Compared to the PDP, the failure of the APC to produce a clearly articulated position and programme on the national question is more pathetic. This is because there are many politicians in the APC, especially in the western part of the country, who made ‘resolving’ the ‘national question’ and ‘true’ federalism as they put it in their erstwhile ‘progressive’ days a political career talking point. It is strange that these politicians who are now APC chieftains and ministers no longer remember what the national question is and what it looks like! It shows the unsteady nature of Nigerian politicians.
The grazing activities of Fulani Herdsmen, which had on numerous occasions led to violations and security breaches, and the secessionist demands of the Indigenous Peoples of Biafra (IPOB) has generated different interpretations and readings from Nigerians.
Also, politically, some critics have suggested that the demands of the Indigenous Peoples of Biafra for secession will negatively impact the potential of a candidate who happens to be of Igbo ethnicity to become the president of Nigeria. Strangely, no one has suggested the same for the Fulani herdsmen and Hausa-Fulani candidates and politicians, i.e. no one has used the crimes, impunity, audacity, and obvious security breaches of Fulani herdsmen in Nigeria to judge Hausa-Fulani politicians.
And when a politician such as Jubril Aminu, a Hausa–Fulani politician who defends only Northern interests in the Nigerian polity, once threatened that it was either a Northern president or nothing after ex-president Jonathan’s term, or when in the past Buhari himself threatened Nigerians with bloodbath, Nigerians still went ahead to vote him, a northerner, in. So, to argue that the activities of the Indigenous Peoples of Biafra will make it impossible for a candidate of an Igbo extraction to win the presidency is unacceptable.
It is wrong to define the legitimate rights of individual members of a national group (in this case the Igbo) to aspire to and be voted into the highest office in the country in the context of the secessionist demands (legitimate or illegitimate) of another Igbo group – the IPOB.
A close examination shows that critics have wrongly interpreted the two security breaches – of the proposal to establish grazing corridors for Fulani herdsmen across Nigerian states, and the secessionist demands of Indigenous Peoples of Biafra – as law and order issues.
But contrary to popular readings and interpretations of the actions of the Indigenous Peoples of Biafra (IPOB) and Fulani Herdsmen, I propose that the activities of IPOB, the Fulani Herdsmen and the Niger Delta Self-Determination Movement (NDSDM) have raised two sides of the national question in Nigeria. Hence, it is inappropriate to hastily conclude that the activities of the Indigenous Peoples of Biafra (IPOB), Fulani Herdsmen and NDSDM are primarily and solely legal issues.
By their nature, the challenges thrown up by these groups are political and moral, arising from the distorted nature of Nigerian ‘federalism’ and the historic failure to openly resolve the national question in Nigeria. Like previous ethnic flash points, such as the mutual “deportation” by some Nigerian states of those they considered as not legal residents of their states, the security breaches of the grazing of Fulani herdsmen has raised the unexamined issue of residency and residency rights in Nigeria. Being an aspect of the national question, the residency issue is first a political and moral concern, before it is a legal issue.
Previous mutual “deportations” of Nigerians by Nigerian states and the complaints (right or wrong from the standpoint of the non-resolution of the national question and its meaning for residency rights) which follow these “deportations” and the security breaching grazing activities of the Fulani herdsmen have shown that the notion of portable and exchangeable residency and residency rights of citizens, which is at the heart of modern liberal democratic living and co-existence of diverse peoples locally and globally, is lacking in practice in the Nigerian society and polity. This means Nigeria does not have objective, universal, rational, equitable and morally just criteria to determine formal portable and exchangeable residency and residency rights. The consequence of this absence touches on the national question, its resolution, misuse and abuse, both by individual Nigerians and the government(s).
For example, living under an open modern liberal democracy one can formally and openly port and exchange one’s residency and residency rights across states within a country. But in doing this, one cannot claim state residency rights in more than one state, as it is wrongly done in Nigeria. In Nigeria, in the absence of a resolution of the national question which constitutionally and formally spells out residency and residency rights, an individual can and does simultaneously claim rights from his “state of origin”, and from the state he resides in! The moral shock is that even middle classes Nigerians who ought to see the flaws in this practice of claiming residency rights in more than one state, justify such fraud in so far as it favours their ethnic group! The words for that are simple: they are the failure to resolve the national question, security breaches, crime, fraud and cheating.
Second, there is no modern and rational account of Nigerian citizenship beyond nature. In other words, speaking in a modern sense, there is no Nigerian citizen, otherwise people from Mali, Niger Republic, Chad, Cameroon, Libya, Mauritania, and other neighbouring countries who claim to have kin and relatives in Nigeria will not cross into Nigeria so easily and under that pretext join the Boko Haram terrorists and criminals.
