Dr Ojo:
Now we are talking.
Comparisons aside, Tim Kola's position is not that far from mine.
Tim Kola has done a great job in assembling some important quotes
and passages from several historical and contemporary publications
to make his points which he summarized succinctly at the end of his submission
in this manner:
"We need encouragers of how a country should be, not discouragers of it cannot be undone."
My interpretation of Tim Kola's words is that our focus should be on what type of a country
we want Nigeria to be and that we should be considering all options including breaking up
Nigeria, if that is what will bring socioeconomic progress to our region of the world.
I have commended Tim Kola's excellent submission both publicly and in private communication.
I gave him that last words on this matter--considering I could not fault any part of his analysis,
even if I'll admit that I belong to the club of those who have been labelled "One Nigerianists."
I have just read Tim Kola's excellent piece again. He did not address the issue of whether or not it
is appropriate as I did to compare the USA, Canada and Australia (at their birth in the 18th century), to
Chief Awolowo's position in 1947 (13 years before Nigeria's independence), about Nigeria as reflected
in the following quote:
"Chief Obafemi Awolowo, wrote in 1947, "Nigeria is not a nation. It is a mere geographicalexpression. There are no 'Nigerians' in the same sense as there are 'English,' 'Welsh,' or 'French.' The word 'Nigerian' is merely a distinctive appellation to distinguish those who live within the boundaries of Nigeria from those who do not."
The position that I took in my original submission was that even if as Chief Awolowo wrote that:
"There are no 'Nigerians' in the same sense as there are 'English,' 'Welsh,' or 'French.' circa 1947,
what has stopped subsequent generations of Nigerians from building a viable nation state, one in which
everyone could, regardless of his or her ethnic origin, proudly identify with--one that we can truly call
our home--a viable Federal Republic of Nigeria instead of the dysfunctional pariah of a nation that
we currently have. In other words, if there were no Nigerians in in 1947 what has stopped us from creating
What has stopped us from building such a nation--considering multiculturalism and diversity of
ethnic origins have not proven to be barriers to nation building in other countries in Europe, Asia and Africa
(South Africa), Canada, USA, and Brazil.
In my opinion, Chief Obafemi Awolowo statement accurately reflected the situation on the ground in Nigeria
in 1947. Chief Obafemi Awolowo was a true federalist who believed that one can not be a good Nigerian
without first being a good Yoruba, Igbo, Igala, Edo, Bini, Hausa or Kanuri, a testament to the truism that
"Charity Begins at Home." Chief Awolowo devoted all of his political life to the task of building a truly federal
-Federal Republic of Nigeria--where every region contributes its regional strengths and resources towards
the task of building a great nation--one that is bigger, stronger and more prosperous than the sum of
its parts.
the majority of Nigeria's founding fathers wanted to build a vibrant federal state in Africa along the lines
of Canada, Australia, USA and India. Subsequent generations of Nigerians have gone of this path beginning
with the overly centralized unitary system introduce by the military in 1966.
We would be taking Chief Awolowo's statement out of context if we continue to use this statement to justify
our individual and collective failures to build a united and vibrant Nigeria.
I concluded my original post by stating that using Chief Awolowo's statement as the excuse for not developing a
positive and unique national identity in Nigeria is akin to a full grown adult who blames his failures in life
on a high school teacher who once admonished him -that he would never amount to anything in life. That was not Chief
The following are the areas where I believe we have gone wrong in Nigeria:
a) we have lost the balance between ethnic and national consciousness. As the Nigerian fortune
has progressively waned most Nigerians have recoiled back to focusing mainly on the interests
of their ancestral origins while neglecting the overall interests of Nigeria as a whole.
This is the same idea that encourages official corruption with each government official seizing the
opportunity of his/her appointment to use his/her office for personal and family benefits first and foremost
and next the interests of those who share his/her ethnic origins. The all encompassing Nigerian national
interests are thus relegated to the backwaters.
b) we over emphasize our ethnic origins to the detriment of our national identity. It is one thing
to be proud of ones ethnic origin, hometown and family it is another thing entirely when such
pride becomes so overwhelming that one begins to think that his or her ethnic group is better
than all others based on either some important historical or contemporary achievements.
We fail to see and address those interests which are common to all Nigerians.
