Chief Ayo Adebanjo, chieftain of Afenifere, Yoruba’s mainstream socio-cultural group, was among the Southern leaders that recently met in Lagos to broach over the controversial ‘quit notice’ issued the Igbo, by the northern youths. In this interview with ADELEKE ADESANYA, Adebanjo says the major crisis besetting the country is anchored on the current constitution, “which favours the northerners more than the southerners.” The elder statesman also observes that the northern youths, in acting that way, must have been goaded by some powerful forces. Excerpts:
The leaders of the Southern part of the country recently convened a meeting in your house. Among the requests made from the outcome of the meeting was the arrest of the northern youths’ leader who recently gave a quite notice to the Igbo in the North. As an elder statesman, don’t you foresee a looming war?
Let me tell you; not arresting the leaders of the youths that made the pronouncement is even the most dangerous thing to the unity of this country. If every ethnic group in the country is doing the same thing that they did, asking other tribes in their region to leave, don’t you think that is more than dangerous to all of us as country? What will proceed from there will definitely be crisis. But if you arrest them and warn them, such a thing will not happen in the country again. For us, we are only showing some maturity in this issue. When a section of the federation rose up with such a notion, if care is not taken, they will drag the country into commotion, and that is why we rose to the occasion, that in Nigeria, that is not acceptable.
But the Kaduna state governor, Nasir El-Rufai, demanded for the arrest of the northern youths’ leader and nothing happened after that.
That is one of the questions we were asking as well. Why have they not been arrested? You see, this is my complaint with the press. You don’t play your role well as the fourth estate of the realm. These are the issues that the press need to expose well to the public. How can people do a thing that is capable of disturbing the nation and the Federal Government did not do anything about it. And that is not good for us as a nation. That is why we are asking the government to arrest them, and check the recklessness of their speech.
I want the whole world to know that we are not with them (northern youths), we are not to supporting them; if we support them, it shows we support the breaking of the country. The authorities should checkmate them to stop the nonsense, instead of folding arms
Are you saying that such a request for their arrest was deliberately ignored there was complicity on the part of government?
Well, there is no suspicion anywhere. The government’s disposition over the case has only confirmed our own conclusion that these people are being supported somewhere. That is obvious. It is not enough to condemn them by the words of mouth alone. I know they are not acting alone. Some forces are supporting them and that is why they are not arrested. And that is why I am calling on the press to highlight such a danger to the government, that they are not doing the right thing and that it’s time to amend things. You see, this issue only confirmed our conclusion at the end of our meeting.
I want the whole world to know that we are not with them, we are not to supporting them; if we support them, it shows we support the breaking of the country. The authorities should checkmate them to stop the nonsense, instead of folding arms. It is something that is wrong. So, if other tribes should retaliate with the same move, saying their people (Hausa’s) too should leave their region, definitely trouble would start in the country. Those of us in the South, we are the people who really want a united country. We are the only people who support peace and unity. Anybody who does anything to the contrary is not a true Nigerian and is an enemy of the nation.
We are the people who really want a united country, we are the only people who use to quiver for peace and quiet. Then you the press should highlight that to those who want to break the country, those who want to cause secession, those are the real enemies of the country. But those who have been.
In the statement released after the meeting, the southern leaders said the ultimatum is the product of the country’s unresolved nationality problem. Can you clarify this?
That is clear enough. This is just a problem within the independence of the federation. That is why without this problem solved, we cannot have peace within the country. We must have a system of government that will allow each group the autonomy to run their governments at one stage. We have a visible government at the federal level and invariably, it should give the autonomy that each group can rule within its sect and there will be peace. One federation assumption should not break the country, it makes us live together in peace on the terms agreeable to everybody. You see, The Point where ’am going to is that restructuring does not break the country, it only makes the country be in peace. The question now is that nobody should preach to us the value of leaving in peace and unity together like the acting president is doing. Of course, we will appreciate that. But the truth is that we have passed that age. What is the convention trip in terms of living together? We must agree upon that; that is the problem. I will go far now to say these are the fortunes with independence. The constitution we had at the time of independence gave us total autonomy. It was the military that restructured the country in 1963. It was because the military restructured the country that we are in the trouble we are till today. What we are now saying is that we want to go back to the right government. Take us back to where we are and restructure the country on a federal system. Restructure is just the saviour, it’s just a thing like the constitution that (Chief Obafemi) Awolowo and (Dr. Nnamdi) Azikiwe gave to us as our independence was approved by the colonial lords. We want the normal thing: what was given to us until the military restructured us in 1966. So let us go back to that. We have no problem at independence until when we had the Republican Constitution. All was federal constitution. It was the Constitution that enabled Awolowo and Azikiwe to be premier and Balewa to be prime minister in 1960 and that was what we had during the republic of 1963. If you follow this things regularly, I do not understand why our brothers, the northerners should be oppos – ing the change and I will continue to say and emphasize that I don’t believe anyone of them will be more northerners than the late Sardauna of Sokoto who agreed to the terms which we had been leaving with, in peace, until the military came in, and the military that came in, made the restructuring to favour the north more than the south, by creating more local government and state government.
The acting president has been moving round t o meet leaders within the geopolitical zones to ensure that peace reigns. What do you see about this move?
That is not the solution to our problem; the solution to our problem is to give us that constitution that we all agreed upon. It is the Northerners that have the constitution, we don’t have the constitution. We should create a constitution which all of us must agree to, the constitution that we are using currently in the country favours them (northerners) and cheats us. They contribute a penny and reap a thousand and those who contributed a thousand reap a penny; that is the constitution we are having on board. So with this, are you now telling us to continue with all that? Nobody tells us to accept oppression. You should listen to the complaints of the South East and see whether they are genuine or not.
We should create a constitution which all of us must agree to, the constitution that we are using currently in the country favours them (northerners) and cheats us. They contribute a penny and reap a thousand and those who contributed a thousand reap a penny
The National Assembly is currently calling for the implementation of 2014 National conference report. How do you feel about this, being one of the members of that conference?
If they are sincere, that will be a very good option. Honesty is the key, but if they are not, we just have to crave for time. I wish them well. They should spare time to read the recommendations of the conference. Some of the problems are caused by us and the solutions are in the recommendations. We are in this together. All these things are constitutional.
