Fulani are turning Yoruba into third-class citizens —Gani Adams

The Aare Ona Kakanfo of Yorubaland, Chief Gani Adams, speaks on issues of national importance in this interview by BOLA BADMUS. Excerpts:

 

What do you make of security presently in the South, particularly the South West?

I think the security threat in the region has reduced drastically through the efforts of the different security groups. There are lots of things that happen behind the scenes. We are making every effort to ensure adequate security in the South West. We are using different groups: the OPC, hunters, Agbekoyas, vigilantes, among others.

We recently distributed 10 motorcycles to all these affiliated groups under the South West Security Stakeholders Group and we have written all the councils of obas that they should bring all these people together for effective security in their communities. We are not saying government security agencies are not doing their work; they are trying, especially the police command in Osun and Ogun states. They collaborate with various security outfits in their states. From a report I got, the police in Osun and Ogun states collaborate with different security organisations for effective security. There was an operation we carried out together in Ilesa, Osun State, recently, in which we lost one of our members. Four kidnap victims were rescued but one of our members was killed by the criminals in the process. So, the two states are doing well in terms of security. Other police formations in South West states are also trying but their performance lies with the amount of support they receive from private organisations.

After the mayhem in Igangan, efforts of the different security outfits have helped in keeping the situation under control but some communities still face some forms of security threat.

Nigeria has been highly polarised on the issue of insecurity. You can imagine what is happening in the North. The only states that are safe a little bit in the North Central are Kogi and Kwara. The rest of the states there have almost been overrun by bandits and Fulani herdsmen. And in the North West, it is only Kano State that has a record of limited attacks from bandits. The remaining states in that region have been overrun. Information at my disposal has it that many schools in the region have been shut. The North East is another no-go area. People can hardly move around without a strong security backup.

In the South East, they have been able to curb external security threat. The only threat they are having is internal; there is not much of Fulani herdsmen crisis in the states; the same thing with the South South. In the South West, with pressure from the office of the Aare Ona Kakanfo, the different security groups and government security agencies, I think the insecurity level has reduced.

 

It is understood that the clamour for self-determination began principally because of the pervasive insecurity, especially in the South West. Why is the clamour still on if the security situation is being taken care of?

It is not only insecurity; there are also issues of bad governance and nepotism. Also, we found out that Fulani people are trying to turn us into third-class citizens. There is a third class after the second class, and the Yoruba are gradually becoming third-class citizens. This is a country where most of the resources being used to run the government come from a particular region but you are now trying to turn those who provide the resources into third-class citizens. That is the number one issue.

There is no good governance and there is lack of rule of law. The government is being run with impunity. Some people are above the law and corruption has been entrenched in the system.

There is pervasive insecurity in the land. The people are not secure anymore. But the agitations for self-determination did not start as a result of insecurity alone; they are also about bad governance. They are about being rendered inferior as Nigerians by Fulani people. So, there are lots of complaints. There are factors that are driving the Yoruba to demand for self-determination and as a result of that, we have been clamouring for a return to true federalism, with which we started at independence. But they have refused and are calling us names. They are even telling us to go to the National Assembly which was created to their advantage, given the number of representatives they have there. They know they have rigged the National Assembly. They are about 65 -70 per cent in terms of representation in the National Assembly. There is the report on the 2014 national conference that was given to President Muhammadu Buhari in 2015, which can solve the problems of the country. But the president has refused to consider the report and things have been allowed to degenerate to this level.

Self-determination is part of the provisions of the laws of the United Nations and the Africa Union which Nigeria is a signatory to. So, agitation for self-determination is not a crime. And we have internal self-determination and external self-determination.

You can have internal self-determination within Nigeria, which is self-governance, but we want external self-determination if they can’t give us internal self-determination. This is because self-determination is similar to what Baba Awolowo got in 1957, which is self-governance. That is internal self-determination within Nigeria. But external self-determination is sovereignty, which means having a country cut out of a country. It is either one or the other. If they don’t want to give us self-governance, we can have total control of our territory and be a country on our own.

Singapore pulled out of Malaysia and today, it is one of the most buoyant economies in the world. Bangladesh and Pakistan broke away from India. Eritrea broke away from Ethiopia. Southern Sudan recently broke away from Sudan. There is no big deal about a nation coming out of a nation. When the United Nations was formed in 1945, how many nations started the organisation? They were not up to 120, but they are 196 now. When children grow up, they leave your house and settle down on their own. So, there is nothing criminal about self-determination if you are not violent in your approach, if you are not trying to commit genocide, if you are not trying to overrun the government.

If you try to overrun the government, they can hold you for that, but you cannot be held if you are pushing for self-determination conventionally, through a referendum that would be supervised by the United Nations. So, it is quite different from when you go and bring guns. We don’t want genocide in one of the most populous black nations in the world but there is nothing bad about demanding for self-determination.

