₦airaland Forum

TODAY, my answer is that we Yoruba have let Nigeria disrupt and destroy our orderly and sophisticated political culture. In particular, we have let Nigeria drag us down into an election culture that is destructive and shameful.

The world judges the performance of a person or a people on the basis of their capability – the Bible says, “To whom much is given, from him much is expected”. In the matter of political order, our Yoruba ancestorsgave us a very beautiful heritage – one of the best in the world. True, our ancestors did not give us the kind of science and technology that the ancestors of the European peoples gave to their descendants, the kind of science and technology that has made European peoples the leaders of the world today. But in many other aspects of civilization, they gave us a great and proud heritage – and one of those aspects is our political culture.
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The world has a right to expect that, in a country like Nigeria, we Yoruba would be a major guiding force in the direction of political order and success. Sadly, we have not only failed to do that, we have allowed ourselves to be dragged from our mountain tops into the depths of the mud. Nigeria dragged us down into the mud, and we have chosen to stay and revel in the mud! Someday, a generation of our descendants will wake up, realize and reject what we have done, and revive the decency of our political heritage. I fear that they will find it extremely difficult to forgive us of this generation at that time.

Here are the basic details of our proud political heritage. Like most peoples in the world, our ancestors chose a political system led by kings. But then they took that system and gave it one of the most refined structures in the world. In virtually all other king-led (or monarchical) systems in the world, when the king died he was simply succeeded by his biological son (commonly his oldest son). The people of the kingdom had no voice in the matter. If it happened that another son of the same father also wanted the throne, then he and his supporters could only start a civil war to kill his brother and grab the throne.

Our ancestors chose a succession system that was much more reasonable, much more orderly, and much more peaceful. They decided that all members of the royal family (living sons and even grandsons of all former kings) were entitled to be king, and that the people themselves must select the one to become king. They then set up a system whereby a standing committee of the high chiefs carried out the selection on behalf of the people. Note that the chiefs were the representatives and spokesmen of the various segments of the community – the large extended families, the quarters, and the neighbourhoods. Note also that the chiefs were not automatically succeeded by their biological sons. Each chieftaincy title was domiciled in one extended family compound; when the chief died, the people of the compound held meetings and selected one among them for the title. In addition, every individual citizen or societal organization was entitled to go the chiefs who were doing the selection of the king and lobby them in support of, or against, any of the princes. In effect, the selection was made by the people. Once made, the selection was final, and the king-elect was immediately started on the installation rituals.

This whole system provided copiously for the people’s participation, and was based on respect for the sovereignty of the people. It provided for very prominent positions for women in the leadership ranks. It ensured that the people honoured their kings and chiefs, and the kings and chiefs respected their people. Various organizations of common people – like age-grade associations, market women’s association, various associations of priests, hunters, etc – were also regularly consulted and involved by the chiefs and rulers.

Moreover, from the early eras of the system, our ancestors further reinforced its orderliness and decency by creating special laws that guided the conduct of rulers, chiefs and prominent citizens; and they set up an exalted institution which had the power to penalize any influential citizen who was adjudged to have abused his powers or to have oppressed any commoner – an institution better structured, more powerful, and more effective, than the institution of Ombudsman which some northern European peoples had.

All in all, for about one-thousand years before the British came and disrespectfully pushed most of our nation into a country called Nigeria, ours was one of the most civilized and proudly orderly systems of government in the world. Under such a system, we Yoruba people became a politically confident people, lovers of freedom, of human rights, of orderly government, and of responsible leadership. We did not have the European ballot-box kind of elections; but our selection of our public officials wasvery orderly and very productive of peaceful political life.

That is the indigenous part of our political heritage. But there is a recent part also, based on the imported European system. When the British set up the system of electoral politics in Nigeria in the 1950s, our leaders immediately made our Western Region the place with the best elections, the best democratic system, in Nigeria. From some other parts of Nigeria, there were, from day one, complaints about election malpractices – such as interference with opposition candidates, manipulation of votes, etc. In our Western Region, our leaders respected our votes, and gave us the most solid and most productive government in Africa. They gave us a modern heritage worthy of our pride, worthy to be cherished and preserved.

We have, altogether then, good reasons why our inter-party and elective politics should be one of the most orderly in the world today. Instead, we have sunk into the truculently crooked, disruptive and destructive electoral politics for which Nigeria has become a byword in the world. Nigeria’s descent into this political morass began at independence. It was generated by the corrupt presumption of those who controlled Nigeria’sfederal government at independence that it was their privilege to determine who would win elections in all parts of Nigeria, and who would control all corners and resources of Nigeria. The military regimes came and legitimized that disastrous assumption, and that is what is wrecking Nigeria today.

