Thousands of Yoruba people today staged a rally in Lagos calling for self-determination for the approximately 50 million strong nationality.
The crowd saw several Okada riders, women and young people chanting “Oodua Republic Now” as they marched through the city’s main highway. The rally was backed with sonorous music of “Yoruba Ronu” composed in the 1960s at a time of great political turmoil in the Western Region.
The crowd which marched through Ikorodu road to Otoja under the auspices of the O’odua Nationalist Coalition, (ONAC) had several young people with banners demanding for Oodua Republic. Over 30 Pan-Yoruba groups took part in the rally that drew thousands of people.
“We are tired of a country where elections mean blood and death” read one of the banners. Another took the inscription “50 million Yoruba people can stand alone”, “Yoruba Republic cannot be a crime.”
Many observers see the rally as the first time in modern times that the Yoruba will be making demand for ethnic self determination through such a massive protest.
Addressing the crowd which later gathered at the Gani Fawehimi Park, in Ojota, Mr Adewale Adeoye, one of the conveners said Nigeria has become an ‘expired drug” that needed to be dispensed with. He said it is a crime against humanity for the Nigerian nation to keep over 300 ethnic nationalities in perpetual chains. He said that the Yoruba people should see the March 28 election as a means not an end in itself adding that Yoruba people must do everything to prevent the South West territory from being turned into a land of wasted lives and souls.
“Yoruba society thrives on robust debates. We have a culture of decent politics. Nigeria is taking away all these from us. Violence and bloodletting have become the surest route to state power. It will be disastrous if we allow Yoruba people to be railroaded into any blind war against people in the North, in the East, in the South South or in any part of the country. Our responsibility is to defend the Yoruba territory from rogues and scoundrels and assert our self determination, nothing more.” He said the content of the build-up to the March 28 election has merely exposed the agelong and incurable division among Nigerian ethnic groups.
According to him, the greatest challenge before the Yoruba people is to create the lowest common factor of survival among the contending interests, and the “most important ingredient is political freedom through ethnic self determination.”
Adeoye stated “There is no symbol of the Federal Government of Nigeria or any symbol of Nigerian unity that has not collapsed: The Nigerian Airways, the Nigerian Railways, the Nigerian Electricity Board, the Federal Airways, the Nigerian military, the Nigerian police, the Nigerian electoral commissions, the Nigerian currency. The only glory left in this country are those legacies built in the era of regional autonomy. These are signs that the concept of Nigerian unity is a farce.”
According to him, most Nigerian leaders are “visiting Nigerians” because they keep their wives and children abroad. “They don’t believe in the country and they know the way they run the country can lead to outburst of violence at any time. They build schools their children wont attend. They build hospitals that they don’t patronize.”
He said “after 55 years of marriage, we have seen that the couple has wasted so many lives including killing their own children. The only option left for this couple is to seek a violent or peaceful divorce.”
Adeoye said that Nigeria has become a curse rather that a blessing to her citizens. “Real development is not possible in Nigeria unless we address the nationality question. We are different people that have lived with unending violent clashes of values. It is a miracle that Nigeria has not collapsed. It is a miracle that Nigerians rare still living in the midst of the blind rape of the country.”
Speaking at the event, the leader of Covenant Group, (CG) Popoola Ajayi said that in Nigeria, elections are conducted at gun point. He said the coming elections are laden with many contradictions which might which might spill over into a major crisis including war if care in not taken. Mr George Akinola, the leader of the Movement for Yoruba Republic, (MORE) said ‘the real issue before us is how to achieve our own Republic. Israel is 5 million people, Kuwait is 2 million, France is about 40 million, there is no reason why 50 million Yoruba cannot stand alone.” A representative of Agbekoya, speaking at the event Chief Akeju Alao said the Yoruba people should not be “ashamed to fight for autonomy and self determination.” He said “it’s our right, it’s not a privilege. Those who want to keep Nigeria united at the cost of horrendous deaths and miseries are the few who feed on the country’s many tribulations.” He said “Yoruba people must not be afraid. We must damn the consequences and declare their own Republic for a country that has brought ruin on them.” Other groups at the rally were Oodua Liberation Movement, (OLM), Network for Yoruba Alliance, (NEYA), Agbekoya, Yoruba Movement for Autonomy, (YOMOU), Itsekiri Nationalist Front, (INF) and the Oodua Students Coalition, (OSC) among many others.
After ceeding power to the North why the agitation for self determination.