IMPERATIVES

OF THE
NIGERIAN REVOLUTION
————•❀✼❀•————

‘Dele Farotimi
(Author of DO NOT DIE IN THEIR WAR)
 Copyright ©2021 ‘Dele Farotimi

ISBN: 979-851-35102-7-7

All rights reserved.

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For information about permission to reproduce selections from this
book, write to [email protected].

Published in Nigeria by:

‘Dele Farotimi Publishers,
Lekki Phase 1, Lagos
 Contents
Dedication ...................................................................................................... vii
Acknowledgements ........................................................................................ ix
Preface: The Foolish Warriors...................................................................... xii
Introduction .................................................................................................. xxi
Prologue ....................................................................................................... xxv
Chapter 1: Change not Violence, the need to educate ................................. 1
Chapter 2: The fallacy of the inevitability of a Nigerian revolution .......... 21
Chapter 3: The Politics of Fractionalisation ................................................ 29
Chapter 4: Birth of the Fulani Hegemony ................................................... 49
Chapter 5: A foundation of Lies................................................................... 79
Chapter 6: Sustaining the Hegemony........................................................... 97
Chapter 7: The 4th Republic and the Consequence of Hubris................ 133
Chapter 8: The new Hegemony.................................................................. 163
Chapter 9: The perfect Storm and the inevitable Implosions .................. 183
Chapter 10: The Time is Now .................................................................... 205
Chapter 11: The Pacifist Warrior ............................................................... 215
The Change Manifesto ................................................................................ 223
Epilogue ....................................................................................................... 247
The Choices before Us ........................................................................... 248
Addendum: Nigeria, Nigerians, and Religiosity ........................................ 263
Appendix: Proposed Constitution of the Federating States of Nigeria .. 287
Chapter I: Supremacy of the Constitution,
Nigeria and its Territories....................................................................... 289
Chapter II: Citizenship............................................................................ 293
Chapter III: Fundamental Rights ........................................................... 298

v
 Chapter IV: The President of the Republic .......................................... 316
Chapter V: Parliament............................................................................. 320
Chapter VI: Executive Powers ............................................................... 337
Chapter VII: Police ................................................................................. 350
Chapter VIII: Courts............................................................................... 352
Chapter IX: Finance................................................................................ 369
Chapter X: The Public Service of the Federation................................. 378
Chapter XI: Transitional Provisions ...................................................... 384
Index ............................................................................................................. 389

vi
 Dedication
THIS book is dedicated to the three women that had been
handed my custody at critical stages of my life, and that have
loved me, in spite of my several imperfections and
peccadilloes.
Maami, Maria Ige Olukole, the grandmother that was my
mother, may we be gathered together when I sleep as is the
way of all mortals. Rest on and keep taking care of Adetoun,
there’s hardly a day I do not remember you both. I shall yet tell
the world of you.
Helen Omolara, the mother who fathered me and taught
me how to be a man. I owe you more than I can ever repay, but
know in the moments when you as a mother urge caution; that
I learnt how to stand by the truth from the very best at standing
by the truth regardless of cost: you. I never saw you settle for
the choice undictated by your conscience. Thank you for the
man you raised, and for being more of a man than the keyboard
warriors of this age.
Olufunmilola! Olufunmilayo! The one that allows me to be
me. My facilitator and co-conspirator. I am blessed to be loved
by you, and I know that you have loved me more than me. The
spoil wey my mama no gree spoil me, na you kukuma dey spoil me
like say i be ya only pikin. Thank you. I might not say it often
enough, I have certainly not been the best that I can be, but
never be in any doubt, I’d marry you again and again, if I came
back to this life, a thousand times.
Igbayilola, Ajibola, Afolarin, I do what i do because of you.
I do not want to see you become refugees in another man’s

vii
land, and I do not want to see you live through unending wars.
Ayaba Esteri! When am I going to practice for Igbayilola’s
wedding? I am getting impatient o. Never forget the daughters
and sons of whom you are.
In spite of my several flaws, never forget that I love you all.

viii
 Acknowledgements
I HAVE been blessed to have shared time and space with some
men and women, and to have benefited immensely from God’s
orchestrated twinning with some of these persons. Taiwo
Akinlami, a brother with whom I somehow avoided sharing a
uterus, but a brother in every sense of the word. The
Okokomaiko Brotherhood of Bayo Ayo, Afolabi Solebo, Dele
Soetan, and the larger LASU family, I am grateful to you all,
and i do not take your love for granted.
My partners and the entire staff of DF Legal. Abiola, the
sister God gave me in place of the one that he took early, the
legal owl and mother hen, Ralph, the most intelligent legal
draughtsman I have ever met, and a man of uncommon
integrity and fidelity. Seyi, Mobola, Maryanne our Yoruba
Biafran, Funmi, and the support staff: Thank you all for your
love and loyalty, I am comforted in the knowledge that the firm
is in excellent hands, may God bless your endeavors. Amen.
I have the best assistant in the world. Feyisayo Olatunde, take
a bow. You have made my work easier without making any
fuss, and your capacity to anticipate my needs, are second to
none. Honest efficiency defines you. Thank you.

– Dele Farotimi, April 2021

ix
 “
The Nigeria ‘ruining crass’ does not
live in the country that they have
ruined. They cream the land for their
all-right living, but they do not live in
Nigeria. Their homes are in the Gulf
Arab states, on the Potomac in
Washington DC; they live in Dubai,
London, Monaco; some live in Niamey,
others in Niger… Their children, rarely
ever born in Nigeria, do not go to
schools in Nigeria, and where they do,
it would mostly be the elementary
schools. The Nigeria ‘ruining crass’
does not use the antediluvian
healthcare facilities…

x
 Preface
The Foolish Warriors

A
s the Buhari presidency has enabled the very worst
of the Fulani Islamist agenda, and heated up the
country in furtherance of these treasonous agenda,
the rhetoric has become extremely violent everywhere in the
country.
Only a few men have dared to speak to the unity of
Nigeria, when the head of the state himself has proven to be
a shameless ethnic irredentist.
In the face of the manifest failure of the Nigeria State and
its security forces to protect the lives and properties of the
victims of Fulani militias, and in the face of the objective
realities that would suggest that the president condones the
actions of these violent criminals by his inactions,
considering the bewildering directive of the Defence
Minister to grieving victims, to defend themselves, it is
becoming increasingly difficult to speak to the unity of a
country that is being killed by its RUINING CRASS.
The venal brutality of the Fulani militias operating across
the length of the country, from Otuoke in the Bayelsa
swamp, to Epe in Lagos, its evil excesses, and arrogant
flippancy, have kindled a flame of ethnic nationalism, the
like of which Nigeria has never seen before. The lines were

xi
clear during the civil war. The borders were defined. The
tribe being hunted was known. This is different, and it is
dangerous. There would be no explosions; only implosions.
The battlefront would not be there, it would be right here.
On the victims’ doorsteps… in their homes.
The Nigeria ‘ruining crass’ does not live in the country
that they have ruined. They cream the land for their all-right
living, but they do not live in Nigeria. Their homes are in the
Gulf Arab states, on the Potomac in Washington DC; they
live in Dubai, London, Monaco; some live in Niamey, others
in Niger. The northern aristocracy has long-favoured homes
in the Sudan, and a few have kept residences in Cairo. The
Nigeria ‘ruining crass’ hates living in Nigeria.
Their children, rarely ever born in Nigeria, do not go to
schools in Nigeria, and where they do, it would mostly be
the elementary schools. The Nigeria ‘ruining crass’ does not
use the antediluvian healthcare facilities. A country that
once had an internationally renowned healthcare system,
once good enough for Saudi royalty, has had its President
travel abroad to fix his unhearing ears. I am sure that you
get the point: the Nigeria ‘ruinous crass’, does not live in
Nigeria.
Fela famously dubbed the Nigeria ‘ruining crass’, Alhajis.
He lamented that we were being ruled by strangers who are
untouched by the pains of our afflictions. He had no idea
just how right he was, and just how bad it is. The case of
Dizzy Baby, Deziani, has brought some attention to a

xii
notorious fact that should engage the attention of the
warring victims. Almost the entire ‘ruining crass’, political
and economic, is possessed of second passports; not subject
to the same travel restrictions, that affect we, the foolish
warriors.
In the cauldron of the afflictions unleashed on the victims
by Buhari, secessionist agitations have boiled over. Self-
defence against the rampaging Fulani militias have become
a fair ground upon which other ethnic warriors are being
raised across the length of the country. The extremes of the
Fulani herdsmen in the Oke-Ogun part of Oyo State, raised
the person of Sunday Igboho as the “Yoruba freedom
fighter” (apologia Punch newspaper).
The prevailing circumstances have led to a situation
where the voices of reason have been ignored, drowned out
and disparaged by the government, and reasonable men and
women have been rendered impotent in the face of the
rampant insecurities, and the government’s failure to
protect the lives and properties of the hapless victims. The
violence of Igboho’s response, was received with respect by
the perpetrators of violence, and by the Nigeria State itself,
in further validation of the extremist view, that the voices of
reason, are being useless in an unreasonable place, and
validation for those that have believed, that violence works
with the State, and is respected by the Fulani militias that
have carried on like an army of occupation.

xiii
Variant of warriors
THE foolish warriors may be broadly divided into two
categories. The chief protagonists are rarely ever resident in
Nigeria. They are the ones that have escaped. They could see
that the Nigeria State was failing early enough, they escaped
the insanities pretty early in most cases. They have built
good lives away from the Nigerian madness. They are
citizens of the countries of their refuge, a privilege that is
denied to them in the country of their birth and origin. But
unlike the Nigeria ‘ruining crass’ that can hardly wait to be
rid of Nigeria, these escapees have never managed to leave
Nigeria behind. Take the monkey outta the jungle, but the
jungle is inside the damn monkey, you might say.
The Nigeria Diaspora is the most homesick you’d find
anywhere in sizable numbers. I have never come across a
single Nigerian in my travels who wouldn’t rather be in
Nigeria; if the country was “working”, they’d say. The
Nigeria diaspora is the most patriotic layer of the Nigerian
peoples, and I say this without ignoring the fact that the
Nigerian is not a citizen in truth. They are the ones that
consume the most news about the Nigeria State, they are
extremely tuned in to the politics, and are constantly
bellyaching about the country that they have been forced to
flee, but which they have never desired to be separated
from. These ones are the first category of foolish warriors.

xiv
 The Nigeria Middle-Class, or its ‘middling class’ as I
have sometimes been forced to label it, is the most foolish
and willfully ignorant of the different layers of the Nigerian
peoples. It is the class that is most incapable of identifying
what is in its own best interests; the most existential of the
classes, and the least reflective of all. The Nigeria middle
class pays for the excesses of the ‘ruining crass’, but instead
of seeking critical engagements with the system to make it
better or to change it, the middle class is in a constant race
for survival, even as the objective realities should have
announced to it that it is fighting a lost battle against the
forces of feudalism.
The Nigeria middle class is the fertile ground for the
promotion of all of the divisions sowed by the ‘ruining
crass’. They are the ones that you would find on the internet
fighting the battles of the ‘ruining crass.’ They are the ones
that have embraced religiosity as a refuge from the harsh
realities of their existential lives, and they are the ones that
have failed to make use of their education and learning, to
teach, instruct, and guide the lower classes with whom they
interact daily. They are the ones with the capacity to
recognise the several iniquities of the Nigeria State. They are
the ones acquainted with its evil wickedness. These ones
have eyes, but are willfully blind. They have failed to discern
that the evil befalling them are visited on them by their own,
and they have bought the hate: hook, line and sinker.

xv
 For these foolish warriors, the solution to the Nigerian
problem is simple, and as simpletons they have believed:
divide Nigeria, and be done with it already. The dangers of
the simple solution have never been better illustrated.
NOTE: I understand the pains and frustrations behind
these agitations, and I am not promoting or counseling
inaction, but beyond people talking about war, have they
factored in the fact that talks inevitably follow wars, before
they might be ended? Why is it so cowardly to offer
alternatives to wars, whilst everyone is demanding war,
when the only way to end that war, would be to speak to
each other and then work out the peace deal?
The war fronts would be our doorsteps, and most of the
keyboard warriors would be in their own homes outside
Nigeria, keeping scores and watching cable networks. But
those of us that have either elected to stay in these blighted
lands, already living as though we are in a war zone, would
find ourselves truly at war, and would have stumbled into
the still avoidable calamity because of our collective idiocies,
and even more ironically, because of our moral cowardice.
The same Nigerians, who have refused to engage with
the system to peacefully demand citizenship, but are happy
with indigene-ship, whilst eyeing promotion to the ‘ruining
crass’, are the ones promoting and demanding the break-up
of the country that they wouldn’t fight to birth. It is lost on
them that it is easier to gain everything they have imagined

xvi
from their tribal homelands, in a restructured and equitable
Nigeria State that has citizenship for all of its citizens.
The Nigeria ‘ruining crass’ is not going to miss the
Nigeria State. As I have sought to establish, the rulers of
Nigeria have committed several crimes against the Nigerian
peoples, and they are afraid of the day when they might be
asked to explain their crimes. They have concluded that the
destruction of the country would assure that they wouldn’t
have to account for the evils that they have perpetrated in
the land. Our ruiners are pyromaniacs; burning down the
State erases the huge crime scene the country is. If Nigeria
would be saved from the impending catastrophe, it would
be Nigerians of all ethnicities, languages, and biases that
would have to collectively save the State from itself. It is the
victims of Nigeria’s several afflictions that need Nigeria to
survive.
Those named Nigerians have never been allowed to
become citizens of Nigeria. The governance systems have
been structured from its beginnings to think in terms of the
tribe; the delineation of rights have been based on tribal and
ethnic foundations. It is not for nothing that the Nigerian Bill
of Rights, found in the 1960 Independence Constitution,
arose from the agitations of the minority ethnic groups, and
was a recommendation of the Willink Commission on the
rights of the minorities. Nigeria was founded on indigene-
ship, and Nigerians have never been citizens in the true
sense of the word.
The foolish warriors have fought against each other, in
the army of the evil rulers, for the benefit of the evil rulers,
and in preservation of the evil rulers and governance

xvii
systems that have mutually assured their enslavement. If the
foolish warriors shall incline their eyes, if they would behold
the evidence of their own eyes, they would see very quickly
that whilst the Fulani elites might be responsible for the
architecture of their oppression, the beneficiaries are not the
Fulani peoples, but a class of people drawn from every nook
and cranny of the Nigeria State.
The overarching ambition of the Nigeria ‘ruining crass’
is to steal. The overarching ambition of the Islamist jihadists
is to push their vile interpretation of Islam across the
country, and the dream of the Fulani peoples across the
Sahel, is to find a homeland, a place to call home, and a
refuge from the hardships of being a nomadic people, in a
region where they are effectively a minority. These
ambitions have collided at a critical point in the history of
Nigeria, and they have found oxygen in the person of a
Nigerian president, whose base instincts and reflexes are
nepotistic in the extreme.

Do Not Die in Their War

THE foolish warriors are those that would fight and die in
the wars of their oppressors. The wise warriors are those that
would fight for the birth of the Nigeria nation; the ones that
would embrace the non-violent path to the birth of the
Nigeria nation; that would speak to bridge the divides; that
would act to heal the wounds; that would demand for others
everything that they have desired for themselves.

xviii
 History beckons the ones that would dare to desert the
ranks of the foolish warriors.

xix
 “
I spent time in the book to deal with
the individuals whom I refer to as the
principalities and the powers that have
governed Nigeria over the years. I
dealt with the systems. I treated it
from a historical perspective in order
to be able to situate each one of these
phenomena in time and in space, so
that the reader, who is observing
these persons and entities today, has a
clear understanding of their root and
how they have grown over the years to
become what they are today.

xx
 Introduction

A
s I wrote out the outline for this book, I came to the
reality that it was always going to be written. In
fact, I came to the knowledge of the fact that the
first book, Do Not Die in their War, was merely meant as
foundation for this book. This perhaps, because it would
have been incongruous to have made a call for the Nigerian
revolution without having first laid the foundation for
making such a radical call. So, I took a circuitous route, the
intention being to ensure that a rational basis and
foundation were laid for what is essentially a taboo call in
Nigeria.
The central idea of a revolution has for long been linked
with violence in Africa. And Nigeria with its long history of
violent coup d’état, the civil war, and military rule, with the
severally named revolutionary ruling councils, have over
the years managed to create a bogey around the idea of a
revolution.
But I use the word revolution advisedly. It does not in
any way, shape or form, promote the interest of the poor and
the disadvantaged, on whose behalf I presume to speak, to
call for violence, when they are not the ones who benefit
from the deployment of violence, and are neither the
purveyors of violence.
We will discuss this point in detail in the later part of this
book, when we begin to deal specifically with the issue of

xxi
tactics and the reasons for the adoption of non-violence, as
the only way to seek the attainment of that revolution.
In writing Do Not Die in their War, I sought to deal
specifically with the several lies, the foundational lies that
have undergirded the Nigerian governance system and
assured that instead of being a nation that caters to citizens
who are equal, Nigeria had over the years become a
feudalised democracy that caters only and solely for the
interest of the rulers, whilst the ruled are perpetually kept
underfoot.
I spent time in the book to deal with the individuals
whom I refer to as the principalities and the powers that
have governed Nigeria over the years. I dealt with the
systems. I treated it from a historical perspective in order to
be able to situate each one of these phenomena in time and
in space, so that the reader, who is observing these persons
and entities today, has a clear understanding of their root
and how they have grown over the years to become what
they are today.
These things I had sought to do in Do Not Die in their War,
but I also knew, at the time of writing the book that there is
a system that undergirds the totality of the evil that has
overtaken Nigeria, and that is impunity; the refusal of the
system to allow itself to be governed by laws and the
resultant inequalities and inequities.
I have dealt with this extensively in another book, which
would be released in future. But the primary intention in

xxii
that book is to show the systemic injustice; to show how the
system has become inured to the idea of the rule of law and
how we have systemised injustice and created the reign of
impunity. How men have bent laws, how justice has been
corrupted to the point where it no longer serves the purpose
of the poor man, but the narrow interest of the few.
The inescapable conclusion I had come to years ago are
the arguments contained in the current book, where I will
endeavour to make a case for the inevitability of the
inescapable conclusion, that a revolution is the only way
forward for the Nigerian people.
I have taken a circuitous route to get to this point. But
that route was rendered inevitable by several factors outside
my immediate control. The first is the successful
weaponisation of ignorance against the Nigerian people. I
touched on this at great length in Do Not Die in their War,
where I had seen that the people are constantly having their
stories told to them by their oppressors and the oppressors
are then the ones who set the parameters for the discussions
and if you really think about it, it becomes inevitable that as
long as the lions are the ones telling the stories of the hunt,
it will always glorify the hunter.
The people became oblivious to the fact that the very
people for whom they die, and for whom they sometimes
kill, are the ones responsible for the state of their existence.
Second is, I wanted to avoid a situation where the system

xxiii
gets the opportunity to define me, and thereby make it
impossible for the reader to hear what I have to say to them.
So, it became very important to lay the groundwork
in Do Not Die in their War, because I found a people so cowed
by poverty, which had been weaponised against them to the
extent that they were completely disconnected from their
own liberation and in most cases, particularly in the middle
class, probably devoid of all intellectual curiosity. I found
constantly that the victims were the ones who have self-
abnegated, make excuses for, and, in some cases, find
justifications for their ill-treatment in the hands of their
oppressors.
Then it got to a point, where I realised that they had been
so successfully indoctrinated and subjected to weaponised
poverty and ignorance, that speaking to these people cannot
be said to be unlike speaking to the deaf. With this
realisation, it became apparent to me that I am not writing
for this generation, but for history. Let history judge whether
I be right or wrong in the choices I have made.

xxiv
 Prologue

I
finished writing the succeeding chapters in the months
of April and May. As the COVID-19 lockdown bit and
the worst effects of hunger began to manifest on the
streets, I began agonising to comrades about how we were
asleep whilst a revolution raged.
The book that was intended as a guide for a revolution
became a redundant exercise, and I soon abandoned all
attempts at concluding what I had determined to have ready
for publication by the first anniversary of the publication of
Do Not Die in their War.
I experienced a condition not unlike the writer’s block. I
could write, and I did write, but I simply couldn’t write
anything related to this book. I was convinced that I was
witnessing a revolution in real time, and I was intent on
studying what I was seeing instead of spending time writing
about what appeared to be happening already. I was both
right, and wrong. All at the same time.
The body of work derived from this season would be
compiled and shared, but I shall resume the purpose of my
immediate work by fast forwarding to the immediate
crystallisation of the social ferment that I was observing: the
#EndSARS protests.
I am not a historian, and I shall leave it for the persons
better informed and interested in the history to tell the tales,
but the #EndSARS protests are as historic as they are also

xxv
predictive of the future. It is for this predictive purpose that
I have deemed it important to analyse what took place in
that season, as a guide to the future, which lies inexorably
ahead of us.
“Ndi lazy youth, are you planning a revolution in disguise?”
After one of the several episodic eruptions of murderous
venality by the Nigerian police, this time in Delta State,
blame as always on the dreaded SARS unit, which had
ended with the end of another innocent life, several
conditions conspired to birth a moment in time, when the
Nigerian youth became engaged enough to demand
answers of the Nigeria State and its evil rulers.
The youth, under the umbrella of the #EndSARS
movement, demanded the end of the SARS units across the
country in the immediate aftermath of the Delta murder,
and they issued a raft of demands which soon enjoyed
celebrity endorsements, and began to take on a life of its
own. I was sufficiently bored enough to read the occasional
news item about one celebrity or the other being called to
the IG’s office as the state scrambled to head-off what would
appear to be getting out of hand.
I soon began to see carnivals on the streets disguised as
protests, abi na protests disguised as carnivals. Ndi lazy
youth became engaged, and the Nigeria State became
uneasy and flustered. The State began to seek whom to
influence, and they began to seek the leadership of the
movement for the usual compromise.

xxvi
 The protests were centered in Lagos, Osogbo, and Abuja.
In Lagos, there were two main protest grounds - one at
Alausa, the other at the Lekki tollgate plaza by The Palms
Shopping Mall.
The one in Osogbo owed its visibility and vibrance to the
efforts of Comrade Mandate and other RevolutionNow
elements in Osun. The Abuja end was extremely successful;
it had practised activists on hand in the persons of Aisha
Yesufu and the inimitable Omoyele Sowore to ginger them,
if they ever required it. Not that they ever seemed tired.
As already confessed, I am not a historian; I have merely
recalled what I can of the protests in order to offer context.
My major preoccupation is with the relevance of the season
in the quest to predict the future. I am keener on identifying
the responses of the Nigeria State, its rulers, the Nigerian
peoples themselves, the governance systems, and the
several other actors, local and foreign, with a view to a clear
understanding of what to expect, when the time shall
come… As it must.
As the protests began to gain popularity and traction, the
Nigeria State began to unfurl its usual tactics. In Benin,
prisoners were released by the prison authorities, and cries
of a jailbreak provoked by the #EndSARS protesters rent the
air, at least it did until the prisoners began to tell of how they
were practically chased out of their cells by the wardens.
In Abuja, there are several photographic records of state
security personnel coordinating with thugs and miscreants!

xxvii
 The state complicity in Lagos was as brazen as it is
predictable.
The relationship between the Lagos State Government,
the Tinubu political family, and the organised crime
syndicates in the state has always been incestuous, but the
#EndSARS protests, more than anything else in recent times,
have removed the veils that had concealed the truth from all
but the most discerning and diligent seekers.
The protests in Lagos were the largest and most effective
of the #EndSARS protests. The one in Alausa was at the seat
of state power, and the one in Lekki had shut down an asset
with which Tinubu has not once been known to joke: his pot
of soup, the Lekki tollgate.
On the 20th of October, and in the full glare of several
cameras, a notorious thug, positively identified as “Oosha”
and based in the Agege axis of the Lagos metropolis,
alongside his confederates ferried in state-owned buses,
attacked unarmed protesters with the intention of breaking
the protests at Alausa. They failed.
The Lekki protests were a different kettle of fish. The
protesters were not on a piece of land, and they were not just
occupying a government building; they were occupying the
Lekki tollgate. The tollgate plaza had seen protests in the
past, both the one at the point that became the killing field,
and the toll plaza at the Lekki-Ikoyi bridge. Tinubu had
never been tolerant of those that had dared to do so in the

xxviii
past; Ebun Adegboruwa, who later sat on the #EndSARS
panel, was a victim in the past.
The modus operandi of past breakup of protests at the
Lekki tollgate plaza bears retelling, for it succinctly
illustrates the criminal syncretism that governs the state. The
oppressed residents of Lekki, who had proceeded in a
peaceful manner armed with placards, were set upon by
hired thugs, and after being thoroughly beaten and serially
injured by the hoodlums, were arrested by the Nigerian
policemen who had stood by and watched them being
attacked. The hoodlums, employed by the state, and the
police, worked together to put down the attempts to
mobilise public opinion against the tolling.
By the time of the #EndSARS protests in October, the
mammoth crowds at the Lekki tollgate, the organisation of
its security arrangements, and the level of awareness and
participation, made the preferred choice of the Jagaban
franchise for dealing with Lekki protests obsolete. It is also
what rendered the murderous violence unleashed, both
predictable and inevitable, the moment that the protesters
were not persuaded to abandon their demands by the
several lying moves of the government and or its farcical
gyrations.
The Nigeria State is happy to deal with mad men; it has
never had any problems with the many insanities that it has
birthed, nurtured, and enabled in its long history of venal
bestialities, but it has never developed the capacity to

xxix
tolerate those that would dare to demand citizenship of it.
The refusal of the protesters to accept the lying
compromises, coupled with the absence of a leadership that
might be compromised, crystallised the events of the 20th
day of October, 2020.
The #EndSARS protests are the seeds of the Nigerian
revolution scattered to the winds. The massacre that took
place at the Lekki tollgate plaza watered the seeds, and it is
the destiny of the survivors to finish what was started with
the #EndSARS protests.
The #EndSARS protests were a practice run by the
Nigerian youth for the revolution that must happen, if we
are not to end up in an avoidable war. The Nigerian
revolution is not inevitable, and neither is the smoldering
ethnoreligious war that is either raging, or looming over
these lands, depending on your location. How?

#EndSARS as a Reaction
THE Nigerian youth is a citizen of the world. He is a global
citizen enmeshed in the pop culture of the western world,
the heady inventiveness of the Asians, the burgeoning
growth of the Arab world, he sees the Americans and their
many freedoms and contradictions, and he is a denizen of
the global village. But at home in Nigeria, he is not a citizen.

xxx
 I have spent a lot of time and effort in trying to persuade
the Nigerian, by deductive analogies and logic, to see how
we are all rendered serfs and slaves by the governing
systems and the fraudulent 1999 constitution, but nothing
that I have ever written or said in lectures and interviews,
have illustrated the point, better than the entirety of the
#EndSARS protests and its brutal put-down at the Lekki
Massacre of 20/10/20. I shall elaborate.
The #EndSARS protests were reactionary in conception
and execution. They were crystallised by the excesses of the
Nigerian police, and were in direct reaction to the venal
brutality of the police SARS units in particular. Having
decided that they had had enough of these excesses, the
conscious layers of the Nigerian youth movements, allied to
some politically-conscious celebrities, organised these
loosely coordinated protests with demands made on the
state to reform the Nigerian police; specifically, to scrap the
SARS units.
The widespread and general nature of police harassment
in the economically well-off southern part of Nigeria is
largely due to the fact that the richest Nigerians are to be
found in these parts, but the fact that the southerners are also
less respected by the law enforcement officers, who are not
necessarily all of northern origin.
The poor Northern Nigerian is more likely to have a
brother in the army, and or the police, that he might call if
and when he is accosted by the Nigeria State and its venal

xxxi
security forces, but the southerner is less likely to have a
brother on whom he might call. The southern Nigerian is
acculturated to paying the police, before his rights might be
recognised, or respected.
The Nigerian police officer, himself a victim of the
Nigeria State, is also the loyal enforcer of the impunity of the
Nigerian ruling class. Paid a pittance that guarantees
penury, he is rendered a disgrace to the name: police. The
Nigerian police is little different from the criminals that he
is pretending to catch, because in truth, that was the
systemic design. The Nigeria State has ensured that the
Nigerian police is kept in its current state, so that it might
never be able to fulfill its declared functions, and become a
law enforcement agency in a state ungoverned by laws.
The Nigerian police runs in the manner of a business
entity. The DPO, as explained by the afrobeat music
maverick, Fela, is the Branch Manager, the Police
Commissioner might be called the General Manager… you
can do the remaining approximations as your imagination
sees fit; but the IGP ‘Ilabe’ is the Chairman and MD of the
board. Whilst the upper management level might be well-
fed and rotund, the lower ranks are wickedly brutalised and
dehumanised. The Nigerian constabulary is one of the
poorest paid and resourced in the world, and this is not by
accident, but by systemic design.
Rendered vagabonds, impecunious, and serial
accessories to the virulent criminalities of the Nigerian

xxxii
ruling class and the immunities they enjoy from any form of
lawful retribution, the Nigerian policemen have embraced
their design purpose, and have become what they were
intended to be: enforcers not of the law, which they quickly
learnt means nothing, but of the will of the men who sit in
the seats of powers, and men, who are able to pay to have
the same unconscionable powers deployed in their services.
The Nigerian police is criminal ab initio.
The Nigerian youth, as I have explained, is a global
citizen, and this is more so in the cosmopolitan southern
states and in the Federal Capital Territory. He has largely
embraced the counter-cultures of the western world, and in
some cases the outward expressions of these cultures and
the totems. He is wearing his hair in dreadlocks, and he’s got
tattoos. He probably has a few piercings and earrings, and
he is somewhat forgetful of the harsh realities of his
Nigerian existence until he runs into the Nigerian police,
and he is reminded that whilst he might be a global citizen,
he is not a citizen in his own country.
These encounters with the Nigerian police, be that the
dreaded SARS units, or any of the several other units that
have become parts of the systemic terrorisation of the
Nigerian peoples, have left a lot of tears, blood, and gore in
its wake. Several families have been irreparably injured,
lives cut short, limbs lost, freedom denied, and lives ruined.
The SARS units are not only dreaded in the southern part
of the country, they are deeply hated and reviled. This is the

xxxiii
cauldron in which the reaction that was the #EndSARS
protests was born, and these were the factors that fed its
growth and popularity.

The response of the Nigeria State

THE response of the Nigeria State to the demands of the
protesters followed the usual predictable patterns, and was
painfully unimaginative in the extreme. The rulers
responded with the usual threats. Then they tried the
carrots, and looked for the bunnies to feed. The distinct lack
of a hierarchy, structure, and centralised authority, meant
that the state and its rulers soon found themselves with
nobody to bribe, intimidate, or otherwise browbeat into
submission.
When the usual carrots and stick had failed, the
government reluctantly engaged with the protesters. The
Nigerian government has always had a love for renaming
things, and in response to the popular demand for the
mothballing of the widely criticised SARS units, it promptly
and with automatic alacrity, renamed the SARS unit SWAT.
What was forgotten in the haste to douse the raging fire is
the rather minor fact, that the SARS unit had already been
renamed SWAT, just a few months before its new
christening ceremony. What was meant to pacify, only
served to inflame the situation: the eagle-eyed youth
pointed to this as further proof of the government’s

xxxiv
untrustworthiness. The trust deficit became a gulf, and the
Nigeria State, along with its Luddite and antediluvian
rulers, were left floundering for the trusted weapons of
choice; impunity and murderous force.
The demand that police brutality be ended, and that the
SARS unit be scrapped is, in truth, a disguised demand for
citizenship. And whilst the protesters did not appear to have
made this critical connection early, they would appear to
have cottoned on to this reality as the protests took hold, and
the government’s inability to engage honestly with the
protesters became undeniable. The more resolute the
protesters became, the more flummoxed the State became.
To end SARS is to end the support infrastructure that is
required to scaffold the reign of impunity that has Nigeria
in its stranglehold, and ultimately, end the absolute powers
enjoyed by the rulers. The Nigeria State, the evil rulers, and
the iniquitous governing systems responded true to type;
deployed its weapon of choice, violence against the
protesters.
Left without any card to play on the protesters, and
without any leverage to exploit, the Nigeria State at various
levels began to embrace the use of violence in its quest to
break the strike and to return to some sort of normalcy. In
Abuja, operatives of the DSS or some other state security
forces were seen and recorded openly coordinating counter
protests. These protests were initially comical and
nonviolent; street urchins were handed placards declaring

xxxv
love and support for the Nigerian police and the SARS unit,
and as the protests gained ground, the placards carried
upside down, quickly became machetes and cudgels.
The State-coordinated thugs began to attack southerners-
owned businesses in the Abuja metropolis. Car lots were set
on fire, the furniture market was torched, and at some point,
peaceful protesters were set upon and brutally attacked by
these thugs, and sometimes by the policemen themselves.
Peaceful protesters became serial subjects of ferocious
violence perpetrated by these State-sponsored miscreants
who were themselves victims of the iniquitous State.
In Benin, the prisons were breached, and the initial
attempts were to blame it on the #EndSARS protesters. The
emergence of the prisoners’ accounts of their escape began
to emerge soon enough, and it soon became apparent that
the prisoners were deliberately set free, and that the prison
break had nothing to do with the protesters, but were in
truth mere pawns in the government’s games.
The protesters in Osun were set upon by the usual
agencies and proxies of the State. Leaders of the protests
were serially harassed. Olawale Mandate Bakare was
targeted for special treatment by the DSS, and a series of
well-coordinated attacks were mounted against the
protesters. It quickly spiraled out of the control of the
government that embraced it. The governor’s convoy were
set upon by thugs, and cars were damaged and people
injured. The quick response was to blame the protesters for

xxxvi
the violence, but the governor himself contradicted these in
the face of the clear evidence. But it was all that was required
as excuse for arresting leaders of the Osun protests.
The Lagos theater of the protests was proving to be
resistant to the charms of the state government. The
governor oscillated between identifying with the protesters
to threatening them when they wouldn’t be pacified by the
usual tactics, and were not amenable to state control.
The Lagos protests were largely confined to two
locations: the Alausa protests, and the Lekki protests. The
first protesters to be visited with violence were those located
at the state secretariat in Alausa. On October 20, state-
branded buses were used to convey armed thugs from the
Agege axis of the state, led by one Adagun Osha, to attack
the protesters. They were repelled.
The Lekki protesters were pretty well-organised, and
their security consciousness and preparations for the
possibilities of armed attacks by sponsored thugs were
topnotch. This was a product of experience and not
paranoia.
The Lekki tollgate plaza had seen protests before, and
some protesters were veterans of the past skirmishes.
Previous attempts by the residents of Lekki to protest the
expropriation of the only road in and out of the peninsula
had been met with organised violence by the state
government and the owner of Lagos. The modus operandi was
pretty basic: peaceful protesters would be attacked by State-

xxxvii
sponsored thugs in some sort of counter protests, and the
police would set upon the protesters and arrest them for
Affray and Breach of Public Peace. The State thugs get to go
home, while the peaceful protesters would end up in police
cells.
The Lekki protesters deployed private security
personnel in securing the protest ground. The protesters
were impossible to engage as had been previously done, and
as preferred by the State. Lekki became a major headache for
the Jagaban franchise, and a major bone in the throat of the
Nigeria State. It was one thing to use uniformed and
ununiformed thugs to break peaceful protests, and as
demonstrated in Abuja and at Alausa, the Nigeria State, at
all levels, is fine with employing criminalised victims,
sufficiently armed to do its dirty work. But the Lagos
situation demanded more; the protesters were entrenched.

The Denouement
Oro’modie ko mo Awodi, iya eh lo mo Asa. The chick has no
knowledge of the gosling hawk but its mother knows all the
raptors in the skies.
As I watched the unfolding scenarios nationwide, I
became convinced that the Nigerian youth had stumbled
into a revolutionary moment in the sad history of the
Nigerian peoples. It became obvious to me that we were at
an inflection point in the trajectories of the Nigeria State, its

xxxviii
rulers, and the peoples. I knew that something simply had
to give. I was deeply worried and equally excited about
what was unfolding before my eyes.
The protests started as a reaction against police brutality,
but it quickly began to take on a life of its own. The long
suppressed and unexpressed grievances of the Nigerian
peoples began to emerge, and the creative energies of the
Nigerian youth were unleashed. Long unheard-of faith in
the Nigerian enterprise emerged as the youth began to
recognise the clear commonalities of their collective
afflictions.
Nigerians began to speak in nationalist tongues, and
ethnoreligious divides were being rapidly bridged. The
Christian protesters physically ring-fenced their Muslim
comrades during Friday prayers, ensuring that they had
protection as they prayed, and the Muslims stood as
Christians worshipped on Sunday.
Mazi Nnamdi Kanu spoke to Nigerian unity in the wake
of the protests.
The Nigeria State is happy to speak with violent
terrorists, it has absolutely no problem with kidnappers,
hostage-takers and militants of all sorts, but it has never had
room for engagement with citizens. It has no template for
such engagements because it has no room for the mutual
accommodation of its rapacious rulers, bred on impunity,
and the lawful demands of the citizens, and the obligations
and restraints that that would place on the rulers.

xxxix
 When confronted by demands for citizenship rights, the
Nigeria State never failed to respond with violence.
The murderous end of the #EndSARS protests were a
tragedy foretold.
In November 1993, as the pro-June 12 national protests
began to bite deep, the Nigeria State began to lose its fear
factor. I was a student at the Lagos State University, LASU,
and a participant in the revolt against military rule.
The LASU corridor, Oyingbo to Okomaiko, had a lot of
military formations dotting the landscape, and military
personnel were pretty ubiquitous in the neighborhood.
There was the Signals Barracks at Mile 2, the Navy Town at
Ojo, and the Army Cantonment, also at Ojo. Military
personnel were part of our daily lives. They announced their
presence as “staff” on the buses, and wouldn’t pay the fares.
This changed as the rebellion took hold.
The Nigerian peoples began to realise that power did not
begin and end in the barrels of guns. The labour movements
shook the country to its very foundations. One of the earliest
indicators of the newfound boldness of the Nigerian was the
refusal of Lagos bus drivers to accept that military or police
personnel ride for free as before.
The bus drivers and conductors could count on the
passengers to support them in demanding that men in
uniform pay their bus fares. Every bus was being powered
by Black Market fuel, and these were mostly sourced from
markets exclusively supplied by the security forces, which

xl
had control of the distribution system, upon the Kokori-led
NUPENG strike.
The streets became hostile towards the military, who
were widely blamed for the annulment of a popular
democratic mandate.
The General Sani Abacha regime was birthed in the
midst of the national paralysis that followed the annulment
of the election. The regime reestablished governmental
authority by violent suppression of the popular will, and the
peaceful protests that had ventilated same.
Soldiers were deployed to all the theaters of protests;
protesters and passers-by alike were brutally attacked with
deadly force. I personally witnessed the wanton killings on
the length of Ikorodu Road between the November 12-16; I
saw the brutal efficiency of the Nigeria State and its killing
machine close-up. Memories of this season began to come to
me as the #EndSARS protests took on a life of its own.

