₦airaland Forum

ReubenE:
Good write up, no doubt. However, the psychological background of the piece is part of the problem. I expected the writer to rue the actions of those young Nigerian soldiers that ceased power in 1966 without playing the ethnic card. From what I know, the coup plotters were from more than one ethnic group. Because it suits the regular narrative, it is no longer Nigerian soldiers, but Igbo soldiers. This is one among the many reasons why there is so much hate in the country.

Is Major. Nzeogwu the reason why the Nigerian government has failed to do anything right since 1970, even the rudiments of administration? Is the coup responsible for the massive stealing that the country has witnessed in the past? Is the coup responsible for the so many deaths we have recorded in the nation? From political motivated, to the ones with ritual and religious undertone? My brother, Nigeria was bound to fail from the day she was created.

The Kano riot of 1956, the election crisis of 1964, census crisis and several others had the potentials to lead us to where we are today. Neither the Igbo nor the Yoruba is solely responsible for our political cum economic desertification, but our collective refusal to agree that Nigeria is not a nation but a mere territorial space where each ethnic group try to grab as much as they can from its belly.

As long as we continue to pretend that Nigeria will get better, the more pernicious and complex our problems would become.
The big question is whether there is hope for this country; frankly it does not look likely because the minorities killed Nigeria in their minds the day the WAZOBIA nonsense was propagated, and it will remained buried until when we stop the pretence.


Nonetheless, I support the writer's call for self determination because Nigeria has proven herself to be an expired product.

SIRTee15:
Ogbeni, I don't have ur time... This no need to throw banter with u... If u are not proud of your lineage, where ever that is.... Then u are not worth it.... And don't even bother quoting me.... Cos I don't deem u a reply....

oooduancalmdown:
I support self determination.

Cofactor:
I don't see any ethnic card here, all I see was an account of a coup which involves five Nigerian soldiers(four from the Igbo stock and one from the Yorùbá stock). The victims of the coup were mainly Hausa/Fulani and Yorùbá.

Third and fourth paragraph nailed it well. There is no hope for a Nigeria with unitary system. It is either regional autonomy or self determination.

zendy:
So Yorubas are now considering self determination? These were people who constantly attacked Nnamdi Kanu for his expression of self determination.

Now the same Yorubas now think it is a viable option if Nigeria is not restructured? Who is fooling who? Yorubas dont have what it takes to agitate for either restructuring or self determination. The best that Yorubas will do is just make mere pronouncement which will end up as mere words. Their agitation never goes beyond words.

Those who should talking about restructuring or self determination are those who have gone beyond talking to actually agitating, people in the SS/SE area

Cofactor:
I don't see any ethnic card here, all I see was an account of a coup which involves five Nigerian soldiers(four from the Igbo stock and one from the Yorùbá stock). The victims of the coup were mainly Hausa/Fulani and Yorùbá.

Third and fourth paragraph nailed it well. There is no hope for a Nigeria with unitary system. It is either regional autonomy or self determination.

zendy:
So Yorubas are now considering self determination? These were people who constantly attacked Nnamdi Kanu for his expression of self determination.

Now the same Yorubas now think it is a viable option if Nigeria is not restructured? Who is fooling who? Yorubas dont have what it takes to agitate for either restructuring or self determination. The best that Yorubas will do is just make mere pronouncement which will end up as mere words. Their agitation never goes beyond words.

Those who should talking about restructuring or self determination are those who have gone beyond talking to actually agitating, people in the SS/SE area

SIRTee15:
Now another big issue bothering on restructuring amongst yorubas, is whether we can survive without nigeria vis a viz naija delta oil.....
Now let's get something clear, all regions in nigeria can survive independent of each other....
Every region is endowed with both natural n human resources required to build a nation.....
If only we can turn away from Abuja n look inward.....
Every region is indeed blessed....
We should not because of oil insist on this acrimonious union......
It's glaring to even the blind that it's not working......
Thus no gainsaying that Yoruba can survive alone and progress at her own pace towards a prosperous n viable socioeconomic pathway......

I understand that the misgovernance of our present leaders has sowed the seed of doubt among our youth.....
But we need to get something clear, the future n prospect of the yoruba nation is bigger than some bunch of clueless n self-serving leaders.....

Yoruba fear of the unknown can be best described as the Stockholm syndrome.....
We know we are trapped but we feel it's better to survive in this captivity than take our chances n chart a new and independent course.....
That's so wrong on so many levels n this mindset must be crushed.....
We must liberalize our minds in order to know who we are n what we are capable of achieving as a nation.....

