On Friday, 17 March, 2023, I did an article titled, Igbo as scapegoat of Lagos politics. In it, I recalled observations of Prof. Chinua Achebe in his concise book, The Trouble With Nigeria, that Nigerians of all other ethnic groups will probably achieve consensus on no other matter than their common resentment of the Igbo. Achebe added that in trying to attach a tag of guilt on the Igbo, their fellow countrymen often accuse them of being aggressive, arrogant and clannish – a case of giving a dog a bad name to hang it.
The issue then was Lagos State governorship election where Gbadebo Rhodes-Vivour, Labour Party (LP) candidate, was seen as enjoying the support of the Igbo. Rhodes-Vivour’s mother and wife were Igbo, two factors considered capital sins by ethnic irredentists of the All Progressives Congress (APC), against the Igbo. Pronto, the Igbo living in Eti-Osa side of the state, were summoned by the local chief of the community and handed a threat to vote the APC or face the consequences.
In Oshodi, the then Chairman of Lagos State Parks Management Committee, Musliu Akinsanya, otherwise known as MC Oluomo, was caught on video, spitting fire against any Igbo that would attempt voting another party other than the APC. Some other elements took to the social media, taunting the Igbo in the state.
In the face of the intimidation, the government did not do much to assure the people of protection. Rather, LP supporters and Igbo business premises became objects of attack by hoodlums, suspected to be on commissioned jobs, the most horrendous being the arson on a motor spare parts market in Ajegunle where at least one person was murdered. The assaults followed the animosities of 25 February, when the participation of Peter Obi, the presidential candidate of Labour Party (LP) in the election, became a reason for the Igbo to be vilified.
Again, South East bleeds
Even after the elections, the hate vendors were not done. Bayo Onanuga, then, the Director of media and publicity of the APC Presidential Campaign Council, pranced about, mocking the Igbo. In one instance, he scoffed, “Let 2023 be the last time of Igbo interference in Lagos politics. Let there be no repeat in 2027. Lagos is like Anambra, Imo, any Nigerian state. It is not “No Man’s Land”, not Federal Capital Territory. It is Yoruba land. Mind your business.
“I hope the Obidients and their LP have now realized that Lagos is not ‘no man’s land’. The state has indigenous owners and today they emphatically made the statement loud and clear”.
As the Igbo, Onanuga is not from Lagos. He is from Ogun State. Yet, nothing was done to rein him in. Rather, he was rewarded with an appointment by the President as Media Adviser. That offer strengthened him to allege that Obi and his Igbo kinsmen were the brains behind the #EndBadGovernance protests that ran though the country between August 1 and 10. What perhaps, saved the Igbo from hoodlums in Lagos, wrath of the federal and state government, was their staying away from street protests. But then, as they say, the horse had been let out of the stable.
The anti-Igbo sentiments had caught up at worrisome speed. It all became manifest with an X (formerly Twitter) handle of @Lagospedia, a page claiming to be proclaiming the virtues of Lagos. The promoters of the contraption gave the Igbo living and doing business in Lagos and other Southwest states 30 days to vacate the region. Again, nothing was done against the promoters of the xenophobic agenda. Before then, in 2015, a first-class Oba in the state, had threatened to drown the Igbo in the lagoon, if they did not vote the APC. He went away with the careless utterance.
Some other famished and fleeting characters, like Reno Omokri and Asari Dokubo, seeking rehabilitation, have on occasions adopted Igbo bashing as route to recognition and prominence. These incidences of talking down on the Igbo or working against them without consequences, must have emboldened Reuben Abati, former Chairman of The Guardian Newspapers Editorial Board and presenter at Arise Television, to toe the odious path.
Some days ago, his colleague had played a video where the Senate President, Godswill Akpabio, lauded the entrepreneurial spirit of the Igbo in developing their places of residence and dwelling with host communities, something he said other ethnic groups lacked.
Abati acknowledged Akpabio’s comment, injecting a popular saying that anyone that finds himself in a community where there is no Igbo should leave immediately because it meant danger. It was however on the flip side of the remarks that Abati unfolded his real agenda. He cited Theophilus Owolabi Shobowale (TOS) Benson, late Yoruba politician and lawyer, to have said that his Igbo in-laws refused to sell land to him, describing it as irony of Nigeria about the politics of the federation.
“The same Igbo who are so industrious that they are all over and do well in other parts of Nigeria, you go as a non-Igbo man to go and buy Umunna land, you will be told that you don’t belong even as an in-law. That’s by the way of an aside, but these are the issues, in my view!”, Abati said.
Those are the issues, in his views. He had programmed his mind on the matter, hence his brashness at his co-presenter, who tried giving him opportunity to change his views in the face of overwhelming evidence against his assertion. Such awkward tendencies matter, in a system as Nigeria where mischief counts in politics and social mobility.
It may be tempting, on the face value, to assume that Abati does not understand the nuances of Igbo cosmogony, in spreading the falsehood. But that will be making light of a serious matter. Years after the 1967-1970 civil war, recollections of how careless utterances and sloppy newspaper write-ups prepared the ground for the mass slaughter of the Igbo, leading to the bigger crisis, linger. Further attempts along that line must be resisted.
It is good that sober minds are calling out Abati on his misguided outing. Former Editor of The Guardian, Abraham, while citing instances of Olorogun Michael Ibru and Chief Gabriel Igbinedion, the Esama of Benin Kingdom, having estates in Onitsha, challenged Abati on the comprehensive survey he did on the subject matter of territorial protectionism in the South to arrive at his sweeping conclusion.
Ogbodo added, “I have a Yoruba in-law who lives in his own house in Enugu. Mukoro Mowoe, a foremost Urhobo nationalist, who, more or less, founded the popular Urhobo College Effurun, was so entrenched in the Southeast, specifically today’s Imo State, that he named one of his sons Orlu.
“This is the needless ethnic profiling that we preach against daily in editorials and other informed analysis. Abati is a scholar but his attitude here is bereft of scholarly temperament. In fact, he ended up betraying a deep aversion and complex. Scholarship is about continuous engagement to break new frontiers. It is not about posturing and intimidation”, he wrote. There are many instances of other Nigerians owning property in Igbo land.
There must be an end to the routine insult and harassment of the Igbo in any part of the country. They cannot be continually treated as scapegoats. The Igbo are Nigerians. The laws of the land permit them to live in any part of the country they choose and pursue legitimate livelihood. The constitution also guarantees them basic freedoms as other citizens. Nobody should deny them these rights under whatever guise.