And I am not against the governors on the issue of regionalism. If the governors can get regionalism actualised, all contents of self-government will be observed. There is nothing bad about it. I give the governors kudos for even agreeing to push for regionalism under federalism because they are beneficiaries of the system. There is nothing bad in Nigeria having the six geopolitical zones as federating units.

And Yoruba people should be very careful about devolution of powers to states. If powers are devolved to the states, it might be the beginning of disunity in the Yoruba nation. This is because every state would like to enjoy its autonomy. Lagos State would say we don’t want to do anything with Ogun State. Ogun would say we don’t want to do anything with Oyo. Oyo would say we don’t want to do anything with Osun and so on. But there is no state that is poor in Yorubaland. The only problem is that there is no political will to realise their potentials.

Oyo State has mass land for agriculture and a lot of solid minerals. Ogun State also has land and some of its riverine areas have oil deposits and bitumen. And the state is becoming an industrial hub because of the economic potential of Lagos State. Osun State has solid minerals. In the state, there are about 16 places where we can mine gold and other solid minerals. Ekiti State also has solid minerals and its land is the most fertile in Yorubaland. You can grow cocoa and kola there easily without fertiliser. Ondo State also has solid minerals. It also has a large deposit of crude oil. Its coast is about three times the size of Lagos’s coast. Yes. And they are the second largest owners of bitumen in the world after Canada. And after Norway, Ondo has the largest number of stockfish. In my community, there is a rock that has a large deposit of gold. People from the Federal Ministry of Mineral Resources have gone there. So, if Lagos State believes that they have developed; that they are industrialised, the potentials in other states are there, too. God has a way of doing things in a gradual manner. God might decide to make you the first rich person in your family. And then you might not know when your brother would surpass you in affluence when his own time comes. There is no land in Lagos State to farm anymore. By now, the state Lagos State government should be thinking of acquiring lands in Oyo and Ekiti states, because food security takes priority in a major economy.

For instance, Northern Ireland is doing about $100 billion worth of agricultural export to many countries of the world and what is its geographical spread? It is just like Niger State but it is a country.

If you engage in modern agriculture, you can do wonders. Ekiti State can do wonders in terms of agriculture and the governor has started. He has launched cattle ranching. The Western Region has a buoyant economy. The World Bank, in 1962, said it hadn’t seen an economy that was growing fast like that of the Western Region.

So, when we talk of self-determination, we know what we are saying. Immediately the structures were collapsed into a unitary system of government, our psyche was broken, our progressive tendency was shattered, everything good about Yorubaland was badly affected.

When we talk of regional or federating units, we are talking of about 70 per cent liberation. Total liberation lies in self-determination. Self-government is just 70 per cent liberation. Having Yoruba Nation is total liberation. If the political class says we should do it in a sequence, there is nothing bad about that. That is why I appeal to all these agitators on the social media that they should not abuse anyone that says they do not believe in self-determination or in devolution of powers. But our governors should never agree to devolution of powers to states because it would bring about disunity and waste our potentials. Olorun ma so wa di omo awusa.

 

There is a well circulated video of you in which you talk about Sunday Igboho. What exactly are you saying about his approach to the agitation for Yoruba Nation?

Sunday Igboho has played his role and I believe that he will continue to play his role. When you want to liberate yourself, you don’t attack institutions. If you attack the political class, that is one thing, but you don’t attack the traditional institution; you don’t abuse them; you don’t curse them.

I said in the video that we have done it before, between 1999 and 2000. It was counter-productive. We did not abuse obas then, we were abusing the Yoruba political class. We did not attack them through social media because that was not there then. We sang songs against them and that provoked them to use political power to attack our group, to weaken it.

When he attacked the Ooni and the Alake, people like me were not happy. Aside from the fact that neither of them was wrong, you don’t abuse traditional rulers; you don’t try to subject our obas to public ridicule. There are myths about our traditional obas and we must not break those myths. If we break the myths, we take away the respect that should be enjoyed by the Yoruba Nation. Some of my friends from Edo wondered why anyone would attack the Ooni like that. ‘Don’t you know that the Ooni is well respected everywhere, even by our obas in Edo State?’ they said to me. Have you ever seen anybody attack Omonoba like that? And Benin is just a minority within the Yoruba Nation. It shows that the traditional institution is sacred and you don’t attack it anyhow.

Look at Fulani people, some of their emirs do wrong, too, but they would not attack them publicly. They could be at meetings and engage in strong arguments with perceived erring emirs but when they come out, they would make it appear that everything is normal. That is an emirate that came to Nigeria in 1894 and we are talking about Ile-Ife which has existed for about 10,000 years. So, if you want to liberate yourself and you think the Ooni’s position is wrong, it is not our way to attack the king in public. Talking of the Alake and other prominent royal fathers, these are elite Yoruba people. We have sophisticated people in Egbaland. If you abuse their monarch, saying all sorts of offensive things about him, Egba people would not be happy and elites who have connection to the oba would not identify with the Yoruba Nation struggle.

