Ileke-IdI:

So Suraj, which one are you? Yoruba or Northerner?
Which language do you speak?
A Yoruba Northerner? hmmm iyen ko possible sha.

oludashmi:

Ileke, what Jarus is saying is that kwara pple are 100% Yorubas ethnically and culturally but northerners under Nigeria's geographical classification. Just as some of ibos are not found under the SE.

Jarus:

What is today Kwara has always been classified as North since 1914. During the provincial era pre-independence, Ilorin province(now Kwara and Kogi) was undr Northern region. During the regional system, Kwara was part of Northern region. Till today, Kwara is still North. Or can you count the 19 Northern states for me?

Whether a place is North or South is not a natural classification like ethnicity. A mistake, so to speak, was made in 1914 and Ilorin province was classified as North, and till today, it still is. Taking it to South will involve official proclamation and boundary adjustment.

Jarus:

I tire o. You still no get my lecture up there. Ani iyato wa ninu 'region' ati 'ethnicity'.
I'm a Yoruba Northerner. Plain and simple. They are not mutually exclusive.

oludashmi:

Ileke, what Jarus is saying is that kwara pple are 100% Yorubas ethnically and culturally but northerners under Nigeria's geographical classification. Just as some ibos are not grouped under the SE.

Jarus:

Thanks for the explanation jare, but I did not say the bolded.
Kwara is not 100% Yoruba. It's multi-ethnic. We Yorubas are the majority, but we have other tribes like Batonum, Nupe, Fulani etc.

Jarus:

Kwarans are 100% Northerners, stop exposing your ignorance.
Perhaps you need a lecture on difference between region and ethnicity. Region: North, South, East, West Ethnicity: Yoruba, Hausa, Ibo etc
What is today Kwara has always been classified as North since 1914. During the provincial era pre-independence, Ilorin province(now Kwara and Kogi) was undr Northern region. During the regional system, Kwara was part of Northern region. Till today, Kwara is still North. Or can you count the 19 Northern states for me?

You are obviously mistaking Hausa/Fulani with North. Whether a place is North or South is not a natural classification like ethnicity. A mistake, so to speak, was made in 1914 and Ilorin province was classified as North, and till today, it still is. Taking it to South will involve official proclamation and boundary adjustment.

Being a northerner doesn't mean you're Hausa/Fulani. You can be a Yoruba and a Northerner in as much as you come from a state classified as North. Kwara and Kogi are such. Late Chief Sunday Awoniyi, a Yoruba man from Kogi, was a dyed-in-the-wood Sardauna loyalist and later Chairman of Arewa Consultative forum. Can a non-Arewa person be the Chairman of Arewa Forum if he is not from Arewa?

I am from Kwara, a Yoruba, and officially a Northerner, because that is what my state has been classified as since 1914.
Kajiko?

DapoBear:

It doesn't appear that Kwara was officially classified as part of the "North" anywhere in the constitution, though. In fact, neither exists in that document, at least from my quick search.

Before 1914, there was a Northern and Southern protectorate. But those no longer exist. Just states.

oludashmi:

I think jarus got that mixed up cos Northern and Southern protectorate only became married in 1914.
Anyway, kwara is a Yoruba land but there are Nupes in parts of Jebba and Fulanis just as he stated.

@Jarus
Do you know one funny thing. . . in my last visit to Jebba, the Nupes said they do not belong to kwara state (if not for the nigerian government) but Niger state. They recalled how their fathers were moved to kwara state cos the government (I ve forgotten the name of the head of state as at then) wanted to use their land. They still maintain that they only follow orders from Niger state and not kwara state.

Jarus:

@ Ileke,
I agree we share cultural affinity with SW than North, at least those of us Yoruba, who are the majority. Many a time, I mistakenly refer to myself as being form the SW sef.
The Nupe, Baruten people however are more like Hausa/Fulani, culturally.

@ Dapobear, a few questions:
- During the northern and southern protectorate era, where was present day Kwara?
- During the regional system era, where was the present day Kwara classified?

It is when we trace back history to pre-20th century that we begin to trace the history of the Yoruba Kwara and Fulani Kwara separately.The Yoruba from Oyo, the Fulani from Sokoto, and that's very complicated. I personally hold the opinion that Ilorin is a mixture of Yoruba and Fulani, but I'm tired of debating this issue. The descendants of Alimi are Fulani, and the descendants of Afonja are Yoruba. Who, among the two, actually owns Ilorin? Both, my take. Both of them were migrants, Afonja migrating from Oyo and Alimi from Sokoto. But who rules Ilorin? The Fulani has been dominating.