Unmasking the Fascist State

THE refusal of the protesters to fit into any of the acceptable
and known moulds endangered the Nigeria State and its evil
rulers. This was also the factor that rendered the violent
reactions of the State pretty much a fait accompli. Unable to
dislodge the protesters by guile, bribery, and or the use of
conventional violence, the Nigeria State became
increasingly desperate. And the Lagos rulers, losing revenue

xli
at the Lekki cashcow, became just as desperate for the
protests to end. The desperation of both levels of power
became the breeding ground for the evil that was unveiled
at both the Lekki tollgate, and at the Alausa protest ground.
“We did not invite the soldiers” was retorted by “you invited
us.” “Blanks were fired by soldiers” soon gave way to “the
soldiers were carrying blanks and live bullets”.
“Nobody was killed” soon transmuted to “one person died”
and then it became two.
The truth of what happened that fateful evening, after
the LCC had acted to remove high-resolution cameras at the
tollgate, switched off the lights for the first time, and clearly
coordinated itself and staff with the invading soldiers, might
never be known, but the many parties to the crimes against
humanity have lied enough for the truth to be apparent to
all seekers of truth. The mask of democracy came off, and
the beast of fascist impunity bestrode the land in the evening
of 20/10/20.

The Shiite parallel

IN December 2015, then newly appointed Chief of Army
Staff, Lt. Gen. Tukur Yusuf Buratai was in a convoy of
soldiers driving to the palace of the Emir of Zaria when he
ran into a procession of Shiite Muslims, who were in one of
the several religious processions, for which they are rather
notorious.

xlii
 The thing is, the Shiite are a religious minority, much
reviled by the Sunni Muslims, and particularly more so by
the Wahhabis that forms the mainstream of Islamic thoughts
in the northern part of the country.
The soldiers turned their guns on the Shiite, and left a
bloodbath in its wake.
Shiite sources placed the death toll close to a thousand,
but the army initially denied that its men had killed anyone.
Then it admitted to a couple of deaths. The panel of enquiry
set up by the Kaduna State Government was to establish the
death of about 347 Shiite men, women, and children. No
soldier was ever sanctioned for these murders, and Tukur
Buratai was still in office as the COAS when the army was
deployed to break the #EndSARS protests! It is only the
Justice Doris Okuwobi panel, that might be able to establish
a figure for the casualties. But enough lies have been told to
establish a semblance of truth.
The Nigerian army murdered peaceful and unarmed,
flag-waving, national anthem-singing protesters. Soldiers
opened fire on defenseless civilians, and the Lagos State
Government, who had invited the soldiers in order to regain
control of the tollgate, was an accessory before and after the
serial murders that it had consciously commissioned. The
LCC, actively coordinated with the soldiers, and is a major
party in the serial murders and countless injuries.
The denials that followed in the wake of the evil done by
the State and its evil rulers has provided a more telling

xliii
testament of the diabolical nature of all the participants, but
the insidious nature of the evil does not become apparent
until one considers the fact that there was a live Instagram
feed of the evening’s events. This was, however, not enough
to deter conscious men from denying the evidence of their
senses, and the truth of the evil that has befallen Nigeria.
I shall allow others to deal with the history of the
#EndSARS protests. How the Doris Okuwobi panel pans out
shall also be left for history to chronicle. My task and
purpose are a tad too urgent to await the pens and judgment
of history, for the very future of the Nigeria State and its
victimised peoples might depend on the success of this and
several other efforts in the same direction.
It is my purpose to draw on the lessons afforded by the
#EndSARS protests, the murderous suppression of same, the
several events triggered by it, and influenced by it to shape
the nature of the Nigerian revolution and or liberation
struggles, going forward.

********

The Nigerian Reality

NIGERIANS are locked in a feudal-fascist dictatorship. This

dictatorship works on the assumption of class cohesion
within the ruling class, who must not be confused with a
political class, for political classes everywhere in the world

xliv
depend on the endorsement of the citizens of the country for
validation and revalidation of their electoral mandates. The
political class in Nigeria is unencumbered by the wishes of
the Nigerian peoples, who having been denied citizenship,
are not in truth or reality, the electors of the Nigerian ruling
class.
The loss of citizenship and the resultant impotence of the
Nigerian vote are aptly illustrated in the national election
cycles. In the southern part of Nigeria, there is a gallant
pretense of voting during elections, but some factors have
conspired to render such efforts largely fallacious, and
misleading in the extreme. In the Yoruba homelands, away
from the bright lights and cameras of Lagos, the popular
phrase is “Di’bo, se’be”. This literally translates to: vote and
cook stew. This is a system that exchanges the vote for a pot
of soup.
The party agent would be at a vantage point, he would
sight the ballot held up by the voter, and having confirmed
that the electorate had voted for his party’s candidate, he
pays the agreed price for the exchange. The amount paid
would vary from location to location, and the closer the
disputation amongst the thieves is adjudged, the more
expensive or relatively expensive the ballot becomes. The
going rates in the 2020 Ondo election oscillated between
N5,000 to N10,000. The epidemic of hunger in the land,
accentuated by the weaponised poverty in the country, has

xlv
rendered the vote useless, and assured that Nigeria has a
democracy that offers no right of choice.
When the people do manage to express their imperfect
will, as was the case during the last gubernatorial elections
in Osun State, the unbridled powers founded on impunity,
assures that they are silenced. Inconclusive elections might
have originated in Kogi, the maneuver was perfected in
Osun State, just as ‘Ade Dancer’ appeared poised to defeat
the incumbent governor of the state.
The near magical transformation of Iyiola Omisore from
venal pirate to saint, and the immediate evaporation of his
criminal charges, should engage the attention of historians
in the future, but of particular importance are the words of
Adams Oshiomhole; one a Freudian slip, the other, a class
declaration of intent and consensus.
“Join the APC and all of your sins are forgiven” and “if
you cannot bear the pains of RIGGING, get out of politics.”
I am not sure it is possible for the Nigerian political class to
be more direct in telling us exactly where they have us.
The purpose of the fascist State is pretty simple, and its
ruthless efficiency is found in the simplicity of its declared
objective: retain power at all and any cost. The Nigerian
ruling class is united in its determination to keep the peoples
underfoot; and regardless of their private vituperations the
general truth is that the peoples do not matter in the
cogitations of the rulers, and are constantly discounted and
dismissed when the affairs of state are being considered. The

xlvi
welfare of the ruling class, and the preservation of the
governing systems are the sole preoccupation of the Nigeria
State.

xlvii
 “
The demand for a change in the way
Nigeria is governed started with the
Nigerian people. The need for this
change had become obvious to the
people much earlier and the first
attempt at the expression of that
desire is the botched elections of 1993.
Even though most of us, at the time,
did not understand the actual purports
of our exertion, what was clear to all
was that Nigerians were simply tired
of the way the country was being
governed.

xlviii
 Chapter 1
Change not Violence, the need to educate

I
am ordinarily an incredibly careful person in the
manner of my use of words. I have been adjudged
guilty of what some have described as linguistic
exactitude, and I have been told that I can be quite
argumentative about the specific definition of words. I am
not one to use words lightly. I use the word revolution with
clarity on the exact import of the word, in the context in
which I have used it. The word revolution appears
generously in this book; it is the entire preoccupation of the
text. I seek to persuade the people to accept that the only
way to save our country is by endorsing a revolution.
The experience of the orange revolution called by
Omoyele Sowore has brought home for me the very idea
that had led me to originally decide to write this book, and
the others I am writing. Because I realise that if you do not
carefully define the content of the revolution you seek, you
leave it to the system to define it in the term that suits the
system. And, that term has always been to cast the
revolutionary as a man of violence, who is seeking a violent
overthrow of a just and lawful order and society.
Contemporary usage of the word revolution would tend to

1
IMPERATIVES OF THE NIGERIAN REVOLUTION

lend credence to that thinking, particularly amongst the

intellectually incurious and the mentally indolent.
It is easy to forget that Gandhi led a nonviolent
revolution to free the Indian sub-continent. They forget that
Nelson Mandela led a non-violent revolution to shake off the
apartheid system in South Africa. It is equally conveniently
forgotten that there have been several peaceful movements
for change all over the world that have led to revolutions.
Revolutions are not always to be confused with violent
overthrow of a government by the popular revolt of the
people. It is not always about violence. To buttress this
point, I would refer us to the etymology of the word
revolution.
Revolution derives from the Latin word revolvere
or revolutio, which simply means for something to revolve,
indicating a turn-around, a roll-back, which does not
necessarily connote a forceful change of Government.
I doubt that there will be any Nigerian alive today who
does not accept that there is a need for Nigeria to have some
sort of course correction, which is essentially a revolution.
The average Nigerian has a rather fearful reaction every
time the word revolution is mentioned.
It is not unlike the viscerally fearful response of the
monkey anytime it comes across a snake or anything that
looks like one. It naturally reacts even when it had never
seen one before in its life and even when the snake is non-
poisonous. The response of every monkey, hard-wired into

2
 ‘Dele Farotimi

its DNA, is to always jump in fright once confronted by

anything that looks like a snake.
Every time the average Nigerian hears the word
revolution, he is already conditioned by the accident of our
history to respond with fear because the word has come to
conjure fear and war.
This is not without reason.
The first coup in Nigeria, the Kaduna Nzeogu coup, was
announced as a revolution. In fact, a revolutionary council
was announced in the immediate aftermath of that coup by
Major Nzeogu himself. Consistently thereafter, every one of
the successive military regimes birthed by coup d’état has
always sought to market itself as being revolutionary. But
what we must all pay attention to is the persistence with
which the word revolution features in every would-be
liberator’s vocabulary in Nigeria. This only serves to
strengthen the argument that practically every Nigerian
regardless of class, tribe or religion has come to the point of
understanding that we cannot make appreciable progress
working within our existing system.
It is very tempting to imagine that the fear for the word
revolution is peculiar to Nigeria; it is not. In fact, the entire
African continent and Latin America share some
commonality in this regard.
The farther you are away from the right of the people to
choose for themselves how they are to be led, the more likely

3
IMPERATIVES OF THE NIGERIAN REVOLUTION

that pseudo-revolutionaries would market their power-

capture enterprise as revolutions.
Africa has been particularly blighted by generations of
violent coup plotters who have tagged themselves
revolutionaries, named their government revolutionary,
whilst wrecking the people mercilessly in their self-
motivated power-capture and adventure, which with scant
exceptions, have been anything but revolutionary.
It is quite easy to understand the phobia of the Nigerian
for the term revolution, especially once viewed through the
prisms of our recent history.
The demand for a change in the way Nigeria is governed
started with the Nigerian people. The need for this change
had become obvious to the people much earlier and the first
attempt at the expression of that desire is the botched
elections of 1993. Even though most of us, at the time, did
not understand the actual purports of our exertion, what
was clear to all was that Nigerians were simply tired of the
way the country was being governed.
Nobody had diagnosed our problems with any measure
of exactitude, but the desires expressed for a break from the
status quo were apparent. The election of 1993 was
revolutionary in its scope and perhaps, if one takes a closer
look, one will find that it remains till date the singular pan-
Nigerian mandate, where the people openly expressed their
will. But of course, we have always misinterpreted the

4
 ‘Dele Farotimi

significance of that event and, the import of the annulment

itself.
In the 1993 election, the Nigerian people found their
voices. They might have been incoherent, they might have
voted for different reasons, their motivations might have
diverged, but they spoke. They spoke with their votes. They
expressed their will. The tribes and religions didn’t matter
for the very first time. Abiola dared to be a Nigerian, and the
Nigerian peoples, across the ethnic and religious divides,
across economic and social classes, spoke. They spoke as
one, and resoundingly voted for a Muslim-Muslim ticket.
The differences did not matter.
But because Nigeria is not a space that was ever designed
to be ruled based on equality and justice, it was dangerous
to allow Abiola’s mandate. To allow the mandate to stand
would have been a coup against the owners of the Nigeria
enterprise. Thus, the citizenship that was validated by the
exercise of the electoral rights of the Nigerian on the 12th
day of June 1993, was brutally abrogated by the subsequent
annulment of that election. The Nigeria State has not
recovered from the tragedy that the annulment is.
The Buhari project was itself a revolutionary fraud in
which Buhari was sold as the change (I discussed this at
great extent in Do Not Die in their War).
Buhari took advantage of the clamour for change and
Tinubu did a fantastic job of marketing a man incapable of
change as the change that was to come. But Nigerians

5
IMPERATIVES OF THE NIGERIAN REVOLUTION

collectively failed to query the content of the change that

was marketed to them, and the result of that failure to ask
pertinent questions is why we are in the mess we are in
today, because the change was never defined.
The change that I seek today is defined. I defined it in Do
Not Die in their War. There is a 59-page constitution attached
to the text, encapsulating the change that I seek.
So, this is not a call to violence, but a call to a necessary
change.

********

AS I have confessed extensively in Do Not Die in their War, I

was once upon a time a Buharididirin… or maybe I’m a tad
too hard on myself, perhaps I stopped at being a Buharist. I
voted Buhari in every election until 2015 when I did not vote
for him, and I have explained why. The fraud that he is, was
already obvious the moment he found the grace to run on
the platform of the APC, which, as I have already explained,
is merely a conglomeration of the thinking thieves of the
ACN, the rump of the old AD, the thinking thieves that were
already in the PDP, who came as the new PDP led by Saraki
and others.
The moment I saw the platform that was coalescing
around Buhari, it was already glaring that it was going to be
business as usual and it became easier to see him for exactly
who he is, the ethnic irredentist who merely enjoys the idea

6
 ‘Dele Farotimi

of power, not because he wants power for any purpose, but

because he enjoys the pomp of the office.
The moment I saw that, as I have already explained in
the original essay, in a democracy that is completely devoid
of choice, I became so despondent, that I elected to sit out
the election. I could not bring myself to vote for either
Jonathan, who had been properly and very charitably
defined as a clueless crook (but perhaps we have also been
uncharitable because it is the system itself we all should
have been focusing on) nor vote for Buhari. But the beauty
of the Buhari presidency is that it finally put a lie to all the
assumptions we always had that anyone could by sheer
force of character change the Nigeria System.
By 2016-2017, my disillusionment with the system had
become complete, and I was beginning to toy with the idea
of running for the presidency, solely with the intention of
seeking to change the narrative. I felt that if I ran for office,
with a clear programme including the constitution that was
eventually annexed to the book, it would force a change in
the narrative. I was quite optimistic that this was the way to
go, but events leading up to the 2019 election, began to help
me to re-assess my options.
The first of these events was the emergence in the
presidential race of certain eminently qualified members of
my generation. I speak of Omoyele Sowore, Kingsley
Moghalu, Fela Durotoye -- all of who emerged in the race
and helped me to further clarify my thoughts. Fela Durotoye

7
IMPERATIVES OF THE NIGERIAN REVOLUTION

is married to a lady who was my junior in the university, a

cherished younger sister, Tara. I have known Fela since he
was a little younger and he has always been a very precise
man. Sometime in early 2018, Fela sent me a text asking for
a meeting. I was not too surprised when he informed me at
the meeting we eventually had, of his intention to run for
president.
I recall telling Fela at the end of the meeting that, whilst
I did not know exactly what I would be doing in 2019, I did
know that I intended to have a role and a say in what would
happen in 2019. That would eventually prove not to be the
case. But I warrant that I had merely jumped ahead of myself
and misplaced the context of the engagement the Nigeria
State and I shall yet have.
I have a reputation for speaking with absolute certainty
about events that have defined my life, long before the
events themselves become reality. This book, and the cause
it advances are no exception to this rule.
I lay no claim to having been handed a manual by God
on some mountain somewhere, this is simply a function of
my God-given capacity to know myself, and thereby predict
what I would do, given a particular scenario to respond to.

Knowing myself, and knowing what I’d do, knowing my
environment and knowing what the different actors would
do, have assured that I am able to make rational deductions,
and draw logical conclusions. I always knew that the day
would come when the Nigeria State and I would have

8
 ‘Dele Farotimi

questions to ask of each other. I am blessed to have lived to

see the day I have waited my entire life for this day. But I
will go back in time to offer you glimpses into how my
relationship with the Nigeria State was shaped.

********

MY earliest memories were that of living with my

grandmother at Inalende, Ibadan. My sojourn in my
grandmother’s home ended with my mother’s return to
Nigeria just before I was to start Primary Class 4, and I left
Inalende to live with my mother in her new home at Ojoo.
This movement also meant a change of school, and I was
transferred to Abadina Primary School 2 in Abadina Village,
within the precinct of the University of Ibadan.
The
University of Ibadan had a primary school for the children
of the senior staff, and it was properly named the UI Staff
School. There was also the Abadina Primary school,
purposed for the children of the junior staff. Those living
close to the university campus would seek to have their
children sent to this second primary school, and my mother,
or Iya Wale as I would fondly call her, ensured that I was
transferred there from St. Stephen’s Primary School
Inalende.


The University of Ibadan campus was a whole different
kettle of fish from the streets of Inalende, Ode-Olo,
Oniyanrin, Mokola, and the others.

9
IMPERATIVES OF THE NIGERIAN REVOLUTION

I went into Abadina in 1976/77 session and began the

task of familiarising myself with my new environment. I
discovered this weird collection of young men and women,
who seemed to have their heads stuck in the clouds of
knowledge that appeared to abound everywhere I turned. I
discovered the children’s library next to the International
Conference Centre and became a habitué.

I was in the library when we first heard the gunshots, and
then the noises. People running around and wailing about
soldiers and policemen shooting at students! Then arrived
the air that bit the eyes, nose, and made the senses weep
uncontrollably! Afterwards, the mad rush through
Olorogun Stream to get out of the campus.
I was 9 years old at the time I witnessed the “Ali Must
Go” riots, and took the same bush paths with the others to
escape the killing machine of the Nigeria State.
The
introduction I was given to the Nigeria State was further
reinforced just a few years later, and it is amazing to me
now, how much the episode impacted on my perspectives
on the Nigeria State.
Bola Ige or Uncle Bola, as he came to be known, the
popular and charismatic governor of Oyo State, and of the
popular opposition party, the UPN, had just lost his bid for
re-election. The thing was, so had practically all the UPN
governors around the country. The UPN branded it an
electoral fraud, and the populace declared it a fraud.


10
 ‘Dele Farotimi

The citizens protested the theft with vehemence. Sunday

Adewusi, the National Party of Nigeria, NPN-appointed
Inspector General of Police, unveiled the Nigeria State to me,
and forever defined its character indelibly. The Nigerian
Police was brutally efficient in putting down the justified
protests of the disenfranchised, but the state stamped its
most important message into my consciousness: it has no
respect for popular will and thinks nothing of
disenfranchising the would-be citizens.
The purpose of power in Nigeria is the preservation of
the State; not the protection of the citizens and, or the
society.

In 1984/1985 session, I was enrolled at the Oyo State
College of Arts and Sciences, otherwise known as OSCAS,
in Ile-Ife. I had failed to pass enough papers in the West
Africa Examinations Council-organised Ordinary Level
School Certificate Examination, after two attempts, to be
admitted to the university, and whilst my father reckoned
that it might not be a bad idea for me to learn a trade, my
mother would have none of it. OSCAS was for me, the Last
Chance Salon, and I was dedicated to my studies,
determined to join my childhood crush, who was by then a
Part II student at the University of Ife. That dedication to my
studies, earned me the lifelong anointing that clarified my
views of the Nigeria State.
OSCAS was a non-residential school; we lived in the
houses all around Ondo Road where it was located. Some

11
IMPERATIVES OF THE NIGERIAN REVOLUTION

students were natives and lived in the town of Ife, and even
back then, there were the inane arguments of the existence
of another town called Modakeke…
I have always thought that the distinction belittles those
making it on both sides. I came from the melting pot of
Ibadan, and the whole place wasn’t larger than a tiny piece
of my childhood home.
But as usual I have digressed.

********

Exposure to the character of Nigeria State

ON the Lord’s day in question, it must have been sometime
in April or May; this I can tell because I was preparing to
rewrite my WAEC for the third time, and I was the most
serious and dedicated I had ever been to my profession of
studentship. There had been some problems in the school
earlier that morning, the University of Ife had sneezed, and
OSCAS had caught a cold. You see, it wasn’t enough for
them to come and take any fine girl in OSCAS, they would
also bring their Aluta to us. The scheduled lectures were
cancelled, and I was walking to school to read, a decision
which proved to be ill-advised.
A fresh skirmish had broken out between the students
and the police, and I had walked into it close to the school
gate. I ran like everyone would, when they would hear

12
 ‘Dele Farotimi

gunshots, and sniffed teargas; I knew the neighbourhood

inside out, so I used back roads, involving walking through
compounds, and scaling dwarf fences.
I was about 20 meters from my hostel, when I walked
into a police officer. He greeted me with a resounding slap.
Igbati olooyi! I collapsed to the ground, dazed and confused.
My books were scattered around me. I was all of 16 years
old; a runt, and clearly a harmless kid to any discerning
being. He stood over me with his gun in hand, but he must
have been touched in some way by the spirit of God. He
walked away without any word, but he had slapped my
eyes open.

I was originally admitted into Lagos State University at
the age of 17. Street protests by students against the excesses
of the military dictatorships ruling Nigeria had defined our
collective childhood, and here we were as young
adolescents, battling another set of military dictatorship led
by General Ibrahim Badamosi Babangida. The brutality of
the Nigeria State is better imagined than to be lived. The
citizens’ rights simply evaporated, and the inequities
amplified.
I had all the precocious energies of youth, and I was a
participant in every “riot” that pockmarked the IBB years. I
was an adrenaline junky.
Freed from the strictures of my mother’s mother-hen
checks, Arokean Bogey with newfound freedom, finally in the
university, and feeling ‘amongst’, I was to be found

13
IMPERATIVES OF THE NIGERIAN REVOLUTION

wherever a protest was called, and excitement to be had. I

had waited all of three years to enjoy the freedom that being
a university student offered my generation, not the pains
being endured by today’s youth, where the very best of our
universities are hardly worth the name, and the capacity for
independent thoughts, are brutally suppressed.
It was in this season of my life that I saw the Nigeria State
in its evil nudity. I could see the inequities and inequalities
in a manner beyond my age, and I knew that the State had
no moral integrity to speak of. But I also learnt important
lessons about the citizens, which I have only began to
appreciate, as I have grown older, and hopefully wiser.
The Nigerian citizens are disconnected from the struggle
for their freedom. Something has stuck with me from those
years; it is the detachment of the Nigerian citizens, from the
struggle for their emancipation.

********

LASU in 1985 was a rather bucolic environment. Cows did

compete with humanity for walking rights, and we killed
snakes in some of our residences and classrooms. We were
part of a thriving community of Alaba traders, mostly of Igbo
origins. The Hausa and several people of Northern Nigerian
extractions were also our neighbours. Alaba Rago, Karambosa,
and the Ojo Cantonment, assured that. Proximity to the
Benin borders, sprinkled in a generous mix of West Africans,

14
 ‘Dele Farotimi

mostly from the francophone region.

Whenever we would

have occasion to rise against something done by the military
junta (and there were several protests – the “SAP riots” – as
they were called), some schools somewhere would expel
some students, and LASU would be in the vanguard of the
reactionary protests that the progressive movements would
call. Our neighbours would look at us as though we were
mad; and I rarely knew of any that believed that we were
doing the right thing. They were almost always detached
from the struggle. This detachment was always rationalised
somehow because the same people, would complain about
the same pains that had propelled the students in the first
place.
By the time I returned to LASU as a law student in the
1991/92 session, I had had all the youthful exuberance and
idiocies slapped out of my head, and I was unavailable as a
pawn in anybody’s games. I could discern the foolishness of
the Nigerian Left, the dominant tendencies in the civil rights
movements, in their asinine assumption that the people
would simply follow their noble leadership, and that the
powers of their personal examples and sacrifices would
propel the citizens into demanding their freedom. The need
to educate the people was not apparent to them, perhaps
because they had presumed knowledge to a people that
remain unaware of their fetters. Many traders would glower
at us for not allowing them to open their shops, even as we

15
IMPERATIVES OF THE NIGERIAN REVOLUTION

bled and died for what we were convinced were the

common good.
The Nigeria State is yoked to an evil system. Agents and
agencies of State are not accountable to the people, and
nothing that they would do to retain the evil integrity of the
governance system is deemed criminal.
The murder of Kunle Sonowo in LASU further cemented
my views as to the ruthless and murderous nature of the
Nigeria State. It is one of those events that have shaped my
engagements with the amoral system. I am not under any
illusions about its evil, I am never surprised by its brutality,
but I am not persuaded that anything would change, except
the people are related to the struggle for their freedom.
Two examples would appear to validate this position,
and I shall share them to allow you judge if my conclusions
be right or wrong.

********

Lion no dey born goat…

SEUN is the true son of his illustrious father, Fela. Fela
would be proud of his son. Seun it was, that shared an
insight with the Nigerian people. Something that Fela had
told his son, and that the son had considered apposite to tell
at the time.

16
 ‘Dele Farotimi

After the Obasanjo-ordered invasion of Kalakuta

Republic, resulting in the death of his mother, Fela had risen
up and refused to be cowed, he had taken his mother’s coffin
in a protest march to Dodan Barracks, the then seat of the
military junta led by his townsman, Obasanjo.
Fela
presumed that the Nigerian peoples, on whose behalf he had
always acted, and for whose rights he had made several
personal sacrifices, would follow his lead, and be inspired
by the power of his personal example. He was to be
disappointed and heartbroken by the realisation that he was
literally on his own.
To understand just how much pain Fela was in at the
time, listen to his song, “Look and Laugh”. The pains of his
experiences came across as rather raw. I have had occasion
to be convinced after several years of listening to the song,
that Fela was weeping as he sang.
There is a more recent example, and one to which I am
tangentially related. When Yele Sowore declared the Orange
Revolution for August 5, 2019, I was furious. I was
unsparing in my criticism of the call. I was convinced that it
would fail, and I was even angrier at what I believed was his
rash endangerment of the like of me, who were left with no
choice, but to join the fray, once the imbecilic agents of the
state responded with predictable idiocy.
I have since gained knowledge and better understanding
of Yele’s perspectives and intentions, as I will explain in due

17
IMPERATIVES OF THE NIGERIAN REVOLUTION

course. But an episode in the legends of August 5, 2019,

defines the point that I have laboured to make.

********
Iya Onifufu
THE legend is often told of a revolutionary woman in
Osogbo. She was arrested for her part in the protest marking
the Orange Revolution in the city of Osogbo, and the
uniqueness of her story is found in the details I read an
interview that she had given to the press in the immediate
aftermath of her release from the detention that followed her
arrest.
In response to a question asking how she came to be
arrested as an Orange Revolutionary, Iya Onifufu laid bare
the errors of the would-be Nigerian liberators.
She had been
hawking her fufu on the day, and she happened upon the
protesting youth made up as always of the Nigerian
students of higher education. She was attracted to the
turmoil, and she asked the reason for their exertions. The
youthful revolutionaries offered her a crash course in
political education, and Iya onifufu became a converted
revolutionary. The tray of fufu was thereafter abandoned,
and mama in the manner of Christ’s fishermen disciples,
became a soldier of the revolution.
When a person is related to the battle, they fight with no
regard to their personal safety; the interests that are intrinsic

18
 ‘Dele Farotimi

to the fight suffices as sufficient motivation. But the duty to

educate and connect the people to the struggle for their
freedom, is not one that has always engaged the attention of
the Nigerian progressive movement. This disconnect
weakens any impact on the system, and delegitimises the
exertions made, devalues the sacrifices, and discounts the
pains of the ones that have sought to lead the people to
freedom.
These examples have taught me that you cannot revolt
on a people’s behalf, and that nothing will change in Nigeria,
until the Nigerian peoples are connected to the battles for
their own liberation.

19
 “
The problem with Nigeria is that
because we have for long
misdiagnosed the problem, we have
also always been left constantly
reacting. So, in place of revolutions,
we have had implosions, and the
Nigeria State has like every repressive
regime all over the world, been the
ultimate beneficiary when there is a
resort to violence. The Nigeria State is
a purveyor of violence, until very
recently, when its many lies and
inconsistencies, birthed the several
contradictions that have ensured that
it no longer has the monopoly of
violence.

20
 Chapter 2
The fallacy of the inevitability
of a Nigerian revolution

W
hen knowledge is coupled with intellectual
arrogance, there is an abiding idiocy that
results, and that is the one that presumes that
every person with whom the knowledgeable comes into
contact or conflict, understands and knows what the
knowledgeable does.
I had touched on this subject in the foregoing section,
where I explained how the Nigerian left has always
presumed that the Nigerian people on whose behalf they
have laboured, had understanding of the issues that agitates
them, or that they appreciate the sacrifices they are making.
This assumption has led to a critical disconnect between
those who presume to lead the people in their liberation, and
the people that they purport to lead.
This presumption of correctness combined with
intellectual arrogance of the most infantile sort, has robbed
the Nigerian Left of the wisdom to realise that there is an
existential and important need to bridge the gap between
themselves and the army by which they might ever hope, to
one day, peacefully change the Nigeria State. There is a
presumption in the mind of the Nigerian Left that, for an

21
IMPERATIVES OF THE NIGERIAN REVOLUTION

exceedingly long time, has hampered its capacity to affect

the society and this has always been the presumption of the
inevitability of the Nigerian revolution. I am not sorry to say
that the Nigerian Left and even every one of those that had
taken time to look at the Nigerian situation, have almost
always fallen into this fallacy of the inevitability of the
Nigerian revolution.
The Nigerian revolution is not inevitable. I shall explain
this stance to show that this is truly the case. There is a
popular quote by Kwame Nkrumah that I would like to
recommend to us. I would also seek to use a deconstruction
of the sentence that makes the quote as a way to emphasise
the lesson that I seek to drive home in this section.
Kwame Nkrumah says, “Revolutions are brought about by
men, who think as men of action and act as men of thought.”
Revolutions are generally the result of deliberate thought
through measures that had anticipated the events because of
the repetitive nature of every system, and then in
anticipation of the events, planned responses ahead of time.
There is a critical difference between responses and
reactions. Responses are the thought-through plans that
were made in anticipation of events. Reactions are what we
do that were not previously planned, in response to events.
One is thought-through, the other is not.
Violence is the language of the ineloquent, the
disenfranchised who has lost the capacity to explain his
pains. Violence is either linguistic or physical. There is a

22
 ‘Dele Farotimi

correlation between the readiness to swear and the level of a

man’s culture and education. When a man has sufficient
words in his vocabulary with which to express himself, the
chances of his being ready to resort to swear words are
severely limited. It is unlikely that you would hear a man in
the British parliament use a swear word or a phrase that calls
a man a “fucking liar,” surely not in the chamber. He will
probably accuse a man of “being economical with the truth.”
It is the same thing that has been said in both instances, but
one is said with “civility”, whilst the other is said violently,
a reflection almost always of the person’s social standing,
and/or intelligence.
The problem with Nigeria is that because we have for
long misdiagnosed the problem, we have also always been
left constantly reacting. So, in place of revolutions, we have
had implosions, and the Nigeria State has like every
repressive regime all over the world, been the ultimate
beneficiary when there is a resort to violence. The Nigeria
State is a purveyor of violence, until very recently, when its
many lies and inconsistencies, birthed the several
contradictions that have ensured that it no longer has the
monopoly of violence. The Nigeria State happily deploys
violence against its citizens as I had explained in the
previous chapter, and almost always is happiest when it is
also challenged with violence.

********

23
IMPERATIVES OF THE NIGERIAN REVOLUTION

Disunited Progressives
THE language of the Nigerian progressive has always been
the language of conciliation, but it has also not allowed itself
to take advantage of the knowledge that it has of the system
within which it functions. I have witnessed two inflection
points in Nigerian history where the populace was clearly
ready for a revolution, but there was no leadership to
provide the alternative that would have galvanised one.
I speak specifically of the June 12, 1993 election as the
first. After the election itself, which had Nigerians
expressing a national will, for the first time in my lifetime,
the people rose as one to demand the validation of the
election results won clearly by Moshood Abiola.
The election in itself was already a revolutionary election
because for the first time, you had a Yoruba Muslim running
on the same ticket with a Northern Muslim, and Nigerians
across all the geopolitical zones had no problem whatsoever,
giving a very resounding valid mandate to this ticket.
Nigerians looked beyond tribe, religion and responded to
the empathy of the man, Moshood Abiola, and the sheer
force of his character unified the Nigerian people. The
annulment was not so much a brutal and evil action, but was
also one where the powers that be in Nigeria were showing
how little they thought of the sovereign will of the Nigerian
people.

24
 ‘Dele Farotimi

The events galvanised the opposition, hitherto

competing forces became aligned, NADECO was formed,
demands were made over time for a constitutional
conference, but ultimately, the opposition lacked the will to
mobilise an alternative on a nationalist platform. All that
happened was as a result of the agitations for the validations
of the June 12 election. The Abacha regime was birthed
because of an assumption by the progressives that they
could work within the system, to achieve that which they
ought to have known could only have been achievable by
working with the Nigerian people. The system emerged
from that season, stronger and reinvented, and birthed
Obasanjo.
The second opportunity came in December 2011/ January
2012: the fuel subsidy protest. As I watched the emerging
movement, I worried because I saw no leadership; instead, I
saw forces that were already aligned to the State, forces
controlled by Bola Ahmed Tinubu at the time, who were
masquerading as progressives. I saw them taking active
roles in the organisation and prosecution of those rallies. I
saw compromised human rights activists waxing lyrical at
Ojota. I realised very quickly that we had squandered yet
another opportunity at building a nationalist platform for
the demand of a turnaround.
The Nigeria State emerged from that season stronger. It
reinvented itself and the birth of Muhammadu Buhari is
directly traceable to the clamour for change that was taken

25
IMPERATIVES OF THE NIGERIAN REVOLUTION

up at Ojota and all the other places where the protest rallies
were held. The fraud of CHANGE in 2015 has its root in the
clamour for change of January 2012.
As at 2012, what the people communicated clearly was
the desire that things change and not continue the way they
were. The fact that they had become fed up with Goodluck
Jonathan after the euphoria of voting him in his own right
into office earlier in 2011 had worn off, made it very easy for
the opposition led by Bola Ahmed Tinubu at the time to
deflect the criticism and make it appear as though it was
Jonathan that was to blame for everything that was going
wrong with Nigeria.
The blame for the security problems in the north-east
were rightly laid at Jonathan’s doorstep. But even the
madness of Lagos, engendered by Tinubu’s own corruption,
was easily disguised as part of some failure on the part of
the PDP. That lie has only now become obvious that the
same party is in power, both at the federal and state level.
By 2012, and leading up to the 2015 election, it was quite
easy to focus everybody’s attention on the big federal
government; Bola Tinubu thereby escaped scrutiny of his
own stewardship of Lagos State.
The system simply reinvented itself, outthought the
progressives, who did nothing with the opportunities
presented by the manifest dissatisfaction of the people,
because they simply could not and did not offer the people
a viable alternative behind which to coalesce. The system

26
 ‘Dele Farotimi

easily responded by coalescing around one of its own, which

it had hitherto rejected several times, and most of those that
should have known better, joined in adopting the lie and
birthing Buhari.

27
 “
There is a common thread that runs
through every one of the several
eruptions of violence and the different
struggles for one right or the other in
Nigeria. Be that the struggles in the
Niger Delta, or the Boko Haram
violence in the north-east, or the
banditry that has ravaged not just the
north-west, but the entirety of the
Nigeria nation; or the gangs that we
see in Lagos and other states in the
south-west, banditry and kidnapping
that are rampant and rife in the
eastern and the south-southern parts
of Nigeria; the fact of the matter is
that undergirding every one of these
outbreaks of violence is a demand by
the disenfranchised and the lost, those
who have become hopeless finding
avenues to express their pain,
disappointment and in most cases,
their rage with the Nigeria State.

28
 Chapter 3
The Politics of Fractionalisation

T
he Nigerian ruling class has adopted the
fractionalisation of Nigeria by exploiting existing
schism in the system as a tactic of subjugation. This
tactic was elevated to an art form by General Ibrahim
Badamasi Babangida.
I’m not suggesting that we were always united before
Babangida turned the fractionalisation of Nigeria into an art
form. Afterall, we did fight a civil war after which we lied to
ourselves and talked about none having been vanquished,
and that nobody had lost nor won; no victor, no vanquished.
Nothing could be farther from the truth (I have discussed
this extensively in Do Not Die in their War). But there is
something unique that did evolve as a function of the
deliberate exertions of Ibrahim Babangida and successive
governments thereafter.
The government did not only exploit existing schisms in
the system, and in the society within the nation, but began
to actively exploit and promote these divisions. I’ll give you
an example:
The Nigerian student union movement used to be able to
speak with one voice. But as I have already explained, with
the fractionalisation of the student body through
exploitation of existing schisms within the body itself, and

29
IMPERATIVES OF THE NIGERIAN REVOLUTION

the employment of violence that was introduced to the cults

coupled with the regional outlook of the northern
university, where more radical Islamic groups were
promoted in an attempt to create a counterbalance to the
radical movements that were in control of the student body,
the Nigeria student union movement lost its voice.
Nigerian students stopped speaking as one, more
sectional interests were pursued and the more nationalistic
interests that had hitherto united the students were left to
sectional and sometimes negligible interests and groups to
chase after.
There was a time in Nigeria when the radical movement
was centred primarily within the university campuses,
which is not exactly surprising given the trend everywhere
else in the world. What used to happen was that there was
an ecosystem within which radical students were mentored
by radical lecturers and the interests of the students and the
lecturers were generally conflated to the point where when
ASUU called a strike, it could not take the support of the
student bodies for granted.
During the Babangida years and thereafter, there has
been an active decimation of the cooperation that used to
exist between these bodies to the point where NANS was
infiltrated, and within the body, there were strands acting as
though they were agencies of the government. And then you
have a situation where NANS has been so commercialised
that it no longer really speaks for anybody but those who

30
 ‘Dele Farotimi

occupy the offices of the student union president in the

different universities and; of course, at the national level,
where you have personalised number plates for
functionaries of a student movement.
The students and lecturers no longer speak or sing from
the same hymn books. ASUU is also locked in perpetual
warfare with all the other unions within the university
system. Hence, not just healthy competition has been
promoted, but exceedingly unhealthy competition that
tends to dissipate energy on what is patently unimportant,
ignoring the common interests of the parties that should
have synergised and worked together.
The Yoruba have a proverb that “airin lowowo omo ejo lon
se iku pa won”. This means that if the snakes were to ever
cooperate and work together, it is unlikely that the sons of men
would find it so easy to kill them. The refusal to synergise and
work together within the university system has rendered the
different sectors of that system incapable of identifying what
is in their common interest, such that when the ASUU union
calls its strikes or industrial actions, the other segments of
the university system do not see themselves as being
invested in the ASUU struggle and are in most cases
antagonistic to the academic staff’s demands. Well, ASUU
itself does not appear to have been able to provide the
required leadership to help the other unions within the
system to see what is in the common interest.