Sadly, Nigerians are caught between two main parties whose elites have turned the national question into a negotiating tool for political and economic spoils of office after they win elections. For example, APC has no officially stated position on the national question (in fact the APC under Buhari is contemptuous of the national question). And after they won the 2015 general elections, political and economic perks, profits and spoils of office seem to have muted known APC politicians who were in the past advocates of ‘true’ political and fiscal federalism!
Third, Nigeria does not have rationally acceptable and economically viable criteria for state creation. Except for one or two states, which are self-sufficient and economically viable, Nigerian states are glorified local governments and councils, which are dependent on the central government and centrally controlled oil and other resources.
This unitary and centrist nature of the Nigerian state makes it vulnerable and susceptible to being misused and abused by individuals and groups from an ethnic group or a combination of ethnic groups, depending on the ethnic group which the president comes from. Where this happens, as it did under ex-president Jonathan and PDP and now under President Buhari and APC, people are bound to react.
Hence it is unhelpful to attempt to apply legal criteria to issues which are not at first legal issues, such as the security breaching grazing activities of the Fulani Herdsmen, the secessionist demands of the Indigenous Peoples of Biafra and self-determination demands of the Niger Delta Self Determination Movement.
Calls for secession in modern democracies is not strange and should not be demonised as it has been done in Nigeria in the media. Strictly speaking, calls for secession is a political call and not a legal one. Hence, commentators who have pontificated profusely on the legality or otherwise of the demand for secession by the Biafrans – the Indigenous Peoples of Biafra – miss the point in a fundamental sense because their appeal to law is fallacious and unhelpful.
For example, the call and debate about secession of states is part of the liberal democratic and political culture in the US. After the election of President Barak Obama in 2012, some states especially in the Southern part of America canvassed for secession from America. The data and facts may be different but there is a similarity in the call for secession in America and its call in Nigeria. Such demand calls attention to unresolved national question(s). And this call is sound and legitimate. Nigerians must deal with it openly, not as a so-called legal issue.
So while the Indigenous Peoples of Biafra obviously overreached itself by forcing non-Igbos into their Biafra Republic, and for failing to see how their own South-Eastern political and economic elites were in cahoots with and openly collaborated with the South-South political and economic elites to set the country back under ex-president Goodluck Jonathan’s corrupt and failed presidency, the overreach of IPOB not withstanding, the conversation ought to be what the IPOB secessionists want and not whether they have legal rights to call for secession, as most Nigerian debates on IPOB and Biafrans have wrongly construed it. The call for secession in Nigeria is not about law. It is about the political, historical and moral foundations of Nigeria as a country and the immoral foundations of the Nigerian state – past and present.
And more importantly in Nigeria, the calls of secessionists and federalists are two ways of resolving the national question. While secessionists look at the unacceptable distortion in Nigerian geo-politics from the standpoint of what they perceive (rightly or wrongly) as the irreconcilability of the national groups and their economic and political elites, the genuine federalists (not – the Chop-I-Chop “federalists” who use federalism and the national question to negotiate in and out of power for official and personal gains) believe that notwithstanding the obvious differences in vision and conception of the need to build and turn Nigeria into a 21st century modern liberal democratic nation and state, these differences among Nigerian national groups and their political and economic elites can still be resolved by building a federal modern liberal democratic society, country and state which recognises portable citizenship and residency rights on explicitly stated rational and morally equitable and just grounds.
I associate myself with and defend the latter position, a morally inclined open modern liberal democratic federalist position while holding publicly the view that secessionists have their rights and any part of the country that wants to secede ought to be allowed to go peacefully. Secession should be allowed because in a global and highly competitive modern 21st century, Nigeria cannot afford (i) a forced union (which in itself will be a subtle psychological violence for those who do not believe in the union) or (ii) an open physical violence – a violent disintegration of Nigeria. Secessionists must be listened to and secession must be allowed where talk and conversation fail in order to avoid unwanted mindless civil war and violent disintegration, which often leave highly subjective but permanent moral scars and sour historic memories.
So to demonise secession, as it has been done by the Nigerian state under President Buhari and by some including those who built their political career around the call for “true” federalism – fiscal and political – especially in the APC, runs against a common sense understanding and resolution of Nigeria’s obvious historic problems and our collective historic failure to forge a nation. Hence, this demonisation of the call for secession, the demonisation of Igbos, the IPOB and the Biafrans in the media is historically, politically and morally unacceptable. It has to stop.
Sadly, Nigerians are caught between two main parties whose elites have turned the national question into a negotiating tool for political and economic spoils of office after they win elections. For example, APC has no officially stated position on the national question (in fact the APC under Buhari is contemptuous of the national question). And after they won the 2015 general elections, political and economic perks, profits and spoils of office seem to have muted known APC politicians who were in the past advocates of ‘true’ political and fiscal federalism!