Yoruba best days was during the regional era of the 50s.....
We achieved a lot of firsts n an unpredecented prosperity......
Those legacies are still very much visible today......
Not because awolowo n co were genius or saints....
No....
Rather they undertook radical initiatives n bold steps that were beyond the scope of their time.....
They were men of Vision n mission.....
We've all heard about the universal free education embarked upon by Awo....
What we didn't know was as at the time the initiative commenced, there was no money in the vault n the region couldn't afford such project......
No adequate schools to accommodate the huge number of pupils to be enrolled....
there weren't enough teachers....
No adequate uniforms n pupils had to share notebooks in class.....
Some felt it will bankrupt the region.....
Despite all these seemingly insurmountable problems, the program kicked off and eventually became a phenomenal success......
Also in that era, when the western world wanted us to focus on agriculture.......
Awo practically industrialize the whole of ikeja to ilupeju, building numerous Industrial estates......
This remarkable initiative was replicated in so many yoruba towns, such that there no major town in the region that doesn't have its own industrial estate.....
When the issue of power tussle along ethnic line reared its ugly head in UI n unilag, Awo simply built a world class university in ife......
As at its completion, it was regarded as the most beautiful campus in Africa......
We achieved all these without any oil money but from resources within our region......
Now what have we achieved with oil money.......
Nothing much, I'm afraid....
Then, don't u think it makes sense we go back to a formula that worked for us than stick to an unworkable formula....
I keep saying it, SW was the worst hit with this present unitary govt.....
It sets us back, stagnated our development n allowed other regions to catch up.....
When we look at things holistically, we've lost more than we received from this unitary system, it is a net loss for SW.....
And I think it's time to demand for that which worked for us......

I'll come back n talk about the youths n osinbajo factor.....

Cofactor:
REGIONAL AUTONOMY OR SELF DETERMINATION: A WAY FORWARD FOR THE YORÙBÁ

The tragedy of Nigeria is that in spite of an history that has lasted more than a century of amalgamation, it is still strongly divided along the major ethnic lines, while religion still plays an important role in its politics. This is so because Nigeria is not a product of natural evolution but the imagination of some people outside the African continent. Sadly, this imagination has forced Nigeria into a spiral along the cyclone of backwardness, underdevelopment and State failure due to the country failure to adopt one of the finest laws of nature which ensured that the cells of liver can only form the organ called liver and that of the kidney can only form the kidney to prevent cellular chaos.

At best, these organs along with other cellular organizations can now come together to form sustainable systems and ultimately an organism. This process is called organization; a process that once define Nigeria's political and economic structure before the destructive coup d'etat that struck the country twice in 1966. Today's Nigeria is a country that can be likened to a scenario of amalgamated Japan, Korea and China with French as their lingua franca. As a country, these three distinct nations will never take a step forward, they will continue to be at loggerheads and will continue to look for an escape out of such unholy union.

It is an amalgamation that is cancerous in nature and essence, for the cells of kidney has been inoculated with that of liver which will continually be at war with one another until they die out; leaving no room for cooperation, survival, growth and productivity. This is a consequence of the failure of these different cells to agree, to cooperate and to survive, and it is when they are able to survive, that they will grow and ultimately produce. Thus, cooperation, survival, growth and productivity will cease to exist in any society that has failed to organize itself based on this natural law. Hence, there is almost a zero possibility that the Yorùbá nation, Igbo nation and Hausa/Fulani nation can be eternally forced together with a language that was never theirs.

This is so because we are a people of different culture, tradition and language with the Yorùbá having over a thousand years of history which makes it a union that is bound to fail. It is to prevent this failure that the British government; our colonial master, gifted to us the regional government which birthed the post colonial golden era of the Yorùbá before some Igbo military officers destroyed this good political and economic structure through military coup. The latter then allowed the Hausa/Fulani this unacceptable domination through a counter military coup that put an end to the ruling of the first military coup plotters. However, we can not allow these dark events that has shaped our post-1966 till date to continue to do so for the sake of our collective peace, uunity, prosperity and security.

Thus, we must restructure this country in accordance to the 1960 arrangement and if we fail at this sacred duty, one nation or the other will be forced into divorce from this unholy union. It is either regional autonomy with territory based on 1958 recognition or the invoking of rights to self determination as guaranteed by the United Nations(UN) chatter by the Yorùbá. It is not sustainable to be generating revenue in Yorùbáland to fund the lives of the Hausa/Fulani or the extravagance of our political elite; most of them being Hausa/Fulani. Gone are the days we work hard only for the fruits of our labour to be shipped to London, and we must not allow the Northern part of this country to continue to replace that London.