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IMPERATIVES OF THE NIGERIAN REVOLUTION

Whatever the case might be, is it not much easier for the
parties to have identified common interests within their
common industry, rather than to be working at cross-
purpose?
You might look at these lecturers, the students, the senior
staff association, the non-academic staff union and the
several other unions that are within the university system,
and begin to wonder exactly what their problems are. But
when you are done doing that, why not look at the larger
society itself; where our pathetic and painful incapability to
see what is in our common interests, has assured that we are
all mutually fettered and hogtied. But the balkanisation of
the struggles in Nigeria is essentially a function of our
inability to see what should be obvious for all to see
There is a common thread that runs through every one
of the several eruptions of violence and the different
struggles for one right or the other in Nigeria. Be that the
struggles in the Niger Delta, or the Boko Haram violence in
the north-east, or the banditry that has ravaged not just the
north-west, but the entirety of the Nigeria nation; or the
gangs that we see in Lagos and other states in the south-
west, banditry and kidnapping that are rampant and rife in
the eastern and the south-southern parts of Nigeria; the fact
of the matter is that undergirding every one of these
outbreaks of violence is a demand by the disenfranchised
and the lost, those who have become hopeless finding

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 ‘Dele Farotimi

avenues to express their pain, disappointment and in most

cases, their rage with the Nigeria State.
Every system is designed with an end in mind, and so is
every human construct. Nigeria is not an exception, and it
was designed with intentions in the minds of its human
designers.
If I were to go all the way back into our colonial history
and the immediate times after the colonial era, I will be
rehashing what I have already dealt with in my first book,
Do Not Die in their War. So, I will limit myself for the time
being, to the IBB years, which provides sufficient proof for
the point I seek to make, as it relates to the complete absence
of nationalistic platforms from where the Nigeria State
might be engaged and where the issues might be properly
addressed. I will explain.

********

The year of the locust

IBRAHIM Badamasi Babangida is one of the fathers of the
Nigeria State. He, probably more than any other, laid the
inequitable foundations of the modern Nigeria State. One of
the first things IBB did upon coming to power after he
pushed out Muhammadu Buhari in 1986, was to weaken
every national platform from where Nigerians had engaged
the State.

33
IMPERATIVES OF THE NIGERIAN REVOLUTION

The Nigeria State has always institutionally sought to

fractionalise the people. The multiplicity of citizenship
levels had already ensured that the people could never
speak as one. But nobody did more to institutionalise this
injustice and inequality than Babangida, and he went one
step further: he took an informed decision to destroy the
platforms that he saw as threats to his power.
You must also understand that Babangida is particularly
important in understanding Nigeria, because he was the
first to begin the process of the feudalisation of the Nigeria
State. Nigeria to be sure had always existed only for the
privileged few. But the systematic feudalisation of the State
began under Babangida’s watch. I will deal with this in
details as we proceed…
But it is of utmost importance that attention be paid to
the fact that it was under Babangida that the Nigeria Bar
Association that had hitherto been a very powerful voice
and a check on the excesses of successive military
government and even the civilian government of Shehu
Shagari, was emasculated.
The politicisation of the presidency of the NBA was
given impetus during the reign of Babangida, when
whoever occupied that office automatically became the
attorney-general of the federation. Babangida corrupted the
NBA to render it ineffectual as a platform through which his
power might be checked. The same thing was done to the
Nigerian Medical Association, where Babangida extensively

34
 ‘Dele Farotimi

sponsored opposition. He did the same with the Academic

Staff Union of Universities, ASUU. But the more important
organisation that he began to attack, which has, however,
been perfected under subsequent governments in Nigeria, is
the student union.
In the early days of his reign, Babangida organised sham
commissions and public enquiries. One of them was the one
where he sought to legitimise a decision he had taken, which
was to seek economic relief from the IMF. There were
debates held all over Nigeria, suffice to say that thereafter,
he did what he had planned to do anyway, and the student
populace in response to the harsh economic measures
started what we called the “SAP Riots,” which more than
any other thing at the time, shook the government to its very
root.
To be clear about what I meant by shook, there is no way
the students on their own could have moved the
government to any change. The disconnect between the
students and the populace, which I mentioned earlier, has
always ensured that the populace were disconnected from
the struggles of the students and from their exertions. So, it
was not like the military were worried of the likelihood of a
popular uprising, but it was surely a nuisance that
businesses were being disrupted all over the federation by
pocket of students in almost all the universities in Nigeria.
In those days, when student protests were called, they
were nationwide in nature. Every university, polytechnic,

35
IMPERATIVES OF THE NIGERIAN REVOLUTION

every school above the secondary schools in Nigeria,

however remote, took part. So, each time the students were
on the march, the impression always given was that Nigeria
was boiling, and it certainly boiled. But the disconnect
between the students and the populace had always ensured
the preservation of the system.
Upon the cessation of hostilities and at the end of the
process where several schools were shut down and several
students killed, particularly in the northern states – Kaduna,
for instance, where about six students were murdered in
cold blood – a novel phenomenon began to emerge within
the university system.
Those of us who spent as many years as I did within the
university system, could not help but have noticed this: the
confraternities morphed into cults. Where young men
played pranks on each other and at best had fisticuffs in the
past, arms were gradually introduced into the conflicts.
What used to be bruised egos soon morphed into killings.
The Nigerian student movement, particularly in the
southern part of Nigeria had become a target in Babangida’s
power games.
In dealing with the students, Babangida’s security
system did what most security organisations in the world
would do. They looked for and exploited the existing
schisms: the rivalries and differences within the students’
body. In the southern parts, where students of Yoruba
extractions, Igbo extractions and others were predominantly

36
 ‘Dele Farotimi

found, fraternities had proliferated since their beginnings in

the 60s and there were always rivalries between them. The
history of the proliferation would even show that some
people left one confraternity to found another because of
some differences that arose between them and their former
compadres.

********

Deepening of feudalism
THESE rivalries were always there and had spilled over into
pretty tame affairs: like a bucket of crap thrown at someone
or a person’s hair shaved whilst they slept. But the benign
nature of these adolescent skirmishes changed and
hardened into something much darker and evil, because the
state got involved. State security officials came into the
campuses and joined confraternities, influenced their
actions, guided, and nudged them into violence. They
provoked it, orchestrated it, and thereby divided the
students’ solidarity.
In the northern part, religion was the tool employed by
the State. The Muslim students’ society, long a presence on
every Nigerian university campus benign and mostly a very
benevolent organisation, was equally infiltrated. Splinter
groups were encouraged in the northern part. And it became
so, that when southern universities would rise in solidarity

37
IMPERATIVES OF THE NIGERIAN REVOLUTION

with a cause, religion was used as a sentiment to divide and

ensure that the Nigerian students in the northern part of
Nigeria would not be part of that solidarity move.
IBB perfected the art of dividing the Nigerian people to
conquer them. Everything was done to make sure that the
people never shared a common purpose. Nigerians became
either northerners, southerners, Igbo, Kanuri, Fulani or
Hausa. All these came because of the need to keep the people
divided.
We were divided only because our rulers have found
that their powers are guaranteed when the people do not
share common purpose. Babangida more than any other,
perfected this evil device, having recognised its utility in
keeping the army in check and incapable of national
cohesion.
With the Nigeria State infiltrating all the existing
platforms through which the grievances of the people were
usually ventilated, like the Nigerian Bar Association, the
Nigerian Medical association, the student bodies, and the
labour movements and trade unions – which have remained
completely compromised to the point where it is pretty
obvious that nobody is really speaking for the Nigerian
worker anymore – what followed, was the
institutionalisation of what I have come to refer to as
grievance politics.
What I mean by this is that when reasonable voices are
either killed, silenced, compromised or somehow taken out

38
 ‘Dele Farotimi

of commission, in order to force a people to accept an

injustice, or an unjust state of being, what tends to happen
and has always happened across human history and
civilizations, is that the system immediately enables two
extremes: you either have those who will seek to profit by
the repressed grievances of the people; or those who will
respond with violence since that would be the only available
option that would have been left to them.
Take the Biafran question for instance, the crisis of
nationality of citizenship that has plagued Nigeria and
assured that she will not develop to her potential, has also
played itself out in full glare as the Biafran question. When
you examine what is generally referred to as the Biafran
question, but which I prefer to call Nigeria’s Igbo question,
you would come to the realisation that the actual questions
are: who is a Nigerian? Why does his tribe matter? Why
should his religion make any difference?
When the Igbo were marginalised to the advantage of all
the people who today identify as middle belt, who were
once upon a time northerners; when the Igbo challenged the
inequality, inequities and injustice in the Nigerian space
which were not common to the Nigerian from Kwara and
Kogi states, who were equally educationally disadvantaged
beneficiaries of the catchment areas; when it was fashionable
to reserve advantages to some and disadvantages to many;
it was easy to ignore the Igbo question and consider it an

39
IMPERATIVES OF THE NIGERIAN REVOLUTION

Igbo problem. The truth is, there is no Igbo problem, it is the

Nigerian problem.
What we have in Nigeria are differential levels of
citizenship, the resultant effect of which is that the
disadvantaged, with their legitimate grievances that have
been silenced and not allowed room for ventilation become
prey to extreme voices. This is what bred MASSOB and;
IPOB. The rational Igbo voices are either silenced or found
nobody to listen to them - none of the Igbo streets will listen
to them because nobody in power would listen to the
reasonable voices.
The Federal Government of Nigeria will rather talk to the
Nnamdi Kanus of this world than speak to the reasonable
voices in Igbo land, or it would speak to the ones that I call
the beneficiaries of grievance politics, that is those who
claim to speak on behalf of a people, whilst they steal off the
same people.
Abia State is a good place to start. None of the governors
of Abia or any of the other states in the eastern part has been
Fulanis, they have been Igbo men. What does their works
say about the kind of politics they play? These are men who
purport to speak for a tribe, even as they have stolen them
blind.
I do not dispute the fact that the Nigeria State has been
extremely inequitable and unjust in its dealing with the Igbo,
but at least, in the last 20 years, no Fulani man has ruled in
Igbo land. A look at the exact point in history where the

40
 ‘Dele Farotimi

entire Igbo land is at this point in time, gives you an idea of

just how well the leadership that has emerged out of the
grievance politics, encouraged by the Nigeria State, has
delivered for the Igbo man or answered the Igbo question.
If you look at the Niger Delta, you will find clear
evidence of how these two extremes have coalesced to
ensure that the Nigeria State has actually lost control of vast
portions of her own territories, even whilst we are not at war
with any external aggressor in the Niger Delta.
It is important to understand that criminality which
persists in the Niger Delta is a direct response to the
criminalisation of decent voices by the Nigeria State. I
recounted in Do Not Die in their War how I was at NNPC and
had to listen to the banters being bandied between militants
who had come to see the minister, and I wondered even back
then, how the same Nigeria State that murdered Ken Saro-
Wiwa, had found space and time to listen to bandits and
thieves. The point is that, when decent voices are silenced as
Ken’s was, when the State encourages fragmentations
within its own territories, it creates room for the reign of
criminal elements.
There are several elements in the Niger Delta struggles
who have argued with me that MOSOP was deliberately
infiltrated; that the murder of the Ogoni chiefs had the hands
of the Nigeria State, its agent provocateurs, and particularly
the hands of Paul Okutimo. The wanton criminality we are
seeing in the Niger Delta today, is a direct consequence of

41
IMPERATIVES OF THE NIGERIAN REVOLUTION

the recklessness of the Nigeria State, in promoting division

within its own territories, even if they be armed
insurrections, in order to preserve an evil system.
The politicians in the Niger Delta are not any different
from the ones you will find in other parts of Nigeria. They
are beneficiaries of grievances. They employ criminals to
preserve unconscionable powers that are not derived from
the people. These criminals work under the cover of State
impunity and therefore the likes of Tompolo, Ateke Tom
and all the others have today become feudal lords. If they
shut down production, it stays shut, because the Nigeria
State operates in vast territories in the Delta, on the license
of what are effectively crime lords and politicians who work
hand in gloves with these crime lords. The poor man in the
Delta is the one who loses because of the Nigeria State’s
deliberate fragmentation and criminalisation of fair and
decent voices.
I recall when Ganiyu Adams was nominated as the Are
Ona Kankanfo of Yorubaland, and a few friends who
considered themselves learned and cultured were querying
the choice. They were waxing lyrical about the pedigree of
those that had occupied the office before him, and I laughed
at them, because what they failed to understand is that
Ganiyu Adams as Are Ona Kankanfo is merely a sign of the
time in which we live. And a reflection of the people that the
Yoruba have also become.

42
 ‘Dele Farotimi

I pointed out to them that if there were to ever be a

meeting of Yoruba elders, none of them would be asked to
attend such but they are certain to find Ganiyu Adams, the
Are Ona Kankanfo of Yoruba land, either chairing the
occasion, or sat at the high table. Ganiyu Adams is the
systemic reaction to the deliberate fragmentation, muscling
and silencing of dissent and reasoned opposition.
The Yoruba are essentially a people ruled by reason, one
of our central proverbs says that ejo lanko, baba enikan ii koja,
which interprets as; you learn to state your case, not how to fight.
The Yoruba cultural demand is that before you fight, you
must reason out the issue and be certain that you would be
able to explain yourself by the time you are asked the reason
for your anger. But the same Yoruba were provoked into
extremes by the annulment of Abiola’s election, and then
allowed themselves to be outfoxed by the State through the
agency of Uche Chukwumerije, to embrace the rebrand of
what remains the only national mandate in Nigeria as
though it was a tribal mandate. Abiola’s national mandate
became a Yoruba agenda. And becoming a Yoruba agenda
meant that the voices of extreme began to speak.
The Yoruba play grievance politics better than any other
Nigerian tribe that I know of, me being one after all. Yoruba
have made a career out of grievance politics, and this is what
has yielded us the tragedy that has befallen our land today,
where we have failed to test all spirits; and we are today,
enslaved even in our own land.

43
IMPERATIVES OF THE NIGERIAN REVOLUTION

The sum and net effect of these fragmentations and the

criminalisation of dissent voices is that, instead of an
alignment of purposes, and for the Nigerian people to have
come together in identification of their common interest,
each aggrieved person or group or tribe act alone in protest
of their conditions, thus we have had sporadic implosions
all over Nigeria. And, because they are not concerted, the
State has remained strong even as the nation has bled. It is
in this cauldron that the seed of the feudalisation of the
Nigeria State was sown.

********

Hegemonies and nation-building

I HAVE found that nations are not unlike human beings in

the trajectory of their growths and or retardation. This might
not be particularly surprising for those who have made it
their vocation to study human constructs, but I have
discovered that nations mimic men.
As humans, we are creatures of our habits. For example, a
person who is habitually prudent in his spending would
almost always have sufficiency for his needs; meanwhile, a
person who happens to annex the capacity to create wealth
ingeniously to a capacity to be prudent in his finances,
almost always ends up being rich and prosperous; also, a
person who is given to his base appetites, perhaps drinks,

44
 ‘Dele Farotimi

narcotics, sex, etc., would also have these habits shape the
outcome of his life because the habits shape the choices.
But just as it is for persons, so it also would appear to be
for nations. I have found that in place of the habits that you
look for as hallmarks of the person’s likely end, in seeking
to predict the trajectory of a nation, or seeking to understand
where the nation is coming from, you would almost always
have to look both to its history, which would have shaped
its habits; in the case of nations, you must look to the
hegemonies. To explain this, it is my contention that just as
habits shape a man’s choices and outcome, the hegemonies
that control a territory equally shape what happens to that
nation or state.
In examining American history, you will find that at its
birth, there were clear west Anglo-Saxon protestants
shaping the future of the country. Their WASP principles,
religiosity outlook on life, view of the monarchy, ideas and
thoughts on governance and religion, shaped the very
foundations of the America State. It is the WASP hegemony
that shaped the very foundations of America, guided its
choices, and formed the nation America. It was founded on
the racist principles of its founding fathers.
Nobody consulted the red Indians, nor asked questions
of the enslaved Africans, the several Chinese and Japanese
labourers, or even the Irish Catholics, who were later day
comers. None of the people that later became known as
Americans were involved in the formation of the America

45
IMPERATIVES OF THE NIGERIAN REVOLUTION

State nor were they ever given a say as to what shape or form
the State would take. That is a function of the fact that they
were the dominant hegemony in the land where the State
was birthed. Their past, foundations, principles, and ideals
of the wasps, shaped the future of the nation.
The contradictions that we see in America today is a
function of the several conflicts that have rendered America
just as tribalistic as Nigerians have become, only that this
time, the American tribalism coalesces around different
principles and political interests that are in political parties.
But America is not my preoccupation, even though it is
very necessary for you to see how hegemonies shape the
future and trajectory of a nation, just as habits shape the
choices and outcome of a man.
Let us look at what we know today as the United
Kingdom. What was the British empire? The entirety of the
British empire was birthed on the back of English bloody
mindedness, the refusal to understand limits, the readiness
to expand boundaries, the Viking spirit that directed English
nationalism and made them begin to see themselves as being
exceptional and of particular specialty. The island status of
England made it begin to see itself as being separate and
distinct and far better than anyone of its neighbours. That
nationalism and the Viking spirit drove the expansion of the
English isle until it took over first, I believe, the Welsh throne
and then the throne of Scotland, and subsequently Ireland.

46
 ‘Dele Farotimi

So, you have a situation where the English were the

dominant hegemony that propelled the creation of the
identity that became known as British. But it took the
annexation of the ruggedness of the Irish and the work
capacity of the Scotts, the Welsh gentleness, all coalescing
together and propelled by the English sense of adventure,
birthed in the cauldron of the Viking origins to shape the
trajectory of the British empire. Every State grows based on
the interest that governs and propels its movements.
Nigeria is not an exception. As with every other nation
or State, it has been shaped by the hegemonies that have
prevailed over Nigeria. It is of critical importance that we
track the origins and growth of these hegemonies.
The principal hegemony that has been attendant at the
birth of Nigeria is feudalism. I have dealt with the issue of
the feudalistic origins of Nigeria to an extent in Do Not Die
in their War, but I shall now take time to point out how
feudalism has overtaken the country to the point where we
have become a feudalised democracy, incompatible with
citizenship rights, and incapable of tolerating any
expression of dissent. A system where citizens have become
serfs, and the rulers, lords; masters and servants. The
purpose of the State has become the preservation of its
officers. The welfare of the elected has become the fulcrum
of the Nigeria State. This will be the preoccupation of the
following chapters.

47
 “
The road to hell is paved with good
intentions and as well intentioned as
the British might have been, there was
nothing altruistic about the creation of
the veto that was created in Nigeria. It
was done with the assumption that
there would be a strong federation
based on the regional system to
ensure that peace would be kept and
that this peace would endure
regardless of the inequities of creating
a lopsided system that assured the
veto in the hand of one out of three
regions at the point of independence.
What happened subsequently was not
something they could have foreseen.

48
 Chapter 4
Birth of the Fulani Hegemony

H
egemonies are creations of history. To understand
and fully appreciate the impact of the Fulani
hegemony over Nigeria, it is apposite that we
examine the history of Nigeria and its very foundations.
The British were the sole powers within the Nigerian
space, and having assumed power by conquering ever more
territory, and after the decisive victory over the Sultan in
1904, the British took over complete control of what became
known as the Nigeria State. I have skimped on several
boring details including how the Niger Company had sold
its possessions to the British crown and how much of the
Nigeria State was fraudulently acquired by the British.
What we must understand is that the British developed
a system by which they governed the vast territories that
they had acquired. This was the indirect rule system, which
meant that the British adopted the existing systems of
governance in the different parts of the territories and in so
doing, they ruled by proxy. Of particular interest to any
discerning student of history, is the fact that the easiest of all
the territories to rule was the northern part of Nigeria.
I will confine myself to that, but there is a need to revisit
history even though I strived to do exactly that in Do Not Die

49
IMPERATIVES OF THE NIGERIAN REVOLUTION

in their War, where I dealt with the multiple layers of

citizenship. But it bears retelling.
In the northern part of Nigeria, before the coming of the
white man, before the Europeans ever blighted this land,
there were two Islamic empires. There was the Kanem
Bornu empire, which had existed long before Usman Dan
Fodio came with his Fulani jihadists. There was a brand of
Islam that had been in that territory long before the coming
of Usman Dan Fodio with his jihad, which was meant to
cleanse Islam in the Hausa states of certain heretical
practices.
The two empires co-existed side by side with occasional
hostility, but the principles of Dar al-Islam and Dar al-Harb,
which means that the land of the Muslim and the land of the
pagan, ensured that strives were kept limited between the
two empires before the coming of the British.
It should be known that before the British came, the
major export product for both Islamic empires were slave
raiding and slave trading. They had established the Tran-
Saharan trade route, which traded essentially in slaves as
well as other products, but the principal product were
slaves.
Vast parts of Northern Nigeria, especially those close to
the southern part of the country, became the exclusive
preserve of the Fulani because they were the ones with the
expansionist ambition towards the ocean. It is important to
keep in mind that by the time the British came, they simply

50
 ‘Dele Farotimi

helped the Fulani to extend their influence to areas they had

hitherto left unconquered. If they had conquered those
areas, they would have had to convert the people as a
religious obligation, but if the people had been converted,
they could not have been enslaved, and the Fulani Caliphate
would have lost its economic power.
There were also parts that they had been unable to
conquer simply because those people were too strong to be
brought under rule: the Plateau, and vast parts of the Benue.
The Benue trough generally, were unconquered and
unruled by the Fulani, but were mostly brought under
Fulani rule by the British. Thus, Fulani hegemony was
extended to parts of Northern Nigeria that they had never
managed to conquer before the coming of the British or areas
they had deliberately left unconquered because they viewed
those tribes as their slave stock.
To have a clearer understanding of the situation and how
the British created the country called Nigeria, it is best to
treat the British as though they were a polygamous man
with several wives and several children. This is what I mean:
the British man might be said to have been married to
several women, one of them is the Fulani and the other being
the Fulani twin sister, the Kanuri. But these two had several
slaves whom they gave as Keturahs to their husband, the
British. These concubines also had children but in the
treatment of the children of this wedlock, those of the Fulani

51
IMPERATIVES OF THE NIGERIAN REVOLUTION

wife and her Kanuri sister were always preferred, while

those of the slave concubines also knew their places.
The children of the Keturahs are also children nonetheless
but they were of the concubines and they knew their place
within that family. But the rest of Nigeria, the other wives in
their own homes did not get to understand this until much
too late in the day.
Most people have continued to be unaware of these
rather important facts until date, and have continued to
indolently speak as though the northern part of Nigeria is
one homogeneous entity. The assumption of the British was
that the northern ruling elements would be able to manage
the many differences within the northern part of Nigeria,
and avoid the rancour and divisions that were already
evident in the southern part.
Ahmadu Bello had the right policy: “One North.” Where
even though the children of the concubines knew their status
and their place within the Arewa pecking order in relation to
the rest of Nigeria, they were always treated as though they
are northerners, and they took primacy over anyone from
the southern part, unless the southern would happen to
have been sponsored by a child of one of the favoured wives.
As the Nigeria State was being crafted in the late 1940s
and before the 1951 parliament was declared, there was a
veto that was handed to the Northern Nigerian elements by
the British. It was deliberate and by design.

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 ‘Dele Farotimi

Akin Osuntokun has in his paper, dealt with this

extensively; I have also dealt with it to an extent in my
treatment of the subject in Do Not Die in Their War. But I will
provide Osuntokun’s account to explain the reality of the
Fulani veto over Nigeria.
Osuntokun’s account is not inclusive of the historical
account of how that came about, so, I will attempt to add this
only to extend what he has said without necessarily
disagreeing with him, even though I will end up disagreeing
with his conclusion.
Nevertheless, I must also note that the disagreement
might be a function of ideological differences, arising from
the way we would necessarily interpret the same
phenomenon. We are entitled to our opinions, it is the facts
that we are not entitled to, and I agree with the facts as
enunciated by him.
If we look at page 168 of But Always as Friends by
Sharwood Smith, we will see very clearly, the level of British
complicity in the creation of the hegemonies. The British had
prior to the inauguration of the 1951 parliament, agreed with
the northern ruling class that they would be handed a veto
in any arrangement that would create a single country, and
not allow them to go on their own, as it would be
economically ruinous. The articulated desire of the northern
ruling class was, however, to be left out of Nigeria.
In order to assure this, the structure of the Government
to come was clearly agreed with the British. This is

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IMPERATIVES OF THE NIGERIAN REVOLUTION

documented by Sharwood Smith in 2nd paragraph of page

221 of But Always as Friends, where he stated that “half of the
members of the house of representatives was to come from
the north.
There were 136 members – 68 from the northern part, 68
from the two southern regions combined. This will mean
that each region had 34 members. Hence the north had 68
and the western region had 34 and the east, 34.
This was the beginning of the institution of the Fulani
hegemony over Nigeria. It is also the beginning of the
problems that have plagued Nigeria from the dawn of its
birth.
The British have a long history of creating royal messes
wherever they ruled even though with the very best of
intentions as they would always protest. The same thing was
done in Nigeria where they handed a veto with the best of
intentions to Northern Nigeria. Every nation develops with
some sort of hegemony or the other propelling its
development.
Given the fact that the British found it much easier to
work with the Fulani, it was to be expected that they would
favour them above any other as a people unto whom to hand
power.
But in giving this power over, the British created a
problem that I have dealt with to an extent in Do Not Die in
their War. Akin Osuntokun touched on it in his treatise but I
have gained a little better understanding of the subject. I

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 ‘Dele Farotimi

would want to extend this a little further to expose the

misapplication of the veto thus given to Ahmadu Bello and
the northern political establishment.
For reasons I have never bothered to research, but by
which I have recently become rather curious, the British
have always referred to their homeland as blighty, and; if
the truth be told, whilst Britain was once great and was
indeed Great Britain, the reality would suggest that it is no
longer great but has actually shrank and become little
England.
However, in the days of its greatness, Britain did do a lot
to blight several lands. The blight of Britain ripped apart the
Indian subcontinent; birthed in blood, India, Pakistan, Sri
Lanka, Bangladesh, Burma; and of course, the Rohingya
problem in Myanmar. The one thing that the British have
done in all their overseas inheritances, is that despite the best
of intentions, they have always managed to leave their blight
behind. Nigeria is not an exception.

********

THE road to hell is paved with good intentions and as well

intentioned as the British might have been, there was
nothing altruistic about the creation of the veto that was
created in Nigeria. It was done with the assumption that
there would be a strong federation based on the regional
system to ensure that peace would be kept and that this

55
IMPERATIVES OF THE NIGERIAN REVOLUTION

peace would endure regardless of the inequities of creating

a lopsided system that assured the veto in the hand of one
out of three regions at the point of independence.
What happened subsequently was not something they
could have foreseen. The feudalistic democracy that the
British presumed to have left behind, was soon lost to
Nzeogwu’s attempt to correct the injustice which only
paused it but never solved the problem.
It is critical at this point to address the nature of the veto
and the way it was used and abused; those who have
inherited the veto and how the same veto had been passed
down overtime. This becomes important because the
hegemony exercising this veto has evolved over time; and
whilst the veto has remained in the hand of the hegemony,
the hegemony itself has not remained the same, or
impervious to change.
I believe that the people of both the Eastern and Western
Regions, and their leaders Nnamdi Azikiwe and Obafemi
Awolowo, must have seen this not too subtle veto that the
British were handing to their favourite son. But they must
have been persuaded by their erroneous belief that the
federation being created was one that was strong enough to
allow them develop at their own pace and to have
reasonable control over the resources of their regions, and
that if it ever came to it, they would have been able to go
their separate ways because all three regions had rather

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strong secessionist instincts at the dawn of the Nigerian

Independence.
The North was always happy to go on its own, as were
the Igbo and to a lesser extent, the Yoruba. Hence, it was a
situation in which for various reasons, the strong federation
made the veto a lot less difficult to accept. The veto could
not have been missed by anyone looking at it, but it was
accepted, and it became an integral part of Nigeria, but it
was the misuse of this veto that led to both the first and the
second coups of 1966. In the immediate aftermath of the
second coup, the express demand of the principal
conspirators, particularly Murtala Mohammed, was for the
northern part of Nigeria to go its separate ways.
There are several historical accounts of how they were
persuaded to stay within the Nigerian federation. It was
pointed out to them that it was more beneficial for them to
stay than to go away. However, the hegemony that was
created at the dawn of Nigeria’s birth remained in place and
was further affirmed in the attempt at secession in the
immediate aftermath of the second coup.
The first thing that happened after the second coup was
that, in so far as it related to the rest of Nigeria, the army
hierarchy no longer followed seniority. Northern Non-
Commissioned Officers were refusing to take orders from
southern officers, including Yoruba officers. They would
only take orders from their fellow northerners. It is also
instructive to note that when the decision was taken to stay,

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IMPERATIVES OF THE NIGERIAN REVOLUTION

the choice of Gowon was one that was more or less forced
on the Murtala Mohammed faction of the coup plotters, who
originally preferred Murtala Mohammed.
To them, Gowon was always a child of the concubine and
not one of them, but it was impolitic at that point to argue
this, because the bulk of the officer corps of the Nigerian
army at the time were drawn from the middle belt as were
the men of the lower ranks.
In the fourth paragraph of page 365 of his book But
Always as Friends, in describing the composition of the
Nigerian army at the dawn of independence in 1957,
Sharwood Smith said “at the moment in the army, men and
the fighting units were predominantly northerners. Not
northern Muslims as in the past, but pagans and
Christianised pagans from Tiv, Zuru and the hills and
valleys of Bauchi and Adamawa”.
These were the words of Sharwood Smith and this was
the reality at the dawn of the coup, even though a lot of
aggressive recruitment and promotion had been done in the
immediate aftermath of independence, when unqualified
persons such as our present president Muhammadu Buhari,
were recruited into the army based on enforced quotas.
These persons were the ones who at the dawn of the second
coup, were more or less forced to accept Gowon as a
compromise candidate, in order to ensure that northern
unity was preserved, but no pretense was made at Nigerian
unity.

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The veto that had been threatened by the first coup was
preserved, but under a new hegemony. The hegemony had
begun to change, because the original veto that used to
reside in the hands of the sultan and the emirs, moved with
political independence into the hand of a new political class
led by the Sardauna. When that class was decimated in 1966,
the new class of power holders comprised boys recruited,
mostly promoted by the NPC elements, who in actual fact
instigated the second coup and who continued to exert
powers behind the thrones, loosely known in later years as
the ‘Kaduna Mafia.’
Hence the powers moved, first from the political
leadership in the emirs to the elected politicians who
worked in consonance with the emirs and traditional
rulership, which then evolved over time into the military
political class of the north, to which was aligned to a very
large extent, particularly for reasons of street legitimacy, to
the traditional rulership system. But the essential nature of
the hegemony began to change at this point, because the
hegemony was not created to accommodate the rulership of
the children of the concubines. It was a veto that was
reserved for the children of the favourite wives.
But the Fulani is patient if nothing else. Murtala
Mohammed always saw himself as the president-in-waiting,
thus the coup of 29 July 29, 1975, that brought him to power,
was a self-fulfilling prophecy. Accounts of the Murtala coup
would leave anyone clear that even Gowon was aware that

59
IMPERATIVES OF THE NIGERIAN REVOLUTION

he was going to be toppled; he also knew that he had lost

control of the officer corps because by this time, key officers
of the army had become disenchanted with him.
Murtala Muhammed was charismatic. He waited and
bided his time, probably to avoid bloodshed, until a perfect
opportunity presented itself. And with Gowon out of the
country attending the 12th submit of the Organisation of
African Unity in Kampala Uganda, Murtala Mohammed
executed his plan and took over. But this is not what is
important.
What is important was what came in the immediate
aftermath of Murtala Mohammed’s murder in the coup that
brought Obasanjo to power.

********

Masters of the Veto

THIS hegemony is what has always propelled Nigeria.
Nigeria was designed with the hegemony in mind. The
character and shape of the hegemony has changed over
time. Its own internal struggles have also meant that its
principal characters have equally evolved. But the most
important thing to be noted is that the principal
characteristic of the hegemony, which is feudalism, has
morphed over the years and it is no longer the traditional

60
 ‘Dele Farotimi

emir or sultan sitting in some corner somewhere with a

turban that is calling the shot.
In seeking to understand this, it is important to
understand that one of the first things that Ahmadu Bello
did after independence, was to assert his powers over the
traditional institution in a manner not unlike the way the
British themselves asserted powers.
He saw himself more as the holder of the powers that
had been bequeathed by the British than a trustee of power
on behalf of the emirs and sultan. The Sardauna was a
master in the art of the deployment of power, and he owned
the political powers that he wielded. Subsequent inheritors
of these powers have also seen themselves essentially as
political overlords of the emirs. And as the military, which
was essentially at this time of northern extraction, became
ever more influential, the traditional power basis became
less important.
When Ahmadu Bello was at the peak of his powers, he
deposed the emir of Kano, Sanusi Lamido, grandfather of
the recently deposed emir of Kano, Sanusi Lamido Sanusi.
When Babangida was at the peak of his powers, he
declined to make Maccido the sultan of Sokoto; he instead,
thrusted his friend, Dasuki into the office.
When Abacha came to power, one of the ways in which
he sought to curtail the influences of Babangida over his
government and to assert himself as the de-facto ruler of
Nigeria, was when he removed the Sultan of Sokoto,

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IMPERATIVES OF THE NIGERIAN REVOLUTION

banished him eventually to Kaduna, and then brought

Maccido, who had been overlooked when Dasuki was
favoured by Babangida, as the Sultan of Sokoto.
The thing to note is that, at all point in time, the
hegemony did not change, the real power levers as it relates
to the rest of Nigeria, remained the same. And over the years
and as the military and its influence over Nigeria had
grown, what has happened is that in consonance with the
command structure of the Nigerian military and also as a
consequence of the grievance politics that the State had
promoted over the years, beneficiaries of the powers (gained
by grievance politics) became more or less a new feudal class
across the length and breadth of Nigeria, and they have
collaborated with the holders of the veto in a pan-Nigeria
consensus arrangement to ruin the country for their own
benefit.
This has become particularly necessary under the civilian
government of the last 21 years. But it has also been the
reason why we are back where we were, at the dawn or shall
I say just before nightfall in the First Republic. The veto is
again being misused simply because an alliance has been
found outside of the north.
Buhari’s worst instinct has again been unleashed and the
worst of northern instincts has been unleashed not only
against the possibilities of the Nigeria nation, but against the
already fragile State, and even within the northern part
itself.

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Feudalism… the malignant cancer

TO be sure, feudalism in its classic form has only ever been
known to the north, and it is through this region that the
concept of feudalism has spread to every other part of
Nigeria. It is important to trace this spread, what has
propelled it, and exactly how it is linked to the issue of the
ruling hegemonies in Nigeria.
We have explored how the inability to manage the veto
had led to the first coup and how the failure to manage the
crisis arising from that eventually led to the civil war.
Before the civil war, in the immediate aftermath of the
first coup, the orphans of power, the Northern Peoples
Congress, NPC politicians who had lost power and out in
the cold, were the ones who actively promoted the notion of
an Igbo coup, instigated the second coup and directed
events from behind the scenes.
It is interesting to note that by all accounts of history, the
federal civil service was already top heavy with northern
permanent secretaries in strategic places, and this continued
to be the case, up until the point the First Republic ended.
With the outbreak of the civil war, the old positions filled
by the Igbos, now cut off in Biafra, were rapidly filled up
mostly with Hausa-Fulani appointees aggressively recruited
in droves to take up these vacancies. By the end of the war,
things became even more glaring.

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IMPERATIVES OF THE NIGERIAN REVOLUTION

The structures of today’s iniquities were erected in these

days.
Yakubu Gowon could mouth his “no victor no
vanquished” mantra all he wanted, but the fact that it took
years before an Igbo general would emerge out of the
Nigerian army gives clear evidence of the decision that was
taken at the end of the war to exclude the Southeasterners
from all positions of power. Elections have consequences,
and so do wars: Ndigbo lost the Nigerian civil war, and two
generations have been brutally suppressed by the ones that
have won. But the third generation is demanding freedom.
There were other collaborators, but hegemonies have
always required collaborators for their survival. For the
Fulani to maintain their hegemony in Hausa land, they
became part and parcel of that system. Much the same thing
has happened; the Fulani hegemony with its route in
feudalism began to cross its natural boundaries the moment
the strong regions were removed at the end of the second
coup.
Nigeria became a unitarised country with a centralised
system of government. The people directing public affairs
and policy were mostly of Hausa-Fulani extraction, and they
were directing affairs with their eyes on the preservation of
the veto that they have always held.
Nigeria was restructured along unitary lines, there was
centralisation of all powers, the regional system that had
acted as a counterweight to the veto was wiped out, and

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Nigeria became a centralised system where the centre now

dictates what happens in the federating units. These were
then increased exponentially based on the narrow interests
of key participants in the military government. Looking at
the politics of state creation in Nigeria, you will begin to
understand how we came to the point where we moved
from three regions; the consensus that we should be
increased to six that has always existed and have today
become 36 states and the federal capital territory that is also
essentially a state on its own to all intent and purpose.
We moved from having three federating regions, which
had reasonable control over their own affairs to a 36-state
structure where states are incapable of paying their own
salaries without going back to Abuja, cap in hand. And the
fiat and approval of the federal government in Abuja must
be sought before a state, the federating unit in a federal
system, might be allowed to create local government
councils!

********

The clientele politicians

ONE of the enduring effects of military rule and the need to
preserve the unjust Nigerian governance system is that a
second class of politicians began to develop, and these are
the clientele class.

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IMPERATIVES OF THE NIGERIAN REVOLUTION

I have already identified the ‘grievance politicians’, who,

all they do, is create divisions because they have to exist in
the niche where the grievances of the people that have been
suppressed by the system must find ventilation. So, they are
perpetually angry and constantly whipping up disunity and
one problem or the other in the system, because they profit
by it.
The second group are the clientele politicians. These are
the ones whom the system supports because they exist to
give support to the system as well, hence it is a symbiotic
relationship.
These politicians are always for the existence of the status
quo. Obasanjo is a classic example of that. He is the
archetypical clientele politician in Nigeria.
The totality of their existence is devoted to rationalising
why the system that has sustained them in power and
granted them advantages should be inviolate, regardless of
whether common sense should dictate that there is a need to
look and tweak. They do not want to hear at any point in
time that there is anything wrong with that system. They
feed, breathe, are fed fat on the system, and have become
exceedingly wealthy by the system.

********

THERE has always been a consensus that governs the

hegemony. The central hegemony at the federal level has

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 ‘Dele Farotimi

always operated on the consensus that there was either

always going to be an agreement to maintain the illusion of
one north in which case it becomes easier to find an alliance
outside of the north with either the west, the east or the
southern minorities and an alliance with the Igbo. But over
time, and with the centralised form of government and the
almost completely unchallenged capacity to write the
constitution of Nigeria in its own image, what we then have
is that every constitution that had been written for Nigeria,
since after the First Republic, have essentially been products
of military fiats.
The 1979 constitution was one, and the 1999 constitution
is no exception. It might declare that “we the people”, but it
never consulted any Nigerian. It is the expressed will of the
military lords of the Nigeria State.
It is important to conclude this section by pointing out a
fact that I have laid bare in the book on the judiciary, and it
is the fact that this veto is incompatible with the notion of
justice and equity and with the very idea of the rule of law.
Because the existence of those principles, directly threatens
the integrity of the veto, what has happened invariably all
the time is that whenever the veto has been threatened, there
have been systemic shutdowns with the system reinventing
itself always in a more virulent form.
I am compelled by a predilection for linguistic exactitude
to again attempt to perhaps explain the nature and the
make-up of the new feudal class.

