From Four to 36: Celebration of Freedom (I)
Bolaji Adebiyi argues that politics rather than the need to facilitate development, drove the creation of states in Nigeria
Five of the 36 states of the federation are in a celebratory mood, rolling out the drums to commemorate 50 years of their existence. Created on May 27, 1967 along with seven others, Cross Rivers, Kano, Kwara, Lagos and Rivers States, have retained their distinctive names since creation, even when all, but Lagos, have shed some weight over the years, losing some of their territories and people to an unending phenomenon of state creation.
Lagos and Rivers have been the loudest celebrants though. Most probably because of the deepness of their pockets. The former began the celebrations earlier last year with a committee headed by no less a personality than the Nobel Laurette, Prof. Wole Soyinka, steering the affairs of the huge party. The latter followed suit only last month but is nonetheless hosting a magnificent ball that comes to an end today.
The reasons for the celebrations vary. For Governor Akinwunmi Ambode of Lagos State, the party is a toast to the unity of Nigeria, which he said the state provided the platform for in the last 50 years. Besides, he said, every opportunity must be seized to market the immense economic opportunities that abound in the coastal state.
“The golden jubilee presents a unique opportunity for us not only to celebrate our achievements but also to showcase to the entire world the immense potential waiting to be tapped,” he said, adding: “We are determined and committed as a government, to fully explore all the possibilities presented by this moment to lay a solid foundation for another glorious and prosperous 50 years.”
The sentiment is different in Rivers State, where Governor Nyesom Wike says his people are making merry to mark their independence from oppression.
According to him: “Many of us, who are now enjoy- ing the fruits of liberty may not truly appreciate what it meant to be dominated, dispossessed, deprived, exploited and oppressed in your own land by the dominant social and political tendencies of the time.
“Before Rivers State was created, our people could not find schools in their neighbourhood, hospitals to treat the sick, universities to educate their children, decent jobs to earn income and good roads to their communities.”
The creation of the state, he noted, had changed this, adding that Rivers had attained greater heights and surmounted development challenges.
“Although we are not where we should be within the matrix of where we want to be, we still have a lot to celebrate and thank God for the 50 years of our existence as a state and as a people with a common destiny,” Wike told a committee he set up in March 2017 to organise the celebrations and explained that the most significant outcome of its existence was that the people were now the masters of their destiny.
Wike struck at the core of the basis of the fragmentation of Nigeria in the name of state creation, arising from the agitations of the minorities against their domination by the majority nationalities. As he noted, however, it remains doubtful if state creation as a tool for dousing minority agitations has indeed fulfilled its objective of securing access to, and, facilitating economic growth and development for the hitherto marginalised nationalities.
The agitations began in the immediate pre-independence period when the minority groups expressed their fear that they might be strangulated by the majority ethic formations in a post- independence Nigeria and, therefore, sought guarantees from the receding colonial government that their interests would be protected.
The colonial government acceded to this demand, setting up in September, 1957 the Harry Willink Commission to ascertain the fears and suggest measures to allay them. The commission reported that the fears were real even if exaggerated in some instances, but fell short of recommending creation of states for the minorities within the three regions, Northern Region, Western Region and Eastern Region. Instead it recommended constitutional guarantees for their protection against domination through the creations of councils in the minority areas charged with fostering their well-being, cultural advancement and economic and social development.
Although the three regions survived the minority agitations and remained intact at independence in 1960, it was obvious that the resolution of their demand for more concrete arrangements that would insulate them from the dominance of the majority nationalities was merely postponed. With the three majority nationalities dominating the politics and the political parties in control of the regions, it was not long before the fears of the minorities became real as commanding government positions were not only occupied by the majority, provision of socio-economic infrastructures and opportunities were skewed against the minorities.
The Hausa-Fulani dominated the Northern Peoples Congress (NPC) in the Northern Region to the detriment of the Middle Belt, consisting largely of the Tiv, Idoma, Igala, Ebira and pockets of Yoruba in the Ilorin Province. The Yoruba controlled the Action Group (AG) in the Western Region with the Edo, Urhobo, and Ijaw feeling excluded. In the Eastern Region, the Ibo were in total charge of the National Council of
If the new state structure brought succour to the minorities, giving them five states, two in the North, three in the South, it soon created its own contradictions as some larger minority groups became the majority in their respective states to the consternation of the new minority groups
Nigeria and Cameroun (NCNC), leaving the Calabar-Ogoja-Rivers people feeling left in the cold.
But politics rather the genuine need to respond to the yearnings of the minorities for their own identity and development would drive the creation of the Mid-Western Region from the Western Region in 1963. That was made to happen by the NPC, which was intent on reducing the sphere of influence of the opposition AG. Although the AG under Chief Obafemi Awolowo was sympathetic to the cause of the minorities, it was nonetheless disappointed at the politicisation of their genuine agitation for political autonomy as the other minority groups in the North and the East had their demands put on hold.