I know it will not be easy because the Hausa/Fulani have total control of the Nigerian State either directly or through proxies but we must rise to the occasion and save the future of our children from the domination of Hausa/Fulani; a people not as sophisticated as the Yorùbá. The Yorùbá youth get educated to acquire skills so as to be qualified to work in relevant capacity yet that capacity is not created, and when it exists only the privileged enjoy such opportunity. While the cost of education remain on the rise with little or no use at all for the certificate that will be acquired in the end.

Majority of us do not know what prosperity is anymore and only see it in the lives of those that are either thieves or corrupt public servants and this comes with great consequences that endanger our values and development as a people. The society does not value earning with dignity anymore, integrity is abandoned and vices are what that are now dignified by our people because the Yorùbá leadership has failed to provide direction that will ensure the needed continuous growth of ability and capacity to drive development, provide jobs, ensure security and prosperity of our people.

Unlike many of us that will want to believe that there is nothing we can do to change the tides of things except we wait on God, I say to you; the future of man rest in his hands and God will not come down to remove corruption from our minds nor will God come down to save us from bad leadership and the apathy we show towards governance. God will only make use of men that are ready and willing to save the day and it is up to us whose culture, traditions and regional development are being threatened and undermined by a Hausa/Fulani dominated Nigeria to rise up to this righteous work. We must do this for ourselves; we must do this for our children and ultimately, we must do this for a prosperous, peaceful and secured Yorùbáland.

Abiola Akintunde is a political commentator based in Ìbàdàn, Nigeria. He tweets at @AAbiolat on twitter and can be reached via paulakintunde@gmail.com

Visit www.abiolaoakintunde. to read other posts by Abiola Akintunde.

knowledgeable:
[url][/url]

"Rubbish", Igbos perished in their numbers, aided by your kind, for wanting to point out to your kind, middle belt people and the rest that the war was levied against them for being Igbo and Christians....only to fell on deaf ears.

The best regional restructured government could have come out of Aburi, but the Tiv man reneged. Every body were shouting one Nigeria or nothing. Just look at Nigerians and Nigeria after 50 years of war. Igbos believe in one Nigeria 2× more than any other major group in Nigeria because of their deep penetrating engaging with other Nigerian cultures through commerce, travelling etc. They are more interested in the nuts and bolts of one Nigeria all these non thinking groups have being shouting of.

Greenback:
chaataap yur mouth there..if someone mentioned the word Afonja now,u will be shouting like a .....

Op made mention of more than a decade long event buh you yorubas keep repeating historic blunders and mistakes even in the 21st century. Biafra in the 60s and ipob now were an attempt to right wrongs and a grand opportunity for us southerners to see the bigger picture for us to address fundamental issues buh the same yoruba beat the loudest drum against them...

Op,you surely should've known and highlighted that.


chaataap yur mouth there..if someone mentioned the word Afonja now,u will be shouting like a .....

Op made mention of more than a decade long event buh you yorubas keep repeating historic blunders and mistakes even in the 21st century. Biafra in the 60s and ipob now were an attempt to right wrongs and a grand opportunity for us southerners to see the bigger picture for us to address fundamental issues buh the same yoruba beat the loudest drum against them...

Op,you surely should've known and highlighted that.

bonechamberlain:
am surprise u guys are talking about regional autonomy or self determination.

one thing I know is that no matter how the north view the east, they would always respect the east. the reasons are obvious, when the east is for you they are for you, when they are against you they are against you, when they stand on an issue they stand firmly no fence sitting and speaking from both sides. that's why any alignment between the north and east, the east gets it easily and gets a fair deal, even Doyin Okukpe attested to this.

no one would take the west serious until they are ready to stand firmly on issues. and not criticising one issue today because it wasn't initiated by them and supporting the same issue they criticised when things don't favour them. just like this issue of self determination u are talking about.

jhubril:
When you fail to see things as they are ,you are either shallow or dumb. Your lies are made useless by a political history of betrayal and cowardice known to us. .

konoplyanka:
You guys just come on social media to to spew bile and silly innuendos.

Tell me when the west has had an agreement with anybody and reneged.

One thing I'm sure of Yoruba is we are progressive and see things rationally. We don't see things from a jaundiced perspective and we are independent in thought- no herd mentality.

We can agree with you and disagree with you when the parameters change and that's the hallmark of a civilized people and we are unapologetic if you guys are too slow to understand the dynamic of civilization.

We showed our resolve when we said no to military regime and our unconditional demand for the thwarted mandate of Abiola. If you guys think anyone could take you serious on anything in Nigeria then show me the battle you have won in Nigeria.