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IMPERATIVES OF THE NIGERIAN REVOLUTION

I have attempted in the preceding chapters to draw a link

between the feudal nature of Northern Nigeria, the
relationship it enjoyed with the British and the preference of
the British for that feudal influence to be the hegemony that
will govern the nation they were seeking to build. But this
feudal hegemony was essentially confined to the affairs of
Northern Nigeria and to the areas where it had influence
over the federal governance.
I have explained in the preceding chapters how the
strength of the federating regions as negotiated before
independence, had mitigated against the worst instincts of
this feudal hegemony that had been created. So even though
it had a veto over what would happen at the federal level, to
a very large extent, it was not in control of what the regions
will do with pretty much everything that dealt with the day-
to-day life and livelihood of the people who live in those
regions.
However, at the end of the civil war and with the loss of
any check and balance on the capacity of the military, which
was largely in the hand of the northern part of Nigeria to
direct and dictate policies, the hegemony that was
governing only the northern part of Nigeria and certainly
things that had to do at the national level with defense, now
began to govern the regions.
It must be understood that one of the first things that
happened at the dawn of the civil war was that states were
created. Hence, what used to be four regions at the

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beginning of the war became 12 states. If you examine the

history of state creations in Nigeria, you will find very
quickly that they were never influenced by any altruistic
motive or by any grand ambition. It has always been
essentially one of the ways in which hegemonies were
created and persons rewarded for their services to the
system. Generals who were deemed influential enough in
the army had states created for them. The story of how
Asaba became the capital of Delta State is in the public
domain for everyone to educate themselves. There are
several instances where the influence of persons or groups
of persons have been the determinant factor in the creation
of a state.
But in all this process of state creation, the balance of 1951
remained untouched. At all point in time, the numbers of
seats in any central body remained in the same ratio as had
been agreed prior to the 1951 inauguration of the house of
representatives. Hence, by the time states were being created
in multiples, the number of states in the north remained
equal only to the totality of states in the southern part of
Nigeria. So, this delicate balance was always kept. By the
time the military came into power, even though there might
be Fulani administrators or in some cases, administrators of
the state origin, they were taking directives through the
unitary structure of the Nigerian military.
In doing this, one of the things that began to happen is
the fact that there was the creation of what I would like to

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IMPERATIVES OF THE NIGERIAN REVOLUTION

refer to as modern day warrant chiefs. Just as the British

created chiefdoms in Igbo land, these warrant chiefs were
created by the military to be able to govern the country
effectively. In administering a state like Lagos, for instance,
Buba Marwa might have been the governor of the state, but
he worked with indigenes of the state, whom he appointed
without recourse to any parliament or to the citizens of the
state. Hence, these were always persons acceptable to the
military and who were promoted into offices by the grace of
the military and they served at the pleasure of the military
super complex.
This process was replicated all over Nigeria and in each
locality. What the military sought to do was to equally rule
as unobtrusively as the British had done using the indirect
system. No culture in Nigeria is better suited for this than
the Fulani culture of governance (which is inherently
feudalistic in nature). The fact that the military industrial
complex and the civil service where policy was shaped, were
largely in the hand of the north, encouraged the
feudalisation of the systems.

********

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Re-characterisation of the Progressives

AS I had pointed out in the preceding chapters, two forms
of politics developed during this season: the first is
grievance politics, the second was clientele politics.

Grievance politics was essentially the exclusive preserve

of the Yoruba. The mainstream politics of the Yoruba
throughout this season was to complain about the state of
affairs in the Nigerian federation. And by reason of their
control of the media in this season, the Yoruba shaped the
narrative and the political direction of Nigeria, because they
automatically assumed the position of the opposition to the
feudal system ruling Nigeria. It is not surprising that this
was the case.
Obafemi Awolowo, the political leader of the Yoruba,
had engaged this feudal system from the beginning. Clearly
understanding what he was dealing with, he had as a
response, empowered his people by making sure that
education was widely available to all who would seek it. In
gaining that knowledge, he had prepared and mobilised his
people as a counter-force against the forces of feudalism that
was already rampant in Nigeria in his time. So, it was quite
easy for the Yoruba in the year of the military era, to retain
their consciousness enough to constantly rebel against the
feudalistic instinct of the military class. The Yoruba became
essentially the conscience of the Nigeria nation, not
necessarily as a preserve but as a people. Yoruba politics was

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IMPERATIVES OF THE NIGERIAN REVOLUTION

shaped by grievance politics, and dissatisfaction with the

existing governance systems.
When you leave the western part of Nigeria however,
you will find that clientele politics developed, and by this I
speak specifically to the class of politicians that developed
in the eastern, south-southern, middle belt parts, and
practically everywhere outside of Yoruba land in that
season.
In that season, what simply happened was that men who
were deemed loyal to the system or amenable to its demand
were promoted in the different parts of Nigeria where the
military administration had to work. There were pockets of
resistance to the feudalisation, but more generally, the
politics of grievance was only rewarded in the western part
of the country given the nature of its politics.
In other parts of Nigeria, to gain political prominence,
you almost always had to be in the good books of the
military. This became the only path to political advancement
for a lot of politicians in those parts of the country. In fact,
during the Babangida years, to talk of a diarchy, a fusion of
the military and the politicians in the governance of Nigeria
was common political discourse. Such was the level of
acceptance of the centralised authority that governed
Nigeria and the compatibility of the unified command
system of the military to the governance of the country that
it was normal to begin to talk about a fusion of the two in
order to have stability of the system.

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You will find that during this season, the likes of Arthur
Nzeribe, Orji Kalu, Arisekola Alao, Lamidi Adedibu, and so
many others who were beneficiaries of the powers that were
conferred on them, not by the people but by the military,
became the apostles of diarchy.
This was the season when the spread of feudalism and
the development of the new feudal class gathered pace in
Nigeria.
After the death of Abacha came the Abdulsalami
transition programme. Anyone who is truly interested in
understanding the phenomenon of grievance politics,
clientele politics and how these two combined to shape the
proliferation of the feudal system that exercises the Nigerian
veto in the form of the creation of feudal hegemonies in each
of the new states; anyone who is genuinely interested in that
history should become a student of the political history of
Abdulsalami’s transition. I will explain.

********

Disrobement of the Progressives

AT the dawn of this republic, the political parties that
emerged, totalling three, in the history of their trajectory and
formation, hold particularly important lessons for any
would-be student of Nigerian feudalism. The Afenifere
intellectually led at the time by the late Chief Bola Ige as

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IMPERATIVES OF THE NIGERIAN REVOLUTION

deputy to Chief Abraham Adesanya, having received

assurances from the mainstream after Abiola’s murder,
sought to be as close to the mainstream as they could
possibly be and their original party of choice was the PDP.
Indeed, Chief Bola Ige it was, that wrote the constitution of
the PDP.
But they found out very quickly, that grievance politics,
which is the hallmark of Yoruba politics as exemplified by
the Afenifere, could not find accommodation within the
conservative conclave that the PDP truly represented. So,
they came out of the PDP and became part of the APP.
I have recounted in Do Not Die in their War, the formation
of both the PDP and APP, all of which I was witness to. I
have equally gone further to explain the ringside seat
afforded me by my chairmanship of what was known as
Binokonu, a Yoruba irredentist group that was affiliated to
Afenifere, and my relationship with the current Attorney-
General of Osun State, Mr. Femi Akande, the son of Chief
Bisi Akande, who was my friend and a member of the
Binokonu, whilst we were in law school.
I knew and could see how the ideological purity of the
AD made it impossible for them to either find a home with
the military establishment that was the then owner of the
Nigerian veto power. They could not find room in that party
and came out seeking to find alliance with the Shinkafi
faction of that hegemony. A failure to find that
accommodation, led them into branding certain classes of

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politicians as ‘Abacha politicians.’ These were the

beneficiaries of the clientele politics that developed during
the years of the military and who did not join the principled
boycott of the grievance politicians during the Abacha years.
The tensions between these groups ensured that at the
formation of political parties, at the dawn of this republic,
the grievance politicians essentially marooned themselves
into the AD, and the establishment politicians who were
past masters in the art of clientele politics were bunched
together in the PDP. On the other hand, was the traditional
party of the old guards who had lost powers in the years that
the military had had to develop their own power structure
and who eventually fused, for lack of ideological backbone,
into the PDP and had never managed to create an identity
separate and distinct from that of the clientele politicians.
It is instructive to note that at the beginning of Buhari’s
presidential ambition, he could never find any
accommodation with elements of the core PDP but he was
always at home within the ANPP, which was the party of
the religious and tribal irredentists who did not understand
the way the Nigerian game was meant to be played and
were never willing to play by those rules. The PDP never
found room for Buhari and neither did the AD because he
was identified as who he was by both. Buhari became the
beneficiary of the splinter groups of the conservative north
that could not find accommodation within the PDP.

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By the time, the election of 2003 was to come around, the

AD which had been registered, bending the clear published
rules governing the Abdulsalami transition, was to suffer
recompense for the compromises it made in 1999. What
Obasanjo did was to unleash what was known as the
tsunami of 2003, sweeping out the AD almost without
exception. Perhaps, it should be said without exception
because the only survivor of the 2003 PDP tsunami that
tripped over Yoruba land, was Bola Ahmed Tinubu, who in
truth was never a part of the Afenifere conclave, but was
merely a beneficiary of the grievance politics of the Afenifere,
which he played in the realisation that they were the only
viable political platform in Yoruba land in 1999.
With the decimation of the AD and every one of its
princes in 2003, feudalism was introduced full-fledged into
the innermost part of the Yoruba land, and men who were
not responsible to the populace, but held their power by
virtue of the alliance they had formed with the owners of the
Nigerian veto, became beneficiaries of power in Yoruba
Land, just as they had been in other parts of Nigeria. And
the feudalisation of Nigeria was finally completed in that
season.
In place of the Awoists, who had been the primary
beneficiary of the grievance politics of the South-Western
part of Nigeria, Bola Ahmed Tinubu became the new centre
of power, around whom all pretenses of progressive politics
began to coalesce. The past 18 years of Tinubu’s

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uninterrupted and unfettered control of Lagos State and to

some extent Yoruba politics, would suggest that there is
absolutely nothing progressive about his politics and that he
is a student of power who is completely at home however
his need is met.
Whatever doubt ever existed as to the conservative
credentials of Bola Ahmed Tinubu, disappeared and
vapourised upon the creation of the APC; his support for
Muhammadu Buhari and the capacity to find explanations
and rationalisations for his worst instinct. The forces of
feudalism, the same that sought out Ladoke Akintola (in the
First Republic), found their perfect match and partner in
Bola Ahmed Tinubu, and history would recall that with the
creation of the APC, full-fledged feudalism overtook every
part of the Nigeria nation.

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 “
Nigerians have seen constant
agitations to succeed to office but
there has never been any constant
agitation to change the society for the
better or to change the trajectory of
the nation itself and prepare it for life
in the new age. The rather unfortunate
consequence of this constant power
plays has been the liberalisation of
corrupt practices in Nigeria, the
normalisation of the same practices
and the complete subjectivisation of
the truth. To be sure, corruption in
Nigeria must be understood as being
completely different in meaning from
that in any other country in the world.

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 Chapter 5
A foundation of Lies

L
ies have a way of multiplying. It gives birth rather
rapidly. The easiest way to illustrate the prolific
nature of lies is to consider the fact that for every lie
that a man tells, there would have to be other lies to scaffold
and maintain the lie that had been told. The lies that were
told to scaffold the original lie usually end up as it is in the
very nature of lies, to further multiply. A person caught up
in the web of lies, however good he might be, eventually
trips himself up with his lies.
When you construct anything on a foundation of lies
such as an edifice like Nigeria, you may then liken this to a
building that has a defective foundation.
Nobody better illustrates the tragedy, paradoxes, and
ironies of the Nigeria State than the person of Obasanjo. For
evidence of how horrible and dire our situation has become,
I will turn to him and will be citing, copiously, paragraph
62-65 of the address he gave at Oleh during the Diocesan
Conference of 2019. I will further be looking to reproduce in
its entirety at this point, Alhaji Baba Ahmed Joda’s letter to
Lamido Sanusi upon his removal from the Emir of Kano
throne. I had earlier cited this letter, but I am particularly
interested in the portion that relates to the evil of feudalism

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as enunciated by Ahmed Joda, who, as I have said earlier,

cannot be said to be anything but a blue-blooded beneficiary
of the same feudal system that he presumed to rail against,
in his letter to his son.
When I speak of the original lie, it is tempting to believe
it is the inequitable distribution of power that attended the
birth of the Nigeria nation. That is not the original lie. The
original lie is the one the British told themselves as they
superintended the affairs of the northern part of Nigeria.
They had viewed it as a monolithic whole because it suited
their purposes at the dawn of Nigeria’s creation to
strengthen the existing system for ease of administration.
And over the years, their presence was sufficient to keep the
worst instinct of the Fulani irredentists who are traditionally
slavers of the minorities, over which they were given powers
by the British.
There is an anecdote that has been shared by no less than
Bishop Matthew Hassan Kukah. He explained that in his
younger days, when he was found eating too hurriedly, his
grandmother would turn to him and ask, “Are the Fulani
coming?” For those who do not understand the context of
this joke, I shall do my best to explain even though I had
touched on it in Do Not Die in their War.
The Fulani principally raided all the minority tribes in
the northern part of Nigeria, coming down towards the
Benue trough for slaves. Traditionally, the Kanem Bornu
empire expanded further towards the Sahel and the

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 ‘Dele Farotimi

Cameroon mountains and did its own slave raiding amongst

the tribes that were to be found in these mountains. These
tribes would come into the plain to plant and retreat into the
mountains in order to avoid the marauding slave traders.
The British presumed to think that with the introduction
of western education and values and their own governance
systems to tame the worst instincts of the Muhammedans,
there was going to be a united one singular north, driven by
the principle of one North. But even as they did this, they
were equally undermining the very thing that was required
to keep the illusion real. I had earlier referred to a
conversation between Sharwood Brooks and Abubakar
Tafawa Balewa, recounted on page 365 of But Always as
Friends. Particularly, where he made detailed efforts to
differentiate between Northerners.
I quote “at the moment in the army, men in the fighting
units were predominantly Northerners, not Northern
Muslims as in the past, but pagans and Christianised pagans
from Tiv, Zuru and from the hills and valleys of Bauchi and
Adamawa.”
It is important to note that even before the independence
of Nigeria, the division amongst the tribes in the north was
always evident to those from those parts, even though the
lie of a monolithic Northern Nigeria was successfully sold to
those in the southern parts.
In the southern part, particularly amongst the Yoruba
who rarely traveled out of their tribal enclaves, everybody

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IMPERATIVES OF THE NIGERIAN REVOLUTION

from across the Niger was considered a Hausa person. The

Fulani were so deeply assimilated and hidden within that
Hausa catch-all phrase that for a long time, until the rise of
Fulani irredentism in the 2000s, particularly with the
ascendancy of Muhammadu Buhari politically, many
Yoruba never really distinguished between the Fulani and
the Hausa.
As far as the Yoruba man was concerned, everybody
from across the River Niger was deemed a Hausa person,
and was mostly dealt with on the basis of that singularity, as
though the Yoruba were dealing with a monolithic North.
For the Igbo and Southern minorities, the case was pretty
much the same. The Igbo travelled extensively in Hausa
land in the north and had for long been extremely
peripatetic in their journeys across the Nigerian landscape,
and so, were always aware of the differences. But these
differences had never been sufficiently highlighted at any
point in time to be understandable by anyone, but those who
have made it their business to know.
For a long time, the North was the North and there was
never any difference amongst the nationalities as far as the
rest of Nigeria was concerned. But as the British planned
their veto for their favourite children, historical realities
would always suggest that this could not work: the fact that
Buhari has today done a lot to polarise the North along tribal
and ethnic lines, reopening old divides; the fact that Boko
Haram, essentially a Kanuri construct, has begun the

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process of reconquering territories that they had

traditionally subjugated before the coming of the British,
have meant that the north is today by far more fragmented
than any other part of the Nigeria State.
The occasional inability to exercise this veto
unchallenged, has never stopped its inheritors from finding
other ways to exercise it. Whatever system of government
was in place in the immediate aftermath of the second coup,
Northern unity was kept intact by a deliberate fostering of
solidarity amongst the governors. In the military era, careful
attention was paid to the nurturing of the Northern
Governors’ Forum, which ensured that regional issues were
kept on the front burner and the region spoke with one voice
and had political guidance from those who knew what they
were doing, and who acted in concert with each other.
The common interests of the supposedly monolithic
North were identified and pursued with single-minded
seriousness. The same was not the case in the other parts of
Nigeria. At the dawn of the Nigerian civil war, when states
were being created, attention was always paid to the
maintenance of the power structure. Every state creation,
regardless of who was in power – be it under Gowon,
Murtala, Obasanjo, Ibrahim Babangida or Abacha – one
thing was constant: the same power balance assuring that
half of the number of states being created remained in the
north. Also, the number of constituencies and seats in the

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IMPERATIVES OF THE NIGERIAN REVOLUTION

legislative houses have been carefully preserved over the

years.
However, note that in the exercise of this veto powers,
attention was always paid over the years to maintaining a
healthy balance between the children of the favoured wives
and those of the slave. Enough states were created for the
Northern minorities to balance out the generals who were of
minority extraction. Sharwood Smith spoke about the Zuru,
who ended up having a state created for them in Kebbi
because of the Bamaiyi brothers. It is a state in the North all
the same, and the share from the federation account that
used to only go for one state, now had to go to two. Hence,
at every point in time, even when the interest of the
Northern minority groups and their sponsors in
government were taken care of, the overall interest of those
who deemed themselves the owner of the veto were never
forgotten.
The tension created by the need to balance this equation,
has constantly shaped the trajectory of Nigerian politics.
The first coup arose out of a failure to manage the veto in
an equitable manner. The second coup rose out of the need
of those who believed themselves to have been dispossessed
of a right to address what they considered wrong. The coup
that removed Gowon from office was intended to place the
right person on the throne believed to have been reserved
for a particular people. The coup that removed Murtala
Muhammed was itself a response and a reaction by factors

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in the Middle Belt who believed themselves to have been

wrongly dispossessed of power and victimised by the
hegemony, against which their ancestors had always fought.
There have always been an unhealthy competition for
power and need to re-equate and balance power because
that power had never been amendable to any peaceful
change over the years. In the course of these conflicts, there
have been accidental beneficiaries of the power being
exercised by whoever is in control of the hegemony that
controls Nigeria.
It must be understood very clearly that, given the nature
of the powers that go with being in control of the Nigerian
space, an unhealthy competition has developed around the
power structure, and what happens is that there is a constant
conflict for power within the power elite itself.
Nigerians have seen constant agitations to succeed to
office but there has never been any constant agitation to
change the society for the better or to change the trajectory
of the nation itself and prepare it for life in the new age. The
rather unfortunate consequence of this constant power plays
has been the liberalisation of corrupt practices in Nigeria, the
normalisation of the same practices and the complete
subjectivisation of the truth. To be sure, corruption in
Nigeria must be understood as being completely different in
meaning from that in any other country in the world.
In Nigeria, what is called corruption is a catch-all phrase
for class impunity. In other countries, these are clearly

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crimes and would be charged as such, but in Nigeria,

corruption is a special class of offence that covers the
dealings of the ruling class that they euphemistically refer to
as corruption, when in reality, they are nothing but class
stealing and outright brigandage. But these have become
inevitable in an atmosphere where corruption has been
normalised on account of the fact that the law does not rule,
but the discretion of human beings is allowed and necessary
in order to assure that some people remain above the law.

********

The curse from 1947

WITH the spread of feudalism due to years of military rule
and the subsequent introduction of the 1999 constitution,
which more or less democratised it, there has been a rise in
the class of clientele politics. The economy itself has taken a
rental form, where real productivity has been stifled and
men of ideas are incapable of playing in the political space.
Political parties have become power platforms merely for
seeking office, completely bereft of ideology and empty of
any pretensions of being visionary.
Every seed reproduces after its kind and every system
produces exactly what it was designed to produce. For
instance, if you design a plant to produce PET bottles, it
would be asinine to expect porcelain plates. It would

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 ‘Dele Farotimi

produce what it was designed to produce. That is in the

normal course of everyday business. A state is not any
different.
When its users and administrators follow the design
template it would always produce exactly what it was
designed to produce. There might be times when you have
systemic errors, which we shall discuss later, but every
system produces exactly what it was designed to produce
for as long as it continues to work as it was designed.
The Nigeria State has remained faithful to the design of
1947. I have shown this by the evidence of state creation and
the faithfulness with which it had adhered to the agreements
of 1947. You will also agree when you realise that it has
never been possible for Nigeria as a nation to hold a credible
census. Such exercise would have undermined the lies that
were told in 1947 and that we have continued to honour with
more lies and the scaffolding of lies even in 2020.
The system around which Nigeria was designed in 1947,
and subsequently, was extremely feudalistic in nature. The
British were looking to build upon an existing system as
earlier explained, and in building upon this system, they had
to work with what they found on ground: the feudalistic
empires upon which they presumed to layer their own
modern sophistication.
The rise of this feudalistic system during the military
years with its own command structure, which turned
Nigeria into a unitary state, brought real consequences. The

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IMPERATIVES OF THE NIGERIAN REVOLUTION

first of these is that to maintain a feudal system, which

necessitates multiple layers of citizenship whilst pretending
that these do not exist because they were not justifiable,
Nigeria has institutionalised madness, and Nigerians have
learnt to embrace madness as though normalcies. I will
explain. What is called corruption in Nigeria, in my own
view, is not corruption, but mere attempts at equalisation of
unjust rights by the victims. One ready example comes to
mind. Despite the announced lockdown in Nigeria during
the COVID-19 pandemic, the government at various levels
went out of their way to announce exceptions for Dangote
trucks.
In Do Not Die in their War, I alluded to a conversation I
had with a police officer about how Dangote trucks were
exempt from any roadblocks and checkpoints, which should
be the case for all genuine businesses, such as Dangote’s, but
because the system is dysfunctional, special exceptions must
be made for a special class of corporate citizen. The same
special exception has equally been extended in this season
of the pandemic to a corporate citizen, which created the
room for the administrators of the exception to make money
by using their own discretion. But the need to relax rules for
one would allow several others pass once they are able to
pay the bills.
The readiness to pay is created by necessity and
exception. Hence, we see a situation where in relation to
certain corporate citizens, a clear dichotomy in rights have

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been created, which is subject to somebody’s discretion. But

this has birthed brand-new toll gates administered by
different agencies. As it is for corporate citizens, so it would
also appear to be for private citizens. The brazen hypocrisy
displayed and highlighted during the sickness, and later
burial of the former chief of staff to the president shows
clearly that some people are more equal than the others.
The temptation is always to assume that when we talk
about some people being more equal than the others, then
the discussion is centred around tribes. This is what makes
it easy for feudalism to hide in plain sight and for Nigerians
not to see it.
But this is the part where we need to begin to ask
questions that even when the primary requirement for entry
into that feuded class might, for the simple-minded, be tribe
or religion, how does Obasanjo qualify? He is neither Fulani
nor Muslim; a Christian who has even gone further to take
degrees in Christian Studies; he has never stopped
preaching and preachifying. But he has been one of the
greatest beneficiaries of the Nigerian system.
If it were to be about ethnic nationality, Bola Ahmed
Tinubu is not Fulani, and no one of Fulani extraction has
ever posted to rule in Abia State. Oyo State has not been
ruled by anyone outside of Ibadan origin for over the last 21
years, except Alao-Akala, but this has not turned Ibadan into
Eldorado. They might be on the way there if the gentleman in
office now is to be believed, but they certainly have not been

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there, and that is before looking at Oke-Ogun and other

forsaken parts of Oyo State.
The reality that must be dawning on every Nigerian is
the fact that the country has become a feudal state where the
care of the people in power has become the raison d’etre of
the State, and not care of the citizens who have actually been
rendered serfs. The entire purpose of the State has become
the maintenance of the ruling class in style and in power.
The most difficult things to find are usually hidden in
plain sight. Not that they are hidden, but sometimes, we do
not see the forest because of the trees; we become so focused
on one thing that we are tragically distracted away from the
other.
In the case of Nigerian feudalism, I believe the inability
to diagnose the problem as early as we should have been
able to, arises perhaps from firstly, the fact that it has been
in plain sight; secondly, the preoccupation with a search for
the solution to corruption, which led us for a long time to
mis-diagnose our problem and to focus on an anti-
corruption crusade as though that was the very problem of
the Nigeria State. This wrong focus, more than anything
else, led to the ascendancy of Muhammadu Buhari,
particularly in 2015, when he was juxtaposed against
Goodluck Ebele Jonathan.

********

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Building a Nation on crooked legs

IN seeking to explain the role of hegemonies in shaping the
trajectories of a nation, I have earlier sought to draw a
parallel between human habits and national hegemonies as
propellant for the development of either a person or a
nation.
Take for instance, a man who is a smoker is compelled
by his habits to have ash trays, lighters and matches, and if
he is conscious of his hygiene, he would probably have
deodorants. The smoking man is constrained by his habits
to do certain things and to acquire certain peccadillos. So, it
is with a nation as well.
The hegemonies that rule a nation shape its habit, its
proclivities, determine what it prioritises, frames the way it
presumes to respond to phenomenon, how it envisions and
shapes its future. What the British left behind, as I had
already laboured to explain, was a feudal system. Although
an attempt was made to correct the worst instinct of that
feudal system, the attempt only served to bring out even the
worst of what survived. The original issues raised by the
first coup were never addressed by General Aguiyi Ironsi
who inherited the power that was left in the vacuum
occasioned by the murders of the first set of coup plotters in
the immediate aftermath of the second coup.
Yakubu Gowon did try at the urging of the British to
make peace with the Igbo. One of such attempts was made

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at what became known as the Aburi Conference, where

Ojukwu repeated much the same demands as the original
coup plotters: a weaker central government, much more
powerful regions. These were agreed to at Aburi but were
later dishonoured and impudently disclaimed by the
Gowon government.
A lot of commentators have argued, or rather placed the
blame for the rejection of what had earlier been agreed in
Aburi at the doorstep of the late Oba of Benin, Akenzua II,
who was the Permanent Secretary at the Presidency at the
time. I think this would be a rather simplistic conclusion to
draw, given the fact that Sharwood Smith appears to have
made clear that even at this point in Nigerian history pre-
Independent, the North was already prepared to take power
through the Military, if that was the option left to preserve
the inherited veto.
With Gowon reneging on the Aburi Accord, the civil war
became unavoidable; it was largely forced on the Igbo. But
the civil war resolved nothing; if anything, it compounded
the spread of feudalism in Nigeria.
By the end of the civil war, with the military firmly in
control of governance, the unitary system of government
with its centralised authority took full charge, and
regardless of the best efforts of federalist such as Obafemi
Awolowo, feudalism took hold, and it was formalised in the
1979 constitution. That document imported the presidential
system of governance with its winner takes all proposition,

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which presumes the homogeneity of the people and de-

emphasises the strength of the old regions by breaking the
country into a 19-state structure with nine firmly in the
north.
Just as Nigeria was being broken into states based on
inequitable parameters, other things were happening
structurally, reflective of the hegemony that was in control
of the country. As men became like gods, and systems that
had existed before Independence were subverted because
they were incompatible with the new military rule, the
shape of a new nation was taking place but it was happening
without the consent of the people and their unwary
acquiescence.
Ten years in the life of a nation is as a day in the life of a
man. What cannot be wished away are the effects of the
unitary system that came with the military in shaping the
cultures and the governance systems of the State. It must be
said that the dominant instinct that has shaped Nigeria’s
trajectory from its birth, and particularly more so, since after
the civil war, has been a most rapaciously feudalistic one.
As a man’s habits shape his trajectory, as I have said ad
nauseam, a nation’s hegemony shapes its trajectory; it
determines its choices and informs its decisions.
The feudalistic nature of the State that emerged from the
civil war years meant that the law could not possibly apply
to all the citizens in the same way. It is instructive that one
of the first actions of successive military governments has

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always been the suspension of the Nigerian constitution.

And, after having suspended the constitution, the powers of
the courts are further ousted in relation to actions of the
government or its agencies, whilst the same laws are
allowed to apply in some form or the other to the individual
members of the State as far as the powers that be would
allow its applications. So, it became the norms that the State
began to decide what laws to obey and which not to obey, to
whom the laws apply, and to whom it does not apply.
Nigeria became a case study in how not to build a nation.

********

THE Nigerian judiciary was lost before the Nigeria nation

was lost. This is more visible when you examine the
appointive processes into the judicial offices.
Judges and magistrates are appointed at the mercy and
behest of the governors; for the Federal High Court, the
Court of Appeal and the Supreme Court, it is at the sole
discretion of Mr. President. At no time has any governor or
the presidency been shy of showing that such appointments
are completely dependent on the appointees’ readiness to do
exactly as they are told.
The fact that in all the years of military rule, the
legislative branch of governance was completely side-lined
and unavailable has meant that whilst the executive has
grown increasingly feudalistic in its instincts, the judiciary

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whose officers it appoints has also learnt to stay in its lane

and do exactly as it is directed. The fact that it is just as
corrupt as every other facet of the Nigeria State has only
rendered it much more susceptible to the control of the
executive branch of government.
With the adoption of the presidential system under the
1979 constitution, a complete departure from everything
that was ever agreed either by the British or even the owners
of the hegemonies themselves, emirates were effectively
created all over Nigeria and these became points from where
patronages were dispensed.
The centre became exceedingly powerful. And at the end
of the Second Republic with the first coming of Buhari and
the subsequent locusts that succeeded him, the emirate
system was further strengthened, and the patronage system
was institutionalised.
The differential levels of citizenship became even more
obvious and entrenched during these years.
The president became like a sultan with the powers to do
exactly as he pleases. The Nigerian president is literally
more powerful than the American president, at least it was,
until the coming of Donald Trump. The Nigerian president
essentially operates at the top of a gangster empire; is
completely above the law; operates above the cult; is
unrestrained and unfettered in his dealings and actions by
any law that will bind every other citizen.

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When the law does not bind a man and the morals of the
people have become as compromised as that of Nigeria;
impunity becomes the order of the day and the society itself
begins to implode from within.
Nigeria became a mad house during the successive years
of military rule.
When the system became scandalously unsustainable in
the dying days of Sani Abacha, the system coalesced, and the
different factions produced the Abacha solution: the Indian
apple.
The consensus that has always governed the Nigerian
space operates at best when it is working with the
assumption of Northern unity. And when this is in any way,
shape or form, undermined, be that as a result of some
disunity within the conservative class in the North itself as
became the case under Abacha; a disequilibrium is always
thrown into the system, demanding some resolution or the
other.
The Abacha apple episode was the resolution of that
chapter. But these resolutions happen almost always with
consequences. The emergence of Obasanjo was also a
consequence of other things that had happened within the
hegemony.

********

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 Chapter 6
Sustaining the Hegemony

T
he creation of the first and original veto that was part
of the foundation of the Nigeria State before its
Independence has been well-documented.
Sharwood Smith’s book, particularly pages 216-221, dealt
exhaustively with how the foundation was laid in 1947 to
ensure that the North always held its veto. The debate also
featured in Do Not Die in their War and in the earlier part of
the current effort. But whilst it is rather easy to provide
evidence of the existence of the original veto, it is not as
apparent because of the opaque nature of the evolution of
the feudal system that came after the death of Sardauna.
It is therefore necessary to trace the origin, character and
metamorphoses of the feudal hegemony that has held sway
over Nigeria from the inception.
I have relied extensively on several historical accounts of
the period, particularly, the works of Sharwood Smith and
other colonial officials, works of contemporary writers such
as Akin Osuntokun and; of course, the scholarship of several
Nigerian commentators and writers who were around at the
time. But in seeking to understand the character of the
Nigeria State, the tendencies and hegemonies that attended
its birth, I have also taken care to listen to the disputations

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amongst those who were there, taking care to understand

the motivation behind their assertions so that I might better
filter out the less reliable part of the stories they have told.
In seeking to understand Nigeria in the immediate
aftermath of the first coup, it has proven important to read
the works of the likes of Max Silhoun. Even the self-serving
biographies of the likes of Olusegun Obasanjo, the works of
Chris Ali and several other writers have provided windows
at various times into the history of Nigeria.
What I have done is to piece together the history as best
as I can, working hard to ensure that my personal opinions
do not matter, but that the facts lead me to the interpretation
of the events.
In the immediate aftermath of the first coup, with Ironsi
as the most senior military officer taking power, his failure
to punish those deemed the proponents of the coup, became
a cause célèbre for the rump of the Northern People’s
Congress, NPC, who had been routed out of office in the
coup and decapitated. They rallied around what was
perceived as Ironsi’s softness on the coup plotters. This
became a rallying point for building what might best be
interpreted as Northern solidarity and opposition to the
Ironsi’s government.
The Ironsi government issued Decree 1, which was more
or less a suspension of the constitution and a unitarisation of
the Nigeria State. This was in effect a reflection of the fact,
given the military command structure of the army, which

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was suddenly thrusted into the position of leadership. But

although this was an enforced choice, it became a rallying
point for building opposition to the Ironsi government. To
understand this, it is necessary to have historical perspective
of Nigeria, at the point in time. Prior to Independence, the
two other regions, and the two other major tribes, both the
Hausa-Fulani, and the Yoruba, had deep-seated resentment
for what was considered Igbo domination of the Nigerian
federation.
The Igbo have always been by far more adventurous
than all the other tribes in Nigeria. And by reason of their
early embrace of western education, as well as their
collaborative stance in colonial governance, the Igbo had
taken lofty command positions in both the army and police.
They equally staffed the upper echelon of the civil service
and were to be found in almost every significant town and
provinces in Nigeria. The affluence of the Igbo had made
them ready preys whenever there had been combustion in
the north. The Yoruba equally viewed the Igbo with distrust
because of what was considered their overambitious and
expansionist tendencies.
The southern minorities, part of whom had been placed
in the newly created Mid-West Region, also had deep fears
of Igbo hegemonic dominion ruling their consciousness,
hence it was pretty easy to find a national consensus around
which to coalesce. This was particularly more so in the

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north, which had lost not only political leadership but also
prominence in the army.
The original celebration that greeted the first coup,
particularly in Kaduna and in most parts of north, was soon
replaced by a deep resentment for what was soon rebranded
as an ‘Igbo coup’. This was the ferment that was rendered
even more volatile by Ironsi’s indecisiveness.
Had Ironsi moved to punish the original coup plotters,
perhaps the excuses that were offered and provided to those
who instigated the second coup would have been
unavailable to them. But Ironsi by his indecisiveness, sealed
his own fate.
Every historical account of that season in the aftermath
of the second coup of 1966, would suggest that the band of
coup plotters had no intention of taking over the reign of
federal power. The primary motivation was to exert
vengeance against Ironsi and officers of Igbo extraction. The
secondary objective was the not too well- thoughtout
reaction to the first, which was secession of the northern part
of Nigeria.
These issues were later to be resolved with the British
High Commission and the American Consul in attendance
at Ikeja Cantonment in 1966, after the second coup. The
immediate cry was one of Arewa, which translates to let each
person go their way.
It took persuasion to create the second phase of the
Nigerian veto and to begin the real feudalisation of the

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Nigeria State. This was because of the success of the second

coup.
The second coup was always inevitable. It could not,
with the benefit of hindsight, have ever been prevented.
There was no way Aguiyi Ironsi could have stayed in power
unchallenged by those who had been dispossessed of the
same.
To come to this conclusion, I have gone back in time
extensively and read up on the factors that made the first
coup inevitable, the second predictable, and the civil war,
almost unavoidable.
As I had alluded to before, the two regions of the North
and the West were in fear of Igbo domination at the dawn of
the Nigerian Independence.
In fact, long before Independence, there had been latent
anti-Igbo sentiment in the northern part. The Igbo are the
most widely dispersed of Nigerians, extremely mercantile in
their outlook and tailor-made to succeed in a country as vast
as Nigeria, whose other inhabitants were almost always
completely happy to stay in their own part of the country.
The enterprising spirit of the Igbo is such that long before
any of the other tribes began to venture out of their regions,
the Igbo had travelled far and wide in Nigeria.
By the time politics began in earnest, and the great
Azikiwe began to mobilise under the NCNC for what
seemed a pan-Nigerian mandate, resistance to his course
came from within the two other regions; and, since the shape

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of politics in Nigeria developed along tribal lines, the

country itself was balkanised into three regions, each
dominated by distinct ethnic and linguistic groups.
At the dawn of Independence, the reality was that the
Igbo, while not hated by the Yoruba were generally feared
by them. It is almost impossible to divorce fear and its
uterine twin, hatred. Though this fear did not snowball into
the hatred that was manifest and easy to see in the north, it
was nonetheless the national posture. The Igbo were the one
that everybody loved to hate.
The minorities trapped in the Eastern region had their
catalogue of woes, and tales of marginalisation in the hands
of the Igbo majority. And as the happiness of minorities
goes, those in the Eastern Region looked to the West as the
model of what they’d prefer. Ndigbo were never much
beloved in Nigeria, or by Nigerians.

********

AS far back as 1957, the North had a contingency plan in

place in the event that it were to ever lose power that was
ceded to it within the Nigerian Federation preparatory to
Independence. On page 365 of his book, Sharwood Smith
recalled a letter he received from Tafawa Balewa, wherein
he was charged specifically with two tasks: the most
important led to the recommendation that the North should

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accelerate its enlistment in the officer corps of the Nigerian

army.
Smith made sure to make a distinction between what he
termed the paganised and Christianised Northerners of the
Middle-belt, the Plateau hills and Adamawa hills and the
Hausa-Fulani of the core North. Beginning from early 50s,
the North had rapidly sought to northernise the officer corps
of the Nigerian army, largely using a variety of quota
systems to ensure and enforce their will.
At the time of the first coup, the Nigerian army had a
sizeable population of Hausa-Fulani officers, particularly
within the junior corps, the lieutenants, captains, and
majors. Quite a number of them were of Northern
extraction.
Of particular interest should be Murtala Muhammed
whose grandfather was the Grand-Alkali of the Kano
Emirate, just as his father was. He had graduated from
Barewa College and joined the army at age 20. He was just
one of the crops of aristocratic Fulani men, who were steered
into the army through the agency of the likes of Mamalari
and the several other officers of Northern extraction who
were used extensively in recruitment drives.
In the West on the other hand, this was the time when it
was only those considered failures were enlisting in the
army. The Yoruba would rather pursue careers in
professions such as medicine, law and engineering. It was
only the lowly, pursued by extreme poverty as have been

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variously confessed by Obasanjo, or the mentally incapable,

that were deemed good enough to be sent to the military.
The North was to reap a bountiful harvest because
immediately after the first coup, with the mobilising work
of the rump of the NPC, the latent hatred that had always
existed for the Igbo based on the jealousies of their
commercial success in far-flung part of Northern Nigeria;
the incapacity of the Igbo to be assimilated into the societies
where they found themselves trading; made them easy
targets. And at the instigation of the rump of the NPC, a new
consciousness began to spread in the north, which was
bound by a common hatred for the Igbo man. The hatred of
the ubiquitous Igbo nation became the binding glue for the
northern hordes.
After successfully decapitating the government and
killing Aguiyi Ironsi and Adekunle Fajuyi in Ibadan,
embarking on the orgies of violence that had NCOs (Non-
Commissioned Officers) turning their guns on their Igbo
and Mid-Western officers, and in some cases the Yoruba
officers, it dawned on the Fulani arrowheads of the coup
that if they were to stay within the Nigerian Federation as
they were being persuaded to do, they would have to revert
to type and begin their centuries-old system of indirect rule
once again.
The Fulani minority rulers needed to create and craft
together a new hegemony in place of the one that had died.
This was the hegemony they had refused to leave in the

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hand of Ironsi, that they had not planned for when they
killed him since they had not thought beyond revenge and
at best secession until they were dissuaded by the British
envoy and the American consul.

