Yorubas are the Problem with Nigeria – By Sanusi Lamido Sanusi

Yorubas are the Problem with Nigeria – By Sanusi Lamido Sanusi

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Yorubas are the Problem with Nigeria – By Sanusi Lamido Sanusi

By Sanusi Lamido Sanusi, the Prospective Governor of the Central Bank of Nigeria
In sum, the Yoruba political leadership, as mentioned by Balarabe Musa, has shown itself over the years to be incapable of rising above narrow tribal interests and reciprocating goodwill from other sections of the country by treating other groups with respect. Practically every crisis in Nigeria since independence has its roots in this attitude.
i. The Yoruba elite and area-boy politics;
ii. Igbo marginalisation and the responsible limits of retribution; and
iii. The Yoruba Factor and “Area-boy” Politics.
See also The Adulteress’ Diary by Lamido Sanusi
My views on the Yoruba political leadership have been thoroughly articulated in some of my writings, prime among which was ” Afenifere: Syllabus of Errors” published by This Day (The Sunday Newspaper) on Sept 27, 1998. There was also an earlier publication in the weekly Trust entitled ” The Igbo, the Yoruba and History” (Aug. 21, 1998).
In sum, the Yoruba political leadership, as mentioned by Balarabe Musa, has shown itself over the years to be incapable of rising above narrow tribal interests and reciprocating goodwill from other sections of the country by treating other groups with respect. Practically every crisis in Nigeria since independence has its roots in this attitude.
The Yoruba elite were the first, in 1962, to attempt a violent overthrow of an elected government in this country. In 1966, it was the violence in the West which provided an avenue for the putsch of 15th January. After Chief Awolowo lost to Shagari in 1983 elections, it was the discontent and bad publicity in the South-West which led to the Buhari intervention.
When Buhari jailed UPN governors like Ige and Onabanjo, the South-Western press castigated that good government and provided the right mood for IBB to take over power. As soon as IBB cleared UPN governors of charges against them in a politically motivated retrial, he became the darling of the South-West. When IBB annulled the primaries in which Adamu Ciroma and Shehu Yar Adua emerged as presidential candidates in the NRC and SDP, he was hailed by the South-West. When the same man annulled the June 12, 1993 elections in which Abiola was the front-runner, the South-West now became defenders of democracy.
When it seemed Sani Abacha was sympathetic to Abiola, the South-West supported his take-over. He was in fact invited by a prominent NADECO member to take over in a published letter shortly before the event. Even though Abiola had won the elections in the North, the North was blamed for its annulment. When Abdulsalam Abubakar started his transition, the Yoruba political leadership through NADECO presented a memorandum on a Government of National Unity that showed complete disrespect for the intelligence and liberties of other Nigerians.
Subsequently, they formed a tribal party which failed to meet minimum requirements for registration, but was registered all the same to avoid the violence that was bound to follow non-registration, given the area-boy mentality of South-West politicians. Having rejected an Obasanjo candidacy and challenged the election as a fraud in court, we now find a leading member of the AD in the government, a daughter of an Afenifere leader as Minister of State, and Awolowo´s daughter as Ambassador, all appointed by a man who won the election through fraud.
Meanwhile, nothing has been negotiated for the children of Abiola, the focus of Yoruba political activity. In return for these favours, the AD solidly voted for Evan Enwerem as Senate President. This is a man who participated in the two-million- man March for Abacha´s self-succession. He also is reputed to have hosted a meeting of governors during IBB´s transition, demanding that June 12 elections should never be de-annulled and threatening that the East would go to war if this was done. When Ibrahim Salisu Buhari was accused of swearing to a false affidavit, the Yoruba political elite correctly took up the gauntlet for his resignation.
When an AD governor, Bola Tinubu, swears to a false affidavit that he attended an Ivy League University which he did not attend, we hear excuses.
For so many years, the Yoruba have inundated this country with stories of being marginalised and of a civil service dominated by northerners through quota system. The Federal Character Commission has recently released a report which shows that the South-West accounts for 27.8% of civil servants in the range GL08 to GL14 and a full 29.5% of GL 15 and above. One zone out of six zones controls a full 30% of the civil service leaving the other five zones to share the remaining 70%. We find the same story in the economy, in academia, in parastatals.
Yet in spite of being so dominant, the Yoruba complained and complained of marginalization. Of recent, in recognition of the trauma which hit the South-West after June 12, the rest of the country forced everyone out of the race to ensure that a South-Westerner emerged, often against the best advice of political activists.
Instead of leading a path of reconciliation and strong appreciation, the Yoruba have embarked on short-sighted triumphalism, threatening other “nationalities” that they ( who after all lost the election) will protect Obasanjo ( who was forced on them). No less a person than Bola Ige has made such utterances.