When I look at Nigeria and Nigerians I see a nation, my beloved motherland where less than
0.001% of the population owns or has access to more than 90% of the nations wealth--with most
of the ownership and access being acquired through corrupt means. The only commonality that I see in Nigeria
is that the crooks who amass the nations' wealth come from all ethnic groups, just as poverty in Nigeria can be found in every extended
family, village, town and city and in all states of the country and in Abuja.
c) we need to move back to the original master plan for Nigeria. Nigeria was originally designed to be
a true federal state. The unitary system has not worked for Nigeria--a situation that will become more acute
when the oil wells dry and there is no more resources to be distributed from the centre.
d) Nigerians need a moral reawakening. Our current value system is a perverted one. we have at least one or two generations
of Nigerians who probably believe that graft is a necessary way of life. Nigerians --all of us regardless of where we live, at home or abroad need moral rebranding.
e) We can not continue to have two Nigerias--one for the natives and indigenes and one for the settlers.
The indigene clause in the 1999 constitution should be expunged in other for Nigeria to move forward.
Finally, back to you beef with my original position which is that it is wrong for me to compare the situation in
pre-Independence Nigeria with those in pre-Independence USA, Canada and Australia nations that were
originally constituted for the most part by migrants from Europe--mainly the United Kingdom and France at their
origins.
The justification for my comparisons is that while most modern day American and Canadian citizens still recognize
their ethnic identities as English, Welsh, French, Scottish, Polish, Italian etc, they proudly declare first and foremost their allegiances to the USA, and Canada and not to the countries of origin of their ancestors.
This I believe this is what we should emulate in Nigeria. We should be proud of our origins--Yoruba, Igbo, Edfo, Bini etc--but we must first and foremost identify ourselves as Nigerians and learn to put the national interests first and foremost above others.
Joe Igietseme puts the above much better than I can ever do. I agree with his views on this issue completely.
I rest my case--courtesy--as they say in Nigeria and with the correct title Engr. Chukwuma Agwunobi.
Bye,
---- Original Message ----
From: Dr. Valentine Ojo <valojo@md.metrocast.net>
To: AfricanTalk <AfricanTalk@yahoogroups.com>
Cc: Participants.Group@mango.metrocast.net; roteemee@yahoo.ca; OlaKassimMD@aol.com
Sent: Wed, Jan 5, 2011 10:16 am
Subject: RE: Is Chief Obafemi Awolowo Right After all? Ouote of the Century...
From: Dr. Valentine Ojo <valojo@md.metrocast.net>
To: AfricanTalk <AfricanTalk@yahoogroups.com>
Cc: Participants.Group@mango.metrocast.net; roteemee@yahoo.ca; OlaKassimMD@aol.com
Sent: Wed, Jan 5, 2011 10:16 am
Subject: RE: Is Chief Obafemi Awolowo Right After all? Ouote of the Century...
Dr. Ola Kassim:
Why not simply admit that your ahistorical fabrications have been debunked by Tunji Timi Tola's excellent, detailed rejoinder...?
Nigeria cannot be compared to how Canada or the United States were settled...once you do that, you are on the wrong path to ever finding any resolution to Nigeria as a failed nation.
Dr. Valentine Ojo
Tall Timbers, MD
On Mon 01/03/11 4:15 PM , OlaKassimMD@aol.com sent:
Why not simply admit that your ahistorical fabrications have been debunked by Tunji Timi Tola's excellent, detailed rejoinder...?
Nigeria cannot be compared to how Canada or the United States were settled...once you do that, you are on the wrong path to ever finding any resolution to Nigeria as a failed nation.
Dr. Valentine Ojo
Tall Timbers, MD
On Mon 01/03/11 4:15 PM , OlaKassimMD@aol.com sent:
-----Original Message-----
From: Tunji Timi Tola
To: OmoOdua@yahoogroups.com
Cc: NaijaPolitics@yahoogroups.com; USAAfricaDialogue@googlegroups.com; nigerianid@yahoogroups.com; NIDOCANADA@yahoogroups.com; NIgerianWorldForum@yahoogroups.com
Sent: Mon, Jan 3, 2011 1:15 pm
Subject: Re: [OmoOdua] Is Chief Obafemi Awolowo Right Afterall?
Nigeria. Whether the event or events would involve only the AG or other parties, only myself or other persons, I did not know, that it would happen, I felt sure but when it would happen I had no inkling".5. Chief Anthony Enahoro said: "if we desire to create a viable federal structure and warm relationships among our nationalities, we have to design a formula under which we can live equitably together and the formula must provide for the recognition of the existence and
corporate integrity of the nationalities. The only thing keeping Nigeria together at present is force".
