"Nigeria is not a nation. It is a mere geographical expression. There are no Nigerians in the same sense as there are English, Welsh or French. The word Nigerian is merely a distinctive appellation to distinguish those who live within the boundaries of Nigeria from those who do not." - Path to Nigerian Freedom pg 47-48 Obafemi Awolowo.

Reading the above made me think deeply on the composition of Nigeria and the different challenges posed to us as a people. Nigeria has seemingly stagnated due to the fact that we have refused to base our togetherness as a nation on the strengths of our differences as a group of diverse nations. As evidenced in the practice of federalism practiced by countries similar in composition to Nigeria as Switzerland and United Kingdom, we can not grow in our present contraption where there is gross concentration of power and duties in an all-powerful central government instead of an ideal situation where we should have powerful states/regions with a strong enough central government to cater for areas of common need such as national security i.e the armed forces, intelligence agencies and para-military forces excluding the police; and foreign affairs. States/Regions should be made to cater for the needs of their peoples and pay tax/duties to the central government and not the other way as currently practiced. There are many countries doing great without access to oil as evidenced in the likes of Switzerland, United Kingdom, Ghana(until next year). Only by so doing can we really develop our people and make governance less attractive to purposeless administrators/leaders. We are a people abundantly blessed by nature with more resources than most of the so-called developed economies in the world.

Under the present system that aims at getting all the peoples in Nigeria to the goal of development at the same time and hour, we are consistently doomed to continuously wander with no concrete achievements to write home about. True federalism would solve problems like local government creation since their funding would be from the state governments and as such problems of increased funding from the federation account leading to suspicion among the different nations in Nigeria would be eliminated. This would also reduce the problem of illiteracy as states would be compelled to develop their people as individuals to be able to compete with other states as a means of avoiding being left behind and also to harness their resources as best as they can, whether mineral resources, petroleum, manpower, intellect, industry etc.

Please do contribute constructively on the (in)fallibility of this viewpoint.