Prof Biodun Jeifo brought “igilangogeesi,” Yoruba onomatopoeia for grandiloquence, to academic discourse. Prof Pius Adesanmi dredged the “iyalaya anybody” lingo from the most uncouth aspects of the underbelly of the Lagos streets to make a brilliant submission to a distinguished audience of actors, professionals, and corporate types.
To the Yoruba, “iyalaya” means grandmother, granddame, matriarch, or female ancestor. When conjoined with the indefinite pronoun, “anybody,” “iyalaya” is more than just a modifier. Both words together express scant regard for the opinion of significant or insignificant others.
The rhetoric of Nigeria’s separatists, militants, and insurgents, are very hardline indeed. The separatist Indigenous (some say, Igbo) People of Biafra, and Movement for the Actualisation of the Sovereign State of Biafra, militant Niger Delta Avengers, and insurgent Boko Haram, are at their most blatant in-your-face as they openly challenge the Nigerian state.
They are gung ho in their quests to exit Nigeria, put no store to the opinion of “iyalaya anybody,” and are not remiss in proclaiming it from the rooftops. IPOB, for instance, has little regard for the sensibilities of the older Igbo generation, some of whom have suggested the more moderate path of political restructuring of Nigeria.
Membership of IPOB is said to be largely from the age bracket of Generation X, iGen, and the Millennial, who some say, hardly know the horrors of the Nigerian Civil War. They are prepared to achieve their goals by violence, and probably think that pacifist MASSOB, from where they broke away, is sissy, and the moderate Ohanaeze Ndigbo, pliant.
Without being asked, IPOB admits to running a pirate protest radio station named after Radio Biafra of the Republic of Biafra. The language of this radio station is decidedly strident, graphic, even swashbuckling. It has no qualms in sending vitriolic words to Nigerians, their President, and any Igbo who does not seem to share the vision or enthusiasm for separatist Biafra.
This young and audacious group consistently pushes the Biafra Agenda into the fore of any interface with other Nigerians. They may not be unprepared to stick it to anyone who describes Biafra as defunct or a former Republic. When they are not staging a protest, they are issuing a statement in what has now been sloganeered into “BIAFREXIT.”
The Niger Delta Avengers are decidedly more violent than IPOB. They have adopted the tactics of the Nelson Mandela-led Spear of the Nation, the militant arm of South Africa’s African National Congress. They consistently attack oil and gas installations of government and the International Oil Companies.
But unlike the Spear of the Nation, they do not destroy other government establishments. They do not also harm civilians or soldiers, and they announce their intentions, and promptly claim responsibility after every attack.
The NDA wants the Nigerian state to concede 60 per cent of oil revenue to the Niger Delta, clean up the degraded environment, restructure Nigeria, adopt fiscal federalism, establish the Maritime University, and organise a referendum for self-determinism. They recently slipped in talk about exiting Nigeria. Though they engage in violence, they have not quite declared wholesale war nor foreclosed dialogue altogether.
But some politicians and unscrupulous businessmen are hiding behind the militants to fight private wars. A lesser known Iduwn Volunteers Force, presumably from the Niger Delta, asks President Muhammadu Buhari to make the Central Bank of Nigeria reverse an order asking banks to bring in insider-related loans.
A recent hoax by the Movement for the Emancipation of Niger Delta announced a pact that included a safe passage for Government Ekpemupolo, alias Tompolo, who is wanted by security agencies. Some Niger Delta governors were reported to have vacated shame and brazenly asked the Federal Government to drop corruption charges against some politicians.
But by far the most virulent of the trinity of perfidy that is facing Nigeria is the Boko Haram insurgents of the North-East. What started as a regular harmless religious movement became extremely violent in protest of the death of leader Mohammed Yusuf in police custody.
Boko Haram uses suicide bombers to attack churches,mosques, even emirs’ palaces, markets, and other public places, to maim, and kill innocent people. They finally embarked on raids to unprotected villages in a quest for territory. Reports indicate that they controlled close to three local government areas of Borno State. Like the NDA, they promptly claim responsibility any time they attack a target.
The insurgency in the North-East has caused thousands of Nigerians to become Internally Displaced Persons within their own country. Their lives and livelihoods have been disrupted, and it will take some time before things return to normal.
Nigeria, that includes the Niger Delta, is losing billions of revenue to the destruction of oil and gas installations. The leaders and elders of the Niger Delta must remind the young men that oil is a depleting wealth, and that before oil, Nigeria survived on other things.
Yet, Andrew Elijah of the Ijaw Monitoring Group’s opinion that the Nigerian state should engage the militants in peace talks is good. A former Delta State Governor, Dr. Emmanuel Uduaghan’s suggestion of a carrot and stick strategy with the militants is also wise.
Government must not ignore separatist IPOB, MASSOB, militant NDA, its alter ego, MEND, and whoever shows up on behalf of the Boko Haram insurgents, in peace talks. Government must constructively engage all-comers, to sieve the genuine from the frivolous. It will not do anyone any good, certainly not the Nigerian state, if the Federal Government climbs a grandstanding pedestal. Dialogue is a weapon of war.
To treat the militants and the separatists like criminals won’t help matters. For far too long the Nigerian state has not treated anyone with too much respect and consideration. Well, except for those enrolled in the register of the ruling oligarchy, who therefore insist that Nigeria must not be restructured.
But while government must abide by agreements to pay stipends promised to ex-militants, it should however be a short term deal. It is better to develop both the human and infrastructure capital of the Niger Delta. Imagine the perfect fit when labour with requisite skills, competence, and experience meets with sustained job opportunities.
One high road that is not yet taken is for IOCs to demonstrate fidelity to the Nigerian project by enlisting on the Nigeria Stock Exchange. Nigerians on Main Street can at least acquire ordinary shares, if not the premium preferred shareswhose claims are settled immediately after payments on debt instruments have been met.
You bet that Nigerian shareholders would certainly acquire the posture of stakeholders and unofficial spokespersons for the IOCs. It may interest you to know that the Petroleum Industry Bill on the floor of the National Assembly does not quite encourage the IOCs to enlist on the Nigerian bourse.
But above all, the Nigerian state must recognise that inaudible grumble from the South-West, self-determination agitations from the South-East, violent demands from the South-South, and murderous insurgency in the North-East, indicate that things aren’t so good within the Nigerian political space.
Everyone knows that the Buhari Presidency did not create the problems. But if it can find the political will not to compound, but end it all, other regions of Nigeria will not seek redress in the rude expression, “Iyalaya anybody!”
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