But the national question in a multi-cultural, multi-religious, multi-national society such as Nigeria is an objective question. Objective issues are concrete, tangible and real. They just do not go away, and they cannot be wished away with a wave of the hand because of their tangible and real nature. This is why the security breaching activities of the Fulani herdsmen and the news that grazing corridors in states are being planned for them, the Biafra protests, and the demands of the Niger Delta Self Determination Movement have roared the national question back to life.
On its part, the PDP under ex-president Jonathan used a morally and politically legitimate question (the national question) for opportunistic purposes to elongate its tenure at the tail end of its poor rule. The consequence of the absence – in the two parties – of a programme to disinterestedly and objectively resolve the national question, is a country, which may explode under serious ethnic fires. The Biafra protest in the South-East of the country is a pointer.
Compared to the PDP, the failure of the APC to produce a clearly articulated position and programme on the national question is more pathetic. This is because there are many politicians in the APC, especially in the western part of the country, who made ‘resolving’ the ‘national question’ and ‘true’ federalism as they put it in their erstwhile ‘progressive’ days a political career talking point. It is strange that these politicians who are now APC chieftains and ministers no longer remember what the national question is and what it looks like! It shows the unsteady nature of Nigerian politicians.
But the national question in a multi-cultural, multi-religious, multi-national society such as Nigeria is an objective question. Objective issues are concrete, tangible and real. They just do not go away, and they cannot be wished away with a wave of the hand because of their tangible and real nature. This is why the security breaching activities of the Fulani herdsmen and the news that grazing corridors in states are being planned for them, the Biafra protests, and the demands of the Niger Delta Self Determination Movement have roared the national question back to life.
The APC responses to these issues are a mockery. The rustling activities of the Fulani herdsmen and the attempt to promote the idea of grazing corridors for them in states is a cynical mockery of the APC and President Buhari who is struggling and trying to ignore the national question while threatening the Biafrans with military action! On one hand both the APC and Buhari ignore the national question while on the other hand they are promoting grazing corridors in states for Fulani herdsmen as a solution to a problem that is clearly an aspect of the national question, while simultaneously threatening the Biafrans!
But on the contrary, the resolution of the problem of the Fulani herdsmen belongs to Nigerian local authorities – state governments, local governments, city and village administrative structures etc. In a federal set up, local authorities are the ones to deal with the issue as they deem fit. And as pastoralists who are into the business of raising and selling cows to make money, and as agricultural business men and women, the Fulani Herdsmen and women should respect the culture, tax laws, land rights, political and economic laws of the states where they conduct their business and deal with such local authorities independent of the intervention of the central government – just as business men and women in other sectors of the economy do in the states they operate.
Nigerians should not demonise the Biafrans while cuddling the Fulani herdsmen and women. Nigeria must respond to the open challenges of national question raised by the Biafrans, the Fulani herdsmen and the Niger Delta Self Determination Movement.
On the other hand, while the Biafrans have no rights to coerce non-Biafrans into their republic, the central government has no business threatening the Biafrans. Nigerians need to contend with what gave rise to the demands of the Biafrans. One of these is the constant ethnically lopsided nature of Nigerian government, which often leads to the politics of ethnic exclusion and marginalisation. For example, while the Jonathan administration was hopelessly lopsided ethnically in favour of the South-South and South-East, such that the power of the central government was used for political and questionable and dubious economic gains, the same thing is happening under Buhari where his administration is lopsided in favour of the North and the West on account of the same dubious political and economic calculation, which Jonathan used and which Nigerians rejected.
The lesson here is that the solution – the proposal to establish grazing corridors around the country for the Fulani herdsmen -has brought back the national question. While the Fulani herdsmen rustle through farmlands of their hosts thereby provoking security breaches and serious issues around the unarticulated notions of citizenship, residency and residency rights in Nigeria, the Biafra protests in the South-East have added a more visible dimension to the same national question.
The consequence of this is that demands such as those of the Indigenous Peoples of Biafra, the Niger Delta Self Determination Movement, and the demands of the former so-called advocates of ‘true’ federalism in the Western part of the country and in APC who will hypocritically and suddenly find their voices again any time they lose power – will not go away as long as political elites across Nigerian ethnic groups and parties tie the national question to their political fortunes and misfortunes and fail to openly resolve the national question as all multi-cultural, multi-national and multi-religious countries do.
Nigerians should not demonise the Biafrans while cuddling the Fulani herdsmen and women. Nigeria must respond to the open challenges of national question raised by the Biafrans, the Fulani herdsmen and the Niger Delta Self Determination Movement.
PREMIUM TIMES
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