The military that took over in 1966 inherited the four regional structure and did not tinker with it until political exigency dictated the dissolution of the regions in the following year. The January 1966 Coup led by Major Chukwuma Nzeogwu, an officer of Ibo extraction, and dominated by his fellow Ibo officers, who killed the Premier of the Northern Region, Sir Ahmadu Bello, and the Prime Minister of Nigeria, Alhaji Tafawa Balewa; and the July 1996 counter coup led by Lt. Col. Yakubu Gowon whose officers killed the then Head of State, General Aguiyi-Ironsi, an Ibo officer, and several other Ibo officers, had tensed up the country. A pogrom in which many Ibos were killed in the North followed, forcing many of them to retreat to the Eastern Region. The governor of the region, Col. Emeka Ojukwu, felt pained enough by the turn of events to declare the region an independent state, proclaiming in May 1967, the Republic of Biafra.
Gowon sought to break the cohesion of the new republic by excising the minority areas of CalabarOgoja-Rivers from the Eastern Region. On May 27, 1967, he dissolved the four regions and created 12 states. The Eastern Region was broken into three states, South Eastern State, East Central State and Rivers State, effectively isolating the Ibo who were the dominant group in the region and promoters of Biafra. From the Western Region were created two states, Western State and Lagos State. The Mid-West Region was rechristened Mid-West State, while the Northern Region was divided into six states, North Western State, North Eastern State, Benue-Plateau State, Kwara State and Kano State.
If the new state structure brought succour to the minorities, giving them five states, two in the North, three in the South, it soon created its own contradictions as some larger minority groups became the majority in their respective states to the consternation of the new minority groups.
Besides, the military who took the country through a gruesome civil war between 1967 and 1970 might have used state creation to put the majority ethic groups in check, to prevent them from threatening the corporate existence of Nigeria. Otherwise the 12-state structure had fairly grouped the country along contiguous ethnic nationalities, although the minority groups had to cohabit in a cluster of states.
Agitations for more states, nonetheless, persisted as the new minorities hungered for their own enclave. Four more state creation exercises followed in 1976, 1987, 1991 and 1996.
Nine years after the first exercise, Gen. Murtala Muhammed who succeeded Gowon created seven new states, bringing them to 19. The beneficiaries on February 3, 1976 were Kaduna, Niger and Sokoto States from North Western State; Borno, Bauchi and Gongola States were carved out of North Eastern State; while Benue-Plateau was divided into Benue and Plateau States. The Western State got separated into Ogun, Ondo and Oyo States even as East Central State was divided into Anambra and Imo States. Rivers State was spared any mutilation while South Eastern State got a new name, Cross Rivers State.
In spite of the deafening demands for more states during the civilian interregnum of the President Shehu Shagari administration between 1979 and 1983 no new state could be created because of the stringent conditions prescribed for the exercise by the 1979 Constitution.
But the agitators had their way again on September 23, 1987 when Gen. Ibrahim Babangida created two more states, expanding the federating units to 21. From Kaduna State was created Katsina State, while Akwa Ibom State was shaved off Cross Rivers State. Four years later, the gap-toothed general increased the states to 30 on August 27, 1991, creating nine more units. Abia State came out of Imo State; Gongola State became Adamawa and Taraba States; Enugu State emerged from Anambra State; Bendel State became Edo and Delta States; Jigawa State was excised from Kano State; Yobe State was split from Borno State; Kebbi State was created from Sokoto State; Osun State was created from Oyo State; and Kogi State came out of Kwara State.
Six more states joined the fray to increase the state structure to 36 on October 1, 1996 when Gen. Sani Abacha created Ebonyi State from Abia and Enugu States; Bayelsa State from Rivers State; Nasarawa State from Benue and Plateau States; Zamfara State from Sokoto State; Gombe State from Bauchi State and Ekiti State from Ondo State.
Even with a 36 state structure plus Abuja, the federal capital territory, the agitations have not stopped with scores thronging the National Assembly in Abuja for the creation of their own state. At the 2014 National Conference put together in Abuja by President Goodluck Jonathan, the matter was topical and the conference recommended the creation of 19 more states to bring the federating units to 50.
In all these, it did not matter though that most of the states were unviable as they were unable to meet their basic obligations, including payment of workers’ salaries. Yet the multiplicity of states has not substantially achieved its advertised purpose of facilitating the development of the country. As many analysts have noted, this could not have been otherwise given the attendant size of the bureaucracy and its cost of maintenance, which has forced the country to spend a whopping 70 per cent of its annual income on recurrent expenditure. Meanwhile very few states and the federal government utilise up to 50 per cent of their 30 per cent capital expenditure.
No wonder, therefore, many of the states remain backward, lacking in most basic infrastructures needed for the economic development that would elevate the living conditions of the people on whose behalf the agitations for state creation were waged.
As the five states celebrate their 50 years of existence, it is extremely important, as Rivers State Governor Wike, pointed out in one his celebratory engagements, that Nigeria and Nigerians do a sober introspection on the state of their federation, which appears to be under performing in spite of the promises that the splitting of the old regions offered.