₦airaland Forum

On the issue of who gave birth to the other, Yoruba or Bini. . . .individual accounts, no matter how convincing, is not enough to resolve the dispute. I encourage all Yoruba sons and daughters to please read up on the odus and let the oracle reveal through its own accounts the narrative on Bini. Let us also study the Ewis and the Orikis. Is Bini accounted for in our history and how?

Whatever answer you get, that is your truth! It doesn't have to be the truth for Bini or Ibo, . . .but it shall be the truth for Yorubaland and we can march forward with that truth.

. . . . representing herself OP, please give her my email address, neegronations@gmail.com.

In fact, you know what. . .dont worry, ill track her down myself. representing herself my as s!! Heading back to NY.

S.L. had an air of courage and confidence in both of those pics. Nice!

the second picture is symbolic. . . . Nigerian Jews should fear you once you begin sitting on the leopard skin too.

He is the Prime leader and authority of islam

bullshyyt. . . the Quran is my authority on Islam, not any human being.

Queen Elizabeth is Igbo

lmfao!! only light skinned people are Igbo. is queen light skinned?

DK, thisis how the dummies destroy their opportunity for Presidency. . . . always put theat fvcking horse behind the cart, never in front! Im sure they need ikwerre vote in future. . . but now they want to make enemy of them. 2015 come ikwerre vote Yoruba, then ibo start whining about ikwerre hate them. stupid pygmies.

bashr, mechionu!

Shut up!!

Wetin ikwerre do wey dey pain u so much that you want to exclude from the ndigbo clan? anyone wey disagree with you become your enemy. you no sabi agree to disagree? they say dem no be Igbo. . . .now u don hate them! but you want make dem vote for Igbo persin in 2015. mechionu~

People in 1950s Nigeria were not stressed because they had nothing.

 I thought you were talking about 1950 Lagos.  People in 1950 Lagos had ownership and jobs or trade or craft. . . .they had safety and nourishment. They received quality education.

For instance, you cannot be stressed by power outage when you've never set eyes on a light bulb, and lanterns are all you know.

I don't know where you lived before moving to Lagos. . . but the old ECN power plant in Ijora did not fail the Lagos population.  

Here's a quote - "The history of electricity in Nigeria dates back to 1896 when electricity was first produced in Lagos, fifteen years after its introduction in England."

Here's the source -  http://www.iaee.org/en/publications/newsletterdl.aspx?id=56

You cannot be stressed by traffic and go-slow when you've never boarded a vehicle, let alone owned one.

Almost every picture you saw of old Lagos had cars parked on the streets and some on the road.  There was not one picture that did not have a paved road. . . even if there was no car in picture, the road itself attest to the network of transportation.  There is a picture of Herbert Macauley rd in Yaba where they showed cabriolet cars that the aristocrats rode around in.  Beside cars. . . there were as well bicyclists.  There were sidewalks for pedestrians.  So the government did not abandon the people as they do nowadays.

You cannot be stressed by lecturers' strikes when there's no university in the country.

Lagos had Yaba College of Tech, founded 1947. It had University of Lagos 1962/

You cannot be stressed by  doctors strike when there are no hospitals, and your local babalawo does not go on strike

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Onikan health center; Island General hos[yl; Island Maternity hosptl; Massey strts health center.  

Rossik, you must be one of those people that came to Lagos and was enamored by the new awareness of landscape architecture and beauty and the appeal of urban  hippyness.

Give me a break~  The new structures and their beauty is okay and the pictures you have are adoring. . . . but to criticize the Old scenery as backward and a failure is outright insensitive of you.


. . . . and if you think what you see here in terms of aesthetic and well being is outstanding. . . wait to hear about Ibadan.   Were the whites all over Ibadan as well?  

stop acting like someone that has never seen opulence before. . . dont let the skyscrapers all get in your head.

Sorry, but those pictures of 1950s, 1960s Lagos are NOTHING - IN FACT CONSTITUTE DILAPIDATED RUBBISH - when compared to the Lagos of today BOTH in terms of beauty, and aesthetics, as well as development.

Rossik,

Aesthetics is the substance, whereas form is the physicality. Together they give balance and promote well being.  I want you to go through again and read the responses that you condemn as nonsense. . . . people were not just appreciating the buildings for what they meant but they also took in the tranquility, the serenity, the openess and touch with the nature of things.  No one is pressed for time or squeezed into limited space.  The outer complemented the inner being. . . . to give balance and well being!

The pictures you posted have a lot of form factor and appeal but the people that live in that space and that time are desolate and depressed and don't feel a sense of attunement with the beauty that sorround them.  