To further show that they were in charge, they led a cult into the Hausa area of Sagamu, murdered a Hausa woman and nothing happened. In the violence that followed, they killed several Hausa residents, with Yoruba leaders like Segun Osoba, reminding Nigerians of the need to respect the culture of their host communities. This would have continued were it not for the people of Kano who showed that they could also create their own Oro who would only be appeased through the shedding of innocent Yoruba blood.
I say all this, to support Balarabe Musa´s statement, that the greatest problem to nation-building in Nigeria are the Yoruba Bourgeoisie. I say this also to underscore my point that until they change this attitude, no conference can solve the problems of Nigeria. We cannot move forward if the leadership of one of the largest ethnic groups continues to operate, not like statesmen, but like common area boys.
iii.The Igbo Factor and the Reasonable Limits of Retribution.
The Igbo people of Nigeria have made a mark in the history of this nation. They led the first successful military coup which eliminated the Military and Political leaders of other regions while letting off Igbo leaders. Nwafor Orizu, then Senate President, in consultation with President Azikiwe, subverted the constitution and handed over power to Aguiyi-Ironsi. Subsequent developments, including attempts at humiliating other peoples, led to the counter-coup and later the civil war. The Igbos themselves must acknowledge that they have a large part of the blame for shattering the unity of this country.
Having said that, this nation must realise that Igbos have more than paid for their foolishness. They have been defeated in war, rendered paupers by monetary policy fiat, their properties declared abandoned and confiscated, kept out of strategic public sector appointments and deprived of public services. The rest of the country forced them to remain in Nigeria and has continued to deny them equity.
The Northern Bourgeoisie and the Yoruba Bourgeoisie have conspired to keep the Igbo out of the scheme of things. In the recent transition when the Igbo solidly supported the PDP in the hope of an Ekwueme presidency, the North and South-West treated this as a Biafra agenda. Every rule set for the primaries, every gentleman´s agreement was set aside to ensure that Obasanjo, not Ekwueme emerged as the candidate. Things went as far as getting the Federal Government to hurriedly gazette a pardon. Now, with this government, the marginalistion of the Igbo is more complete than ever before. The Igbos have taken all these quietly because, they reason, they brought it upon themselves. But the nation is sitting on a time-bomb.
After the First World War, the victors treated Germany with the same contempt Nigeria is treating Igbos. Two decades later, there was a Second World War, far costlier than the first. Germany was again defeated, but this time, they won a more honourable peace. Our present political leaders have no sense of History. There is a new Igbo man, who was not born in 1966 and neither knows nor cares about Nzeogwu and Ojukwu. There are Igbo men on the street who were never Biafrans. They were born Nigerians, are Nigerians, but suffer because of actions of earlier generations. They will soon decide that it is better to fight their own war, and may be find an honourable peace, than to remain in this contemptible state in perpetuity.
The Northern Bourgeoisie and the Yoruba Bourgeoisie have exacted their pound of flesh from the Igbos. For one Sardauna, one Tafawa Balewa, one Akintola and one Okotie-Eboh, hundreds of thousands have died and suffered.
If this issue is not addressed immediately, no conference will solve Nigeria´s problems.
By Sanusi Lamido SanusiBeing Excerpts from A Paper Presented At The “National Conference On The 1999 Constitution” Jointly Organised By The Network For Justice And The Vision Trust Foundation, At The Arewa House, Kaduna From 11th –12th September, 1999.

Femi Fani-Kayode

THE ''CONVICTION'' OF AL MUSTAPHA-GOD IS NOT ASLEEP.

When I heard that Major Hamza Al Mustapha was convicted of murder and sentenced to hanging by a Lagos High Court yesterday afternoon I was utterly shocked, saddened and disgusted. And let me tell you why. I was one of those that opposed the late General Sani Abacha's government and fought against Al Mustapha and co. with every fibre of my being during the NADECO days. Given that, if anything, I should h...ave been rejoicing with the many other NADECO leaders, supporters and stalwarts who honestly believe that Al-Mustapha actually ordered the death of our wonderful heroine Alhaja Kudirat Abiola and who believe that he deserves to die as a consequence of it.

However I am not rejoicing with them simply because as far as I am concerned, based on the evidence that was adduced in court, this man had absolutely nothing to do with the killing of Kudirat Abiola. I believe that whatever we do we must always operate within the law and there is no place for the expression of unfettered emotions, vendetta or jungle justice in a civilised country when it comes to the administrsation of justice. I have been following this case closely for the last four years and I have publically called for the release of Al Mustapha on a number of occassions simply because I found it shameful and unjust that the state could lock up a man in a dungeon for 13 years without being able to prove a case against him.