“At the moment in the army, men in the fighting unit were
predominantly Northerners. Not Northern Muslims as in
the past, but pagans and Christianised pagans from Tiv,
Zuru and from the hills and valleys of Bauchi and
Adamawa. The technicians on the other hand and the men
in the supply and transport unit, came almost entirely
from the South. Equally, the Northern police, because of
superior educational standards were mostly recruited from
the non-Muslim middle belt provinces, while for different
reasons, a high proportion of the police in the South were
Igbo with officers. The position was largely reversed, there
were I thought, far too few northern officers. A situation
which under stress might have awkward consequences as
could imbalance amongst other ranks. Much as one might
dislike the thought, tribalism would be a potentially
explosive factor in Nigerian politics for some time to
come.”
– Sharwood Smith (Page 365 – 366)

This was Sharwood Smith’s position as at 1957, but it

must be remembered that the Fulani rulers had now had
nine years to correct the imbalance identified by Smith, in

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IMPERATIVES OF THE NIGERIAN REVOLUTION

his position paper to Tafawa Balewa back in 1957. Hence

you had a situation where the officer corps had become
better balanced in terms of the Fulani to Middle-belt officer
ratio, it was now a better balance as far as the Fulani were
concerned. But the fighting men in the units themselves, the
regimental sergeant majors, the sergeants, the core of the
fighting men remained essentially people of the Middle-belt
and those generally referred to as the pagans and
Christianised pagans.
These were the objective realities on the ground in July
1966.

********

THE insistence of the North on retaking the veto that it had

lost when its leadership was decapitated in the first coup
had to be balanced against the need to preserve the illusion
of a singular North. So, while it was okay to overlook
Brig.Gen Babafemi Ogundipe, (the second in command to
General Aguiyi Ironsi at the time of the July 1966 coup), and
impose a Lt.Col. Yakubu Gowon as the head of the new
government, it was only so because Murtala Muhammed
was left with no choice but to accept the order of seniority,
at least as far as it concerns the Northern Region, in order to
preserve the illusion of a monolithic northern bloc.
To do this, realpolitik demanded that power must then
be shared in an uneasy relationship with the other part of

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the North that had never traditionally held these powers.

This meant that the Zuru who were always the
marginalised, the Borno and Kanuri, who were never quite
at home with the British had to be brought into a new power
concentric that was to administer the veto that had been
retaken.
Having dealt with the enforced recalibration of what the
North meant, the next thing that was done in order not to
have too many warfronts, was to make the strategic move of
removing the unjustly incarcerated Obafemi Awolowo from
prison, in a move that was calculated to win the support of
the Yoruba in the campaign against the Igbo. The Yoruba
support was won as envisaged, but there was another
critical support that was secured at the same time.
Each party to the new hegemony that was being crafted
joined in for reasons best known to each. The benefit of
history means that one has a rear-view mirror from whence
to look. But one critical part of the hegemony were the
Nigerian ethnic and religious minorities. Taken together as
a group, the minorities are actually numerically superior in
number to any of the three major ethnic groups. But given
their balkanisation in the three original regions – which
became four at the dawn of the second coup – simply meant
that their fear of ethnic domination and injustice which had
always coloured their relationship with every one of the
majority, it was better to be a part of a united Nigeria. In a

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balkanised Nigeria their minority status would guarantee

their marginalisation.
It then meant that at every point in time when anyone of
the three major ethnic groups sought to break away from the
Nigerian federation, it had to fall on the ethnic minorities,
acting in concert without consultation, responding to their
own fears, to act as a check on every secessionist tendency.
There is nothing for the ethnic minorities in a breakdown
of the Nigerian Federation. Those in the northern part have
centuries-old memories of Fulani or Borno domination.
I have dealt extensively with the history of Fulani slave
trading and how long it persisted; how it shaped the tone of
their relationship with every one of the other tribes, trapped
in what had for so long been erroneously referred to as
northern Nigeria, as though it is one homogenous whole for
whom the Hausa-Fulani speaks.
In the South East, the Igbo are the single largest ethnic
group. Given the regions as set up by the British for the
benefit of their own administrative convenience -- as with
the Igbo, the Hausa-Fulani and the Yoruba -- numerically,
the Igbo will always form the government. This is not unlike
the Ibadan vote in Oyo politics, every other part of the state
ends up as minorities, and this is a purely Yoruba state. So,
the refusal to ensure justice amongst all has created
minorities, even within a tribe and a sub-group.
It is not my purpose to examine who was right or wrong,
or what the role of each of the tribes might have been in the

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prosecution of the Nigerian civil war. But what one can see
clearly in the rear-view mirror of time is that even though
Gowon might have trumpeted “no victor, no vanquished,”
the reality was that the Igbo were thoroughly vanquished.
In the apportionment of rights and privileges in the new
Nigeria, there was an active policy that sought to
discriminate against the Igbo. But this policy was equally
balanced against one that sought to advantage the North.
The North this time being the new coalition of powers
between the old slaves and the old masters, in an alliance
that created a super class of citizens in their dealings with
the rest of Nigeria.
For this to work, the Yoruba were equally complicit in
the sense that they competed against the Igbo on an uneven
scale, but never on an equal scale with the Hausa-Fulani and
the remaining part of what was known as the North. The like
of Obasanjo recognised where the real power laid, and he
was the token that was favoured as a rebuke to other Yoruba
that would complain of marginalisation.
The infrastructure of inequality was strengthened in this
season, and the character of the hegemony and the broad
agreements and assumptions governing it were equally
established. In this season, the Fulani reserved for
themselves the positions of power and they also allotted to
trusted members of the Northern minorities, positions of
power.

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There was the emergence at this time, the fruit of the long
foresight of the Sardauna in his protestation of the One
North policy. Chris Ali in his account of how he sought
favours under the illusion of the one North policy, shows
clearly that even within the one North policy, there were
classes of membership.
But be that as it may, a class of Northern aristocrats had
been sent overseas in the 50s, and this group of intellectuals,
well-trained abroad, some of them went to the finest of Ivy
league colleges in America and Oxbridge Universities in the
UK, had returned to form part of what became known as the
Kaduna Mafia.
Other writers and historians have dissected the
phenomenon of what became known as the Kaduna Mafia.
But suffice to say that after the decapitation of the Northern
aristocracy in the political leadership of the North at the end
of the first coup, this crop of leaders emerged, and they were
mostly to be found in Kaduna, which was the administrative
headquarters of the old Northern Region. This
conglomeration of Northern intelligentsia, aristocrats,
politicians, bureaucrats, police and military officers, were
mostly people who had attended the famous Barewa
College. They were not exclusively of Hausa-Fulani stock,
but that was certain to gain one admission at that level.
There are several dissertations that have been written
concerning these gentlemen, but it should be understood
that the new power concentric after the civil war during the

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 ‘Dele Farotimi

Gowon years, came fully into its own during the Murtala
Mohammed and Obasanjo years. These were men who were
of conservative Fulani stock, and they shaped the policies of
Nigeria from behind the scenes.
The north generally benefitted extensively from the new
power arrangement because it simply meant that the Fulani
who have now retained control of the veto only needed to
assuage the feelings of every one of the minority groups
(within the region) that truly mattered. The Yoruba were left
largely to their own devices, but they became complicit in
what became the Igbo marginalisation agenda. As I have
said before, every marginalisation agenda has beneficiaries,
the Yoruba were marginal beneficiaries of the systemic
wickedness towards Ndigbo.
The lessons imbibed by leaders of the North pre-
independence and particularly as revealed by the position
paper prepared for Abubakar Tafawa Balewa by Sharwood
Smith, had led them to a clear understanding of the need to
preserve the North, as though it were a single entity in all of
its dealings with Nigeria. This was in order to be able to
retain the veto that was conferred in 1947.
To keep this up, the new crop of leaders, who as
mentioned, were mostly centred around the Kaduna axis,
resourced mostly by the old NPC cadres and the younger
elements they had sent to schools abroad, well-trained but
nevertheless, extremely conservative in their view of the

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world, were the ones who extended the concept of one

North, as originally propagated by the Sardauna.
They understood the need to preserve that unity, but
their readiness to be more progressive in their thinking and
quite pragmatic in understanding the need to make
concessions to the Middle Belt, meant that they created the
myth of the Northern Governors Forum. There was also an
attempt to create a very clear Northern identity which
discounted in its dealing with other Nigerians, the
differences between the different components of the north.
Within the north itself, there were active concessions,
nothing of consequence, but certainly tokenist gestures that
led other parts of the North to begin to feel as though they
be one. The old master-slave relationship that goes back into
historic times and exists between the Northern tribes and the
Fulani overlord began to recede into a past, and a new
synergy emerged.
So, the way politics was determined, for instance, was
that for Murtala Mohammed to fulfil his destiny as it were,
he had to have the backing of a Joseph Garba. But, across the
broad spectrum of the North, whilst there were momentous
shifts in terms of the relationship dynamics, the fact remains
that the actual powers remained in the hand of the
institutional hegemony that have always existed in the
northern part of Nigeria. So yes, the Kaduna Mafia existed,
not so much as a body that took formal decision, but as a
coalition of interests, mostly Northern interest being the

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primary interest, and they had men in all parts of Nigerian

life.

********

The scheming Prince of the Mafia

MURTALA Mohammed himself was believed to have been
a core member of what was generally referred to as the
Kaduna Mafia. And, generally, the North at this time was
better prepared for the challenges of power that came with
the loss of the republic after the second coup, and the
structure that emerged after the civil war.
At the time of the Murtala Mohammed coup, another
disruption happened within the system. Every system that
is predicated on injustice is bound to breed grievances, and
when the avenues for such diiscontent to be ventilated are
shut off, they almost always resort in outburst of violence.
When a system is inherently unjust, and when advantages
are deemed inherited, implosions are unavoidable.
The Murtala coup that ousted Gowon must be
understood within the context of historical realities. Gowon
was never the choice of the Nigerian prerogative; he was
merely a trustee.
By 1976, Murtala Mohammed, having lost patience with
the direction of the government, and having built enough
consensus, moved in at a time when it was easy to assure

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that there would be no bloodshed. This is because there was

the need to keep the illusion of one North and to ensure that
Middle Belt sensibilities were not going to be bruised. A
palace coup was his choice, but he ensured that there were
sufficient Middle-belt officers on board.
Murtala Mohammed took the office he had sought since
that day in Ikeja cantonment. But this was to have
consequences, which was not to be long in coming. The
consequences came in the form of the Middle Belt reaction,
known as the Dimka coup of 1976. The unique character of
each one of the two coups is that even though the beneficiary
of the first was the Fulani man, Ramat, the reality is that the
casualty of the coup had been the Middle Belt officer corps,
who were caught up in the politics that had necessitated the
coup and the counter coup. The sacrifice of the Middle Belt
will come to define the coups of that era up until the coming
of Ibrahim Babangida.

********

Aremu the grateful beneficiary

WITH the passage of Murtala Mohammed, the nature of the
Nigerian governing hegemony was further defined. In fact,
that will probably be the time when it had been most open
in showing its hand in how it came about. There are
sufficient accounts in the public domain – from Obasanjo

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himself and other participants in the politics of the age. It is

revealing that shortly after the coup that killed Murtala
Mohammed, Obasanjo went cowering under the bed in
Chief S. B. Bakare’s house! He was fearful for his life because
he remembered exactly what had happened in the past
when the North had lost its leaders. Obasanjo could not have
forgotten so quickly the events of 1966 that led to the civil
war; and he was not interested in being caught in the
crossfire.
If we admit to Obasanjo’s cowardice, what is to be said
about TY Danjuma’s “diplomacy”? It has been variously
reported that being the most senior officer of Northern
extraction at that point, and being the Chief of Army Staff,
and having repeatedly put down coup, he was asked to
declare himself the Head of State. But TY Danjuma turned
down the poison chalice, he insisted on Obasanjo being
sworn into power since he was the second in command to
the deceased Head of State, and the one in the line of
succession. And in a show of realpolitik and a clear
understanding of the power dynamics, the North had to
choose between Shehu Musa Yar’Adua and Muhammadu
Buhari to fill in the position of deputy to Obasanjo.
Yar’Adua was promoted above his rank, I believe two ranks,
so that he might become Obasanjo’s deputy.
Yar’Adua’s promotion into that office consolidated the
powers of the traditional Northern oligarchy. His father had
been a minister in the First Republic NPC’s government; and

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he was from a Fulani aristocracy, hence he effectively

became the voice and the face and representative of the
owners of the Nigerian veto in the new power concentric
formed after the murder of Murtala Mohammed.
The Obasanjo government was promptly rebranded the
Murtala-Obasanjo government. The reality of the season
was that Obasanjo ruled in a collegiate manner. The SMC
met and took all the critical decisions. Obasanjo knew his
place in the pecking order. He had no grand ambitions
beyond feathering his nest and escaping to enjoy his loot.
Obasanjo never ruled in the form in which he ruled in the
second term as a democratically elected president, even as a
military dictator. He reigned understanding clearly that he
was a regent in power; conscious of the need to constantly
reassure the real powers that he was loyal to them. There are
several accounts by other Yoruba generals of how they were
sold out to the Fulani and the powers that be by Olusegun
Obasanjo.
He was a loyal servant of the feudal system that he has
begun to rail against in the twilight of his years.
The new power concentric was clearly in the hand of the
Fulani, and Obasanjo understood the need to show his
loyalty in every way, shape or form, as a way of
guaranteeing his own life, and also as a way of ensuring that
he was allowed to be practically anything he cared to be, for
as long as he knew his station in life. Hence, while Obasanjo
might turn around today and be one of the loudest voices in

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criticism of the Fulani hegemony, he was one of the builders

and architects of that same hegemony, even as he was also a
principal beneficiary of the hegemony.
The feudal hegemony reached the height of its powers
during the Obasanjo years. The Kaduna Mafia, as it came to
be known, set the agenda for governance. They had a clear
understanding of exactly what was required, and they set
about executing it ruthlessly and brutally. The Igbo were
completely marginalised. The infrastructure for their
marginalisation was fully set in place during these years:
Quota system; educationally disadvantaged states.
The totality of the infrastructure of preservation of feudal
advantages were institutionalised in the years of the
Obasanjo regime. The systematic apportionment of Nigeria
was also done at this time. The Northern minorities were
mostly given whatever it took to keep them restrained and
happy, but power was consolidated in the Obasanjo years.
It was easy for a lot of things that might have been
difficult for even the Murtala Mohammed government to do
or accomplish, as it would have been easy to brand those
things as being feudalist and pro-North, to be done under
the Obasanjo Government. But this were mostly done in the
years of Obasanjo with Yoruba complicity, not necessarily
because there was any real trade off, but because of the fact
that the Yoruba were largely left to their own devices and
ignored in the moment. Obafemi Awolowo’s mass literacy
campaign had ensured that to a very large extent, the

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IMPERATIVES OF THE NIGERIAN REVOLUTION

Yoruba were capable of creating a new middle class, that left

them completely inured to the shenanigans of government,
even as real power was consolidated in hands that had
always had design from the dawn of time.
The Obasanjo regime committed to a return to
democracy that was birthed by a widely applauded
timetable, contrary to what Gowon before them had done.
This was quickly embraced by the political class who saw it
as an opportunity to retake what had been lost after the
second coup.
But there is an interesting phenomenon that must be
observed here again.
As it was at the time of Nigeria’s Independence, so it was
again when it came to time for the return to democratic rule.
The North protested its unreadiness, but quickly
gathered a coalition that coalesced around the former
minister in Balewa’s government, the old schoolteacher,
Shehu Shagari and; contrary to the expectation that the likes
of Adamu Ciroma were going to emerge as NPN candidate,
Shehu Shagari became the anointed candidate of the
Northern oligarchy.
With Shagari’s emergence in office, and by consensus,
what became known as the Kaduna Mafia, was again
expanded as the exigencies of the moment demanded. They
took enough from the East but could never penetrate
effectively in Yoruba land. So, the need to put together a
coalition for whom Obasanjo was to pass power necessitated

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broad coalitions, which brought about further changes to the

synergy governing the hegemony ruling Nigeria. The
realpolitik of the moment meant that alliances had to be
formed with critical parts of the middle belt once again, and
yet again, with the Igbo as it was in the First Republic.
The Yoruba again were the main opposition. So, a new
power concentric came out of the Obasanjo transition,
retaining much the same coalition that had held power after
the Murtala coup, and assuring as always, that the Igbo were
again marginalised.
The position of the Yoruba as the opposition was
cemented in this season, under the able leadership of
Obafemi Awolowo and the Unity Party of Nigeria.
The ineptitude of the Shagari regime, the contradictions
engendered by the need to service the alliances ensured that
the government failed spectacularly.
By around 1982, there were schisms even within what
was known as the Kaduna Mafia. A faction of the mafia
aligned with Shehu Musa Yar’Adua, went into an alliance
with Obafemi Awolowo, who felt that working with this
body might make him more acceptable to the hub of the
northern part of Nigeria. Their ‘altruistic intentions’ led
enough of the northern intelligentsia to adopt his candidacy,
and to actually have one of their members run as his vice-
presidential candidate. Alas, this handshake across the
Niger was not to be. A moonslide election victory was

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IMPERATIVES OF THE NIGERIAN REVOLUTION

declared for the NPN, not unlike Buhari’s landslide re-

election result. The rest as they say is history.
The contradictions and controversies arising out of that
election, led to the end of the Second Republic.
The coalition of forces that plotted that coup had no
choice after the death of Brigadier Ibrahim Bako, who was
intended candidate for Head of State, but to adopt
Muhammadu Buhari, who had been overlooked in the
power reshuffle of 1976. The factors that disqualified him in
1976 were still there, but the expediency of the moment
demanded that the person who must replace the Fulani man
that was being removed, had to be another Fulani.

********

The unfit inheritor

IT should be noted that the system that undergirds the
Nigeria State is not amenable to law and cannot be
submitted to law. It is incompatible with democracy. These
were the contradictions that led to the end of the Second
Republic. It had become unsustainable, and the government
had lost legitimacy. But the military, as had always been the
design, was available and ready as an alternative to the
failed political experiment, to take over power on behalf of
the north, yet again.

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 ‘Dele Farotimi

So, out goes Shagari and in comes Buhari. But with his
ascension to power, came a further evolution of the
hegemony that has governed Nigeria from birth.
The same reasons that rendered Buhari unsuitable for
consideration at the time of Shehu Musa Yar’Adua’s
ascension soon reared its heads; it became obvious at his first
coming. These were his inability to understand that he needs
to carry along other interests, his refusal to countenance the
need to build the coalition that accepts the illusion of a
homogeneous North. His prebendal instincts and nepotistic
posture became evident very quickly, and key officers of
Middle Belt extraction, including Babangida, who felt
themselves marginalised and threatened by his Fulani
irredentist posture, and his readiness to lend himself to the
worst of extreme religious instincts.
A combination of all these meant that his days were
quickly numbered. And the hegemony that had brought
him to power, in the understanding of the need for the
collegiate governance of Nigeria, quickly coalesced to evict
him from power. He was realised to have been a system
error, and was treated as one and removed in a palace coup.
He was promptly arrested and kept away.
Babangida had a profound effect on the shape of the
hegemony that was to follow, and it was shaped in his
character and likeness. He is the mother, or shall I say, one
of the fathers of modern Nigeria.

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Enter the power-gamer

BABANGIDA is from one of the minority tribes in the
Middle Belt, a Gwari by origin, a minority from amongst the
minorities. He is from one of the tribes in the long history of
Hausa-Fulani subjugation and slave raiding and trading.
But he was also one of a generation of military officers who
grew up in the early days of one North. He bought into the
illusion of one North, but was also quite politically savvy
and sophisticated. He was to be found wherever power was
tilting at any point in time. Babangida has always been a
consummate player in the power game.
On assuming power, Babangida elevated the politics of
one North even higher. He built a consensus in government
as far as the northern part of Nigeria was concerned. He saw
his primary constituency as being the North and in
consolidating his powers, he made sure to appease the
Fulani and not do anything remotely against their interest.
In fact, it is arguable that asides from the Obasanjo years,
Babangida’s were years during which the Fulani hegemony
truly had the opportunity to spread its wings and tentacles.
In the Babangida years, the inherent veto of the North
became an institutionalised commodity.
Babangida worked from the concept of a clear
understanding of power. He understood how much power
he could wield and the limitations of such powers. He had
Abacha, the Kanuri general as his Minister of Defence, he

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had select-officers of the mid-cadre level who he had

promoted to choice offices and promoted over and above
their mates, with whom he created a clique that was
particularly instrumental to the retention of power.
Amongst these were the likes of Gwadabe Aliyu, Major
Umar and quite a number of young officers whom he
cultivated.
Babangida was quite good at playing the power game
and he created a new hegemony, which whilst essentially
Hausa-Fulani centric, was also instrumental in the
proliferation of the feudal system. He created the prebendal
reward system that has come to normalise Nigerian politics.
To fully understand Babangida’s power plays and the
way he structured his government and built his hegemony,
one needs to pay particular attention to the Vatsa coup.
The people who suffered the most through every one of
the coup plots of the Babangida years were always of Middle
Belt extraction. These were the people he got rid of, solely so
that he might consolidate power, and in order to rid the
army of those he considered inimical to his interest.
Babangida’s interest was the primary motivation for his
exertions. But the closest Nigeria has come to diarchy was
witnessed in those years, when military intervention and
participation in politics was all but 123ormalized. A
pseudointellectual basis was also laid for the future
involvement of the military in Nigerian politics.

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The June 12 debacles

THOSE for whom the June 12 election represents important
landmark in the consideration of their own thesis have done
a good job of defining the importance of the election in the
trajectory of Nigeria’s politics. It is, however, important to
point out that at the end of Babangida’s transition
programme, and with the truncation of June 12 elections,
and the refusal to swear in Abiola – the winner of that
election – a schism developed within the ruling hegemony,
which made sure that whilst Babangida could no longer stay
in office, Abiola who had won the election, could also not be
sworn in. As much as people might wish to forget history,
the reality is that Abiola himself was instrumental in the
enthronement of the Abacha regime. He had the mistaken
belief that he had an agreement that would have Abacha
swearing him in and vacating power, whilst recognising the
validity of the election that had been annulled.
These negotiations were not held in the open, none of us
was privy to the terms. But that the negotiations were being
held on the basis of a mandate that had been given by the
people would suggest that there were/are powers in Nigeria,
whose voices and will speak louder than that of the Nigerian
people.
The tragedy of the June 12 election is not really to be
found in the refusal to swear in the winner of the election
and the several tragic events that followed that unfortunate

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happenstance. The real tragedy is to be found in the willful

subversion of the will of the people and the refusal of the
system to allow that singular opportunity offered for the
system to correct itself. allow
The opportunity to allow people transit from being serfs
into citizens was summarily truncated!
Needless to say, the hegemony that birthed the
Babangida regime practically ground to a halt and died after
June 12 election. It could not birth a democracy, but it did
birth a dictatorship.
And with Abacha came the dawn of another hegemony.

********

The rude, brutal intrusion of Abacha

WHERE Babangida was urbane, diplomatic and perhaps
charming in enforcing his will, and where he was smooth in
seeking to get the consent of other players in the power
concentric, Abacha did not pretend to care about such
finesses. He introduced himself quickly and brutally and the
hegemony that was built around his rule had room for only
himself. He ruled maximally and with fear. Abacha’s
maximum powers meant that he never could find the grace
to play the consensual games that would have seen the order
of the veto; ensuring that the southern minorities continued
to stay on the side of the political North.

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By the years of Abacha’s coming, the Niger Delta had

become restive from long years of ecological rights
devastation. Ken Saro-Wiwa who had once found common
cause with the Federal Government during the civil war,
became the focal point of agitation in the Niger Delta, and
the Abacha hegemony, finding no patience for him or any
agitation that does not countenance the fact that Nigeria was
an estate to be administered as they cared, brutally put him
dow. The same was done to the Yoruba. The June 12
mandate was quickly branded a Yoruba agenda – with the
help of Chukwumerije and most of the mercantile Igbo
commentators.
The age-old rivalry between the Yoruba and Igbo became
a ready tool in the hand of those who will divide them to
conquer them. The hegemony that was built around the
Abacha regime was truly pan-Nigerian in nature, in terms
of the personalities that sat therein. It was extremely
irredentist in its alignments. Abacha, the same man that
announced the ouster of the Fulani general, also brought
Buhari out of his political exile, and consequently made him
the head of the PTF.
Babangida had built a hegemony that operated on a
system that allowed a class to be enriched if it was not in
opposition to his rule. He had democratised corruption
within the critical sectors and, particularly within the
military. To be a Babangida boy simply meant that you had
access to every wealth that Nigeria had to offer anybody. So,

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when Abacha inherited power from Babangida, all he did

was to continue servicing the existing structures. By this
time, however, Babangida had weakened the military super
structure with the purges that took place after the Vatsa
coup and the subsequent Gideon Okah’s.
All Abacha had to do was to deal with the restiveness in
the Niger Delta which was the cashcow, and he did so
brutally with the instrumentality of Major Paul Okuntimo
and the eventual murder of Ken Saro-Wiwa and the Ogoni
9.
But there was to be no significant change to the existing
hegemony under Abacha. All he did was to remove one
clientele, Sultan Dasuki, who was crowned by Babangida
and replace him with his own suppliant Fulani ruler,
Maccido. Though the power structure remained constant,
every Fulani of significance, who might have represented a
threat to Abacha within the military super structure was
either hounded out, retired, rendered client, or in some
ways, made completely incapable of striking against the
dictator.
Abacha did a fantastic job of consolidating power in a
sense that he became more or less a champion of the
Northern hegemony and a beneficiary of the barely
concealed hatred of the Yoruba and their grievance politics.
So, the resentment that the North had always had for the
Yoruba grievance politics reached its apogee in the years of
Abacha. His treatment of the Yoruba at the time was not

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IMPERATIVES OF THE NIGERIAN REVOLUTION

considered anything special, it was just the Yoruba getting

their just dessert, but this time around, it was the Igbo and
the North against the truculent Yoruba.
Abacha ruled maximally without recourse to anybody,
he was truly a dictator. Perhaps, the only true dictator that
ever emerged in the Nigerian pantheon of crooked, bloody,
and brutal rulers.
For Abacha to leave office, given the fact that he was a
man without lieutenants, no loyalists outside of his own
immediate circle, the old gang found a final solution. The
facts of that solution remain known only to those who were
direct participants, but that final solution saw to the death of
Abacha in the hands of supposed Indian prostitutes, vide the
agency of apples, not agbalumo, apples. He was fed his
apples, and his reign came to an end.
Abacha was the sole hegemon, even though he ruled
with the North as his base, and taking care of the clients that
he had either created or inherited from the Babangida
regime. He was the maximum ruler and with his death came
the end of his hegemony.
In the aftermath of Abacha’s death, the Babangida
hegemony aligned with the old Obasanjo hegemony, given
their common origin and root, which is to be clearly
understood more or less as a reaffirmation of the old Kaduna
Mafia view of the exercise of the power that was given. This
has the North as the central beneficiary, but was consistent
in making sure that the concept of a single monolithic North

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was always preserved in order to ensure that at a minimum,

the amoral rights enforced against the rest of the country are
generally done with the acquiescence and, never to their
exclusion of the minority tribes in the North.

********

The Abdulsalami Abubakar-Obasanjo cojoined

hegemony

THE Abdulsalami regime that came into power Abacha’s

death, by some magic, managed to coincidentally preside
over the death of Moshood Abiola who was completely
unacceptable to the hegemony that had equally rejected him
after the June 12 elections. The rest as they say is history.
Obasanjo who was imprisoned by Abacha, was
promptly released, rehabilitated, and the new hegemony
coalesced around him, recruiting the likes of TY Danjuma
and other faces of the old northern hegemony that had
served during the Murtala-Obasanjo government, and the
rump of the Babangida government – to rebuild the same
hegemony.
This hegemony held sway for the bulk of Obasanjo’s first
term but was gradually dismantled and replaced by
Obasanjo dictating his own pace, sidelining TY Danjuma
and other key actors; ensuring that Babangida did not
succeed him as he had hoped and making sure that his own
will reigned supreme in his second term.

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For Obasanjo to achieve the dismantling of the

hegemony that had brought him into office, he recognised
and deemed primary the interest of the Fulani interest. He
never did anything overtly against that interest because he
recognised that the source of his own legitimacy and power
came from his alienation from his own people and his
adoption by the same hegemony that had similarly adopted
him in 1976.
Obasanjo has always been at critical points in Nigeria’s
trajectory. He, probably more than any other person, has
affected the trajectory of the Nigeria nation. His willingness
to be a tool in the hand of the Fulani hegemony legitimised
the bulk of the instrument of oppression that today holds
Nigeria down. Laws and governance structures, that might
have found resistance if they had been imposed by the
Fulani or Northern ruler, were imposed during his first term
in office.
Obasanjo was generally considered a friend of Northern
Nigeria. But in his second term, he came into his own and
became his own man. By this time, he had ruled Nigeria for
a total of seven years, had seen Nigeria in all of its glories
and also knew that he did not require anybody’s support as
long as he was the one in office to determine his re-election.
Upon getting rid of the nuisance that Abubakar Atiku
represented for his re-election campaign in 2003, Obasanjo
unflapped his wings.

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 ‘Dele Farotimi

I am not sure if any insurance company, holding a policy

on the lives of either General Abacha or Chief Moshood
Abiola would have paid out on such a policy. Even though
both were deemed to have died of cardiac arrest, it was
always very clear that they were the sacrificial lambs on top
of whom the hegemony that brought Obasanjo into power
in 1999 steeped its feet.
By the time of Abacha’s murder, it was already clear that
Nigeria had reached an impasse.
The international community was unable to deal with
Nigeria as a rogue State and Abacha was unwilling to
democratise or to free his prisoners.
A plot to which western intelligence agencies must have
been privy and of which the Afenifere itself must have later
become briefed, if it was not originally complicit, is that in
which this hegemony decided that the Yoruba needed to be
appeased as a tribe in Nigeria. This further reinforced the
tribe as the basis for rights within the Nigeria State, rather
than citizenship. The fruit of this plot for the appeasement
of the Yoruba was the murder of Abacha.

131
 “
On gaining his second term, an
internecine war began between
himself and Atiku. This was a civil war
with consequences, part of which was
that powers that might have been
restrained in their attack on Obasanjo
became emboldened in his second
term. The politics of his stay in office
and the second term as well, birthed
insanities such as of Boko Haram --
which found legitimacy on the streets
of Arewa – mostly because he was a
Southern Christian president who had
to deal with a problem rooted in
political Islam. He lacked the
legitimacy to deal decisively with the
problem.

132
 Chapter 7
The 4th Republic and
the Consequence of Hubris

T
he first of the parties was the People’s Democratic
Party, PDP, which by its make-up, ideology and later
persuasions was obviously the party that the
military under General Abdulsalami had decided it was
going to hand power over to.
The Afenifere realising this quickly, pulled out of the PDP
to go into the All Nigeria Peoples Party, ANPP, and from
there, into the Alliance for Democracy, AD. The fact of their
complicity, before or after Abiola’s murder is best reinforced
by the fact that they were registered for participation in the
Third Republic, although they were unqualified.
The new party, the PDP, had zoning as a major plank for
all its doings. All offices were duly zoned. Consensus was
rebuilt in this period.
Consensus was the basis for the exercise of the powers
and the primacy of the North as the next in line to what was
meant to be a single term for Obasanjo. It was the glue that
brought the PDP together, unified the entire north with
significant support in the East and South and; ensured that
Obasanjo, an orphan even from his own people – who lost
his own very polling booth – was the one that became the

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IMPERATIVES OF THE NIGERIAN REVOLUTION

president. The Yoruba were to be appeased, but it was not

to be a candidate of their choice. The veto was effectively
displayed in its full flow.
TY Danjuma was Obasanjo’s chaperone as he had been
in the days of old. He came in as Defence Minister, and made
sure to purge the Armed Forces of all the officers who had
ever held political posts in the past. An entire generation of
Army officers above the rank of Colonel, and every officer
who had ever held a political post outside of their
professional calling became casualties of the hegemony that
brought Obasanjo to power.
TY Danjuma and Colonel Kayode Are, then head of the
DSS, did a fantastic job of weeding out an entire class of
politicised officers who might have proven to be dangerous
to the democratic experiment. TY Danjuma stabilised
Obasanjo’s government in power, until Obasanjo became
quite used to power, and had no need for a chaperone
beyond the first term.

********

Game of the wily fox, the real ‘evil genius’

THERE is an importance to Obasanjo that is often
overlooked This is the fact that he represents two different
phases of the same hegemony and he also shows the way it
has morphed over the years.

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 ‘Dele Farotimi

The same hegemony that brought him to power the first

time as a military officer and sustained him in power was
also instrumental to his re-emergence as president in 1999.
That same hegemony continued to hold sway almost for the
entirety of his first term in office. Even on coming into the
second term in office, with all his power drunkenness and
the extreme use of power, even against people who used to
be his allies, he was always careful to be protective of the
interests of the hegemonies that brought him into power. He
was only ever in conflict with them when it came to the
exercise of his own privileges.
Obasanjo is a wily fox. He made the necessary promises
to whoever he needed to make them to, in order to secure
his second term in office. His face-off with his deputy, Alhaji
Atiku Abubakar, before he could get his second term ticket
is already the stuff of legend and does not require any
repeat. But suffice to say that the crisis of his second term re-
election introduced a schism into the hegemony that had
produced him.
It must be remembered that Atiku Abubakar had been
waiting in the wings expecting to take over from Obasanjo
in 2003. He believed he had been short-changed; after all, he
had given up his Adamawa governorship chance to become
the VP in the belief that he was the president-in-waiting, and
that Obasanjo would play Mandela, serve out his term, and
hand over to him.

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IMPERATIVES OF THE NIGERIAN REVOLUTION

Obasanjo went after Atiku with a vengeance during his

second term, and; in his quest to ensure that Atiku did not
succeed him, when he could not gain a third term, he more
or less planted the seed, not only for the destruction of the
hegemony that brought him into office, but of the very
foundation of the iniquitous Nigeria State by his hubris.
It is rarely seen that the effect of an isolated action will
reverberate down the ages as much as Obasanjo’s failure to
plan his own succession. The connective thread between the
emergence of the blight known as Buhari goes back to
Obasanjo’s quest for his third term, and the hubris that
followed his insistence on having his way.
Ibrahim Babangida has for long been tagged the evil
genius in Nigeria, but I believe that this is a sobriquet that is
best reserved for the man Obasanjo. This is not without
reason.
Obasanjo is one of the architects of the moribund Nigeria
State. He was always complicit at every critical point in the
evolution of the State; he has been a recurrent decimal. He is
a man infused with a lot of cunning and intelligence. He
ruled on the back of a hegemony with which he was very
familiar, not only because he had worked with it before, but
because he had helped to shape its trajectory and, install it
in power.
Obasanjo, more than any other Nigerian ruler, has the
capacity to affect the trajectory of Nigeria in one direction or
the other, at more time, than any other. It took Obasanjo’s

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 ‘Dele Farotimi

readiness to collaborate with the Northern elements in the

army to neutralise the critical Yoruba voices in the army to
consolidate his own powers and be seen as the good person
in the eye of the hegemony. He ingratiated himself and was
deemed a son and a trustee of the hegemony. He was always
trusted by the hegemony. He cemented his bona fide with the
Fulani aristocracy by his open display of disdain for
Obafemi Awolowo, a man much feared by them, for his
principled opposition to forces of feudalism.
The problem, however, came with Obasanjo’s first
decision; his quest for a second term, which was variously
challenged by several people in the know, including Atiku
himself. This was contrary to the agreement reached at the
time Obasanjo was invited to be the beneficiary of the
hegemony that took over power after the murder of both
Abacha and Abiola. But Obasanjo remained committed to
his second-term pursuit, having gained power and been
freed of the constraints of worries about coup because of
Danjuma’s steady hands as the Minister for Defence. Added
to this was the earlier purge carried out by the Abdulsalami
regime as part of the systemic correction, even though all
those officers were given soft-landing and none ended up
with a prison term. This was aside those who had personally
offended Obasanjo and were held responsible for the
murder of Shehu Musa Yar’Adua. I speak of none other than
the Al Mustaphas of this world who never received justice
for what they did.

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IMPERATIVES OF THE NIGERIAN REVOLUTION

By the time Obasanjo took the decision to take a second

term, contrary to the agreement forming the foundation for
his enthronement, he caused a schism within the same
hegemony. But it was an intra-hegemonic warfare that did
not spill over but was contained and, he gained the second
term.
On gaining his second term, an internecine war began
between himself and Atiku. This was a civil war with
consequences, part of which was that powers that might
have been restrained in their attack on Obasanjo became
emboldened in his second term.
The politics of his stay in office and the second term as
well, birthed insanities such as of Boko Haram -- which
found legitimacy on the streets of Arewa -- mostly because
he was a Southern Christian president who had to deal with
a problem rooted in political Islam. He lacked the legitimacy
to deal decisively with the problem.
(But I will deal with this in detail in the section that deals
with religion and the Nigerian political hegemony).
Obasanjo’s hubristic failure to plan his succession meant
that he stayed beyond the point when he could reasonably
plan a smooth and orderly transition, and he had to fall back
on what was familiar: the choice of the two-term governor
of Katsina State, Umar Musa Yar’Adua, younger brother of
the man who had been promoted to be his deputy at his first
coming.

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 ‘Dele Farotimi

Obasanjo could not have been unaware of the state of

health of Musa Yar’Adua. But in order to have somebody he
believed he could teleguide; who would listen to him; and
allow him to remain relevant in power. Also, in order to
keep his own part of the bargain, ensuring that a Northerner
succeeded him in power, it became impossible for him to
allow Peter Odili, who had been led to believe that he could
gain power, or a Donald Duke ascend to the presidency.
Obasanjo had to pay his debt with the enthronement of
Umar Musa Yar’Adua.