What you have done is like posting the picture of a muscular guy on steroid supplement and saying look, he is handsome and athletic he represents good health!

Negro disagrees!

Alhj, dont mind the pygmies. . . if they want privacy they should go converge in Bashr's home. This is public domain. . . . .they have no privacy where I prowl.

and for those ignorant people(igbos and non igbos) that keep saying we are descendants of jews F, U.CK you , my lineage in anambra is older than isreal so go fu, ck yourself

. . . nigga, you are light skinned people, you are industrious, you never had king beside ones you imitated, you looove money, you are short, you are distributed all over the world, everywhere you go you irritate people, your are targeted by the Islam North, your origin is Nri - a Jew. . . . what else can your a s s be other than Jew?  
You punk!

For Hercules to get a deeper understanding and appreciation for the Yoruba sacred manuscript. . . please read this book/journal.  I want to say I like your attitude and openess about the differences and Im glad you have opportunity to gain a new awareness and pride in the legacy of our fore fathers.  Yoruba is no joke. . . . look at how much is uncovered just discussing Kiriji alone.  There are plenty wars in our history and none is more fascinating than the internal ones because they reveal the galantry and fortitude and resolve of Yorubas to strategize and counter-strategize against their opponents in war.  One things is clear. . . .none of them ever underestimated the capabilities of the other side, not even the war hardened Ibadan and without doubt there is consistency in the way they responded and acted on the value of building coalition and alliances.

http://www.oyansoro.com/archives/Archives/Oyansoro/Marketkplace/OsogbeSoro/OsogbeSoro.PDF


Kilode, O se o jare.  

This picture is labeled incorrectly. This Church is in front of Lagos City Hall and on same street with King's College. It is situated midway between Odan and Campos.

I don't know how a different country/tribe establishes an emirate and imposes a king on another country/tribe and yet people of the latter say those people weren't conquered. Ilorin is apart of the Sokoto Caliphate. It is conquered yorubaland. The yoruba were conquered by the fulani. And Ilorin was not the only yoruba territory conquered. Accept it.

Historical list of wars fought by Ibo.

1. market women riot of Aba - 1929. Quelled by British.
2. Biafran cessesion - 1967 to 1970. Conquered by Nigeria.

Chyz, did I leave any out?

@Negro, I might have got the word civilization wrong, I am talking about learning from others, I am not aware our "technologies" were as advanced as those of the Arabs (17th to 19th century

I believe you did.  As far as learning from others. . . . thats is human nature!  Our existence is relative from one to the other. . . . there is continous interexchange of ideas and new awareness between the ruled and the ruler.  It is innate!  Civilization on the other hand has a political and dominion inference to it and it does not necessarily has to be technologically based. . . . you can create a new world order and become a super power via art.   Egypt was not as technologically advanced as Babylonia but yet the scholars of Babylon were trooping to Egypt to learn the secrets of nature and divinity.

We have always cohabitated with Fulani, but that does not mean they brought us any enlightenement that we did not already have.   In fact, at the height of scholarship in West Africa. . . .two cities were the seat of knowledge - Timbuktu in Mali and Ife in Nigeria, period!    

Timbuktu had Islamic scholarship and Ile-Ife had Ifa philosophical thought.  Ifa itself as a sacred manuscript of nature predated revelation of Holy Quran.

^did you check out the threads on yoruba art and architecture in culture section?

tpia, I am not sure he did. I think he should go familiarize with that first and then come back here and dobale and say Kabiyesi. . . . instead of Ran ka ya dade.

@Negro, you do know that the Arabs at that point in time were quite ahead of us, it follows that people who are exposed to the arabs early enough will be ahead of those who were still warring within themselves, I should say this relates to Oyo and the Ekiti people more, the Egbas, Ekos and Ijebus might have had early exposure to portuguese sha, I am not demeaning our tribe, we were organised, very organised, but, we learnt a lot from the fulanis, can not say its the same in reverse.

No, I did not know that.   I want to make sure that we have the same understanding by your inferrence of 'civilized", "enlightened", 'exposed". . . .and so on.

By civilization, I am looking for a culture that evolved from within itself to compete at or above parity level with its contemporaries in shaping and modeling a new world order and thus becoming pioneers of ideas and knowledge which chained the thoughts and evolution of other less societies.