The political classification began in the early 20th century. That doesn't mean we are losing our Yoruba history. Ethnicity cannot be changed. It's natural. Political classification can be changed. Today a government can come and reclassify Yoruba part of Kwara to SW and the other tribes to NC. But nobody can come and say we are no longer Yoruba or that our Nupe brothers are no longer Nupe etc.

Jarus:

I am from Kwara, a Yoruba, and officially a Northerner, because that is what my state has been classified as since 1914.

DapoBear:

Ultimately, this is sort of a hearts and minds thing, not a political classification thing. I grew up in Maryland in the US. At one point it was considered a Southern state. Nowadays, it is not, mostly because the inhabitants of the state view themselves as having more in common with the idealogical North (Democratic Party, liberalism, etc) of the country rather than the South (Republican Party, conservatism, Evangelical Christianity, etc).

DapoBear:

I highly doubt that you can look at someone and tell what fraction Yoruba/Fulani they are. Alimi was Fulani, but his son and heir Abdulsalam, his mother was Yoruba. It is quite possible that this fraction has increased over time; I wouldn't be surprised if their Emir is now 75%+ Yoruba. Even people who are 25% white mostly look black, not to talk of someone who might be as little as 25% fulani.

Most of this stuff is politics, really.

You have to remember that when Afonja began his rebellion against the Oyo Empire, a good portion of his troops were runaway Hausa slaves. And Fulani were not likely to be that numerous in Ilorin when the rebellion began. It seems plausible that a lot of these guys who claim to have Fulani ancestors instead in Ilorin instead have Hausa slave ancestors.

This was my suspicion about Saraki before reading this article, my guess was some sort of descendant of a Hausa palace slave. Instead he turns out he is Egba  
I have a problem with what they are doing because it causes division. The Sarakis are vipers in our midst.

I suspect if Kwarans ever have to choose one day between North and SW, they will choose the latter.

Ileke-IdI:

They can claim whatever they desire. As long as they're ready to move out [b]when [/b]the country breaks. Hopefully, they're not expecting us to leave a piece of our land for them. That would be very tragic.

Jarus:

I'm aware there is a part of Jebba called 'Jebba Niger' and a part called 'Jebba Kwara', but whether the 'Jebba Niger' is officialy recognized as Niger state or whether the whole of Jebba is classified as Kwara is what I don't know.

Why haven't you said that you are a north-centralist (of the six geo-political zones) in your definition of your person?

Katsumoto:

Afonja had an issue with Alaafin Aole and sent a calabash to the Alaafin signifying that he no longer respected his rule. In 1817, Afonja then invited a muslim scholar, Alimi, to Ilorin ostensibly to fortify himself with more charms. At this point, even with Ilorin, an out post town of the Oyo empire, isolated from the rest the rest of the empire, the Fulani did not attack Ilorin. In 1823, Alimi died and Abdulsalam became his successor. Abdusalam then sent for the Caliphate flag and Ilorin came under the Emirate of Gwandu. There was no armed rebellion in Ilorin

Read Samuel Johnson's 'History of the Yorubas' and a book by Professor Akin-jogbin; I can't remember the title now.

Opele was the only powerful chief Afonja respected and having now no rival he resolved upon a scheme to reduce the provinces under his own sway, leaving the capital severely alone in complete isolation. He made no attempt on Oyo, had no aspiration after the throne knowing that was impossible of attainment ; it was sufficient tor him that the King was powerless to check his ambition. In order to strengthen his hands in the enterprise he was about to undertake, he invited a Fulah Moslem Priest named Alimi to Ilorin to act as his priest. Alimi in responding to his call came with his Hausa slaves and made Ilorin his home. These Hausa slaves Afonja found to be useful as soldiers. He also invited to Ilorin a rich and powerful Yoruba friend at Kurwo named
Solagberu, who quartered himself at the outskirts of the town.

All the Hausa slaves in the adjacent towns hitherto employed as barbers, rope-makers, and cowherds, now deserted their masters and flocked to Ilorin under the standard of Afonja the Kakanfo, and were protected against their masters.

Jarus:

Now I see our arguments converging.

Both I'm not from Ilorin, I'm from Offa, which is 100% Yoruba, as is the case with all other communities in Kwara South.

Ilorin is not the only town in Kwara, although it is by far the largest and most important.

