CONTINUED FROM LAST WEEK
A speech given in the House of Representatives, Lagos, on 31st March, 1953.
I declare, sir, that Britain is in illegal occupation of this country … (Hear, hear). When they came here, they used different devices to conquer us, or to bring us under subjugation – force of arms, deceit, guile, undue influence and all sorts of crooked methods that any Imperialist power has used to bring any nation under subjugation. They entered into treaties with our fathers; but these treaties are invalid because they were obtained under circumstances which would not warrant their validity.
It is true that if we go to an International Court, it might be argued that under the law of nations, these treaties are valid.
But who are the makers of this law of nations?
Are they not these same political spoliators?
To go to other people’s country, and to seize their property forcibly, I say, sir, is wickedness.
Britain had no right to come here in the first instance, and has no right to remain as our overlords. I must make that clear.
The traders, businessmen and missionaries are welcome. They come to do business and they do whatever they can for the country and we welcome them in subjection and in freedom.
They are our friends.
They need not have any fear at all that in a free Nigeria they will have no place to live in, and to do their business.
The British officials, as individuals, we have no quarrel with them. They are mere instruments of a machine which we detest very much, but as individuals we like them. They come here to earn their money and when they go back, we will wish them all the luck. In a free Nigeria we shall need more of them, more of the technicians, engineers, educationists, etc., etc.
Our quarrel is with British sovereignty in this country, whereby our political and economic affairs are determined without consultation with us.
Our governor and our lieutenant-governors are appointed without consultation with us.
It is elementary that when the head of a nation cannot be removed by the people of that country, the rulership of that country degenerates very very easily into tyranny.
For, power corrupts, and absolute power corrupts absolutely. We in this country are fed up with the state of affairs in which one man will dictate the pace at which we must go, and holds the key by which he could put the whole place into confusion if he likes.
After all, he is only one man, whoever he is, and in the appointment of such a person we would like to be consulted. We want to vote for our own governor-general and our governors in the regions.
We want to be able to vote for our president and if he is not doing things in accordance with our wishes, to have the power to remove …
That is what we seek to do. It has been suggested by my Northern friends, and I am very sorry that they have fallen victims to the evil propaganda of the British, that they are not fit to govern themselves.
It shows the exent to which this evil propaganda has gone in this country, and we all ought really to weep, that people who are as advanced and are as civilised as the Northern people can come here and say: ‘We are not fit for self-government’.
The bones of the great and illustrious Uthman Dan Fodio would shake in their grave if it were possible for him to listen to one of his descendants …
Well Mr. President, sir, I would like to wind up now.
This motion has come before this House to be debated.
We are all Nigerians, and we are all in one accord about wanting self-government and wanting freedom from British rule. The only issue in dispute as I see it now, is one of the question of time, as between North and South. But that has always been the issue between Britain and everyone of her colonial territories.
At division time we know by the look of things that we will be beaten.
But we are not afraid.
It will go on record that A, B, C and D once voted for freedom for their country and that E, F, G and H, once voted against.
That is all we are asking.
But what do we find now?
We find the Northern majority is not only being used in having their way, but is also being used in preventing the minority from having their say.
That is a situation with which we find it absolutely impossible to accommodate ourselves.
I am speaking for the West now.
I should have thought, Mr. President, that you would have ruled this motion out of order and used your discretion in favour of allowing the original motion and amendment to be fully debated. But you have already decided in favour of allowing a dilatory motion to be debated and voted upon.
There is no doubt in anybody’s mind that when the division comes, the North will win the day, and this momentous motion would have been postponed indefinitely.
With a situation like that, as I said before, we are not prepared to accommodate ourselves.
We are prepared’ to be voted out at any time, in a spirit of sportsmanship.
But we are certainly not going to submit to a situation in which we are being muzzled into the bargain. I would like to say, sir, on behalf of the Western Region that we will not stay here to continue this debate.
We will allow the North alone to run the show by themselves.
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