********

The mis/adventure of ‘Baba Oba’

THE emergence of Yar’Adua contained the seed of
destruction of the hegemony that had brought Obasanjo to
power. Umar Shehu Yar’Adua was not as pliant and
receptive to being controlled as Obasanjo had imagined. By
the time his illness proved to be a major Albatross, Obasanjo,
ever the wily old fox, sensed an advantage that had him
controlling Yar’Adua’s deputy, Dr. Goodluck Ebele
Jonathan from behind the throne. He more than any other
person, forced the doctrine of necessity, legitimised its
application and teleguided the transition of Jonathan to
becoming acting president and, eventually the president
upon the death of Yar’Adua.

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IMPERATIVES OF THE NIGERIAN REVOLUTION

Obasanjo did a lot to stabilise Jonathan’s government in

power. In the early days of the administration, Obasanjo
was seen as the father of the president, “Baba Oba.” He was
playing his favourite role. But this was not to last long.
Goodluck Ebele Jonathan might have been the orphan in
power, his people, the Ijaw, long kept out of the power
concentric, long mere collaborators of the Fulani hegemony,
came into their own with the ascension to power of their son,
and without the worries of a military coup at the back of
their mind. GEJ set about dismantling Obasanjo’s influence
on his government, became his own man, literally won his
first election in his own right, and then proceeded to get rid
of Obasanjo.
Obasanjo became the loser in the power game. The man
he had installed in power perhaps, always knowing that
Yar’Adua did not have long to live, proved to be
unamenable to control once power was in his hand.

********

GEJ riding the wily fox, ending in its tummy

GOODLUCK Ebele Jonathan became the beneficiary of
powers that he knew not what to do with, and the traditional
owners of the powers became orphans. His ascension to
office, catalysed several contradictions that had been
systematically planted over the years, particularly more so

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 ‘Dele Farotimi

during the years of Obasanjo’s presidency, when Boko

Haram was seeded alongside the Fulani herdsmen crises.
Actions have consequences. I have found in the study of
men, even of nations and states that at the very peak of their
powers, they become susceptible to hubristic acts whose full
ramifications and consequences are usually lost on the
person when the actual acts themselves were undertaken.
To be sure, Obasanjo’s hubristic pursuits of a third term
had immediate consequences and one of these was his
demystification as a democrat. But there was equally a long-
term payment that Obasanjo and the system had to reckon
with.
With Yar’Adua dead and Goodluck Ebele Jonathan in
power, an unintended consequence of Obasanjo’s hubris
was revealed. The Nigeria State was found on the
assumption that only three ethnic groups could aspire to
power.
To be sure, there is a historical basis for the conclusion I
have just drawn, and I will attempt as best as I can to explain
this.
The bill of right enshrined in the Nigeria constitution at
independence came out of the efforts of the southern
minorities to ensure that they had constitutional protections
for their rights. Therefore, whilst other nations of the world
enshrined fundamental human rights in their constitutions
as a response to citizens’ agitation for protection, the bill of
right in our constitution came as a direct response to the

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IMPERATIVES OF THE NIGERIAN REVOLUTION

demand of the minorities for protection within the Nigeria

State.
Nigeria has evolved with the unique incongruity of
being a State where ethnic origin is the basis of engagement,
and not citizenship.
This will suggest that the Nigeria State has always been
inequitable in its ramifications and the less represented
tribes were always fearful for their rights within the
originally negotiated Federation. Their demand for equity
was what led to the insertion of the bill of rights. One of
these minorities, perhaps the 4th largest ethnic tribe in
Nigeria, the Ijaws, came to power, as an unintended
consequence of Obasanjo’s hubristic pursuits of his third
term.
In the early days of the Jonathan regime, when he was
spending the remaining part of Yar’Adua’s tenure, Obasanjo
managed the regime and helped to stabilise it to a very large
extent. He interfaced on behalf of the power groups,
moderated, and ensured that Jonathan was adopted and
accepted by the hegemony that brought Obasanjo to power,
and that he himself had marginalised in installing Yar’Adua
and ensuring that Jonathan was his deputy.
Whether or not Obasanjo was aware of Yar’Adua’s ill-
health is known only to him and to God, but seeing that he
chose Jonathan as VP to Musa Yar’Adua, it is only right and
fair to conclude that upon Jonathan’s ascension, Obasanjo –
the “Baba Oba” – promptly took over management of the

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 ‘Dele Farotimi

day-to-day facetime with other members of the hegemony

and stabilised that government through its first term in
office.
Jonathan coming back in his own right in 2011, having
won the election represented the longest period that the
political North had been out of power; it became determined
to retake power almost by any means necessary.
Goodluck Ebele Jonathan played into the hands of these
hegemonies by his own inability to manage the power that
he had fortuitously inherited and then won. He became
estranged from his godfather Obasanjo, which is not
surprising, given Obasanjo’s overbearing nature. But more
importantly, Jonathan’s occupation of the presidential office
brought the Ijaws out of the creeks into Abuja, showed them
just exactly how much they had been cheated; they thus
unleashed forces beyond Obasanjo’s or anybody else’s
intentions.
Obasanjo’s hatred of Atiku sealed the latter’s fate in 2015.
Obasanjo could not find the grace to forgive his vice
president and even though he was intent on making sure
that Jonathan did not come back to power. This was a
position shared with other members of the hegemonies that
had always propped up Obasanjo himself and a mission to
which he was dedicated. He helped to destabilise the PDP
that he had ridden to office himself, cannibalised the party
by encouraging his own loyalists within it to pull out,
ceremoniously tore up his PDP identity card and

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IMPERATIVES OF THE NIGERIAN REVOLUTION

encouraged the destruction of the party from under

Jonathan’s seat.
These were to have consequences. The net effect was the
alignment of two hitherto irreconcilable forces and the
conglomeration of very strange bed fellows. These were the
circumstances in which the Buhari project was birthed; the
contradictions that have finally brought the Nigerian
hegemonies to a head and have now guaranteed that the
days ahead are going to be indeed interesting for Nigeria if
it were to ever rescue itself from the clutches of the evil
system that governs it.
The same system that had always held Buhari to be an
irredentist with whom it could not work found the
desperation to commit an unpalatable error in 2014/2015. It
coalesced around the person of Buhari whom it had already
called its own error. And the system error became the
President in 2015!
When Obasanjo in a show of public misalignment with
GEJ tore up his PDP membership card, it was generally
meant to signify that not only had he parted with the PDP,
but that the party had been destroyed symbolically by his
act. But that would be very far from the truth, which is the
fact that Obasanjo had destroyed the PDP with his hubristic
pursuit of his third term in clear breach of the agreements
that had birthed him as the first president of the new
Republic.

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 ‘Dele Farotimi

In reality, if a time must be located as the point at which

the PDP was truly murdered, it would be when Obasanjo
began the pursuit of his third-term agenda.
Obasanjo’s hubris destroyed the hegemony that brought
him to power because it effectively ended the consensus
around which the old PDP was built. The consensus had
always operated in the understanding that power was to be
used collegiately, and that as much as possible, certain broad
principles were to be adhered to. Obasanjo ran riot in his
second term, effectively ran the government to the exclusion
of critical members of the hegemony, antagonised quite a
number of them, divided the hegemony itself by his pursuit.
That effectively ensured that the hegemony died or had
begun its journey to death before he left office.
With the death of the hegemony on which Obasanjo rode
to office, upon assumption of Jonathan’s first term in his
own right and the clear indications that he would be seeking
a second term in his own right, those who believed
themselves to have been kept out of the power concentric
because of the incomplete tenure of Yar’Adua, the many
years of Obasanjo’s rule and his exclusive use of power (and
the fact that for a long time, the bogeyman to explain the
failure and failings of Northern governors was always the
exclusion of power at the central) felt themselves entitled to
power and became aggrieved.
For the first time, northern Nigeria politicians began to
play the exact politics of the Yoruba: politics of grievances,

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which became the foundation for the birth of what became

known as the APC, even though it started out essentially as
the Buhari project.
With Obasanjo pulling the carpet from under GEJ’s feet,
the PDP essentially began to collapse right around him, and
he was being stripped daily of institutional levers of support
that had kept the PDP in power for 16 years.
The powers Goodluck Ebele Jonathan was wielding were
never meant or intended for the likes of him. The northern
governors had played all the cards they could, to find
excuses for their own electorate for the serial failure of
governance in their region, and Jonathan became the
bogeyman and the excuse that was used to explain the serial
failings by the northern leadership.
After having been effectively out of power for a total of
12 years, barring the little over two years that Yar’Adua
spent in power, the one thing that practically every member
of that hegemony could agree on, was the need to remove
Jonathan from office. This need became an obsession, and
the fertile ground on which the systemic error that Buhari is,
was birthed.
********

Enthronement of the systemic error

MUHAMMADU Buhari was not the choice of those who
started “the get Goodluck Ebele Jonathan out” project, or

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 ‘Dele Farotimi

even the person who had any effective say over whether that
was going to be done. But in the lead up to the APC
primaries in 2014, the deciding vote was held by Bola
Ahmed Tinubu; and for reasons best known to him, he
decided or perhaps felt himself unable to support Atiku; he
supported the candidacy of Muhammadu Buhari instead.
The adoption of Buhari as the APC candidate in 2014
effectively meant that the hegemony that had been in power
since the death of Abacha was finally being forced into
embracing the very tendency, and the same person that had
always been its arrowhead, whom it had been designed to
reject.
Muhammadu Buhari became the beneficiary of the very
system that had always worked to prevent him and his type
from holding power in Nigeria. The new hegemony thereby
constructed, left itself mostly in the hand of the ultra-
conservative element of the same system that had hitherto
been contained since Buhari’s ouster in power in 1985.
But even more important and relevant to the subject at
hand, a realignment of old forces that had been historically
linked in the 1960s found its foot again. The historical
parallels between the Sardauna of Sokoto and Muhammadu
Buhari, and between SL Akintola and Bola Ahmed Tinubu
played out: the west aligned with the conservative
oligarchy.
The forces of feudalism finally found legitimacy in what
was hitherto the most conscious part of Nigeria. It was

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IMPERATIVES OF THE NIGERIAN REVOLUTION

raised as a standard against the forces of feudalism and; the

worst nightmare of Obafemi Awolowo came true for
Nigeria.

********

BAT the schemer

I HAVE done sufficient work in establishing the bona fide of
Muhammadu Buhari, his ethnic irredentist root, how his
extremes rendered him useless to the hegemony that had
overtaken Nigeria since the murder of Abacha and Abiola,
and how they had ensured that he never gained power
despite the fanatical support he had built up in the north,
based on the grievance politics he had perfected.
Every hegemony, as I have explained, is the same as a
man’s habit. As a man’s habit shapes his character and forms
his trajectory, so does the sum of the hegemonies that shapes
a nation’s trajectory determines where it goes. And as habits
are important in discerning the character of a man, so are the
characters of the hegemonies, or the persons that make up a
ruling hegemony. The Nigerian case is not dissimilar.
It is important that we understand clearly who Bola
Ahmed Tinubu is and how he correlates historically with
Ladoke Akintola.
In popular Yoruba political consciousness, Obafemi
Awolowo is a god, and the Satan in that pantheon has

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 ‘Dele Farotimi

always been Ladoke Akintola. This is not necessarily a fact-

based conclusion, but popular opinions rarely are. Every
good legend comes complete with its cast of heroes and
villains. Such is the legend of The Sage of Ikenne. Volumes and
tomes have been written about the two personalities.
I was not alive at the time of Akintola’s death but I
believe he could not have been as evil or useless as history
has sometime cast him, for he was for a long time
Awolowo’s trusted deputy. But I will leave history for the
historians and, rather deal with the contemporary history
that I witnessed.
I was there at the Eagle Square at the launch of the All
Nigeria Peoples Party, ANPP and at the formation and
beginning of the Alliance for Democracy, AD. I was at the
Law School when the AD was birthed, and I recall
specifically that on the 8th day of January, 1999, I left Abuja
by overnight bus, specifically Chisco, because I was
determined to vote in the gubernatorial elections of
Saturday the 9th of January 1999.
I made my way to Lagos and went to sleep in the house
of Ademola Adeniji-Adele, whose brother-in-law, Saheed
Salawe is my friend, and with whom I was squatting
whenever I was in Lagos, having given up my
accommodation in LASU.
I came all the way from Bwari, Abuja to ensure that I cast
my vote for Bola Ahmed Tinubu, the gubernatorial
candidate of the AD in Lagos State.

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IMPERATIVES OF THE NIGERIAN REVOLUTION

When I woke up in the morning and was making my

way to the polling booths at one of the secondary schools off
7th Avenue in FESTAC Town, Prince Adeniji-Adele (of
blessed memory) stood on the balcony in front of his
bedroom, and said to me, “Man Dele, you are going to go and
vote for me right?” He was at the time the deputy
governorship candidate on the PDP ticket, where he was
running with Chief Dapo Sarumi. I turned around and told
him jokingly: “You know that I won’t vote for you, papa, I’m
going to cast my vote for the AD, there is no way I am going to
cast my vote for the Abacha politician.” This was the way we
used to rib ourselves in those days.
Bola Ahmed Tinubu has never met me, but I was one of
those persuaded to vote for him by the platform on which
he was introduced. He came as part of the Awoists; he was a
beneficiary of their politics. He did not waste time in getting
rid of the stuffy old men of the Afenifere and by the end of
the 2003 tsunami, which he escaped, he had come into his
own, and his true character began to unfold.
As Obasanjo battled to clip Tinubu’s wings, beginning
after the second term for both men in 2003, Tinubu built
upon the Yoruba history of grievance politics -- a very
formidable opposition that grew strong on the steroids of
corrupt money and a control of the streets.
He built a franchise that began to move outside of Lagos
State with his pragmatic understanding of the corruption of
the Nigerian judiciary and the political processes.

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 ‘Dele Farotimi

While he was doing this, because Obasanjo was

generally reviled amongst the Yoruba, and his bullish ways
had more or less united opposition to his rule, Tinubu
became the focal point and, main spokesperson of the
opposition forces. He also became the recipient of goodwill
from all those who had been alienated by Obasanjo’s
excesses.
By 2014, when he was entering the alliance with the CPC
that birthed the Buhari presidency, Tinubu had grown to
become the main person in Nigerian politics. He did this by
buying up the press; the critical press was mostly silenced,
and questions that ought to have been asked have never
been asked.
Nobody can swear to know exactly what the true name
of Bola Ahmed Tinubu is, or his true origins. Several legends
surround the man Bola Ahmed Tinubu. But the most
consistent is the one that has shown that over the years, the
man has evolved a most rapacious stealing machine, runs a
system that is essentially a limited liability company, that is
the modern face of a feudal system. Tinubu sits atop more
or less as a Sultan, promoting people into the offices of
governors, first in Lagos with the succession plan that had
Babatunde Raji Fashola, BRF, succeeding him. He spreads
his tentacles to other states in the South-West, where he had
formerly been sponsoring the opposition during the
Obasanjo years, to deflect their capacity to focus on him in
Lagos.

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…The making of the behemoth

IN order to explain the character of the man named Bola
Ahmed Tinubu, it is necessary that I go back to the
beginning, which in this case would be the Eagle Parade
Ground in Abuja, where I had gone to attend the launch of
the ANPP in company of Femi Akande, the current
Attorney-General of Osun State and son of Chief Bisi
Akande, who was to become the governor of Osun.
While we were at the parade ground, the Awolowo
political clan sought to form an alliance with the Shinkafi
elements and other conservative elements from the North,
more or less a rehash of the rumoured alignment that was
said to have existed between Awolowo and the Kaduna
Mafia, and the one to which the Yoruba have forever
hankered after even as they have sought a definition of the
Nigerian federation.
Femi Akande advised that we needed to leave the Eagle
Square venue of the party’s inauguration and launch. When
I asked why, he told me that; he had it on good information
that his father and the others were at Savannah Suites; that
they were not coming for the launch any longer. This is
because they did not want to have anything to do with folks
the Afenifere, generally referred to as Abacha politicians.
On hearing this, I sought out Alhaji Ladipo Kotun, a dear
friend from my days at the Oyo State College of Arts and
Science in Ife, and with whom I was to later attend the Lagos

152
 ‘Dele Farotimi

State University. He was standing with the Lagos State

contingent, which had amongst them Prince Ademola
Adeniji-Adele, popularly known as Prince of Hope, one-
time chairman of Lagos Island Local Government, who as I
had earlier mentioned, was a brother-in-law to my friend
Saheed Salawe. I had made acquaintance of the Prince after
he left Abacha’s gulag in 1994; he was to become a dear
friend and a sort of godfather to me.
I gave the information I had to Alhaji Kotun and Prince
Adeniji-Adele and advised that we all left together. Alhaji
Kotun and Prince Adenije-Adele responded, saying they
were not following these old men; that this was how they
dragged them out of the PDP alliance at the last minute.
They said the oldmen were doing much the same thing
again with the inauguration and they were tired of being
dragged around.
My advice to them at the time was that they would be
making serious political miscalculations because it was
already clear to me, even at that point, that it was up to the
Afenifere to tell the Yoruba exactly who to vote for, and how
to vote.
Afenifere carried the power balance in Yoruba land, and
I felt that my friends were making strategic errors by
refusing to see this. But the two of them were adamant,
insisting that they were not going to walk away from the
inauguration, but I did. This error was to cost Prince Adeniji-
Adele the Deputy Governorship of Lagos State.

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IMPERATIVES OF THE NIGERIAN REVOLUTION

Bola Ahmed Tinubu, who was to become Governor of

Lagos, whilst already a senator under the SDP during the
Babangida transition programme, did not have the pedigree
in his own right, at that point in time in Lagos State politics,
to have earned him the governorship. He earned it on the
back of the Afenifere.
Afenifere could have stood behind anybody, and the
person would have won in 1999. The military knew it and
registered their party. Tinubu knew it and he aligned with
them.

********

I HAVE dealt with the issue of Bola Ahmed Tinubu and his
emergence extensively in other places, but the character of
the person he became, and the hegemony that he built, that
aligned with the CPC is important to an understanding of
the consequence of the realignment. This realignment
brought about Bola Tinubu, Muhammadu Buhari, and
Obasanjo albeit reluctantly to an extent, at least in the
original project that birthed the Buhari presidency and the
consequences of this to the Nigeria State and what manner
of hegemony was built.
You already have a situation where the unconscionable
powers, the same that Obafemi Awolowo exercised with
prudence and discretion, and with temperance, is the same

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 ‘Dele Farotimi

that Bola Ahmed Tinubu has inherited without the same

restraint, discipline, or a pretense to temperance.
What was essentially a socialist ideology-based political
party that governed the political and socio-economic
development of Yoruba land in the Awolowo days, has been
supplanted by the most modern exposition of the feudal
system. It operates as I have said as a company with
shareholders, and the membership levels are variable.
It is the most systematic feudal system in the Nigerian
space outside the traditional Fulani feudalism. It is at its
absolute best, a criminal empire that exists within the state
structure. It is, to borrow the words of Pat Utomi, “the classic
exposition of criminal state capture”.
Tinubu’s franchise is defined by the professionalism of
its stealing. I have for long distinguished Tinubu’s
imaginative stealing from the brazen thievery of the PDP.
The Tinubu franchise is in truth a case study in state capture
by a criminal gang, and at the apex sits the man himself, Bola
Ahmed Tinubu as he is known, though nobody would
swear that those are his real names.
With Obasanjo distracted by his egotistic pursuits, the
danger that Tinubu represents was ignored, and he
successfully managed a transition from governor, to
governor-emeritus, and then began to expand his franchise
aggressively, even as the PDP disintegrated.
The Tinubu template was simple. Cast yourselves as the
champions of Yoruba interests, the PDP as the overbearing

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IMPERATIVES OF THE NIGERIAN REVOLUTION

federal monster that Awolowo and his political machinery

had trained the Yoruba to reflexively distrust and hate.
Nurture the grievance politics of the Yoruba as a tool for
uniting and galvanising tribal interests, and control the
public narratives at all cost.
The Awoists were themselves mostly marginalised and
brutally expunged from influence, and divisions were
promoted within their ranks. Tinubu rebranded hitherto
credible voices that had spoken in the past, into men, whose
words must be viewed with skepticism.
But beyond the billboards promoting the false
comparisons and equivalencies with The Sage of Ikenne, Bola
Tinubu is nothing like the revered old man. The political
system that he built is a rebuke to the late sage’s life’s work.
By their fruits, you shall know them! so declared the Holy
Book.
With the late Awolowo, the fruits of his fecund mind
remain for all that seeks to behold. I am a witness to his
works, a beneficiary of his vision, and one of the several
fruits of his benevolent leadership and exercise of the same
powers that Tinubu has used to enslave the Yoruba.
It took me a while to understand the visceral hatred of
Awoists such as Baba Adebanjo until I came to the
knowledge of the historical parallels between the powers
Awolowo exercised collegiately, and prudently, and the one
that Tinubu wields in a prebendal manner today. Tinubu’s
franchise talks the talk, but the reality is that the franchise is

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by far more corrupt than the PDP has ever been. The Tinubu
crew stole and privatised government institutions. Tinubu
is the modern-day sultan of the Yorubas, and the purse of
states in his franchise are his treasuries to spend at will. The
Yoruba have never had power personalised and exercised
solely by a man in modern time. Tinubu’s true genius was
the management of his succession, he has never been truly
challenged on his turf since the yet unsolved murder of
Funsho Williams.
Tinubu is so high on the narcotics of power that he has
hubristically lost the very quality that had carried him this
far: his street smarts. There are two rules that I have come to
believe define the ultimate survival of every street guy in the
Nigerian experience. The first is to always be aware of the
street; second is to always have an exit in view. In the new
hegemony created with Buhari’s ascension to power,
Tinubu was shown his place in the partnership; he was not
to be allowed his wings back until the time came to plan and
execute the Buhari re-election strategy. He was an asset to
be deployed; not an ally to be trusted. He has blocked his
exit to prove his loyalty, and he will pay a political price in
Yorubaland, in due course.
Power corrupts? No! It is power unaligned to purpose
that corrupts. Tinubu in another generation, perhaps in
Awolowo’s generation, with the spirituality and moral
rectitude of the age, a consciousness of the importance of a
man’s place in history, would have been a visionary leader.

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IMPERATIVES OF THE NIGERIAN REVOLUTION

As it is, he is a visionary thief. His appetite for acquisitions

is second to none, and his corruptive influence, extremely
corrosive.
Tinubu had built the most efficient taxation system in the
entire country, while the PDP thieves were still focused on
the oil monies they were looting. Tinubu was applauded as
he developed the capacity of the state government to
generate hitherto unheard-of sums in tax revenues. Also, the
fight against the evil, overbearing Federal Government of
Obasanjo, gave him the cover to privatise the tax collection
in perpetuity. The vast wealth generated has, in truth,
belonged to the Jagaban and his court; the citizens and
taxpayers of Lagos State have merely been serfs. The state
belongs lock, stock, and barrel to the owners of the Lagos
franchise.
But in 2014, the Tinubu franchise was in trouble. The
alliance he found with the CPC was predicated on the need
to preserve the hegemony he already held over the South-
West.
In the countdown to the 2015 election, by early 2014,
there were formidable opposition revolting against Tinubu’s
hegemony in the South West. In Lagos, there was Jimi
Agbaje who was not an unknown quantity to Lagos voters,
and who had made quite some impression in previous
elections where he had run against the Tinubu machinery on
the platform of rather obscure parties, and he was already
poised to repeat the same in 2015.

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 ‘Dele Farotimi

In Oyo, Ondo, and practically every state in the South-

West, there were latent sentiments rising against the
dominance of Bola Ahmed Tinubu. These were mostly
aided by the federal government under Jonathan who was
equally funding the PDP elements in the South-West. So,
while Obasanjo and the rump of what he controlled in the
PDP in the South-West had left the party, the other elements
who were diametrically opposed to Tinubu’s hegemony
were already significant headaches for him in the
countdown to the 2015 election; and it was in Tinubu’s
interest to nationalise the elections.
Every election is local, the conventional wisdom goes,
but in 2015, Tinubu found it necessary to nationalise the poll
because the power of incumbency was poised to work
against every one of his candidates in the South-West. Such
was the glaring level of their failure across the length and
breadth of Yorubaland.
For Tinubu, it was a boon to have an election where the
subject of discussion was about PDP’s corruption. That way,
the focus was taken away completely from the serial
malfeasance of his own electoral machine; the corruption of
the system he had instituted in every part of the western
region. Having a rentable press was a bonus.
The fact that every one of these governors had failed
spectacularly was also sufficient reason for him to be
worried. In the countdown to the 2015 election, it was
strategically important that attention be taken away from

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IMPERATIVES OF THE NIGERIAN REVOLUTION

the lack of a record on which the ACN governors could run.

Hence, in the run up to the formation of the APC, Bola
Tinubu’s primary focus was not on winning power at the
center, it was essentially about the preservation of his own
hegemony in the west.
In getting into his alliance with the CPC, it is arguable if
Tinubu honestly believed that the APC was capable of
winning power at the center, giving his keen knowledge of
the power dynamics of the Nigeria State, and the knowledge
of everybody involved in the Buhari project that only a
person in the character of Jonathan could have been the
incumbent president and found the grace to lose an election
that he himself had supervised.
Had Obasanjo been available to micro-manage the
electoral process on Jonathan’s behalf, that election would
have been a foregone conclusion. At the dawn of 2014,
leading up to the 2014 formation of the APC, Tinubu found
himself obliged to align with the most conservative elements
in the north.
Obasanjo was in a position where he had out-
maneuvered himself and practically every member of his
own hegemony into accepting the fait accompli that
Muhammadu Buhari truly is. And in endorsing him, a
systemic error was made because a man incapable of sharing
or working in a collegiate manner, or endorsing the
consensus that had empowered the hegemony he

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 ‘Dele Farotimi

supplanted, Buhari took power, aligned to a most rapacious

stealing machine that had overtaken the Yoruba land.
That is where we are today.
Jimi Agbaje and others ended up in the PDP as a result
of the creation of the APC and the resultant need for them to
respond to the systemic quest for a behemoth on whose
platform to run in the elections. Agbaje who had started his
political career with the Afenifere and the Democratic
People’s Alliance, DPA, found himself marooned in the
PDP. His case was not dissimilar to those of several others,
whose capacity to run in the smaller parties in the South-
West were destroyed with the formation of the APC in 2014.
On APC and Buhari gaining power in 2015, the death of
opposition politics was effectively signaled. Ideological
syncretism has led Nigeria into a situation where we have
today become a feudalised democracy, where no credible
voice is speaking in opposition to this from an organised
political platform, and when they do, their voices are lost in
the milieu.

********

161
 “
Every hegemony inflicts its character
on the people over whom it rules. The
defining instincts of the hegemons
within the hegemony shape the
trajectories of the nation or state. The
Nigeria State is not an exception, and
the ruling hegemonies have shaped
Nigeria and the Nigerians in their own
sordid images.

162
 Chapter 8
The new Hegemony

T
he trajectories of every hegemony are shaped by the
character of its arrowhead. As a man’s habits shape
his choices, and hence, his character, so does an
aggregation of characters of the hegemons determine the
trajectory of the nation or state controlled by the hegemony.
It is necessary to examine the character of Buhari, the
arrowhead of the hegemony that currently rules Nigeria,
and whose image, the State projects.
Muhammadu Buhari is a product of the hegemony that
was birthed to rule Nigeria. Muhammadu is a Fulani before
he is anything else. He sees himself and the entire world
through the prism of his Fulani nationalism. Whilst this is
not in itself either unique, or necessarily negative, the
unimaginative irredentism of his Fulani nationalism has
worked to narrow his perspectives and worldview to the
point, where he had been deemed unfit for leadership by the
other components of the traditional operators of the
Nigerian hegemony.
As a student of English Literature, I was taught critical
analysis and characterisation. The key methodology for

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IMPERATIVES OF THE NIGERIAN REVOLUTION

decoding the character of a protagonist in a literary work, is

to listen to what the person has to say about himself.
Another is to evaluate what others have to say about him,
and the most important is to observe and then evaluate his
actions. Muhammadu Buhari has been in the public eye
since he was Petroleum Minister in the Murtala-Obasanjo
government, and his records are in the public domain.
I have already dealt with the systemic rejection of the
man, Buhari, and proffered what I believe to be the rationale
for this rejection by his own. It is now time to examine the
reasons he was serially rejected by his own; how and why
he has been embraced, first by the wretched of the north;
then by myopically romantic southerners in their search for
a shortcut to national redemption, and finally by the
illusionists who sold the Buhari project in 2014/2015.
Buhari is a populist. Populism is the affliction of the
unintelligent, but when found in the intelligent, it is best
recognised for what it is: an inability to be curious enough
to stake out one’s own position, and a readiness to
opportunistically adopt the opinion that has gained pre-
eminence without due interrogation of the thinking, or lack
of thoughts, behind the opinion.
The populist has a simple solution for every complicated
issue, and rarely has the nous to understand the issues
he/she presumed to simplify. For Trump, it’s a wall: for
Buhari, it is his imaginary war on corruption; for Hitler, it
was exterminating the Jews.

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 ‘Dele Farotimi

One of the most consistent stories told by everyone

involved in the removal of Buhari at his first coming, is his
resolve to retire Gen. Gusau and some other high-ranking
officers loyal to Babangida, and in some account, Ibrahim
Babangida himself, for corruption. That the alleged act of
corruption was one from which Muhammadu was said to
have benefited, as the loot was allegedly used to finance the
coup that brought him to power, was insufficient to save the
alleged thieves. This inflexibility, and refusal to play by the
rules was what Babangida used to justify his removal. The
same were the reasons offered for passing him over to
promote Yar’Adua in 1976.
Out of office and something of a pariah to members of
the Babangida hegemony, he was not to be brought back
from the cold until the Abacha years. Abacha rehabilitated
Buhari because it was politically expedient to do so. As the
Nigeria State began to grow stronger in the Babangida years,
and the new feudal lords were being created across the
country, Buhari had acquired a cult like following amongst
the poor and disinherited of Northern Nigeria.
The gluttonous consumption and vulgarities of the
Babangida era were cultural anathemas for the Hausa-
Fulani.
The fact that Babangida is from one of the northern
minorities considered to be of the barely tolerated slave
stock made it easy for the disinherited Hausa-Fulani streets
to develop a romantic relationship with the austere Buhari,

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IMPERATIVES OF THE NIGERIAN REVOLUTION

who always appeared spartan in comparison with the

epicurean Ibrahim and the coterie of thieves around him.
The Fulani royalties loved Babangida for recognising their
privileges and ensuring same, but the Fulani streets hated
him.
Abacha removed Sultan Dasuki to build his own
clientele traditional rulers, and to erase Babangida’s
influence over a critical throne in the Pulaku hegemony. The
rehabilitation of Buhari, and his appointment as the
chairman of the PTF, were deliberate steps to raise him as a
counterweight to Babangida. It was also to make sure that
the fanatical support enjoyed by Buhari on the streets of the
north, rubbed off on the Kano-born Kanuri man who had
announced the coups that ushered him in, and the one
removing him. What’s more? Buhari got his pound of flesh
off MKO, who was allegedly complicit in his 1985 removal.
Two examples would suffice to establish the point I seek
to make. The episode at the Government House in Ibadan
should interest any genuine researcher of the Buhari
persona.
Buhari had stormed Ibadan on October 13, 2000 to meet
Governor Lam Adesina and protest on behalf of the Fulani
herdsmen, who had been in a constant state of strife with the
Oke-Ogun communities of the state, where they had lived in
peace for decades. Lam Adesina was to deprecate Buhari’s
crass tribalism, in view of the fact that he had occupied the
highest office in the land.

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Buhari is a religionist, and his instincts are conditioned

by his religiosity. After the meeting of the Council of State
on February 29, 2000 in which the council was said to have
ordered cessation of the implementation of Sharia Law,
Buhari a member of the council, in an interview with BBC
Hausa, had the following to say: "If we as Muslims want
amputation or death penalty, we said we want it because it is our
religion and the constitution of the country has agreed that
everyone has the right to practise the religion of his choice."
The problem with this statement is that the constitution
of Nigeria has never endorsed the Sharia Criminal Law. So,
the deliberate politicisation of Islam in Nigeria is rooted in
the deeds of simple-minded men such as Buhari, who have
failed to understand the extent of the damage they have
caused the Nigeria nation by their unthinking religiosity.
Buhari built his political platform around the political
grievances of the Hausa-Fulani peoples. He became the
darling of the ethno-religious movements that had begun to
emerge and coalesce during the Babangida years, and which
found its apogee in the second term of Obasanjo’s
government.
The political class that had emerged in the Hausa-Fulani
states had been mostly bereft of visionary leadership; the
rulers were mostly focused on the narrow interests of their
own class. As the failure of the political class multiplied,
they collectively sought to find other persons to blame, and
the Christian Yoruba civilian president became the

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convenient scapegoat for all their woes; the common enemy

against whom they could unite the northern horde, and
thereby divert attention from their own abject failures.
Obasanjo is tailor-made for villainy; he was rather easy
to present as the enemy to blame for the many problems that
afflicted the North. He is brash, can be as uncouth as he
might be charming; is extremely egotistical in his evaluation
and treatment of perceived opposition and enemies, and has
been around and inconsistent long enough to have provided
validation for every one of the many accusations they
levelled against him.
Obasanjo was rendered even more vulnerable to these
charges by his Janus embrace of the Afenifere in his quest for
Yoruba endorsement for his second term; a seeming
repudiation of his original backers.

********

The opium… religion as politics

THE northern political class has always viewed and used
religion as a legitimate weapon in the zero-sum game of
politics, but the traditional institutions were always
cognisant of the need to avoid allowing the religious
institutions the freedom to preach anything inconsistent
with their own divine right to rule as feudal lords over the
impoverished hordes, who had been indoctrinated to accept

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the worst excesses of earthly rulers, and to never challenge

their rules. This began to change in the wake of Obasanjo’s
ascension to power and religion was weaponised.
We are reaping the fruits of the seeds sown in the rich
fields of grievance politics that took roots in the days of
Obasanjo’s reign.
Religion is taken from the Latin word, religare, which
literally means to bind. The true meaning comes alive in the
country named Nigeria, and religions have in truth,
unbounded the Nigerian peoples from reason, and yoked
them to idiocies.
The Sultan of Sokoto sits atop the pyramid of Islamic
religious governance in Nigeria, and he does so as a
hereditary right possessed in the office he occupies, and
unconnected to any training he might possess in Islamic
jurisprudence. It is an inheritance unyoked to reason. Islam
was in Yoruba land long before the Sokoto Jihad
commenced, so the Yoruba never required the help of the
Fulani to convert to Islam. But the Sultanate was the
centrepiece of the Islamic empire upon which the British
built their Nigerian possessions. The sultanate was the
intended beneficiary of the estate built by the British when
the time came to leave.
The Sultan and the emirs worked in concert to control the
clergies, and by a deft combination of patronage, carrots,
and sticks, managed to keep the radical clerics quiet and
under control, whilst promoting their loyalists amongst the

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IMPERATIVES OF THE NIGERIAN REVOLUTION

clerics. The mosques and the palaces worked effectively in

concert to keep the North quiet and free of the worst effects
of religious fervor and ferment.
Poverty has a way of breeding extremism, and when you
factor in ignorance, its most common denominator, you find
a volatile mix, which finds easy expression in religious
extremism.
The north has always been suffused with religious
extremism and hatred, but a new dimension was introduced
in the Obasanjo years. Those that would have in the past
condemned the excesses and worked to stamp it out,
facilitated and promoted it. Unimaginative politicians began
to unleash forces that had long been used sparingly, and the
North began to seed the tsunamis that it is reaping today.
Sharia law was one of the most divisive issues tackled by
Ahmadu Bello in cobbling together the political North, but
he was sensitive to the political dangers of pushing to
Islamise a people who have had a long history of brutal
subjugation and slavery at the hands of the Fulani
hegemonies that had reigned supreme in the bulk of
northern part of Nigeria.
The introduction of the penal code, as recalled by
Sharwood-Smith, was considered crucial to the resolution of
this most divisive of issues in the north. The fears of the
ethnic minorities – in the middle belt and the Mambilla
Plateaus – of having the Muslim Shariah laws forced on
them were removed. Deliberate and conscious efforts were

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made to assimilate these disparate tribes, and thereby fuse

their identities into the political mainstream of Northern
Nigeria.
The colonial masters emphasised the need to unite the
North, and the evidence would tend to suggest that apart
from the conscious layers of the minority tribes, who kept
up their agitations against the Fulani hegemony, the
populations of these minorities rarely became energised
enough to threaten the existing order. In the instances where
passion became inflamed, such as the Tiv Riots, the army
was drafted in to violently suppress the dissent.
The Nigeria State, after the civil war, became a state of
four broad divisions. The North of the Hausa was a major
part of the division. This was the division of the country in
power. It comprised of the entire old northern region. It
spoke as one and carried the loudest voice. This North was
one in every material particular. The Angas of the Gowon
family believed themselves to be northerners. The
Christianised pagans and those of the Benue plains, Jos and
Mambila plateaus had space in this North. The Zuru tribes
of Kebbi, the many northern minorities fused, spoke as one,
and dealt with the remaining three regions as though they
are one.
The elite consensus that ruled the north, and by
extension, the Nigeria State, had no space for religious
extremism, recognised the need to keep the North united,
and made concessions to the long-oppressed minorities, in

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order to build and foster the illusion of a monolithic

Northern Nigeria. This was the understanding that birthed
Gowon’s ascent to power in the aftermath of the second
coup. This was the reason Murtala Muhammed was
constrained to wait nine years before he would fulfill his
long-restrained ambition to rule.
With Obasanjo in the presidency, not in any hurry to
leave, second term done, and a third being sought, the
northern parts went up in flames.
The northern governors and politicians began to
weaponise Islam. And whilst the introduction of Sharia
Criminal Law might be the public evidence of the embrace
of religious Islam, the real violence was taking place in the
mosques and madrassas. Militant clerics, the very ones that
the traditional elite would have made sure to expunge from
the system, became the norm in most parts of the North.
The extremism had always been part of the northern
religious climate, but it was tightly controlled, and in some
cases even tolerated. The most radical Sunni Muslim groups
were actively cultivated and used by the Nigeria State and
its intelligence agencies in the years of military rule, and
Babangida more than most, tolerated them as
counterweights to the mostly garrulous Christian
organisations, who had constituted themselves into some
sort of unofficial opposition platform. But this was different.
Politicians were bypassing the traditional structures that
had for eons managed the religious affairs of the emirates.

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The clerics became aware of the immense amount of power

they could wield in the name of Allah, and several became
politically motivated in their interpretation of the Koran.
Boko Haram was a part of the political machine built by
Governor Ali Modu Sherriff of Borno, and they were
represented in his cabinet. The deadly history of the evil sect
is rooted in Sheriff’s politics as the first governor of the state
in the current republic.
Sani Yerima’s madness soon swept the streets of the
north. Demons that had been leashed for generations were
again reborn, energised, and weaponised in pursuit of
ephemeral and tangential interests. Islamic
fundamentalism, the sort that had been the source of fears of
the northern minorities, and the one thing that was bound
to reawaken the latent ethnic nationalism of the long
oppressed and institutionally-marginalised Middle Belt,
was embraced by those who would play the grievance
politics that was initially the preserve of the non-PDP
politicians such as Sherrif, but which was to become the
hallmark of every seeker of power, outside of the corridors
of power.
********

Sentiments of the PMB base

MUHAMMADU Buhari’s fanatical northern support base
has its roots in the belief that he is a pious man, devoid of
the consumptive and sybaritic lifestyle of the Babangida era.