It is only Ilorin that has a debatable ethnicity, Kwara South is indisputably Yoruba. The Nupes, Barubas of Kwara North are not in any way Yoruba. The Kwara central and Ilorin is mixed, but largely Yoruba too. So I'm not sure a Nupe man(they have also produced governor - Shaaba Lafiaji 1991-1992) or a Baruba man(Bio, current sporst minister, Farooq Kperog, NVS writer are Baruba) will agree with you that Kwara is a Yoruba state. But given the fact that other tha the SW states, no state is 100% a single tribe in Nigeria, we can loosely call Kwara by the majority tribe, a Yoruba state.
Being quite conversant with Kwara, your guess is not exactly correct.

This is the mindset:
KWARA SOUTH(purely Yoruba): Prefer SW
KWARA NORTH(Nupe, Baruba etc): Prefer NC
KWARA CENTRAL(debatable history, between Yoruba nd Fulani): Almost 50-50 preference. Some will tell you they are not Yoruba but Fulani even if his/her name is Bukola or Toyin and can't speak a single word in Hausa, not to talk of Fulbe. Some others wil tell you they are Yoruba. But politically, majority prefer North.

Jarus:

Now I see our arguments converging.

Both I'm not from Ilorin, I'm from Offa, which is 100% Yoruba, as is the case with all other communities in Kwara South.
Ilorin is not the only town in Kwara, although it is by far the largest and most important.

It is only Ilorin that has a debatable ethnicity, Kwara South is indisputably Yoruba. The Nupes, Barubas of Kwara North are not in any way Yoruba. The Kwara central and Ilorin is mixed, but largely Yoruba too. So I'm not sure a Nupe man(they have also produced governor - Shaaba Lafiaji 1991-1992) or a Baruba man(Bio, current sporst minister, Farooq Kperog, NVS writer are Baruba) will agree with you that Kwara is a Yoruba state. But given the fact that other tha the SW states, no state is 100% a single tribe in Nigeria, we can loosely call Kwara by the majority tribe, a Yoruba state.
Being quite conversant with Kwara, your guess is not exactly correct.
This is the mindset:
KWARA SOUTH(purely Yoruba): Prefer SW
KWARA NORTH(Nupe, Baruba etc): Prefer NC
KWARA CENTRAL(debatable history, between Yoruba nd Fulani): Almost 50-50 preference. Some will tell you they are not Yoruba but Fulani even if his/her name is Bukola or Toyin and can't speak a single word in Hausa, not to talk of Fulbe. Some others wil tell you they are Yoruba. But politically, majority prefer North.

excanny:

I think this is one of the reasons why Kwara and some states in Nigeria are lagging behind in development on a daily basis. There's no way you can loop people who have different ideologies and political destiny together, and expect them to move as one. This is one area where the past military juntas did a very crazy job. Personally, i'm a advocate of boundary adjustment(it may not be a creation of new states), but there should be a kind of referendum in which people will be asked where they want to belong to, after which, they'll be group into their chosen states. The nupes for example might what to join the majority nupes in Niger state. The okuns in Kogi may want to join the predominantly yoruba Kwara south, etc. This will give folks like Saraki an opportunity to be in Kwara or be absorbed in other fulani communities. 

excanny:

I think this is one of the reasons why Kwara and some states in Nigeria are lagging behind in development on a daily basis. There's no way you can loop people who have different ideologies and political destiny together, and expect them to move as one. This is one area where the past military juntas did a very crazy job. Personally, i'm a advocate of boundary adjustment(it may not be a creation of new states), but there should be a kind of referendum in which people will be asked where they want to belong to, after which, they'll be group into their chosen states. The nupes for example might what to join the majority nupes in Niger state. The okuns in Kogi may want to join the predominantly yoruba Kwara south, etc. This will give folks like Saraki an opportunity to be in Kwara or be absorbed in other fulani communities.

DapoBear:

Jarus, many of the people you call Yoruba now in Kwara, their ancestors were not. I'm sure you are familiar with the history of Ilorin and Afonja's rebellion. A lot of his forces were runaway Hausa slaves, for example. Those guys eventually forgot Hausa, intermarried (or quite possibly did NOT intermarry!), and today speak Yoruba.[b] A similar process happened in Ibadan, [/b]actually (there is an interesting book I read recently on google books describing this process.)
So Yoruba ancestry/identity/whatever is quite fluid.

