries share borders and have been engaged in war since 1947. Good job. We always warned that there was a very slim possibility that Nigeria will resolve a breakup in a convivial manner. It is emerging today that we are right. I believe if we are calm we can make this country work. 4. Misgovernance writ large Ultimately, what ails Nigeria is misgovernance, simplicta. Not much else. Because of the village mentality still existing in most of us - and by extension our leaders - we cannot get rid of greed and ego. The leaders who emerge here are those who still exist in the realm whereby they have to show off to the rest of us with their possessions. We are easily taken with shiny things of life. Therefore we have made all the wrong decisions since the white man departed and we keep making more. If 20% of our commonwealth had been used for the betterment of society at large, no one will be thinking of scattering the union, and the Nigerian specie would have greatly improved in thinking, in productivity, and otherwise. But what we have instead are politicians playing poverty politics, financing thugs and area boys, subjugating the majority in the worst form of poverty on planet Earth, and ensuring by every means that majority of us continue to be well, ‘savages’. Nigeria is simply the most mismanaged country on Earth, where even in an economic recession, we make appalling choices with our commonwealth and waste resources like drunken sailors. If we could have a new ethos in governments, and conserve and maximize our resources, and deploy first to the most vulnerable, we will see Nigerians rise from the ashes, unity will grow, and we will all pursue a new vision.