That is what I meant by the approach. Then about his (Sunday Igboho’s) intention to go and open the border, if you want to do something like that, you don’t say it in public because you don’t have enough power to back your threat. You have to be a rebel or a warlord to want to venture into taking over the border of a sovereign state. You don’t open the border and then run away. We are talking about strategies and more.

You have a very good spokesman that issues statements on your behalf. That is strategy in the media space. You don’t talk anyhow. My press statements are signed by Kehinde Aderemi except when I personally grant interviews.

 

Have you met with Sunday Igboho one-on-one on this issue?

There are certain things you don’t do one-on-one but you do publicly so that people can say Aare has spoken to his brother, Sunday. We have to restore unity in Yorubaland otherwise we would be wasting time. Many obas called me after I made that statement and many of them have restored their sympathy for Sunday Igboho. The obas issued a statement on Sunday, signed by Oba Samuel Adeoye, the Molekun of Atijere Kingdom in Ondo State and the Olukotun of Ikotun Ile in Kwara State, Oba Abdulrasaq Abioye. You use native intelligence to appease your people. Obas deserve respect and if you don’t give them respect, you would not get what you want from them. When you undermine their position, they would work against you and they would have sympathisers.

 

What is the way forward?

The way forward is to continue clamouring for self-determination and those who want devolution of powers to states should continue. We should move forward with our struggles.

 

The Afenifere has been clamouring for the restructuring of the country for a long time but the authorities have refused to budge. How long do you think the clamour for self-determination, which has just begun, continue?

It is a matter of continuous sensitisation of our people. It was because we continued pushing that MKO Abiola should be honoured that President Buhari did it 2018. With continued advocacy, the president did it.

When you are talking of self-determination, some cunning politicians would raise the alarm, saying you want to wage war against the country but you have to convince the public that it is not every country that got self-determination through war. You have to give examples and enlighten people that that is the way. There are many ways you can gain self-determination peacefully. The Yoruba do not like war. They unavoidably went to war in the past. Our ancestors will not allow a general war in Yorubaland. The only wars you find in the history of Yorubaland were community versus community or one tribe against another. The Kiriji War, which lasted for 16 years between Ijesa/Ekiti Parapo and Ibada, was the worst. Not even all the warriors in Ibadan partook in the war with Latoosa; it was a few warriors from Oyo that fought against the Parapo. There were many communities in those areas that did not join the war. Akure did not join the war. The people in the Ondo axis did not join the war. The people beside Osogbo did not join the war. So, there has never been a time a general war was fought in Yorubaland. Eewo ni. It is an abomination.

When the Igbo were fighting for Biafra, they were doing well until they tried to come and overrun the Western Region. They got to Asaba. They got to Benin. Then they stepped on Ogun-Ore and that was the end of Biafra, because it is an abomination: no human being can bring war into Yorubaland. It can’t happen. Our ancestors will not allow it. So, anybody thinking of bringing war into Yorubaland has already dug their own grave. I got that information from the spiritual realm. You can’t bring war into the entire Yorubaland. It is not possible. It is not part of the Yoruba destiny.

 

Many observers have said that Buhari is not a listening president. Do you share that opinion of the president? What advice would you give him at this moment that Nigeria is facing challenges on many fronts?

The president should know that he has a limited time to spend in power. When a president has just one year to leave office, he only has 50 per cent of influence to throw around. His influence will reduce by half because anything he does at that time, people will read political meaning to it. I don’t know whether he has a third term agenda but I will advise him to govern in such a manner that his name will be written in gold in the history books. He should not be brutish as if Nigeria is under military rule. Those who advise him to crush dissenting voices will deny him when problem comes.

The international community is watching him. He should realise that there are petitions flying all over the world against his government. He should be resolute and should respect the autonomy of the federating units. He should not be listening to political merchants who can be telling him that he can put numbers together and get an advantage in 2023.He should be thinking of solving the problems of the country before leaving power in 2023. He should do that once and for all.

Now, look at the anti-media bills coming from the presidency. In the history of Nigeria, this is the first time there would be a joint advertorial from the Nigeria Guild of Editors and the Nigeria Union of Journalists splashed on the front page of every major paper in the country. It is a disgrace to our parliament. Such anti-media bills are suicidal to for the parliament.

President Buhari should know that when you start a war with the media, it is the beginning of the end of your political career and image, because the media is the mirror of the society. We are practising democracy; this is not a military government. Even during the military era, they knew the price they paid for the enactment of Decree 4 against the media. We have to be very careful, power is transient; it is momentary and the will of the people is the will of God.

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