By doing that they have already almost ruined his life yet there is a presumption of innocence in our law. Now the state has gone even a step further in this whole unsavoury and disgraceful episode and they have convicted a man to hang for something that he knew nothing about simply because they want to silence him and stop him from exposing the truth about the rolen that many of the high and mighty played in the death of Abacha, MKO Abiola and many others. They want to jail and kill Mustapha just as they have jailed and killed so many other innocent men that came before him. Let me make this clear- I hold no brief and I have no sympathy whatsoever for the Abacha government that Al-Mustapha served and neither do I seek to defend their actions whilst in office.

The truth is that they committed many atrocities and till today many find it hard to forgive them for those atrocities. Many of our people in the south-west were killed, locked up and driven into exile by that government as was the late General Shehu Musa Yar'adua and many others from other parts of Nigeria. I myself had to leave the country and go into exile in Ghana in 1996 because of them and I never thought that I would ever return to Nigeria again. Yet despite all that I cannot allow my bitterness and anger with the Abacha regime so becloud my reasoning and sense of justice that I would support or applaud a case of what would essentially be judicial murder.

Yes Abacha's government and even Mustapha himself, as a consequence of his unflinching loyalty to his boss, committed atrocities and violated the rights of many but does that mean that we should do the same to them? Do two wrongs make a right? Are we all to descend into the pit of slaying the innocent and punishing thioer families simply because we must have our pound of flesh and even where there is no tangible evidence to justify such a course of action? I challenge those that doubt me to look at the evidence and to study the judgement closely as I have done. It is wickedness and it is a travesty of justice. Worse still it sends the wrong signal to an already tense nation that is fraught with regional, north/south and christian/muslim tensions. This absurd judgement could not have come at a worse time and I have little doubt that the Boko Haramites amongs us (whether it be the overt or covert ones) will make quite a song and dance of it.

Thankfully Al Mustapha has the right to appeal but the implication of that is that this man's enemies have virtually destroyed his life already and left him with no hope because, unless he is granted bail pending that appeal, he will be struggling with it from the dingy dungeons of Kirikiri prison all the way to the Supreme Court for the next ten years. That is the Nigerian state and ''system'' for you. When you are loyal to your leader, when you speak out in his defence, when you defend him with your life and when you tell the world the truth they come at you with everything that they have got and seek to jail or kill you for it once that leader is no longer in power or is no longer alive. One thing is clear though- those that seek to hang Al Mustapha and silence him forever have forgotten the God factor. They have forgotten that there is a God of justice and mercy who still rules in the affairs of men and who forges the destiny of nations.

For my old adversary and new friend Major Hamza Al Mustapha I will not beg any mortal for mercy and neirher will I plead for him. I will only pray to the Living God that if truly this man is innocent, as I earnestly and honestly believe that he is, then he should be eventaully freed and completely vindicated. This is especially so because something tells me that our country will still need him. God's ways are not ours and only He sees and knows the hidden things that lie ahead. It is not Al Mustapha that we should weep for, it is Nigeria.

Finally let me restate my position clearly for all to see and for posterity to take note of. I believe that Hamza Al Mustapha is innocent of this crime. As far as I am aware there is absolutely no evidence against him and the only person that said that he ordered him to go and kill the late Kudirat Abiola (Sergeant Barnabas Jabilla) has long since recanted and said that he was induced and complelled to give that false evidence by the authorities. In any civilised country that would have been the end of it but not in Nigeria. In Nigeria it is a case of ''we must get him at all costs'' even if it means bending the law and influencing the courts. One has to ask whether, as a people, we have any fear of God? Is there any justice in Nigeria? Is there any fairness? Can we ever rely on the courts to do the right thing when the state determines to punish an innocent man for his perceived sins against the powers that be?

I am fed up and disgusted with the sort of thing that goes on in this country when it comes to such matters and I just cannot understand how Nigerians are so comfortable with such injustice and wickedness being meted out to their compatriots. Do they not know that tomorrow it could be them or a member of their family? On this matter I stand by Al Mustapha shoulder to shoulder just as I do with every other innocent person that has been unfairly charged to court for political reasons and who has suffered persecution at the hands of a relentless and vicious state that have no fear of God.

This country just has to change. God's wrath is stirred up by such wickedness and insensitivity. You lock up an innocent man for 13 years in the most horrific conditions for something that he did not do, you delay his trial, you wrongly convict him where there is clearly no evidence to justify it and now you want to hang him? God is not asleep Nigeria. Unless God wills it Hamza Al Mustapha will not hang and ultimately he will be vindicated. My prayers are for him and for his family at this difficult time. God bless Nigeria.