And to those ignoramuses saying the north will never accept restructuring- I say keep your generational inferiority complex to yourselves. Restructuring will be achieved very soon. Nigeria is not restructured due to the lack of political will of our politicians and not your imaginary "powerful north".

konoplyanka:
You guys just come on social media to to spew bile and silly innuendos.

Tell me when the west has had an agreement with anybody and reneged.

One thing I'm sure of Yoruba is we are progressive and see things rationally. We don't see things from a jaundiced perspective and we are independent in thought- no herd mentality.

We can agree with you and disagree with you when the parameters change and that's the hallmark of a civilized people and we are unapologetic if you guys are too slow to understand the dynamic of civilization.

We showed our resolve when we said no to military regime and our unconditional demand for the thwarted mandate of Abiola. If you guys think anyone could take you serious on anything in Nigeria then show me the battle you have won in Nigeria.

And to those ignoramuses saying the north will never accept restructuring- I say keep your generational inferiority complex to yourselves. Restructuring will be achieved very soon. Nigeria is not restructured due to the lack of political will of our politicians and not your imaginary "powerful north".

bonechamberlain:
who is talking about agreement. independent in thought, no herd mentality, u don't even know urself, I don't have time to right epistles. like I have said even okupe ur tribesman has attested to my point.

konoplyanka:
which betrayal and cowardice are you talking about?

can you give historical examples if you are not just a shallow tribalist?

jhubril:
I don't waste my precious time talking to stupid people .

knowledgeable:
[url][/url]

"Rubbish", Igbos perished in their numbers, aided by your kind, for wanting to point out to your kind, middle belt people and the rest that the war was levied against them for being Igbo and Christians....only to fell on deaf ears.

The best regional restructured government could have come out of Aburi, but the Tiv man reneged. Every body were shouting one Nigeria or nothing. Just look at Nigerians and Nigeria after 50 years of war. Igbos believe in one Nigeria 2× more than any other major group in Nigeria because of their deep penetrating engaging with other Nigerian cultures through commerce, travelling etc. They are more interested in the nuts and bolts of one Nigeria all these non thinking groups have being shouting of.

konoplyanka:
Oh really? So you just make baseless tribal slurs on social media forum and when called upon to justify your claim you look for the most shallow escape routes?

Stupidity must be a pastime in your lineage.

jhubril:
.

You're not even intelligent enough to punctuate your balderdash . And as for your last statement,I get you're forcibly trying to make a derogatory point but that was a woeful attempt.

tellmemore15:
I commend the OP for such a brilliant write up, i love the truth and people who speak it.

Yoruba's to be sincere are one of the problems of this country, thank God they've woken up to their senses but not as we expected.

it's time for southern Nigeria and all communities under threat to come together and face the North once and for all, Northerners are cowards. that's who they are cowards !! and they need to be put in their place finally.

You people should talk to OBJ ooh I dont know what he's seeing in this one Nigeria.

konoplyanka:
You guys just come on social media to to spew bile and silly innuendos.

Tell me when the west has had an agreement with anybody and reneged.

One thing I'm sure of Yoruba is we are progressive and see things rationally. We don't see things from a jaundiced perspective and we are independent in thought- no herd mentality.

We can agree with you and disagree with you when the parameters change and that's the hallmark of a civilized people and we are unapologetic if you guys are too slow to understand the dynamic of civilization.

We showed our resolve when we said no to military regime and our unconditional demand for the thwarted mandate of Abiola. If you guys think anyone could take you serious on anything in Nigeria then show me the battle you have won in Nigeria.

And to those ignoramuses saying the north will never accept restructuring- I say keep your generational inferiority complex to yourselves. Restructuring will be achieved very soon. Nigeria is not restructured due to the lack of political will of our politicians and not your imaginary "powerful north".

shervydman:
The north wants cattle colony and d south doesn't......cattle colony was dropped at d end of the day. That means the north is not the sole dictator of Nigeria.

Cofactor:
This is what I've been telling those who care to listen. Nigeria is yet to be restructured because Yorùbá political elites lacks the willingness to achieve it. They are more concerned with the loot they benefit from this present unitary system. Nigeria not being restructured is not because the North is powerful in the face of Yorùbá opposition but because Yorùbá is on the onlooking mode. A mode we will soon exit.

jhubril:
.

You're not even intelligent enough to punctuate your balderdash . And as for your last statement,I get you're forcibly trying to make a derogatory point but that was a woeful attempt.

konoplyanka:
Not Yoruba but the politicians across Nigeria lack the will to effect change.

Cofactor:
What is this one ranting and wailing about? Can't comprehend.