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He was born to rule unlike the Kanuri man, Abacha, who

dealt with the ‘foolish’ Yoruba, and most definitely better
than the other one from Minna. That a Yoruba bully such as
Obasanjo was in power for all of eight years, drove them into
apoplexy, and Jonathan was the final straw.
The pious Muslim, the saint that would punish the many
sinners, had to win in 2015. And with Tinubu’s support
proving the difference, Buhari had a clear path to Aso Rock
once Jonathan decided to blink.
The CPC that fused with the ACN to win the APC
presidential primaries in 2014 had two dominant
hegemonies; the ACN and the APC. These have fused
together to define the character of the hegemony that
currently governs Nigeria, and the smaller hegemonies,
such as the N-PDP Bukola Saraki and co have been either
pushed out, destroyed, or assimilated into the new realities.
These other hegemonic powers lost the APC presidential
primaries in 2014, and it was always a matter of time before
they were to leave. The conflicting interests of the many
strange bedfellows were always bound to unravel; such is
the nature of power in these climes.
I have attempted to show how Tinubu’s franchise is one
and the same as the ACN hegemony. I would proceed by
describing the CPC hegemony which had at its head,
Muhammadu Buhari.
The CPC was long on talk but never had a foothold in
any state. Buhari’s fanatical northern supports, annexed to

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Tinubu’s ownership of the Nigerian press, birthed the myth

of Buhari as the change agent, and the reality of return to the
madness of 1984.
The hegemony that controls Nigeria is the same that was
in power during Buhari’s first coming. It is a hegemony that
does not share power. It is happy to tolerate stealing, it has
no quarrel with corruption either -- what can be more
corrupt than a refusal to be governed by law? Tinubu and
everyone else can steal all they want, as long as they do as
they are told.
The gangsters’ paradise dawned in Nigeria.
With the CPC/ACN alliance in power, Tinubu’s street
savvy while in opposition, the same one that saw him
employ the judiciary to take back what the PDP had stolen
in its own highjack of the electoral system, found a
dangerous synergy with the feudalistic impunities of the
most feudalistic elements of the historical North. Feudalism
has never been compatible with the rule of law, and
Tinubu’s street savvy is in truth, barely concealed contempt
for the law, which he knows applies only to the weak. It was
an alliance of two feudalistic forces.
The Kogi election that had Abubakar Audu as the APC
candidate and James Abiodun Faleke as his deputy, set the
tone for the relationship once the alliance gained power.
That election served to establish the pecking order in the
emerging hegemony.

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IMPERATIVES OF THE NIGERIAN REVOLUTION

I shall not be bothered by the squabble that ensued upon

Audu’s demise, but it is public knowledge that Faleke was
denied the right to succeed Audu, simply because of the fear
of Tinubu by persons who employed the powers of the
presidency, to declare that the election was inconclusive.
Yahaya Bello, Governor of Kogi is the child born of the
power game.
The hegemony deployed the same powers in Ekiti,
where Fayemi bested his old nemesis and friend, Ayo
Fayose, in the bidding war that was the Ekiti election.
Nigerians were treated to a new level of electoral chicanery
in the Osun gubernatorial election. Tinubu was in his
element at the palace of the Ataoja of Oshogbo, declaring the
state too poor to be worthy of his kleptomaniac attention,
and the candidacy of his anointed candidate, a favour to the
state. The rest as they say, is history. Iyiola Omisore is no
longer corrupt, and the election declared inconclusive was
concluded with the anointed enthroned.
The 2019 general election was decided before the vote. It
was only the foolish and the romantic that expected results
any different from what were declared. The marriage
between Tinubu’s hegemony and the Buhari crowd has
produced a most dangerous hegemony, one that has scant
regard for the law, has corrupted the press, and is unmoored
to any restraint in the pursuit of power, and its retention. If
Tinubu was not a part of the reigning hegemony, albeit a
junior but ambitious one, the Nigerian press would be

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correctly pillorying the Buhari regime for its sickening

nepotism, and serial failings.

********

Collateral victims 1: The Press

THE 2019 elections are over. The battle for the 2023 elections
had commenced before the advent of the COVID-19
pandemic; the time has come to take stock of where we are,
and where we are headed if we kept traveling on our current
trajectories.
With the ascension of the APC to power in 2015, the
Jagaban had every shackle on his avarice broken. He already
owned the press, and had acquired considerable savvy in
the judiciary under the noses of Obasanjo, Yar’Adua, and
particularly under Jonathan. Tinubu brought all these into
the alliance. The direct facilitation and complicity of the
presidency has had the consequence of annexing the
impunity of the PDP to the thuggish street-smarts of the
Jagaban franchise. The thinking thieves have aligned with
the ones that believe themselves above the law, and a most
vile evil has been born of that union.
Tinubu has helped deodorise, and thereby normalise the
enthronement of a feudal democracy. The corruption and
putrefaction that entered his soul, have blinded him to the
truth of the evil that he has helped to enthrone. Now too rich

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to even number his wealth, high on the aphrodisiac that

power is, a narcotic more potent thanopiates, ambition has
finally become the Achilles’ heels of the man that would be
the sage. Tinubu has been too blind to see what he ought to
be seeing: he has now outlived his usefulness to the
hegemony that he helped to birth. His quest for the
presidency in 2023 has failed before it began. He has been
caught up by the irrepressible forces of history.
The feudal state must die. Now.
Every hegemony inflicts its character on the people over
whom it rules. The defining instincts of the hegemons within
the hegemony shape the trajectories of the nation or state.
The Nigeria State is not an exception, and the ruling
hegemonies have shaped Nigeria and the Nigerians in their
own sordid images. It is the current hegemonies that
concern me.
Literally and figuratively: I am worried.
I am worried because certain factors that are inimical to
the survival and sustainability of the Nigeria State, and the
birth of the Nigeria nation have emerged. These factors have
never been dealt with in the past, and I am worried because
those that would have been concerned in the past,
institutional checks against the endemic madness, have
become either compromised, or complicit. The praetorian
guards have become the receivers of stolen goods.
With Tinubu and the like of Orji Uzor Kalu owning their
own media empire, and the press drowning in corruption –

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as the judiciary, police, and every other part of our dying

State – its legendary vibrancy has become largely
compromised, and mostly lost. The Nigerian press has
become lost in the crass mercantilism of the current time;
almost unrecognisable from its glory days in the military
era, and during the heady days of the pro-democracy
movements.
Truth was the first casualty of the Buhari project, and the
Nigerian press where the lies would have once been
challenged thrives on the subjectivation of truth. The same
actions that were once correctly criticised are today
endorsed, and defined in terms of the persons involved.
Men that were once labelled corrupt and evil, have now
been rebranded and held up as models. The current
hegemony is the one that has rendered the Nigerian press,
bar a few exceptions, completely lacking in the capacity for
objective and fair reporting. The lions are the ones telling the
tale of the hunt.

*********

Collateral victims 2: Judiciary

ONE of the very first things that the current hegemony did
was to subjugate the judiciary. To be sure, there is nothing
new in the Nigeria State -- another word for the Nigerian
Presidency -- keeping the judiciary under its control. That is

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IMPERATIVES OF THE NIGERIAN REVOLUTION

the standard fare. But this is different. The new hegemony is

not contented with the old style of remote control of the
judiciary by influencing its decisions, it wants to dictate to
the bench. The removal of Onnoghen must be viewed
through this prism.
With the loss of power by the PDP, and the movement of
most of its old merchants into the APC, coupled with the
corruptive presence of Tinubu in the APC, something had to
give in the judiciary. Armed robbers are not spirits, and the
judges serving on the benches of our different courts are
parts of the Nigerian systems. The knowledge of what
damages a judiciary gone rogue could do was not lost on the
new hegemony, and with the removal of a viable opposition
and an independent press, a brutal war was waged against
the remnants of the PDP’s influence on the bench. It was a
most corrupt war against judicial corruption, and it ended
with the judiciary captured, and Ibrahim Muhammad
Tanko unlawfully ensconced in the office of the CJN.
During the reign of Raji Fashola as the governor of Lagos,
a new word entered the legal lexicon amongst litigation
lawyers: “Fashola’s Date.” Tinubu’s franchise was
consolidating power in those days, and the boundaries of
citizenship rights were shrinking, as the extremely
feudalistic policies of the hegemony began to take hold. The
phenomenon was characterised by an adjournment of cases
against Lagos State to dates when the court would not be
sitting. Several cases taken before the courts challenging the

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worst excesses of the state suffered untold adjournment and

many aggrieved citizens were frustrated into abandoning
their claims. It is nigh on impossible to get social justice in a
Lagos court; the progressive partners in the APC
partnership.
The Nigerian judiciary cannot remedy the situation, it
has instead become a part of the problem, and the Nigerian
people have ceased seeing it as being a refuge for either the
weak or the poor.
In the new hegemony created by the wedlock of the CPC
and the ACN, a most dangerous entity has been birthed. The
instinctive impunity of the Fulani feudalists has been
welded to the criminal genius and lawlessness of the Jagaban
political dynasty, and pure tyranny reigns today in Nigeria.
Those who pretended to corruptly fight tyranny as they
looted the commonwealth have aligned with those who
always viewed the commonwealth and its riches as their
own inheritance. What we have feared the most has
overtaken us. The perfect storm is here with us.

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 “
The loss of critical voices in the human
rights community because of their
friendship with key political actors
which is further aggravated by the
deliberate appointment of such critical
voices into political offices, has
assured that the ones that used to
watch have stopped their watch, and
the ones that once wailed are either
hailing now, or have lost their voices.
Truth has been largely subjectivised, or
completely ignored. The same act,
when performed by different actors,
attracts disparate reviews.

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 Chapter 9
The perfect Storm and
the inevitable Implosions

T
he Nigeria State has been described as a crime scene.
The persons who came up with this characterisation
are geniuses beyond their own comprehension. The
State has been hijacked; it does not exist for the benefit of the
citizens who have had their citizenship rights cruelly
snatched away from them, and have been reduced in station
to serfs, bondsmen, and slaves.
The Nigerian civil right groups have for long
mischaracterised the struggles that they have endured and
have thereby been engaged in what are essentially
distractive wars of attrition.
As the feudal system was emerging, the civil rights
movement, fresh from what it believed its finest hours in the
wake of the transition to civil rule at the dawn of this
republic, began to embrace the madness that was always
there, but mostly restrained by the exigencies of the pro-
democracy battles. The human rights community grew, but
the rights community went to sleep; believing that
democracy had been won.
The traditional human rights community became
subsumed beneath the umbrella of Bola Ahmed Tinubu, and

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IMPERATIVES OF THE NIGERIAN REVOLUTION

their exertions became mostly corrupted because of his

corruptive influence. That Tinubu was the rallying point and
funder for a lot of the agitations engendered by Obasanjo’s
tyrannical rule further cemented his relationship with the
human rights community, which goes back to his days in the
NADECO movement.
A lot of people, who are otherwise incorruptible, have
found themselves sucked into the corrupt vortex that
revolves around the Jagaban. Some critical voices have been
lost as a most rapacious feudal system has been foisted on
the people. Those Tinubu had not managed to purchase
with filthy lucre, he managed to compromise with his toxic
friendship.
The loss of critical voices in the human rights community
because of their friendship with key political actors which is
further aggravated by the deliberate appointment of such
critical voices into political offices, has assured that the ones
that used to watch have stopped their watch, and the ones
that once wailed are either hailing now, or have lost their
voices. Truth has been largely subjectivised, or completely
ignored. The same act, when performed by different actors,
attracts disparate reviews.
With the press lost, there is only a precious few left to ask
the critical questions, and to hold the government
accountable.
With the human rights community distracted by the
many existential considerations that define the Nigerian

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 ‘Dele Farotimi

experience, there are few people available to speak for the

voiceless. Lines have been blurred, and the people have
become preys in the hands of the State, its press, the
judiciary. The men and women who once kept the watch,
have become one with the ones they used to watch.
Ole ti ja wa.

********

The impish clergy…

NIGERIA is a very religious country. There is practically a
church or mosque on every street of the country. We
commence every national assignment with prayers,
sometimes said to the same God in the manner of the Arab
slavers, and then according to the inheritance of the Christ –
mouthing colonialists and slave traders!
We are a very religious country.
Nigerians are however only vacuously religious. We
mouth all the rhetoric and have mastered all the dogmas; we
have the motions but are severely lacking in motivations.
Our deeds have rarely matched up with our protestations,
and the loudest proclamation of religiosity is usually a mask
for deceit. Our religions are stripped of godliness; superficial
and hollow. Christians and Muslims are alike and same. The
clergy is truly Nigerian in all ramifications. Religion has
truly found its home and true meaning in Nigeria.

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IMPERATIVES OF THE NIGERIAN REVOLUTION

While religion is a means to bind, Nigerian religiosity is

in a class all by itself. When you have embraced religion in
Nigeria, you are obliged to divest yourself of your God-
given brains, and you are expected to wait on God for
everything. There are spiritual explanations for every one of
the many existential considerations that defines the
Nigerian existence. The church is not unlike the hospital,
and the mosques are no different.
We demand of God, duties that are owed to us by the
State. The imams and pastors are constantly urging prayers
by the victims for the State and its rapacious rulers. The
clergy have become complicit in the mess.

********

The curse of religion

IN the northern part, religion has always been everything.
Islam is everything to the Hausa-Fulani plebeians. For the
traditional slave stock of the Fulani jihadist slavers, their
religion is also everything. To the several minorities in the
north, religion is linked to the personal and tribal identities
of the persons.
Slavery has a history in the north that predates the
transatlantic slave trade by over three centuries. I speak
specifically of the trans-Saharan slave trade that drew its
stock from the Benue plains and the Cameroon mountains

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 ‘Dele Farotimi

and valleys -- the basis of the powers of the two Islamic

empires of Kanem Bornu and the Sokoto Caliphate.
With the incursion of the Europeans into Africa, and the
subsequent history of colonisation and indirect rule, many
of the tribes that were resistant to Fulani hegemony but had
not evolved a governance system suitable for British
intentions, were brought under Fulani rule, taxation, and
dominion.
The embrace of the missionaries and Christianity became an
act of defiance by a people determined to seek out an
identity distinct from that of their historical enslavers. The
minorities in the north embraced Christianity and western
education with the colonial service protesting and doing
everything it could to impede the works of the missionaries.
This is because the feudal hegemony was incensed and the
colonists were unhappy about having their partners
discomfited.

********

ISLAM and religion are important factors in the allocation

of rights and privileges in Northern Nigeria. Both are at the
root of every one of the several crises endemic in that part of
the country. They are also closely aligned to the issues of
ethnic violence.

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IMPERATIVES OF THE NIGERIAN REVOLUTION

Religion is the most visceral of all human emotions

outside of sex; and the less informed a person is, the higher
the level of his religiosity and superstition.
The long history of feudalism, and the resultant need to
keep the serfs suppliant, has rendered the north susceptible
to all manner of religious charlatans, rabble rousers, and
demagogues. Boko Haram was born in this storm, and the
“suspected Fulani herdsmen” draw their lifeblood from the
pool of hate thus created.
The traditional power structure in the north is controlled
by the original inheritors of the Nigerian veto and partners
of the British colonists; an aristocratic lot. They were highly
educated men with Islamic worldviews, but were not
religionists.
The feudal lords controlled the mosques and imams, and
the sultan was the head of the entire ummah. The Emirs were
educated in the Islamic traditions and shariah, and they
were knowledgeable about Islamic jurisprudence. The state-
controlled religion, and sheiks were clients of the State.
The Nigeria State is reaping dividend of the diminishing
powers of the traditional authorities over the northern
mosques today in increased politicisation of Islam, and the
embrace of fundamentalism.

********

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Decapitation of the foundation

AS the military became entrenched and found less and less
need for political coverage of the traditional political
institutions of power, thus began to treat the traditional
rulers as clients, however influential they remained, the
mosques and imams began to gain independence that was
hitherto unheard of, but difficult to discern, and, restrain
when seen.
The Almajiri system has always been part of the Islamic
education system in the north. What is different today is the
extreme poverty that coexists alongside the religious
extremism that the hopeless poverty has birthed.
The return of civilian rule in 1999, and the promulgation
of the Abdulsalami (1999) constitution, created a state that is
in truth, a feudalised democracy. The long years of military
rule has taken us farther away from the mornings of our
beginning. Instead of the four federating regions of 1966 --
and the expressed desires to create a further two, one out of
the eastern region, the other from the northern region --
Nigeria had become a highly centralised unitary state.
Where the holder of the Nigerian veto would once prefer to
govern from Kaduna, now he would rather be the president
that would have been unacceptable to everyone in the
negotiations leading up to creation of independent Nigeria
State in 1960.

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We are now a federation of 36 states, and a Federal

Capital Territory (that has the status of a state); 774 Local
Government Areas. Each state has a mini-presidential
system in place, complete with legislative house, speakers,
and ‘loudspeakers’. The purpose of the state has become the
maintenance of the rulers in style, and poverty has become
the lot of the people. The living reality of the human called
Nigerian is to just survive. The rulers are in a class all by
themselves, and the Nigerian people have become preys to
the ones sworn to serve them.
The creation of the 36 ‘Emirates’ and the Sultanate in Aso
Rock has destroyed the foundation of the Nigerian
federation, and rendered the state a modern feudal system.
The purpose of governance, to reiterate, has become the
maintenance of the ruling class in comfort and style, and the
people would appear to have become serfs in the land of
their birth. The rulers appropriate rights of representation to
themselves; they exercise all the rights that should belong to
the citizens, leaving them barely able to breathe, even as they
luxuriate in the largesse purchased with the commonwealth.
The southern part is not much better. Vacuous religiosity
has largely overtaken the land. Amongst the Igbo of the east,
the tussles are denominational and not across religious lines:
the Anglican Church is in a perennial war with the Catholic
Church, and the Methodist Church wars with the Baptist. In
some cases, it is the Anambra Catholic priest that is
unwelcome in the diocese in Imo State. The few Muslims

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amongst the Igbo are mostly heard of but rarely seen. They
are victimised and marginalised by their own.
The Yoruba culture has always been quite adept at
tolerating diverse expressions of religiosity. Religious
syncretism is part of the Yoruba worldview. There are
families where brothers and sisters, uterine siblings and
cousins, husband and wife, worship God in different
manners. Among the Yoruba, religion is generally a relaxed
affair, but the people have not been spared the corrosive
effects of the politicisation of religion. Whilst it might be
tempting to situate the problem in the present, and present
it as though it is an unusual phenomenon in Yorubaland,
historical facts would suggest otherwise.
Those opposed to the politics of Obafemi Awolowo had
used religion, particularly Islam, to rally and mobilise
opposition to the Awoist philosophy and urgings. The Ede-
Iwo axis of current Osun State was primarily mobilised
against Awolowo and his ideology by the adoption of
Islamist arguments that sought to couch the ideas in
religious terms. It took active engagement of the like of
Senator Adeleke (father to the dancer that wants to be
governor), and Chief Bisi Akande to tamp down the
religious fervour that was being whipped up against
Awolowo.
On Bola Tinubu’s watch, Yoruba’s long-held religious
tolerance was gradually eroded, and overt Islamic influence
began to exert and assert a dominance over the affairs of

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state. Though he has never shown an inclination for

religious extremism, or even religiosity, Tinubu has
unleashed forces that were hitherto dormant, not in any
expression of religious zealotry, but as a force for political
mobilisation.
Islam has a long history amongst the people of Lagos
State, particularly the indigenous. Early trade with the
Malians had exposed the Lagos elites to Islamic influences,
and had become a rallying point for the aborigines, in the
days before Nigeria’s Independence, and in the outcry and
demand for the creation of the state.
Whilst religion is a difficult tool for political mobilisation
in Yorubaland, it has proven a powerful weapon for
mobilising against political interests of persons perceived as
working in the interest of other ethnic groups.
Jimi Agbaje’s candidacy couldn’t be undermined on
account of his Christian religion, especially as the Jagaban
had also been compelled to field a Christian candidate, but
the massive support of the Igbo residents, who are
predominantly Christian, was spun in selected circles of
Muslims to become a nascent plot by Christians and Igbo to
take over the state.
Islam has become a tool for political mobilisation in the
hands of the Jagaban.
Nigeria is a place where religion has become a tool for
keeping the people down; a tool for the enslavement of
otherwise freeborn men and women. The clerics have

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become fattened on the food taken off the tables of the

wretched, and the religious orders are as complicit in the
conditions of the masses as the political class. Religion is the
opium being fed to the masses, and the sedative that has
kept the people pliant.
The religious Nigerian is held bound; incapable of
rationally examining how he got to the sorry pass in which
he lives. He is told to pray for the rulers, and to await his
reward in the heaven he is assured awaits him if he obeys
the laws of God, those of the unjust State, and then fulfills
his obligations to pay his tithes and bring his offerings to the
men of God who have become the gods of men.
With the loss of the Nigerian press and the civil rights
movement to Tinubu’s political machinery, and the
resultant loss of hitherto critical voices in the marketplace of
ideas and ideals, truth became subjective, and ignorance
weaponised against the people.
Tinubu had succeeded in normalising the most modern
exposition of feudalism before Buhari happened on the
scene. The pinnacle of Tinubu’s governance capacity
remains the city state of Lagos, a painted sepulchral, rotten
and putrid in all of its ramifications.

********

THE Nigerian situation had come to a head for me in 2014.

As I helplessly watched the unveiling of Buhari as a power-

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seeking, visionless, ethnic and religious irredentist who

would do anything to gain power.
Witnessing the emergence and ascension to power of the
APC in 2015, I began to understand the systemic nature of
our malaise and the impotence and limitations of personnel
changes in affecting systemic issues. The eight years of
Obama’s presidency had no effect on the systemic racism of
the America State or the racist chokeholds of white privilege.
Buhari is no Obama, and has proven to be more corrupt and
corruptive than the ones that he replaced in 2015. The
illusion of change was hyperbolically packaged and sold in
the months before the 2015 elections, and Jonathan lost the
liver he had never been accused of possessing.
Nigerians were promised change and change they have
received: A change from bad to worse; to newer levels of
leadership degeneration. Left with the glaring reality of
Buhari’s inability to deliver on the change that was
promised in 2015, the hegemony reverted to the systemic
position; fascist tactics were embraced, and in the absence of
an articulated alternative to the enduring system, the
behemoth in the race captured power at the centre with the
usual impunity fully restored but with a new-found
swagger that had been born of the knowledge that nobody
is watching again. The watchmen have become complicit in
the robberies.
The press is largely bought and owned by the Nigerian
ruling class, the courts are complicit, and Tinubu’s

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involvement has compromised critical strata of civil society.

If you were to place a map of Nigeria on a wall, and a
selection of colour-coded flags ranging from green denoting
peace, and the amber signifying insecurity, you would find
very quickly that Nigeria is a State in a state of war. The
entirety of Nigeria is in a state of anarchy. The state has lost
its monopoly of coercive force. In large chunks of its
territory, it has lost its very legitimacy for a loss of purpose
and relevance.
Nigeria is rendered asunder in the Eastern parts – land
of the Igbo – by the same Igbo question that had led it into
the first civil war and that has continued to ensure that
whilst the war might have been declared over, the battles
have continued to rage; the wounds have continued to
fester.
The refusal of the Nigeria State to provide equal
citizenship to its peoples is founded on the feudal need for
the creation of a class above the law, and explained by
placing group interests above that of the general citizenry,
thereby providing the seeding grounds for legitimate evil
and iniquitous systems.
The Igbo man was the original victim of the Nigeria
State. Having lost his voice to the war, his group privileges
were appropriated to the winners of the vanquished. But as
the Yoruba would say: Ore ti a fi na Iyale, o wa la’ja fun Iyawo.
The rod that today adorns the back of the senior wife, shall
visit the new consort’s derrière someday. That day has come

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for the rest of Nigeria. The failure and the refusal of the
Nigeria State to provide equitable citizenship to the people
have birthed the idiocy of secessionist struggles in the
entirety of the southern part. The phenomenon deserves
attention because of the distraction that it truly is.

********

Triggering the Secessionist alarm

I MUST confess to having been once possessed of the
intellectual indolence required to embrace the asinine belief
that Nigeria’s problems, and more particularly, my interests
as a “Yoruba” man, would be resolved by a breakup of the
“Nigerian federation”. I was ideologically committed to the
creation of a “Yoruba Nation”, and at a minimum, I was
happy to accept a “restructured” Nigeria State. I have now
come to the knowledge of just how foolish I was. Now, I
have little patience for those who continue to hold to this
distractive and idiotic position. They are the ones that have
been blinded to the truth. The Nigeria State can never break
up peacefully. Whilst they are wasting their energies and
lives seeking the unachievable that is easily achievable,
much-better is being lost.
If Nigeria were to be a nation founded on the equality of
citizenships; if laws shall be the foundation upon which the
state is found; if all are truly equal before the law, and the

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law is not an instrument of injustices and institutional

wickedness, the secessionist noises would have never been
heard.
If a man’s tribal origin has nothing to do with his rights
as a citizen, or his weight before the law, if his religion is his
business and solely his; if Nigeria is what it was purposed to
be, nobody would want to be part of a smaller nation. If
some people do not profit by claiming to speak on behalf of
the divisions that they have created and fostered, the
secessionist voices would have long been silent.
The systemically endemic inequities and injustices of the
State are the breeding grounds for the demands for tribal
homelands but I assure you, that Nigeria is too strong to be
broken into the tidy enclaves sought by the secessionists.
The State knows this and works always with this
knowledge. I will even go as far as to say that the Nigerian
intelligence agencies have encouraged these tendencies as
part of the scheme to deflect critical attention away from the
failures of the State and to both delegitimise and criminalise
genuine dissenting voices that have embraced secession in
their frustration with the system.
I have recently become increasingly convinced that we
are sleeping through a revolution that has commenced
without announcing its arrival. The common lullaby being
sung for the somnambulists, which are in truth, dirges, are
secessionist songs. I ask that you open your minds. The sum
of the Nigerian minorities is larger than whichever believes

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itself the biggest of the three dominant ethnic groups – the

ones that have ever demanded to secede. The minorities are
more than the biggest of the ethnic giants.
The Nigeria State has never been predicated on the
equality of citizenship, or on the very idea of citizenship. It
has always been characterised by the rights acquired by the
group. In every modern State of the world, at the basis and
very foundation of the State, would be the citizens.
Montesqui’s social compact theory is the generally accepted
explanation for the evolution of the modern state, but the
countries and states of Africa have been robbed of the
capacity for evolution, and had states arbitrarily decreed
into existence by malign interests and forces of slavery and
colonialism.
The regionalisation of Nigeria by the British was an
exercise in administrative convenience. Management of
scarce resources and systemic efficiency were the cardinal
reasons behind the adoption. What did not feature in
colonial considerations were the several minority ethnic
groups that were arbitrarily Balkanised and rendered
subjects of the mostly overbearing ethnic majorities in the
regions created. Nobody asked questions of the many
ethnicities before they were lumped together for
administrative purposes, and the social compact theory was
nowhere in sight. The Bill of Rights contained in the
Independence Constitution was a direct result of agitations

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 ‘Dele Farotimi

by the minorities, and a recommendation of the Willinks

Commission raised to address the concerns.
The minorities have always found common cause in
refusing to be part of any secessionist undertaking. This is
informed by a commonality of their fears of domination,
subjugation, and repression by the majority tribes. If the
fundamental human rights sections of the Independence
Constitution owe its origins to the fears of the minorities for
the inequities of the State at birth, why would they support
any secessionist agitation by any of the three behemoths?
What has changed?

********

… A justifiable Yoruba nationalism?

THE Yoruba have the most impressive secessionist
arguments. I know because I had argued a few of them in
my time. They are the most homogeneous of the old
regions., The few ethnic minorities to the fringes of their
territories have been mostly assimilated. Aside from the
Ondo riverine boundaries with the Ijaw, and the
troublesome issues of Ilorin and the Okun Yoruba of Kogi,
they have few conflicts to resolve. But where would the rest
of Nigeria be if they allowed the secession of the part of
Nigeria that has, by the exertions of all, become the
economic engine room of the Nigeria State?

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The Igbos have been the loudest of all the secessionist

voices. They have fought the civil war, paid a heavy price
for the war they had no choice but to fight. Ndigbo are still
paying to date for their daring. But the Igbo secessionists
would forget the truth of their own history. They are the
ones that have proven the thesis that I seek to establish. To
watch the refusal to draw the strategic lessons for which
entire generations paid a hefty price, is a disservice to their
sacrifices.

********

…An insolvent Igbo question?

NIGERIA has an Igbo problem. At the root of the many

seemingly intractable problems assailing the Nigeria State is
the refusal to allow the equality of citizenship. The Igbo man
has never asked to be treated differently from anyone. I have
never heard Ndigbo ask for anything that he is unhappy to
see other Nigerians enjoy. I have never heard anyone say
that what the Igbo man is demanding injures their own
rights. I have not heard of any, that would reject the Igbo
charter of demands from the Nigeria State if the same were
offered to them. If Nigeria would resolve its Igbo problem,
it would have answered its crises of nationhood.

********

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 ‘Dele Farotimi

TWENTY-TWO years after the military junta had left office,

years in which the states have been exclusively ruled by sons
of the soils – the governors, legislators, local government
chairpersons and all members of the state governments are
not foreigners posted to loot the state – how well have the
states fared? Who is responsible for the bulk of the rots that
the secessionists point at as validation for their agitations?
Granted that the Nigeria State has facilitated the evil by the
evil governance systems, how do they expect to cure these
institutional maladies in their utopian republics?
In the Oodua Republic being sought by the Yoruba
irredentists, where would Tinubu be? Would the rulers be
different from the current lot that afflicts the people? What
would be different in that republic? Would the Ibadan allow
the Oke-Ogun people to rule Oyo State? Would Okeho allow
Saki to take the slot? Ofiki people nko? Would the Yewa-
Awori in Ogun State become eligible for the gubernatorial
office? Ha! Lest I forget, would the Ikorodu people then get
a shot at the governorship of Lagos State? And this is
amongst the homogeneous Yoruba. What about the warrant
Obas and chiefs? Would we be appointing new ones whilst
we are at it?

********

IGBO KWENU! Would the Anambra man be the one that

rules first? What about the Ebonyi man? Ehn ehn, where are

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the Ijaws in this Biafran Republic? The Ikwere and other lost
tribes of the Igbo people nko? Where would the Orji
predators of Abia be? Would you be hosting annual New
Yam Festivals to beat the Ekweremadus of the Biafran
utopia? Those pesky Calabar people nko?

********

I WILL not even bother to address the many issues that

make it impossible for the North to secede. I will merely ask
that you pick up a map of the Nigeria State, and seek to
divide its northern part according to the disparate ethnic
groups that have endured centuries of political and religious
oppression in the hands of the Fulani and Kanuri
hegemonies. Northern secession is equal to cultural and
religious genocide for a lot of people that Nigerians of
southern extraction have blithely labeled as northerners.
It is possible and much easier to galvanise Nigerians
behind a quest for a better Nigeria, one that is just and fair
to all; than to chase the illusion offered by secessionism.
Every Nigerian that is not in government or a friend of
government, is a victim of the injustices that permeate the
Nigerian experience. Members of the ruling class do not
bicker over their tribal differences, and even the ones that
have demanded restructuring and encouraged secessionist
voices in the past, become great nationalists once they are
given room at the feeding trough. We play into their hands

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when we accept the divisions that they have sown to keep

the people divided; and unable to see the commonalities of
their afflictions.
In the north, Islamic terrorism has become a pandemic.
The systemic failure is even more evident to the cursory
observers than in the south. The general state of insecurity
has meant that the natives, mostly farmers and pastoralists,
have become prey to rampaging bandits that have overtaken
the countryside and the parts outside of the larger cities and
towns in the region. Kidnappings are rife, and the security
forces are complicit in the despoliation of the land. Boko
Haram has the northeast in a vicelike grip while the
“suspected” Fulani herdsmen and bandits have overtaken
the northwest, north central, and the Benue trough.
The Niger Delta has largely become a no-go zone for the
Nigeria State for the last 20 years. The State has become a
licensee of the several warlords and militias who in truth run
the show in the creeks of the oil-soaked Delta. The few cities
and towns of the Delta region are the only parts where the
State pretends to exist, for once the state capitals are in the
horizon, all that remains are vast fields of deprivations,
armed men that are not agents of state, ecological
wastelands and criminal impunity. The Nigeria State has
abandoned the common citizens to the criminal accomplices
of the feudal lords that operate the local franchises.
The level of popular support for separatist agenda
amongst the Yoruba was always a good measurement of the

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egalitarianism, otherwise of the government of the day.

However, current realities have led to a subtle, but
substantial shift in Yoruba worldview. Political power in
Yorubaland, for about four decades, had been predicated on
the enlightened selfish interests of the larger group and
determined by the collective wisdoms of the Afenifere
collegiate led by charismatic men, who exercised necessarily
despotic powers in pursuit of clearly identified and carefully
articulated group objectives. With the Obasanjo designed
tsunami of 2003, what the Afenifere had gained as AD, was
lost to the Yoruba, and what emerged is the thriving Jagaban
political dynasty.

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 Chapter 10
The Time is Now

“But all the same, our charity must begin at

home. Government must appreciate where we are, summon
each group that should make contributions one by one and
subsequently collectively seek the way forward with all
hands on deck and with the holistic approach of stick and
carrot. There should be no sacred cows.
“Some of the groups I will suggest to be contacted are:
traditional rulers, past heads of service (no matter how
competent or incompetent they have been and how much
they have contributed to the mess we are in), past heads of
para-military organisations, private sector, civil society,
community leaders particularly in the most affected areas,
present and past governors, present and past local
government leaders, religious leaders, past Heads of State,
past intelligence chiefs, past Heads of Civil Service and
relevant current and retired diplomats, members of
opposition and any groups that may be deemed relevant.
“After we have found appropriate solution internally, we
should move to bilateral, multilateral, regional,
continental, and global levels. With ISIS involvement in
the Boko Haram crisis, we cannot but go global. Without

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security and predictable stability, our development, growth

and progress are in peril.
“Let me hasten to add that we must be at the appropriate
seat at the table of international discourse, deliberations,
agenda and action. That Nigeria from independence has
always been in the forefront of any continental initiative,
decision, action or programme has put us in some form of
leadership position. For Nigeria to be outside the African
Continental Free Trade Zone Agreement when it
automatically came into effect with twenty-two-nations’
ratification is to say the least unfortunate.”
– Obasanjo, 2019

“Time is running out and the stock of options available for

rekindling the dying embers of Nigerian unity is getting
steadily depleted. I have argued elsewhere that the failure
of Nigeria cannot be remedied by hopes of the arrival of the
elusive good leadership alighting on our shores to
incrementally tackle the myriad of problems and crisis
afflicting this country.
“What we are confronted with is systemic failure and it
directly results from the extent of our constitutional
deviation from the practice of federalism which requires no
less a holistic constitutional response and reversal to what
the President himself called 'true federalism'. The
constitutional vehicle of Nigeria suffered an accident at the
error of the road rule violation of a group of young military

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officers in 1966. Rather than repair and restore the vehicle,

we kept on piling on the damaged vehicle until it becomes
a near complete wreck that constitutes a present danger to
the safety and security of the passengers.
“Going forward, we are left with two options: we can
deconstruct and reassemble the vehicle and make it whole
again – a feat that is not beyond the trademark ingenuity
of Nigerian mechanics or we can abandon the wreckage
altogether and get another one. The first option amounts to
deferring to the logic of restructuring (understood as the
restoration of federalism) while the latter represents the
abandonment of Nigeria altogether to seek new nations.”
– Akin Osuntokun

I HAVE taken the quotes above as examples of the

roundabout manner that several Nigerians have taken in
calling for the obvious solution to the Nigerian conundrum.
For the Nigeria nation to be born, the State as it is presently
constituted, must die. The Nigeria State is not amenable to
reform. It is the very definition of injustice, inequity and a
most violent rapist of its citizens. A cannibalistic entity that
sucks the very life out of its people, the wolf that has fed on
the flock it had deceived was watching over. The Nigeria
State is a criminal empire that does not exist for the benefit
of the ruled.

What has eluded Nigerians have been the absence of
alternative views or pathways by which we might safely

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navigate the murky waters of our quest for nationhood. The

Nigeria State has stifled alternative views since the collapse
of the First Republic, and the entire purpose of the state and
its agencies has become the preservation of the State. This is
regardless of the cost to the nation and the citizens, who
have been stripped of their citizenship rights because these
rights are incompatible with the feudalistic State, and; an
unfettered expression (of the rights) would threaten the
unjust foundations of the State.

Nigeria is a country that has been taken to the edge of the
abyss. All pretences at normalcy have been abandoned;
what has been normalised is generalised and rampant
insanity. To continue traveling on our current path is to end
up with a fate much worse than Somalia, and certainly
comparable to the Rwandese situation on steroids.
Something must give, and it is my conviction, that the time
is now for a radical turnaround. It is time for the Nigerian
revolution.

The Nigeria State is at war with itself. The country is in
the grip of a vicious and most debilitating Islamist
insurgency in the North-East. A vast part of the North-West
has been overtaken by Fulani militias and criminal elements
of all types. The Plateau and the hills of the Mambila are in
a general state of strife. The Benue trough has become a
death zone. The Nigeria State is prostrate in the Niger Delta;
the presence of armed troops and the rents paid to ethnic
warlords, assured that oil production has continued in the

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Delta. The land of the Igbo people continues to enjoy

grinding insecurity. Yorubaland is not unaffected. Nigeria
needs help.
As Nigeria began the countdown to the end of the Buhari
Presidency and the battles for the succession begin amongst
the coterie of thieves and feudal lords, the time has come for
the Nigerian peoples to critically assess the state of the
country. It is in my opinion, by far more important, that we
earnestly commence radical overhaul of our entire
governance systems and structure of our country. The
alternative is to wait for the imminent and unavoidable
collapse of the country due to implosions that are
completely unavoidable if the current trajectories are not
speedily reversed. I believe it to be most dangerous and
irresponsible for us to wait for an already precarious
situation to further deteriorate before acting to prevent the
tragedy.
The COVID-19 pandemic has painfully crystallised the
sickening failure of the Nigeria State and exposed the truth
of its feudalised democracy and institutional inequities. The
Nigeria State at all levels has proven to be most
lackadaisical, evil and wicked in the way it has allowed itself
to be completely indifferent to the sufferings of the citizens
and untouched by their afflictions. Elsewhere in the world,
the state took the lead in the fight against the pandemic. In
Nigeria, the pandemic has become just another opportunity
to exploit and impoverish the already beleaguered citizens.