Jarus:

The common statements '19 Northern states' and '17 Southern states' mean North and South still exist.

excanny:

I think this is one of the reasons why Kwara and some states in Nigeria are lagging behind in development on a daily basis. There's no way you can loop people who have different ideologies and political destiny together, and expect them to move as one. This is one area where the past military juntas did a very crazy job. Personally, i'm a advocate of boundary adjustment(it may not be a creation of new states), but there should be a kind of referendum in which people will be asked where they want to belong to, after which, they'll be group into their chosen states. The nupes for example might what to join the majority nupes in Niger state. The okuns in Kogi may want to join the predominantly yoruba Kwara south, etc. This will give folks like Saraki an opportunity to be in Kwara or be absorbed in other fulani communities. 

excanny:

I think this is one of the reasons why Kwara and some states in Nigeria are lagging behind in development on a daily basis. There's no way you can loop people who have different ideologies and political destiny together, and expect them to move as one. This is one area where the past military juntas did a very crazy job. Personally, i'm a advocate of boundary adjustment(it may not be a creation of new states), but there should be a kind of referendum in which people will be asked where they want to belong to, after which, they'll be group into their chosen states. The nupes for example might what to join the majority nupes in Niger state. The okuns in Kogi may want to join the predominantly yoruba Kwara south, etc. This will give folks like Saraki an opportunity to be in Kwara or be absorbed in other fulani communities.

DapoBear:

@Pukkah: Custom & politics in urban Africa: a study of Hausa migrants in Yoruba towns, page 30:
http://books.google.com/books?id=orO0DRiPvGMC&printsec=frontcover&dq=Custom+%26+politics+in+urban+Africa&hl=en&ei=LGj_TNS4IoGCsQPzu6GwCw&sa=X&oi=book_result&ct=result&resnum=1&ved=0CCsQ6AEwAA#v=onepage&q&f=false

Basically, some emancipated Hausa slaves were sort of caught culturally between Hausa and Yoruba. Claimed to be Hausa to the Hausa of Sabo (the Hausa district in Ibadan) and claim to be Yoruba to the Yoruba in Ibadan. Eventually gravitated towards the latter.

This reminded me of the Sarakis 

Anyway, it isn't really a big deal, Yoruba probably aren't some sort of racially pure group. My guess is that we are a mix of a lot of things. And will continue to mix over time. The culture is a lot more important than genetics, to me

Jarus:

Kwarans are 100% Northerners, stop exposing your ignorance.
Perhaps you need a lecture on difference between region and ethnicity. Region: North, South, East, West Ethnicity: Yoruba, Hausa, Ibo etc
What is today Kwara has always been classified as North since 1914. During the provincial era pre-independence, Ilorin province(now Kwara and Kogi) was undr Northern region. During the regional system, Kwara was part of Northern region. Till today, Kwara is still North. Or can you count the 19 Northern states for me?

You are obviously mistaking Hausa/Fulani with North. Whether a place is North or South is not a natural classification like ethnicity. A mistake, so to speak, was made in 1914 and Ilorin province was classified as North, and till today, it still is. Taking it to South will involve official proclamation and boundary adjustment.

Being a northerner doesn't mean you're Hausa/Fulani. You can be a Yoruba and a Northerner in as much as you come from a state classified as North. Kwara and Kogi are such. Late Chief Sunday Awoniyi, a Yoruba man from Kogi, was a dyed-in-the-wood Sardauna loyalist and later Chairman of Arewa Consultative forum. Can a non-Arewa person be the Chairman of Arewa Forum if he is not from Arewa?

I am from Kwara, a Yoruba, and officially a Northerner, because that is what my state has been classified as since 1914.
Kajiko?

alj harem:


yorubas think they are clever

they are the only group that has a state in 4 zones in nigeria to keep control of things

1 kwara northern state

2 kogi midle belt

3. a of edo because of cultural ties,,,,mid-west

4. ondo and rivers state because of itsekiri,,,,,,south state


when will u yorubas be trusted

when will u stop this impersonation

i tell u u can take your kwara and kogi and stop disuniting the north

alj harem:

jarus pls can i ask when u became a northerner

the northerners i know are kanuri, hausa, fulani, and other minority

when did the yorubas become northerners i ask

so opc in kwara did not know u are arewa before they start kill our brothers

yorubas think they are clever

they are the only group that has a state in 4 zones in nigeria to keep control of things

1 kwara northern state

2 kogi midle belt

3. a of edo because of cultural ties,,,,mid-west

4. ondo and rivers state because of itsekiri,,,,,,south state


when will u yorubas be trusted

when will u stop this impersonation

i tell u u can take your kwara and kogi and stop disuniting the north

in the core north like borno and sokoto we all know that yorubas are not true muslim and are not truth northerners

how can u be a northerner when u support opc in kwara and kogi how

or do u think we are stu-pid