6. Said Professor Wole Soyinka: "if nothing happens, I can not guarantee what recourse the people will take. The level of anger has peaked. I don't rule out Nigeria breaking up. That is what happens to a failed state".7. Admiral Nduibuisi Kanu stated: "Nigeria has for far too long been proceeding heedlessly on the wrong road, the road antithetically opposed to nation building. The only road upon which Nigeria at independence could have embarked on the journey of nationhood was as a federation. We have to go back to that road, any other road leads to nowhere".8. "We have been lying to ourselves that we are one indivisible nation. Can a Fulani man claim the same brotherhood with the Birom. Can an Ijaw man call an Itsekiri man his brother". Casmir Igbokwe.9. "There is no need for a national conference because those who benefit from the rot that exists will not allow it. Each constituent part of what is Nigeria must first and foremost declare its independence from the failed state of Nigeria.
Then those who are interested in forming a new modern state around the area around the rivers Niger and Benue can then go ahead and form such a state with due consideration for rules, regulations and proper procedures. Everything else is simply postponement of the inevitable"- Kole Omotosho=======What else does anyone need to understand the direction Nigeria is going which is described by Tony Nnadi in a recent article 'Is it possible to restructure Nigeria? Tony drew the attention to "...various groups are already taking unilateral steps to extricate themselves from the 'mistake of 1914' and to retrieve their portion of the geo-space (geographical expression) called Nigeria. In this category we find OPC arming itself outside the law, Lagos State creating 57 LGAs outside the constitution, MASSOB flying the Biafran flags — in rejection of the constitution (Nigeria). Today, 12 states in the north are operating sharia law outside the constitution, MEND is engaging the armed forces of Nigeria in a war — questioning their relationship with Nigeria in respect of the resources found in their region and which the constitution has vested in the centre by fiat. They are all saying the same thing – we have not agreed."The countries cited by Dr Kassim are not declining in growth, they are not retarding but advancing in spite of their differences. With this happening, one can say that the group-mix is of higher intelligence beings than we have in Nigeria?, else how do you describe a set of people arrogating to themselves the headship or rulership of the country? How do you explain the dismantling of the structures of foundation of the Republic and still expect the Republic to hold...unless something is wrong with our wisdom. How do you explain the continous downward sliding of the country while the people causing the problem remained unconcerned, and the 'siddon-look' populace continue to say 'e go beta'. I find it hard to share this 'wisdom'.Furthermore, let us look at the America example, Americans are Americans in and out of the USA. But for Nigerians, they are first their ethnic identity before being a Nigerian. An igbo man would rather have igbo people fill all the excutive positions of NIDO, so also is an Hausa man who would rather put his folks in juicy positions, and leave the others to scramble for the remnants, the Yorubas would do the same, but with some elements of fairplay, but let's leave fairplay aside.For those of us in the Western world, there is a saying you 'it ain't need a fix if it ain't broken', Nigeria is opposite of this, it needed to be fixed since 1959, yet no efforts are made to fix it, every successive administration continued to dismatled it.10. Prof Sekoni in the same article referenced above have this to say, "....between 1946 and 1963, Nigeria had moved considerably away from the centralist or unitary governance that the amalgamation of 1914 symbolised. It must be stated that the Republican Constitution of 1963 had entrenched in it the principle of 50% derivation for oil_producing regions Even after the creation of 12 states by Gowon, some measure of regional powers was still evident in each of the twelve states. It was the government of Murtala/Obasanjo that resumed the process of de-federalisation that Ironsi introduced in 1966 and for which he was removed from office by Northern troops. Under this regime, symbols of federalism were removed: regional flags, coat of arms. The Federal Military Government took over regional universities, stadium, and broadcasting houses. It also commissioned the writing of a new national anthem to replace the Independence version, in addition to taking the power of indigenous communities over their ancestral lands and vesting such powers in the government through the Land Use Decree."=================For the die-hard supporters of this failling Nigerian state, you need to go to Ghana, Kenya, Tanzania and see how fellow BLACK Africans are rulling their countries as they ensure, orderliness, rule of law, justice, efficient police systems etc.And for Sudan, of which composition is somehow similar to Nigeria, it is about to have a referendum to split the country into North and South.On a final note I can only summarise that the people who are for a continous Nigerian State, are; 1. those who have gone out of their tribal enclave into other tribes for marital purpose; 2. those who are okay with the status quo; 3. those who value their tribal-friendship to the overrall greater good; 4. those who are too intellectually lazy to research the evolvement of Nigeria, and how it had abandoned the basis of what brought it into existence, and finally 5. those who have allowed themselves to be brainwashed that it can't happen, or that is the way it supposed to be'We need encouragers of how a country should be, not discouragers of it cannot be undone.Happy new year!"No one can make you a slave without your consent." - Mrs. Eleanor Roosevelt
From: Adeniran Adeboye <aadeboye@mac.com>
Subject: Re: [OmoOdua] Is Chief Obafemi Awolowo Right Afterall? Ouote of the Cen...