For a start, we Yoruba put up a strong resistance – stronger resistance than any other region or people of Nigeria, at least until the 1983 elections. But, steadily since then, we have succumbed. Most of the fault belongs to those politicians among us who happen to belong to parties ruling in the federal centre, who want to benefit from the federal rigging of elections, and who therefore deliberately suppress their cultural and moral sensitivities in the matter of elections. But others have also moved in to share in the rut – especially by rigging party nominations in their parties. We have now sunk so low that it is difficult to see how we can extricate ourselves as a nation from this mess. As long as we remain in Nigeria, the future looks bleak – for our political life and for our development.


www.tribune.com.ng/columns/backpage/diran-apata-s-sunday-message/item/21038-yoruba-nation-what-we-are-doing-wrong-x

Summary pls, that is damn too long, no time for ....

How on earth am I supposed to read all of that?

Fully appreciate the write up.

#crap

superstar1:
Fully appreciate the write up.

Seconded. I pray Nigeria restructure to regional government or disintegrates for us to form a nation. Yorubas are sinking into the abyss...very rapidly

Nice write up

The only region where tribe or religion can never be used as campaign strategy. Where true democracy is taught.
God bless my Yoruba people.

Either regionalization or outright independence will favor the Yoruba. Such country must be prepared however to include some minority groups as the Itsekiri from Delta, Ebira and Igala from Kogi, Tapa(Nupe) and Bariba from Kwara,the Edos and may be even the Urhobo.
The Yoruba country will be a good place, a multireligious society with booming Pentecostal Christianity,moderate Islam, innovating traditional religious groups and loads if free thinkers! It will be an epitome of parliamentary democracy with semi autonomous regions in which the right of minorities are guaranteed.
it will have a population in excess of 60million, vast agricultural land, existing commerce infrastructures in Lagos and a handshake across the Niger River to make its ports world class.
it won't enjoy a total break from the past as millions of Igbo will reside there from the tip of Anambra in the Igalaland to Lagos, many of Igbos will call the nation home.
The country will face its challenges, the problem of Warri, boundary demarcation with the Igbo in Anambra, possible migration from the North and handling the migrant ijo that have made Ondo state home since 1950s.
The country will be a commonwealth of Yoruba-Benin-Igala history and will have half castes of zYoruba-Fulani in Ilorin and many Yoruba-Igbo families.
The challenge with France will also be there because of the Yoruba spread across its western frontier into Benin and Togo, there could be an ambition to wan a confederacy that will include the fairly prosperous regions of these countries, bringing them into Anglophone region won't go well with Paris but that will take a long while.
Economically,Lagos will be the center of commerce, industries in Ogun will remain ,oil and gas in Ondo and across its coast will come to the fore and its commonwealth will also include the energetic farmers from kogi, the rich culture of Benin, and the business acumen of the Ijebu.
There the heritage so talked can be kept and the culture of impunity so pervasive can be annihilated.

Yorober people of south west nigeria, a lizard that calls itself a crocodile

IF YOROBERS WERE NOT THESE PEOPLE THAT I LIVE WITH HERE IN LAGOS, I WILL THINK THAT ANOTHER VERSION EXISTS IN THE OUTTER SPACE.
I KNOW EVERY DANM THING ABOUT THE YOROBBERS, HAVING STAYED 13 YEARS AND HAVING BEEN TO ALMOST ALL THEIR TOWNS AND CITIES, I KNOW Yoruba MORE THAN MANY YOROBBERS.

will an ijebu man trust an ibadan man?will ondo state agree to share oil money with osun,ekiti?how about kwara state...

mandarin:
Either regionalization or outright independence will favor the Yoruba. Such country must be prepared however to include some minority groups as the Itsekiri from Delta, Ebira and Igala from Kogi, Tapa(Nupe) and Bariba from Kwara,the Edos and may be even the Urhobo.
The Yoruba country will be a good place, a multireligious society with booming Pentecostal Christianity,moderate Islam, innovating traditional religious groups and loads if free thinkers! It will be an epitome of parliamentary democracy with semi autonomous regions in which the right of minorities are guaranteed.
it will have a population in excess of 60million, vast agricultural land, existing commerce infrastructures in Lagos and a handshake across the Niger River to make its ports world class.
it won't enjoy a total break from the past as millions of Igbo will reside there from the tip of Anambra in the Igalaland to Lagos, many of Igbos will call the nation home.
The country will face its challenges, the problem of Warri, boundary demarcation with the Igbo in Anambra, possible migration from the North and handling the migrant ijo that have made Ondo state home since 1950s.
The country will be a commonwealth of Yoruba-Benin-Igala history and will have half castes of zYoruba-Fulani in Ilorin and many Yoruba-Igbo families.
The challenge with France will also be there because of the Yoruba spread across its western frontier into Benin and Togo, there could be an ambition to wan a confederacy that will include the fairly prosperous regions of these countries, bringing them into Anglophone region won't go well with Paris but that will take a long while.
Economically,Lagos will be the center of commerce, industries in Ogun will remain ,oil and gas in Ondo and across its coast will come to the fore and its commonwealth will also include the energetic farmers from kogi, the rich culture of Benin, and the business acumen of the Ijebu.
There the heritage so talked can be kept and the culture of impunity so pervasive can be annihilated.

awon eleyin ni opolo. Very intelligent write up.

OP

You just have to keep it in mind there is no Nigeria and one Nigeria don't exist.

Once you accept that, the rest is easy.