Time for Yoruba Constitutional Convention


Knowing full well that the Restructuring of the Nigerian Post-Colonial State cannot be achieved without fundamental changes to its fraudulent Constitutional order, the Yoruba Nation, in the Year 2002, convened the Yoruba Constituent Assembly, under the chairmanship of retired Bishop E. Bolanle Gbonigi where the Draft Yoruba Constitution was adopted; its Articles having been earlier produced by the Yoruba Constitution Group, coordinated by the coalition known as Alajobi.

The correctness and validity of this Constituent Assembly now underscored by the various conferences and reviews carried out by the Nigerian Post-Colonial State with nothing to show for them.

It is written:

This is the ‘stone, which was rejected by you builders, which has become the chief cornerstone.’ Acts 4:11

Referencing Jesus Christ, as the stone, recorded in Luke 4:18:

“The Spirit of the LORD is upon Me, Because He has anointed Me To preach the gospel to the poor; He has sent Me to heal the brokenhearted, To proclaim liberty to the captives And recovery of sight to the blind, To set at liberty those who are oppressed; To proclaim the acceptable year of the LORD.”

By which we know that neutralizing, denying or homogenizing the Multi-National, Multi-Cultural geo-political economy of Nigeria in the formulation of her State Architecture is retaining the Nations in colonial captivity; continuous suppression and broken-heartedness; the current realities in Nigeria.

And not acceptable to the Lord.

That none of the merry-go-round of Constitutional Reviews and Conferences addressed the fundamental issues of the various Peoples and Nations of Nigeria confirms the initiative of the Yoruba Constitution Group, and subsequently the Draft Yoruba Constitution.

This is the stone rejected by the builders of Unitarianism and uniformity; the centralizers of the Nigerian Post-Colonial State anchored on Northern hegemony, reinforced by its military and legitimized by a fraudulent Constitution which its 1999 version brazenly and falsely declared itself as a product of “We, The People”; even when none of those who swore to administer the Nigerian Post-Colonial State saw the document before swearing by it.

The Peoples of Nigeria had no input in the conception of the Grundnorm; their existentialism played no part in the formulation; their humanity defined by the exigencies of their oppression.

The representations of the Peoples at those reviews were at the behest of those in control of central power.

By which we know, that the Central bureaucracy, rather than enhance the humanity of the Peoples, deny it by various permutations and policies that subject the Peoples to lower standards of human existence; the greatest manifestation of which is found in the “brain drain” celebrated as an achievement by the Post-Colonial State.

Whereas a Nation can exist without a State as it currently is with the many Nations in Nigeria, a State cannot exist without the Nation or Nations, the reason for the perennial attempts by one Nation to dominate the other, usually through attempted imposition of uniformity, as being practiced in Nigeria; now referred to as “Fulanization”.

Whereas colonial powers imposed a form of State which is only beneficial to their expectations and anchored on their own histories which the colonized are expected to consummate.

Ignoring God’s definition of us and embracing the human, colonial definition; the Peoples and Nations became identified with and as shrimps (Cameroon); of sketches of European clothing (Gabon); of rivers, (Nigeria) a fusion of the territories bordering on parts of the Niger and Benue rivers.

By which we experience the deliberate destruction of the territorial extent of the Nations inhabiting the geo-political space thus shortchanging them in the existential prerogatives.

It is written:

“What is man that You are mindful of him, And the son of man that You visit him? For You have made him a little lower than the angels, And You have crowned him with glory and honor. You have made him to have dominion over the works of Your hands; You have put all things under his feet, All sheep and oxen—Even the beasts of the field, The birds of the air, And the fish of the sea, That pass through the paths of the seas.” Psalm 8:4-8

By which we know that continuous existence under the colonial-inspired paradigm is a denial of God, despite public exhibition of fidelity to God by officials of the Post-Colonial State.

The first condition for Redemption: a recognition of our Indigenous Identities, of our individual Nations, territorially and politically, created by God.

This cannot be abridged, as the National Assembly is attempting to do, by making our Identity subject to residency.

One is not Yoruba simply because of residence in Yorubaland for several years; neither can one be Igbo for similarly residing in Igboland.

These are identities beyond residence; anchored on historical, cultural and existential experiences, culminating in identification as such.

Indigeneship therefore, is not a question of residency; for an indigene of any society can reside outside that society; and this will not be a repudiation of the indigenship.

To advocate otherwise, as the National Assembly is trying to do, is to launch a direct assault on the Peoples and Nations within the Post-Colonial State, especially the Yoruba, whose existentialism accommodated non-Yoruba as a matter of course.

To bring into memory: The Free education policy of the Western Region neither prevented nor excluded non-Yoruba from outside the Region benefiting from the policy. There was no attempt at separating the Yoruba from the rest.

Military adventurism, the formal attempt at forcefully reinforcing Northern Hegemony through Centralization of all the resources of the country.

A reflection of the nature of the military whose colonially imposed mission is the neutralization of the Nations, making orphans of the Nations.

Itself an orphan, for it is not a creation of, or for the Nations or the Peoples; but a utility vehicle which ran aground once its owners got out of the way.

By which we know that making an issue out of Indigeneship by the National Assembly is another attempt at formalizing uniformity as the foundation of the Post-Colonial State.

Therefore, when the Church prays for unity in and of Nigeria, it is without recognition of the Nations as integral to any definition of Nigeria.

Martin Luther King once said, in reference to the silence of the Church of England on the quest for Ghana’s Independence: “God comes in the picture even when the Church won’t take a stand.”

For, it is written:

“I hate, I despise your feast days, And I do not savor your sacred assemblies. Though you offer Me burnt offerings and your grain offerings, I will not accept them, Nor will I regard your fattened peace offerings. Take away from Me the noise of your songs, For I will not hear the melody of your stringed instruments. But let justice run down like water, And righteousness like a mighty stream.” ----Amos 5:21

Justice and righteousness start from the recognition of the Nations as Nations in and for themselves, created by God, which the Church is yet to come to terms with. Yoruba Christians, take note.

The Yoruba response to this initiative by the National Assembly must be anchored on a Yoruba Constitution fashioned out of the Yoruba Constitutional Convention, confirmed by the Yoruba Referendum, becoming the only Legitimate and valid answer to the Nigerian Post-Colonial State conundrum.

Therefore, all the Yoruba Leaders who are now clamoring for restructuring, must convene the Yoruba Constitutional Convention as the litmus test of their leadership; regardless of whatever positions they might have held in the past or in the present within the architecture of the Nigerian Post-Colonial State.

Otherwise, not only their voices but also their Nation will be silenced by the rampaging forces of uniformity.

By which such a leadership would have failed God.

That which I have heard from the Lord of hosts, the God of Israel, I have declared to you.

Wale Odeku