Igbos Should Quit Playing Marginal
Politcs
… Prof. Nwala
Professor Tim
Uzodinma Nwala is former Dean, Faculty of Social Sciences, University of
Nigeria, Nzukka, UNN; acclaimed father of African Philosophy and a founding
member of the People’s Democratic Party. He is also the president of Alaigbo
Development Foundation (ADF), a non-governmental organization of Igbo
intelligentsia, elders, clergy, and patriotic Igbo figures, whose vision is to
rebuild and develop the Igbo nation, and advance the spirit of her culture and
civilization. In this interview with Uzo Chikere, he enumerates the
challenges facing the Nigerian polity with regard to the ethnic nations in
particular.
Excerpts:
What does Buhari administration portend for the Igbo
nation in Nigeria?
The election has come and gone, results from various places,
irrespective of how genuine they are, have been officially announced and
accepted. That installs the All Progressives Congress (APC) into power. That
power, I must stress, is the power to manage the affairs of the Federation in
accordance with its Constitution and not the power to own the Federation. It
means that in terms of resource and power-sharing, appointments and
allocations, the APC government has the responsibility to supervise them. In
doing so, the APC government shall ensure that every geo-political zone and
every state gets its entitlement according to the Constitution, whether they
voted for the APC or not.
It is important to underscore the point that resource and
power-sharing in the Nigerian Federation is among the geo-political zones and
states of the Federation. It is not among the political parties. The PDP is
watching to see how the APC government manages the affairs of the country, the
masses are also watching. The peoples of the South-East and South-South where
the APC did not win much, the people there are also watching. They did not vote
for the APC for various reasons. Maybe they voted for the PDP as the devil they
know rather than the one they were not sure of. If the APC does the right
thing, the South-East can swing to it.
The Igbo nation voted as a result of their past experiences.
The Igbo situation is that of utter neglect. Even the Jonathan government which
they voted for was not fair to them. Nigeria has six zones and these zones are
political units for equity and fairness. We do hope that the APC government
will convince the Igbo nation that not voting for them will not give rise to further
marginalization.
The different political parties that constitute the APC
are jostling for their shares. Can the Igbo nation use the ladder of the PDP to
accomplish their political advancement?
Ndigbo have to organize themselves in relation to other
ethnic nationalities and zones. It depends on how they understand the game of
politics in a multi-ethnic society, and how strong they are in protecting their
own interest. Whether they are in the PDP or the APC, they can play significant
roles and effectively protect their interest if they are internally united and
focused. I don’t know how strong at the moment they are in the PDP despite that
we founded the party. I wrote the first Constitution of the PDP. The PDP was a
child of the G-34, of which former Vice-President Alex Ekwueme, Prof Jerry Gana
and I put together. At a point, it was obvious that Alex Ekwueme would become
the party’s Presidential candidate. I remembered that most people within the leadership
of the G-34 and the nascent PDP agreed that the Presidency would go to the
South-East. But what happened along the line shows that the Igbo nation is very
marginal in the nation’s polity.
When President Olusegun Obasanjo came to the PDP, it became
his private property. If he did not like your face, he would throw you out, no
matter your position. That was how about five chairmen emerged in the PDP when
it was the turn of the Igbo nation. The same happened in the Senate Presidency.
I was the first to challenge the privatization of the PDP under President
Obasanjo leadership when his men rigged out the late SenatorSunday Awoniyi
and myself in the PDP party election of 1999. Both of us were on the same
ticket; he was running as chairman while I was running as secretary with
General Idada running as assistant secretary, and as soon as I discovered that
the courts were either too shy or too timid to defend democracy, I felt it was
futile to continue waging a legal battle in defense of internal democracy within
the party.
In the APC today, the Igbos may still be playing
marginal roles. I don’t know how far the Igbo leadership in the APC was privy
to the recent game at the National Assembly. That is where the Alaigbo
Foundation comes in. We know that this nation requires the balance of
interests, equity and justice and among the federating ethnic nationalities to
survive. Instability will continue to reign as long as any one section or
combination of sections tries to dominate the others.
The Igbos cannot continue to blame others alone for their
weakness within the Nigeria Federal System. But the part of the blame lies with
the Igbo themselves. They have not understood the dynamics of a genuine
federalism. The trouble however is that there is no genuine federal system yet
in Nigeria. The present system makes effective location of political power in
one section possible. This encourages Igbo politicians to play second fiddle in
order to survive economically and politically. Consequently, each of them is
looking towards somebody in the North or in the South-West for appointments. I
tell you regrettably that under the APC, nobody outside the South-West will
determine what any-one from that area will get out of the various appointments
due to them except the South-West leadership. Similarly, nobody outside the
North will also do that for the North. But among the Igbo, whatever anybody
gets must be through his patron either from the North or the South-West. Good
materials in the North are known and nurtured from childhood. The Igbo should
learn the art of the game and stop complaining.