To: OmoOdua@yahoogroups.com
Cc: NaijaPolitics@yahoogroups.com, USAAfricaDialogue@googlegroups.com, nigerianid@yahoogroups.com, NIDOCANADA@yahoogroups.com, NIgerianWorldForum@yahoogroups.com
Received: Monday, January 3, 2011, 1:06 AM
Dear Dr. Kassim,
Happy New Year to you and your family.
Your post below seems to be a response to one by Paul Oranika. However, I do not have the post by Oranika and I'll greatly appreciate getting to read it so that I can put your reply in proper perspective
Thanks,
On Jan 2, 2011, at 3:04 PM, OlaKassimMD@aol.com wrote:
In a message dated 02/01/2011 10:20:24 A.M. Eastern Standard Time, oranika@yahoo.com writes:
Dear All:The above statement by Chief Obafemi Awolowo (in a book published in 1947) would also have been applicable to a pre or immediate post independence USA as in those early days of the British North American Empire, there could also not have been in the true sense of the word any "Americans" (except for the Aborigenies) in the same way as there were English, Irish, Welsh and French immigrants answering, in the pre-independence era to the authorities of the King of England and the King of France..The USA found its nationhood and the reason for her existence, in the same act that led to her independence--the rebellion against Great Britain. Subsequent generations of Americans since 1776, have continued to build on the ground breaking work of their founding fathers..Instead of building on the accomplishments of the founding fathers of Nigeria's independence, subsequent generations have unlike the Americans been engaged on a backward mission to dismember the unifying monuments that their founding fathers built. We do this probably unknowingly through our obsessive glorification of past ethnic or sub ethnic achievements at the expense of the present. We are busy chasing the past instead of concentrating on building a prosperous and united Nigeria. We tolerate mediocrity in all oaspects of our national life as long as one of our own--a member of our clan is in charge even if he.she lacks the ability to perform the duties that are being assigned to him.Nigeria is not the only multi-ethnic nation in the world. Other nations like India, Malaysia, Belgium, Brazil, Canada, USA , Australia etc. have proven that ethnic diversity is not necessarily an hindrance to national unity and progress.Thus, I believe it is unfair to blame the lack of a unifying national ethos in Nigeria on the words of Chief Obafemi Awolowo who was writing about the situation on the ground in 1947, some 13 years before Nigeria's independence.We can not blame the failure of Nigerians to find their nationhood even after more than 50 years post independence on the words of the late sage! Doing so will be no different than a failed adult of 50 years who is blaming his lackluster and unproductive life on a high school teacher who once told him that he will never make it in life!When you try to justify the breakup of Nigeria, it is only fair for the sake of historical purity to leave Chief Obafemi Awolowo out of the picture--as the records would undoubtedly show that he spent his entire political career trying to build a united Nigeria. The basic questionwe should be asking is whether Nigeria would have been in such a mess if Chief Obafemi Awolowo had had the opportunity to serve either as a prime Minister or President.If Chief Awolowo\s achievements as the premier of the the Western region is anything to go buy, it is safe to say that Nigeria will probably have surpassed countries like South Korea, Malaysia, India and others in terms of socioeconomic development. If Chief Awolowo had served even one term as Nigeria's president, he would have laid a solid foundation--one that would have avoided many of the ills of today's Nigeria. Most importantly, Nigeria will not be a Republic of Darkness at night, and a nation that manufactures almost nothing because of insufficient electrical power supplies if Chief Awolowo had been given the opportunity to serve as Nigeria's president!Bye,
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