Oyo did that successfully.  Fulani did that successfully.    Fulani in fact followed in the footsteps of Oyo.  Hausa, at its polytheistic age was superior to Fulani at its monotheistic age.  So to say that the Arab philosophy of monotheism was a heirarchical influence is wrong.  By the way, which Arabs are you referencing. . . the ancient Black ones or the modern age white ones?    Hausa had state kingdoms. . . . Fulani never in its history in West Africa established state kingdoms of that scale.  They merely stepped in what was existing when they toppled Hausa.   The Hausa 7 state structure itself was modeled after the Ife 7 state Empire. . .  .which spun off Oyo and Bini and by the glory of which, thank God, today we have a Yoruba commonwealth extending into Ghana.

Hercules, Id love to listen to your case. Share with us the reasons and the markers that put the Northern tribes ahead of Yoruba civilization and enlightenement.

Where is DK. . .are you going to vie for Are Ona Kakanfo or not? Don't let Akintola down. . . . it will be nice to have in history that two Ares came from same bloodline.

Lisabi was the Egba warrior who started the revolt against Oyo that would ultimately lead to fall of the Oyo empire. After the Egba fought for and won Independence, the others such as Ijebu, Ijaiye, etc did too.

. . . So how come no one ever heard about him in Lagos? He must have been one of those that fought with swords instead of acoustic booming canons as was the practice in Lagos. How do you think we kept ambitious Dahomey and England away for so long?

You dont have to respond now. . . .Kiriji is still the topic.

Did Negro just mentioned Kososko?
Have you ever heard about Liasbi Agbongboakala?
When we are discussing of Warriors, Don' t ever mentioned that name again. Even Iyalode Tinubu will wipe Kosoko 's azz if they have met.
That poo warrior

. . . who was this Lisabi Agbokonla? I mentioned a warrior that did what no other African coastal power had ever done or dared to do to the invading European - terrorized them and forced them into a compromise, rather than adopt their terms by default. You must have mistaken Kosoko for Akitoye and Dosumu. Repeated bombardment of Lagos by British only succeeded by an act of luck. . . and not by virtue of tactical or strategic superiority to Kosoko's defense of his domain. You cannot talk about him without mentioning his war general - Oshodi Tapa. First read about Oshodi then come for lesson on the commander himself.

Negro straps on his war armor

I understand the need for unity and all that Pan African, Pan Nigerian good stuff, it's a valid argument, but it's hard to force unity upon yourself in the face of untold hardship and pure exploitation. Yes, I too want Nigeria to remain united but when that unity is an impediment to Development, a tool for control and a yoke that is pulled and controlled by a minority group of overlords it's hard to see the need for it.

Unity in Nigeria was the song our Military controlled Government sang for several decades, it was their main tool of control, the excuse upon which many acts of inhumanity were based and explained away.

Yes. we cannot rule out conflict even in the most homogenous of societies, afterall brothers from monogamous homes do fight, but it becomes too big to swallow when that idea of unity is a tool of oppression in itself.

For example, Gowon, after the Biafran war declared no victor no vanquished, which was one the dumbest statements ever made by a Nigerian leader. The mentality that brought about that declaration from Gowon is the prevalent mentality in Nigerian leadership, I'll explain:

Gowon, through that statement, rolled into motion another 3 decades of Ostriching, his inability to deal with the main Nigerian questions. Which is "why are we together" what is the basis of our unity? What are the binding ideals of this nation? Led us to where we are today, of course Gowon did not create Nigeria, but he wasted a great opportunity by hiding the cause of that war under the idea of "no victor no vanquished"

I told that story because I see many defenders of unity doing the same. Unity is not a virtue if it's resultant effects are oppression, poverty and disillusionment, we cannot have unity in the absence of liberty, freedom and equality.

Those egalitarian principles are missing in this country. We've had several opportunities to correct and reset it, but we've constantly failed to take advantage of them. So I seriously sympathise with those who are calling for a foundational shake-up or even a break up, something that will radically force us to answer the questions demanded by our forced togetherness.

Until we answer those fundamental questions, this faux unity will remain a liability, a very good tool in the hands of those who seek to profit from our chaotic arrangement.

The lessons of the Kiriji wars are clear in this context, unity is possible, but it must not be based on fear and oppression. It must be in the spirit of shared values that are tempered with egalitarian principles. No idea is more important than our collective well being. Even unity.