They should unite with the South-West to demand a genuine
Federal structure, what many call true federalism. After that they should
ensure internal unity and focus to ensure they get what is due to them.
One driving force of the ADF is to encourage investments
in the South East. How does the body create a smooth environment for this?
What the various governments in the South East have been
emphasizing in their policy statements in recent times are in tandem with the
objectives of the ADF. We shall work with them, continue to encourage them, and
provide the necessary intellectual back force on a larger scale within the
context of a regional setting. We shall work for greater regional integration.
Everybody knows that the Igbo land is neglected and the solution has to start
from state governments. Unity of purpose and cooperation is imperative for the
survival of the Igbo nation. Governor Willy Obiano is doing well in Anambra.
The governors of Enugu, Abia, Ebonyi and Rivers are thinking in this manner.
ADF will help articulate the ideological and requisite program that will boost
the economy and social system in Igbo-land to make the area attractive for both
local and foreign investors to invest in Igbo-land.
The ADF launched a two-volume book recently. What is the
goal of the book?
He who does not know where rains start to beat him will not
know where he dried his body when or how the rain stopped. The person won’t
even know what kind of shelter he needs. The book – Igbo Nation: History &
the Challenges of Rebirth and Development is an excursion into the chequered
history of Ndigbo, showing the challenges they have faced and continued to
face, the enormous resources, human and material available to them; their
strengths and weaknesses as a nation and race. It is clear that the
problem of the Igbo is a result of the colonial history.
The Igbo nation was in the forefront of self-governance.
People do not emphasize the fact that even before the National Council of
Nigeria and Cameroun (NCNC), the Igbo women had set the anti-colonial ball
rolling. That was in 1929 when they assaulted the citadel of colonial
administration. The British called it The Aba Women’s Riot, but it is more
appropriately called “The Aba Women’s Resistance against the colonial
exploitation. Herbert Macaulay and Dr Nnamdi Azikiwe were the doyens of
Nigeria’s nationalism, but Zik was the focal figure. Many Igbo leaders were
very vibrant in that struggle.
The colonial masters realized that they must pull out, but
they planned on how to pull out and still have control of the territories they
set up for purposes of continued exploitations. They planned it in such a way
that they left the powers in the hands of the people they could work with. The
Igbo were not the people they could work with because they felt that the Igbo
wanted the black man to be in charge of his destiny. In trying to prevent that
in the case of Nigeria, the British tried to make the Igbo look like an enemy
and also make other ethnic nationalities antagonize them.
The relationship between the Igbo and the North in the early
days was cordial. Most of the Igbo leaders were born in the North. It is only
at the political level that tension existed. Remember that Nzeogwu executed his
coup with northerners among whom he was born and grew up, and not Igbos. His
name is Chukwuma Kaduna Nzeogwu. That showed the kind of nationalistic outlook
then. Zik and Ojukwu remembered with pride their birth places at Zungeru in the
North.
ADF is trying to get our people and their neighbours within
the Nigerian Federation understand and appreciate this reality of our history.
The British created a structure that fouled the air for their own
self-interest. But the military and politicians are the main culprits and
forging an inequitable Federal structure that continues to fuel inter-ethnic
and religious crises. Nigerians have also not sat down to define the kind of
federation they want. The Nigerian military was at a point a Northern military,
trying to entrench more inequitable political structures. Look at the local
government creations.
The main goal of the ADF is to work towards the rebuilding
of the Igbo nation; to advance their culture and civilization; to help them
overcome their weaknesses as a people and nation. Till today Ndigbo still
believe that politics is a way to overtake one’s brother. In the North, the
leadership plays a major role in moderating their collective political actions.
The marginalization of Ndigbo is systematic and deeply
embedded in the structure and social consciousness of the other neighbours of
Ndigbo. Butchering of Igbos has become a fashion. Igbos were the first victims
of the Boko Haram sect. Many Igbos hitherto in the North are in the South East
dying. Nobody tries to rehabilitate them, not even our own governments. ADF is
a wake-up call for the Igbo to understand themselves and work towards
self-governance.
ADF is worried about recent developments where Ndigbo are
now treated as strangers in a Federation they have done more than any other
ethnic group to build. ADF is also interested in a proper definition of
citizenship rights within the Nigerian Federation. To call somebody a refugee
in his country he is being urged to embrace as his own is the height of political
dishonesty. Lagos was built with the resources of the entire country. Most of
the leaders saw Lagos the way Americans see Washington DC or British see
London. Until recently, Igbos lived happily with their counterparts in Lagos.
Citizenship and indi
geneship
rights are the part of the major problems of this Nigeria. Former Niger
Governor Babangida Aliyu called for its abrogation. During the constitutional
conference, I played a major role with others in trying to make this a
Constitutional right. Our view was that once a person lived in a place up to
five years, the person should have the same rights as the people born there.