I now step down from the soap box

. . . . Im searching for words to remark on this response and my tongue is locked, I cant find the voice. Kilode, may Oduduwa be with you, may Oranmiyan be with you, may Sango be with you. . . . may all the illuminated souls of Yoruba commonwealth who form an embodiment of Oduduwa be with you, Ase!

hercules,

I dont care if you talk about 5 and a half century. . . .fulani more enlightened than Yoruba?  Is that what you said  

Do you know what an Empire means. . . . particularly in an African context of pre colonialism?  No automobile, no aircraft, distances were covered on horseback and took days.  Oyo went as far as Asante Empire and Mali Empire. . . took offensive to depose their Kings and subdue them into paying tribute to Alaafin.  Yoruba alone spun off three Empires. . . Oyo, Ife and Bini.  Beside the Jihad which largely succeeded because of Hausa support against their Kings and the coup plot of Afinja in Ilorin. . . what other expedition did Fulani took or won in this country?   Compare that to the numerous times Oyo fought the fearsome Dahomey and its world renowned Amazons or obliterated the Nupes and then drove the Asante out and beyond the Volta.  

Dude. , .

The interior was more concerned about moving northwards than coast wards, we had been having contacts with the fulanis and other tribes northward than before the portugi, when I say civilization (maybe I should have used early modern civilization), we all know that the fulanis were more advanced than us because of their contact with the arabs who were more advanced than them, they brought some of those enlightenment to us, abi that one no be civilization, I do not mean it in a perjorative manner sha, of course after our contact with the "white man" modern civilization now came from the coasts.

Seun, . . . . dont ban this hercules, just fire him, period!

Lagos maintained its independence (under the continued protection of the British)

ahh!!  who said this?  

Have you heard about Kosoko?  Omo Oba to'n jagun bi eru . . .Ogb'ori olori kale l'orun gangan gan. . . .  the Machiavellian son of the soil that kicked British a s s to the point they expended all resources in their control towards pacifying and carving out his own Empire for him in Ereko if he would just stop invading and waging trouble against their principal interest.  The most fiercesome warrior ever produced in either of Yoruba or Bini domains.

Seun, ban Katsumoto for insulting Lagos.  In fact, I'll tell you what. . . penalize his pocket first, then ban him from future participation.  

No more talk about Lagos. . this is about Kiriji.    

Screening for what? What the fvck concern House of Assembly with Bianca? Gaddem!

I blame this shame on the protocol officers. If I was a protocol officer, her a s s will not be allowed into the building, I dont care what credentials she carries. You are not going to present yourself in front of the President looking like a fvcking ho on her way back from night duty. shyyt, git yo as s outta hia

On arrival in the hinterland of Yorubaland, whites documented their finding that Yorubas had the highest urbanized population in all of their encounters in Africa as a whole, paying attention particularly to Ibada, Ilorin and Ife.  They also documented the attraction of these cities to citizens of neighboring empires and the unmistakable beauty and stylish settings of these towns that they concluded their own arrival must have been preceeded by an earlier wave of European explorers and this development and beauty was the handwork of those brethrens.  In his interview with Sultan Bello to get a general view and knowledge about the Oyos, the Songhays, the Kanems, the Ashantis and the Nupes. . . . Livingstone published very detailed narratives of the beauty and glamour of Yoruba cities dictated by the Sultan.

So do not give too much credit to whites. . . we had the value and the aesthetic outlook even before their settlement in our midst.  Our problem is not misgovernment. . . our curse is the wholesale abandonment of our own indigenous philosophy in preference for foreign ideologies.

Anyway. . . back to topic now.    Look at the picture below, the Araromi house.  The person that took this photograph stood on the sidewalk right in front of Sir Louis Ojukwu's house (Ikemba's father) to get that angle of the Araromi house.  Ojukwu's house on Oshodi street was also one of the Brazilian architecture of the city and beautiful. I wish they had it.  If anyone has it please post.

I trust you! I saw some pictures online of old Marina back when Ports Authority yard was there and it was called quay side, and I cant locate it anymore. It was an album with picture of Broad street, taken right by Taiwo Olowo and Abibu Oki area. . . . then some old Saro homes by Kakawa and Odunlami. I will keep looking, those were very beautiful pictures. Hard to believe it would become what it is now.

I heard they had tram cars and rails along Marina but I thought they were limited just to the water front, the business district and on to Onikan. . . . it was a shock to see picture of tram lines on Balogun street that far back in history of public infrastructure in Lagos. But I think I know why they would have them on Balogun, it had to do with history of Ereko and the colonials interest by all means possible to pacify and situate the Machavellian Kosoko by carving his own Empire for him, away from Idungaran.

Glover Hall in this picture was the original one that was destroyed in fire. The Araromi house is on the corner of Oshodi street and Tokunboh street. From that angle, the person that took that picture is standing on the sidewalk in front of Sir Louis Ojukwu's house (Ikemba's father). I used to go to the chemist next door when I was little to buy cod liver oil. Now Im online terrorizing the followers of his dumb son. Isnt that strange?

i keep saying lets embrace unity between igbo and yoruba.

. . . .for what

.

.