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IMPERATIVES OF THE NIGERIAN REVOLUTION

A scamdemic.
Everywhere in the world, lockdowns were preceded by
massive public health education campaigns, ramped up
efforts at building and increasing the operational efficiencies
of the healthcare delivery system, economic stimulus
packages and relief efforts. In Nigeria, the lockdown was
announced weeks after when it should have been in force; it
was incompetently enforced, totally ineffective and
ineffectual. The usual corrupt exemptions were made to
accommodate business and political interests, and as with
everything Nigerian, the discretion dictated by corrupt
interests were corruptly applied by the corrupt and
corrupted gatekeepers.
The rest of humanity ramped up their test and trace
capabilities, but as I write these final chapters in the third
week of June, the Nigeria State has conducted less than a
hundred thousand tests! It has stopped pretending to trace
and build healthcare capacity. It has continued pretending
as if we do not have rampant community spread, and the
rulers have continued to maintain the focus of governance
on the provision and assurance of their own personal
comforts and powers.
As its economy has continued to crumble in response to
the global financial collapse that has been
acknowledged by better placed nations and economies, the
Nigeria State and its ruling class have continued as though
we are immune to these realities, even as they have

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continued to borrow unsustainable amounts of monies,

which soon disappear into the vast holes of the feudal
“demoncrazy” that we have erected in place of a democracy.
No less a person than a prince of the evil system itself,
Atiku Abubakar had this to say in an article published in
Cable Newspaper on June 16, 2020:

“Not only have we squandered our opportunities, we have

also squandered the opportunities of our future generations
by bequeathing them debt that they neither incurred or
enjoyed.
“As a matter of utmost urgency and importance, I call on
the Federal Government to take immediate steps to
drastically reduce its expenditure, especially on wasteful
projects, such as maintenance of the Presidential Air Fleet,
and unnecessary renovations of buildings that could serve
as is, limousine fleet for top government officials, overseas
travels and treatments, and the ₦4.6 billion Presidential
villa maintenance budget, etc.
“In fact, Nigeria must sell those planes and channel the
revenue to other vital areas of need while taking additional
steps to reduce the cost of running our government.
“The Federal Government cannot continue to justify these
unsustainable numbers by pointing at Nigeria’s debt to
GDP ratio. That is only half the picture.
“Our debt to revenue ratio paints a much more realistic
portrait of our financial situation, especially as our

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revenues are majorly tied to a mono product, oil and gas,

which are very vulnerable to global shocks.”

********

…The economic meltdown

THE unholy alliance between the rapacious Bola Ahmed
Tinubu political crime family and the exceedingly
conservative CPC wing of the northern hegemony, which
had never found oxygen in Southern Nigeria, has birthed a
tragedy that has today normalised impunity amongst the
Yoruba who were the historical conscience of the Nigeria
State, and whose free press and culture of egalitarianism had
once called out the very best in all of Nigeria’s several
ethnicities.
The Nigeria State is drifting aimlessly in very turbulent
seas, and everything deducible from the general state of our
country would suggest that we have entered a period of
extreme economic and financial crisis, and this is aggravated
by the burgeoning security challenges that the years of
grievance politics, political brinksmanship and
unenlightened selfish interests have foisted on the entire
country.
In the midst of these meltdowns, the state and its ruling
class have continued to behave as though it is business as
usual and have accelerated the process of systematically

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impoverishing the people, even as they have taken a

chokehold on every avenue for the ventilation of alternative
views, and every hope of a systemic change predicated on
electoral choices. The Nigerian citizen is being daily
asphyxiated, and we are losing the capacity to breathe, but
we have also lost our voices and stopped crying out our
agonies and pain.

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 “
The Nigeria State is the only legal killer
in this space and given its manifest
and well-established reputation as a
serial killer, it is only the foolish or the
deranged that would engage with
such an entity at its own game. I am
neither deranged nor foolish, but I
seek a change in Nigeria. The Nigeria
State is killing the Nigeria nation, and
if the amoral State and its evil
governance systems are not killed, it is
all but certain that the Nigeria nation
will die.

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 Chapter 11
The Pacifist Warrior

I
f I would be bothered, I am confident that I can pick out
the exact date of my entry into Fiditi Grammar School.
It was the second Sunday of September 1978. It was
most likely the 10th of the month. I had just turned 10 years
old in April of that year. I was a runt. We were assigned
Houses, and in the Houses, we were assigned rooms.
The bell was scratched at 5 AM, and barely tolled at 5:30
AM. I will save the beatings that cleared the fog of sleep;
today is not the day to recount the tales of the incubuses that
passed by the names of seniors or my own transition into
one. I intend to offer you a window into how I grew up to
embrace my pacifist ideology.

********

MORNING devotions and prayers done, basic orientation

talks dispensed with, we were assigned our morning duties,
then it was bath time, and I truly found my level.
I entered the bathroom every other person appeared to
be entering, a long room rigged with showers. It wasn’t the
compartmentalised space I had imagined, and there were
men inside. Some of them with more pubic hair than the

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entire Afro on my young head, and seemingly sporting

snakes where I had a tadpole. I ran outside in fear. I believed
that I had somehow managed to stray into the staff
bathroom. The seniors were amused beyond words, slapped
me back inside to have my bath. I also embraced my future
and began to evolve in order to survive.
I was brought up to be respectful of myself, deferential
with older persons and measured in making my position
clear to anyone with whom I would treat. These trainings
came in handy in the land of bullies into which I had been
immersed when I was sent to the boarding school at the
tender age of 10. The seniors’ only restraint was that they
must not kill their juniors but that did not stop them from
trying. A few of the seniors might have tried to find out just
how much abuse the junior could endure. I learnt to avoid
interactions with the seniors. Someday, I will tell you of my
bed in the attic, all to avoid Senior Sola Adedun.
But my own classmates were no less intimidating. I was
the runt of the litter, and being constantly bullied
themselves, they mostly responded by bullying others… Oh,
yes, you guessed right: Oladele was the favourite person to
bully. I have always been blessed with a quick wit and a
sharp tongue, and; whilst I was brought up to be respectful,
I was never taught to fear anyone. My tongue got me regular
beatings amongst my own classmates, and I quickly became
adept at avoiding fights, even as I learnt to court trouble.

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“Ejo la n’ko, baba enikan ki ko ija.” It is best to learn how to

state the facts of the dispute than to learn how to fight. This
is one of the foundational pillars of Yoruba civilisation and
culture. Resort to physical violence is culturally deprecated,
while civility of peaceable disputation is generally
encouraged. To be fighting when you could reason with the
other person is an anathema to the culture in which I grew
up.
But whilst I could afford to forget these admonitions at
Inalende, with Maami constantly watching to ensure that
none of the older kids would practice their acquired fighting
skills on me, there was nobody to protect me at Fiditi, and I
soon learnt to embrace extreme pacifism. It was the
difference between being constantly beaten or learning to
hold my tongue – an affliction that has never found space in
my spirit.
I would disagree with anyone regardless of their office
or seniority, but I would do so methodically. I learnt to be
extremely respectful in my choice of words, depending on
the person’s age, stature and status. I would go to great
lengths to ensure that every person listening to us is clear
about my disavowal of violence as a tool for resolution of
the dispute, and labour to establish my readiness to be
swayed by superior reasoning. The unwary would commit
to these terms, and I began to escape the perennial beatings
that were my lot in the first months of secondary school.

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My 16-year-old son is taller than me today, and he has

been taller since he was 14. I am 1.73 meters, but at
graduation from secondary school I was still shorter than the
boys in Form One. The fact that the iron clad discipline that
birthed the bullies of my junior years had waned by the time
I got into my senior years, and the number of boarding
house students had reduced in tandem with the Unity Party
of Nigeria, UPN’s Free Education Programme, meant that I
had to be reasonable with the men that became my juniors.
Day students that might beat the runt on his truant forays
into town.
When I was at Oyo State College of Arts & Science,
OSCAS in Ife in 1984/1985, I found myself in an argument
with a retard named Niyi Obembe. I cannot now recall what
the subject was, but I was my usual respectful self – it is my
factory setting; I have never known any other way. We were
not friends, and I am not even sure I knew him before the
day. He was brash, loud and as uncouth as he was ignorant.
I was intent on making him realise the idiocy of his position,
and I succeeded. He lashed out with a head-kick. It was the
first time anyone had physically bullied me outside of my
own home in over five years, for doing nothing aside telling
the truth. Others were present, but only one person rebuked
him. Lesson learnt again.
I have always hated seeing birds in cages. I have always
found the sight of the avian in a cage a constant source of
great discomfort. This predilection was the catalyst for the

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 ‘Dele Farotimi

last fisticuffs in which I was a participant, albeit a reluctant

one. I was living in Adanla Hostel at the Lagos State
University. Pardon the extension of the word hostel to
describe the LASU hostels. Adanla Hostel was in Adanla
Close. It was a bungalow in the classic ‘face me I slap you’
style. At the rear was an enclosed courtyard with the
customary communal kitchen and the toilets and
bathrooms.
The birdcage was hung in front of the open kitchen, just
by the entrance. The cage housed a captured bird, I cannot
now recall its breed, or name of its owner, a mild-mannered
man, very respectful of me. He was a good neighbour too.
He never caused me offence. I was to blame for the beating
I received in his hands.
I freed his bird. I opened the cage and set the captive bird
free. The owner asked, and I fessed up. I explained my angst
at seeing the bird imprisoned. I preached to him a sermon
on how God did not create the bird for his amusement and
the decoration of his cage. The usually mild-mannered man
was enraged, and we did not fight as much as he trashed me.
My hands were addled by the knowledge of the fact that I
was wrong, and that he was clearly provoked. But I learnt
another lesson that day. Let’s bring home the sermon.

********

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IMPERATIVES OF THE NIGERIAN REVOLUTION

My resolve
IT has become necessary and crucial that I define my
position in the public arena, and thereby make clear that in
pursuit of the systemic changes to which I have committed
my life, I do not seek the use of violence. I disavow it
unequivocally and will never consider it.
The Nigeria State is a criminal empire. It is happiest
when dissenters embrace the use of violence., And as it has
narrowed avenues for the ventilation of grievances, it has
deliberately forced violence on those who have sought to
engage with it. The State would then turn around to label
the ones that they had led to violence as terrorists, and
thereby kill, jail and criminalise genuine agitations. I have
no truck with violence.
The Nigeria State is the only legal killer in this space and
given its manifest and well-established reputation as a serial
killer, it is only the foolish or the deranged that would
engage with such an entity at its own game. I am neither
deranged nor foolish, but I seek a change in Nigeria. The
Nigeria State is killing the Nigeria nation, and if the amoral
State and its evil governance systems are not killed, it is all
but certain that the Nigeria nation will die.
I seek a new beginning for Nigeria. I seek a nation built
on citizenship, one in which everyone is treated the same
before the law. I seek a Nigeria nation. I seek a nation where
your religion is your business, where there is no use for the

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 ‘Dele Farotimi

state of your origination or tribe, where the Yoruba man is

unknown to the constitution of the federation, and; where a
man’s humanity is the common denominator of his rights. I
seek a nation that is the lighthouse of humanity; a refuge for
the brown race. I see a nation the equal and better of any
other nation on God’s earth.
I see the assurance of a most vile and violent future if we
should persist in working with the current systems. I see the
consolidation of the forces of feudalism and further
enslavement of Nigerians in the immediate future. I see the
day after COVID-19 with this lot in charge, and I see men
and women in fetters. I see Asian overlords, and their local
collaborators. I see the slave trade that is coming. I see the
decimation of the middle class, and I see the turbaning
ceremonies of the local pashas disguised as swearing-in
ceremonies. I see a feudalised “demoncrazy”, where the
citizens are truly serfs, and the rulers live in style.

********

NECESSITY demands that the revolution sought must be

nonviolent, and the rulers of Nigeria are the only ones that
might decide the peacefulness or violence of the revolution.
We own no arms and shall seek none. Now, or in the future.
We have evolved a raft of nonviolent actions that are
designed to help the citizens educate themselves as to the
truth and the issues at stake, and then build consensus and

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IMPERATIVES OF THE NIGERIAN REVOLUTION

common purpose for a people who had been deliberately

and systematically divvied up for long.
The Nigeria revolution is not inevitable. It is also very
unlikely to be peaceful. The beneficiaries of the current
system, the victims of the system and those of us that have
sought to end the system are doomed to a cycle of violence
determined by the reflexive evil of the Nigeria State. and its
total inability to identify what its own altruistic interests are,
because there is nothing altruistic about Nigeria. But the
higher duty of care belongs to the patriots that would birth
a better Nigeria State. We thus have to articulate a
nonviolent path to the future that we have sought.

********

This section is rounded off by the contribution of my brother,

Taiwo ‘Wemimo Akinlami. He is a better man than I am in several
ways but he is a particularly well-grounded advocate of nonviolent
tactics and a committed revolutionary.

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 THE CHANGE
MANIFESTO
by Taiwo Wemimo Akinlami

“
The masses of our people seem to believe in the messianic
approach and they believe that an activist or group of activists is
coming to help them, and make everything work for them. The
Nigerian masses have perfected the act of waiting for a
messiah…The masses of our people must be made to understand
and accept that change does not happen except they take their
collective destiny into the hands and become their own messiah.

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THE CHANGE MANIFESTO

CHANGE is an ever-present possibility for any person,

organisation or nation which is ready to take responsibility
for it.
In the following axiom lie the 20 major components of
change.

1. CHANGE IS WAITING ON US: Change is a

waiting and ready servant willing to be engaged,
though it hardly engages itself.

At every point in time, change is either acting on us

or we are acting on change. When we heed the
invitation of change, we act on change but when we
do not heed the invitation of change, change acts on
us and we waste all its inherent potentials which can
only be unlocked for the eternal benefits of humanity.

2. CHANGE MUST BE INITIATED AND

ENGINEERED: To be initiated here refers to
deliberately putting in place the machinery (the
system and processes) of effecting a change in a
desired area.

To engineer is to 'skillfully arrange for (something) to

occur.'

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The principle is very simple. Nothing on the face of

the earth improves except human efforts are
deliberately and skillfully engaged in the direction of
the same.

Franz Fanon speaks to the first and the second

components of change as enunciated above
thus: ‘Each generation must, out of relative obscurity,
discover its mission, fulfill it, or betray it.’

3. CHANGE IS FIRST A PERSONAL

RESPONSIBILITY: The way it works is that we
cannot lead a change whose credibility we are not
able to consistently model.

Our lives must become the symbol of the possibility

of the change we seek at the corporate level, gaining
the moral authority and credibility to lead a moral
persuasion.

The change seeker must be the conscience of the

change processes and must be able to say like Nelson
Mandela, 'The struggle is my life.'

According to Ghandi, who prosecuted one of the

most successful political struggles of the 20th
Century which delivered political independence to

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the Indian people on August 15, 1947, through the

instrumentality of passive resistance, ‘You must be the
change you wish to see in the world.’

4. CHANGE MUST BE DEFINED, SEEING THE

END FROM THE BEGINNING:
What change exactly do we want? The vision must be
clear and the mission must also have a level of clarity.

The vision of the political change we seek in Nigeria

must be the attainment of an egalitarian society,
where there must be a level-playing field for every of
its citizenry to give expression to his/her God-given
potentials.

I think in expanding the scope of the preceding,

suggested direction for the change we seek, we may
have an idea to borrow from Bryan Stevenson, when
he said, ‘My work with the poor and the incarcerated has
persuaded me that the opposite of poverty is not wealth; the
opposite of poverty is justice. Finally, I’ve come to believe
that the true measure of our commitment to justice, the
character of our society, our commitment to the rule of law,
fairness and equality cannot be measured by how we treat
the rich, the powerful, the privileged and the respected
among us. The true measure of our character is how we

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treat the poor, the disfavoured, the accused, the

incarcerated and the condemned.’

5. CHANGE MUST SET ITS METHODOLOGY

It is not only change that must be defined, the
methodology must also be defined with an intention
to adhere to the same strictly. Mode of execution of
the method must be reviewed from time to time but
not the agreed method.

The mission/mythology of achieving the vision or

direction enumerated above must by all means
necessary be peaceful, through the instrumentality of
nonviolence resistance, which is an age-long and
tested strategy of achieving social and political
change through peaceful means.

According to Wikipedia, ‘Nonviolent resistance (NVR),

or nonviolent action, is the practice of achieving goals such
as social change through symbolic protests, civil
disobedience, economic or political noncooperation,
satyagraha or other methods, while being nonviolent. This
type of action highlights the desires of an individual or
group that feels that something needs to change to improve
the current condition of the resisting person or group.’

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The article, ‘Gandhi and the Passive Resistance

Campaign 1907-1914,’ published on the website
(www.sahistory.org.za), shed some light on the basic
ideology and reasoning behind nonviolent resistance
as follows: “Gandhi biographer Louis Fischer says
Satyagraha ‘means to be strong not with the strength
of the brute but with the strength of the spark of God.’
Satyagraha, according to Gandhi, is ‘the vindication
of truth not by infliction of suffering on the opponent
but on one’s self.’ The intention is to convince the
opponent and not to crush him, to convert the
opponent, who must be ‘weaned from error by
patience and sympathy.’”

In his book, Stride Toward Freedom, Martin Luther

King, Junior, an outstanding proponent of
nonviolent resistance, set out the following cardinal
principles of nonviolent resistance as follows:

I. First, it must be emphasised that nonviolent resistance is

not a method for cowards; it does resist. If one uses this
method because one is afraid or merely because one lacks
the instruments of violence, this person is not truly
nonviolent. This is why Gandhi often said that if cowardice
is the only alternative to violence, it is better to fight. He
made this statement conscious of the fact that there is
always another alternative: no individual or group need

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submit to any wrong, nor need they use violence to right

the wrong. There is always the way of nonviolent
resistance. This ultimately is the way of the strong
person. It is not a method of stagnant passivity. The phrase
“passive resistance” often gives the false impression that
this is a sort of “do-nothing” method in which the resister
quietly and passively accepts evil. But nothing is further
from the truth. For while the nonviolent resister is passive
in the sense that she is not physically aggressive toward the
opponent, her mind and emotions are always active,
constantly seeking to persuade the opponent that he is
wrong. The method is passive physically, but strongly
active spiritually. It is not passive non-resistance to evil;
it is active nonviolent resistance to evil.

II. A second basic fact that characterises nonviolence is that

it does not seek to defeat or humiliate the opponent, but to
win his friendship and understanding. The nonviolent
resister must often express protest through noncooperation
and boycotts, but the resister realises that these are not
ends in themselves; they are merely means to awaken a
sense of moral shame in the opponent. The end is
redemption and reconciliation. The aftermath of
nonviolence is the creation of the beloved community, while
the aftermath of violence is tragic bitterness.

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III. A third characteristic of this method is that the attack

is directed against forces of evil rather than against persons
who happen to be doing the evil. It is evil that the
nonviolent resister seeks to defeat, not the persons
victimized by evil. If she is opposing racial injustice, the
nonviolent resister has the vision to see that the basic
tension is not between races. As I like to say to the people
in Montgomery: “tension in this city is not between white
people and Negro people. The tension is, at bottom, between
justice and injustice, between the forces of light and the
forces of darkness. And, if there is a victory, it will be a
victory not merely for fifty thousand Negroes, but a victory
for justice and the forces of light. We are out to defeat
injustice and not white persons who may be unjust.”

IV. A fourth point that characterises nonviolent resistance

is a willingness to accept suffering without retaliation, to
accept blows from the opponent without striking back.
“Rivers of blood may have to flow before we gain our
freedom, but it must be our blood,” Gandhi said to his
countrymen. The nonviolent resister is willing to accept
violence if necessary, but never to inflict it. He does not
seek to dodge jail. If going to jail is necessary, he enters it
“as a bridegroom enters the bride’s chamber.”

One may well ask: “What is the nonviolent resister’s

justification for this ordeal to which he invites others, for

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this mass political application of the ancient doctrine of

turning the other cheek?” The answer is found in the
realisation that unearned suffering is redemptive.
Suffering, the nonviolent resister realises, has tremendous
educational and transforming possibilities. “Things of
fundamental importance to people are not secured by
reason alone, but have to be purchased with their
suffering,” said Gandhi. He continues: “Suffering is
infinitely more powerful than the law of the jungle for
converting the opponent and opening his ears which are
otherwise shut to the voice of reason.”

V. A fifth point concerning nonviolent resistance is that it

avoids not only external physical violence but also internal
violence of spirit. The nonviolent resister not only refuses
to shoot his opponent, but he also refuses to hate him. At
the center of nonviolence stands the principle of love. The
nonviolent resister would contend that in the struggle for
human dignity, the oppressed people of the world must not
succumb to the temptation of becoming bitter or indulging
in hate campaigns. To retaliate in kind would do nothing
but intensify the existence of hate in the universe. Along
the way of life, someone must have sense enough and
morality enough to cut off the chain of hate. This can only
be done by projecting the ethic of love to the center of our
lives.

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VI. A sixth basic fact about nonviolent resistance is that it

is based on the conviction that the universe is on the side of
justice. Consequently, the believer in nonviolence has deep
faith in the future. This faith is another reason why the
nonviolent resister can accept suffering without
retaliation. For the resister knows that in the struggle for
justice he and she have cosmic companionship. It is true
that there are devout believers in nonviolence who find it
difficult to believe in a personal God. But even these
persons believe in the existence of some creative force that
works for universal wholeness. Whether we call it an
unconscious process, an impersonal Brahman, or a
Personal Being of matchless power and infinite love, there
is a creative force in this universe that works to bring the
disconnected aspects of reality into a harmonious whole.

Gene Sharp, an American political scientist and

founder of the Albert Einstein Institution – a non-
profit organization dedicated to advancing the study
of nonviolent action, has identified 198 methods of
nonviolent action and same are published on the
website of his organization (www.aeinstein.org).

The Gene Sharp’s 198 methods of nonviolent actions

are ‘classified into three broad categories: nonviolent
protest and persuasion, noncooperation (social, economic,
and political), and nonviolent intervention.’

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I think a careful study of the Gene Sharp’s list holds

the sure promise of providing inspiration for
employing nonviolence resistance as a means of
seeking political liberty.

It is important to note that the fourth and fifth

components must be in place to forestall the change
and its process from being hijacked and redirected.

6. INTELLIGENCE MUST PRECEDE

METHODOLOGY: Without intelligence, a careful
observation of the thinking and inner workings of the
maintainers of the status quo ante, methodology will
not be optimised, strategies will be defective, tactics
will be out of place and execution will be futile.

The intelligent efforts of the change engineers must

never be embarked upon with the aim of underrating
or overrating the maintainers of the status quo ante,
noting that the commonest errors of change engineers
is to underrate the maintainers of the status quo ante.

7. WHAT IS THE PLAN: There must be a meticulous

plan that breaks down the change we seek into
phases and the measuring rod for the attainment of
each phase. The following helps us to monitor and
evaluate progress.

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8. INVOLVE THE MASSES: The change engineers

must deliberately involve the beneficiaries of the
change being sought as the foot soldiers, building
them into a conscious mass ready to take their destiny
into their hands.

To involve the beneficiaries of change in the battle for

the same, particularly in political struggles, the
change engineers must deliberately build mass-based
organisations, energised by a well communicated
ideology.

To build mass-based organisations means that the

society and its people will be organised along the
lines of social, economic and social Interests, helping
all or most parties to see what is in the change being
sought.

Except the micro interests are linked to the macro

issues of the national social, political and economic
interests, it may be difficult to get the buy-in of the
majority of the people. It is about building the
interests of the people from the ground up.

Another way to engage the masses is to be committed

to embarking on rigorous political education in the
language that the masses understand. The political

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education will help to clarify the issues, understand

the concept of citizenship and debrief them of all the
misinformation they have been fed by the state.

9. KNOW THE MASSES: It is important to

understand the mindset of the Nigerian masses who
have never agitated for anything before. They are
more used to being recipients of the gain of an
agitation than for them to be in the forefront of the
agitation.

I think the only section of the Nigerian masses that

have been involved in an agitation before are the
Igbo, who participated in the civil war.

If the saying: ‘You are as good as your last match’ is

anything to go by, the Nigerian masses do not
necessarily have an antecedent and discipline of
being part of a political movement fighting for the
liberation of the Nigerian people.

It is important to note that Nigerians are also not

long-distance runners when it comes to holding the
government accountable through peaceful protests.
Still fresh in our minds are the June 12, 1993 protest
and Occupy Nigeria, in January 2012.

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The masses of our people seem to believe in the

messianic approach and they believe that an activist
or group of activists are coming to help them and
make everything work for them. The Nigerian masses
have perfected the act of waiting for a messiah.

The masses must be made to understand and accept

that change does not happen except they take their
collective destiny into the hands and become their
own messiah.

10. CHANGE CHARTER: This is the curriculum for

the political education referred to in point 8 above. It
is also a charter of demands stating the minimum
standards acceptable to the change engineers as
minimum standards of alternative in different areas
of social, economic and political lives.

There must be a closely knit connection between our

change charters, the political education earlier
referred to and most importantly the vision and
mission of the change that we seek.

11. BUILD BRIDGES

Build the bridges of consensus to a polarised people
who lack political education. When a people are
polarised along the line of ideology, it means they

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have developed a system of thinking and reasoning

leading to persuasion but if they are polarised along
primordial sentiments and religious persuasions, it
means their intellectual capacity to think has been
sacrificed on the bleeding altar of sentiments.

We must therefore build bridges of collaboration

across the entire Nigeria. To build such bridges, we
must identify gatekeepers to diverse areas of interest
in Nigeria, work with them and guide against the lies
that the ruling class has fed them with over the years.

12. CHANGE DEMANDS SACRIFICE: Change,

irrespective of the methodology employed, demands
personal and communal sacrifices, including the
readiness of the change engineers to lay down their
lives if the need arises.

Nelson Mandela, concluding his statement from the

Dock, titled, ‘I am Prepared to Die’ at the Opening of
the Defence Case in the Rivonia Trial, before the
Pretoria Supreme Court on April 20, 1964,
declared, ‘During my lifetime I have dedicated myself to
this struggle of the African people. I have fought against
white domination, and I have fought against black
domination. I have cherished the ideal of a democratic and
free society in which all persons live together in harmony

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and with equal opportunities. It is an ideal which I hope to

live for and to achieve. But if needs be, it is an ideal for
which I am prepared to die.’

13. PAYING WITH YOUR LIFE OR THE REST OF

YOUR LIFE: While the immediate point is critical,
what must be paramount on the mind of the change
engineer is the commitment to accept that the choice
of sacrifice is always between paying with his/her life
once and for all as a martyr, or dedicate the rest of
his/her life to the change efforts.

As Mandela said at his trial, the change engineer is

ready to lay down his/her life but must never be fatal
and tactless in his/her disposition and operation.
Fatalism is often a function of foolhardiness.

The change engineer wants to be alive to prosecute

change for as much as necessary except the shedding
of his/her blood becomes necessary when the same
will advance the cause for which he/she is martyred.

For example, Nelson Mandela had to go

underground for over six months when he was being
haunted by the apartheid government. He even left
South Africa to attend the Conference of the Pan-
African Freedom Movement of East and Central

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 Taiwo Wemimo Akinlami

Africa in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia. It is important to

note that Mandela did not surrender himself for
arrest but he was arrested by the state.

Martyrdom is not what a change engineer makes

himself/herself available for as a lamb who must
surrender himself/herself to the slaughter. It is a
consequence a change engineer is conscious of but
does not live to pursue, knowing that while his/her
death may accelerate the change process, the rest of
his life may do much more.

It is a strategic commitment of the change engineer

that it is not his/her responsibility to surrender
his/her freedom or life to the maintainers of the status
quo ante to prove the point that he/she is courageous.

14. VIGILANCE IS AN ETERNAL

COMMITMENT: 'Eternal vigilance is the price of
liberty,' says a sage. Therefore, vigilance is a major
tool in executing change. Vigilance does not happen
by wishes. It happens by putting in place the
mechanism to build a system almost impervious to
the infiltration of the fifth columnists and detecting
the same early or making it impossible for them to
access useful information.

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THE CHANGE MANIFESTO

15. CHANGE REQUIRES HUMAN AND

FINANCIAL RESOURCES: Mass-based
organisations raise funds from their members to
prosecute the change processes. There is a sense of
belonging that also comes with being financially
committed to a cause. A sage once said, ‘Where your
treasure is, your heart will be also.'

Therefore, proper financial system and budgeting is

critical to engineering and managing the change
process.

16. ORGANISED AND FULLTIME LEADERSHIP

IS A PREREQUISITE TO PROSECUTING THE
CHANGE PROCESS: 'Strike the shepherd, the sheep
will scatter,' says a sage. Therefore, a change agenda
must have its leaders and cadres, and the processes of
ascension to leadership and ‘cadreship’ clearly
defined and documented. Change engineers, who get
the foregoing right may have also estopped the
machinations of infiltrators.

The other aspect is that change engineers all over the

world are often people whose fulltime commitment
is the prosecution of the change being sought.

Those who are designing diverse plans to continue

240
 Taiwo Wemimo Akinlami

holding Nigerians in servitude do it fulltime, how

much more those who want to fix the nation? If it is
true that we produce most effectively in the area of
our dominant commitments, then we need fulltime
commitment.

17. SEIZING THE CONTROL OF THE MEDIA: He

who owns the media owns the mind of the people.
Seeking to execute change without seeking to have
consistent and meaningful access to the minds of the
people for whom the change is sought is to set in
motion a frustrating mirage.

There must be a commitment on the part of the

change drivers to create their own media.

18. CHANGE WILL FOREVER BE A FUNCTION

OF THE BALANCE OF FORCES: According to
Montesquieu, French philosopher, 'Power does not
shift except for superior power.' Therefore, the
change drivers must never be under any illusion as to
its power per time and what it can deliver, guiding
against offering false hope, thereby making
irreplaceable withdrawals from the trust bank
account of the people they are mobilising for change.

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THE CHANGE MANIFESTO

The change engineers must therefore know how to

win some and lose some while embracing necessary
and immediate compromises in the interest of the
larger goals, even at the risk of being accused of being
bought over by the maintainers of the status quo ante.

That was the spirit with which Nelson Mandela chose

to reach out to the apartheid government in South
Africa for a round of negotiation that led to his
freedom and the path to general election, aimed at
giving power to the majority.

19. CHANGE IS A MARATHON AND IT IS

NEVER A DASH: It is a marathon because it involves
human actions both on the side of those who seek
change and those who represent the status quo ante

Therefore, the change engineers must understand

that those who represent the status quo ante do not
relinquish their positions and the benefits thereof
because a demand has been made for change.

Also, the change engineers may become victims of

their own human foibles, falling into temporary
despondency and depression due to the enormity of
the requirements of the change they seek or the

242
 Taiwo Wemimo Akinlami

reaction of the maintainers of the status quo ante

which is often virulent and ruthless.

When the change engineers experience the foregoing,

depending on how deep this is, change suffers minor
or major setback. Therefore, the change processes
must be insured with what I call 'comeback
strategies.'

Change is marathon because the status quo ante exists

and is fueled by a system which is often entrenched
and has developed a life of its own. Dismantling such
system might take a lifetime, or may be trans-
generational.

Change is a marathon because the status quo ante often

functions by ideology and indoctrination of both the
maintainer of the status quo ante and the change
engineers. The maintainers of the status quo ante live
by an ideology to keep it alive and beneficial while
the change seeker seeks to debrief the people for
whom the change is initiated of the ideology which
has come to accept that the maintainers of the status
quo ante are invincible.

The rule of thumb here is to hope for the best but be

prepared for the worst.

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THE CHANGE MANIFESTO

When Mandela and his comrade were jailed, they did

not know that the walk to freedom was still 27 years
away. The foregoing must have informed the title of
his book, ‘Long Walk to Freedom.’

20. CHANGE BEGINS WHEN CHANGE

OCCURS: Change is in phases; therefore, change
begins when change occurs. Change management is
more important than change occurrence.

When change occurs, there must be a concrete plan

on ground to ensure that the people for whom the
change is achieved, live up to the expectations of the
achieved change. There is a sense of uhuru when a
major change occurs, which becomes the greatest
enemy of the occurred change.

Consider the Israelites when they encountered the

change of deliverance from Egypt but the generation
who experienced that change of departure from
Egypt did not get to experience the ultimate change
that was the arrival at Canaan, which was the original
plan.

A more recent example is the Islamic Brotherhood of

Egypt, who gained political power, with a chain of
change processes set in motion for years, but were

244
 Taiwo Wemimo Akinlami

poor in managing the newly won change. The status

quo ante re-emerged and crushed the change
engineers and they are today in a worse state to arise
and begin another process of leading political change.

Whatever change processes that do not have an

inbuilt mechanism for the management of the same
after the occurrence of a milestone, will constitute a
waste of time and resources, and may orchestrate a
round of backlashes, which may dwarf whatever
gains of the attained milestone.

245
 “
The Nigerian peoples, long denied
citizenship, have learnt to accept and
live with their derogation to indigenes,
but this has also meant that in the
absence of citizenship, the Nigerian
gave up on the Nigeria State. Denied
the benefits of citizenship, the
Nigerian lost the capacity to become
patriots; for true patriotism is found
and birthed in the souls of citizenship:
how do you demand patriotism from
the persons to whom you have denied
citizenship? The Nigerian peoples,
having little or no benefit of
citizenship, have become estranged
from the country that the Fulani, long
desirous of their own homeland, covet
and are pillaging to provoke a pretext
for war.

246
 Epilogue

“
The Nigerian people have only one choice in the unfortunate situ-
ation in which we have found ourselves: we have to discover the
Nigerian identity and character in the furnace of these afflictions.
We have to desire Nigeria more than the Fulani Islamists. We
have to want Nigeria, and we have to want it more than we hate
the other Nigerian, who worships God differently, or speaks a dif-
ferent language from mine. Nigerians have to want Nigeria
enough to fight for it, and enough to die for it, if we must.

247
Epilogue

The Choices before Us

T
he Nigerian peoples are left with only two plausible
scenarios in the face of their sick realities. And
however much we might seek to sugarcoat things,
the painful truth remains unavoidable. Nigeria is already in
a slow burning civil war. That war has been escalating
steadily since the beginning of the Buhari regime, the
remarriage of unbridled Fulani irredentism and the
unconscionable powers of the Nigeria State. The second
option would be anything that might be done to yank
Nigeria off its current trajectories and reorientate it to restore
the citizenship rights of the peoples that have been rendered
indigenes, indigent, and impecunious by a governance
system that has guaranteed servitude to them.
The Nigeria State is already at war with itself. The
Nigerian, wherever he might live within Nigeria is already
living a nasty, short and brutish existence. He does not live
if the truth be told; he exists from day to day, and has been
generally stripped of hope. From Kankara to Kagara, from Ile-
Oluji to Orlu, from Otueke to Daura, Ibogun to Telubodo…
from the Benue trough to the Jos Plateau, the forests of
Akure to the marshes of Bayelsa; the indigenous peoples of
the Nigeria State are under the guns of the Fulani
herdsmen/militia.
The reality is that the Nigeria State is at war, even though
the enemies are being mollycoddled by the Buhari regime,

248
 ‘Dele Farotimi

and principal members of the regime are not unsullied by

what would appear to be credible evidence of vile
complicity at the highest levels of Nigerian governance. The
virulence and spread of the Fulani herdsmen/bandits, the
brazenness of their bestiality and the complete impunity
that attends their operations, when taken in tandem with the
constancy of presidential interventions on their behalf,
whenever anyone criticised them or point out their excesses,
suggest that the time has come to examine what would
appear to be the unfurling of a Fulani-Islamist agenda.

********

I HAVE taken time to lay bare the historical basis of the

Fulani agenda in Nigeria, and I have laid out the symbiotic
nature of the relationship that was built and fostered
between the Fulani rulers of Northern Nigeria, and how
centuries of the Fulani feudal system and the highly
stratified society that they had built with the vast
administrative systems of the sultanate, lent itself to British
purposes for their new Nigerian territories. Of the several
ethnic nationalities that ended up in the British creation that
was eventually named Nigeria, the Fulani were the favoured
of the colonists, and the anointed inheritors of the Nigerian
possessions.
The installation of the Buhari regime in 2015 marked the
beginning of an aggressive and undisguised fulanisation of

249
Epilogue

the Nigerian security architecture and of the upper reaches

of the governance systems. All pretense of ethnic and
religious balancing in Federal appointments disappeared,
and where the Fulani was not available to be doubly
promoted to head an agency, a nominal head with limited
powers would be named while the Fulani subordinate
would be appointed as a deputy to wield the real powers.
The EFCC and its recent politics of removal and replacement
of the head, offers a ready example.
The security architecture paints a rather dangerous
picture too, and it is here that the agenda becomes quite
glaring. The upper reaches of the security services are almost
exclusively northern in origin, and less than 10% of the
members of the National Security Council, are from outside
of the northern part of Nigeria. The brazenness of the
security forces in taking sides with the Fulani herdsmen in
their perennial clashes with indigenous communities all
over the country, from the Benue trough to the forests of
Ondo and the hills of Ekiti, has led one to question the
neutrality of the security forces in these conflicts.
The Nigerian reality is that we are already at war. The
Fulani herdsmen, bandits and Boko Haram would appear to
have fused together somewhat, and almost impossible to
differentiate. The ranks of the terrorists are stocked full of
Fulani from across the entire African subregion. The Sahel
would appear to have exported its war-hardened, battle-
tested and unwanted Fulani to Nigeria, where they have

250
 ‘Dele Farotimi

been welcomed by the long-established Fulani ethnic

groupings, and extended the cover of impunity by which
they had long established and managed their Nigerian
inheritance.
What is the Islamist angle, you might ask? The Fulani are
the masters of disguise. The true minority of the Nigeria
State, they have by sleight of hands, for long punched above
their weight. The Fulani took over the Hausa kingdoms by
stealth. They are the masters in the art of cultural
assimilation. But they are the true Teflon Don; nothing they
swim in permeates their armour. The Fulani assimilates all
without ever being themselves assimilated. The Fulani
blended into the Hausa culture, and by a deliberate
combination of marriages and conquest, have largely
replaced the Hausa aristocracy and rendered the people
serfs in their own lands.
For a long time in Nigeria, official sources deliberately
helped to promote the myth of an imaginary tribe: the
Hausa-Fulani. The identity of the Fulani rulers of Northern
Nigeria was hidden behind that of the larger Hausa ethnic
groups, and the rest of Nigeria was none the wiser for as
long as it suited the Fulani to remain hidden behind the
Hausa and the facade, myth and illusions of a homogeneous
and monolithic Northern Nigeria.
The emergence of Buhari is what has accelerated the
Fulani agenda for the domination of Nigeria. And again in
need of a larger shield to hide behind, the Fulani has

251
Epilogue

emerged in the shadow of the Wahhabi Islamists. Thus the

Fulani agenda for the expropriation of Nigeria is today
cloaked in Islamist robes.
More people have been killed in God’s name than by any
diseases or by wars occasioned by other factors. When the
venal brutality of the Fulani herdsmen and bandits are
combined with the murderous psychopathy of the Boko
haram terrorists, what you find is that Nigeria has been
turned into a most horrific killing field. The statistics are
scary to contemplate. The spread of the malaise is suggestive
of a country that is trapped in a civil war.
The Nigerian peoples, long denied citizenship, have
learnt to accept and live with their derogation to indigenes,
but this has also meant that in the absence of citizenship, the
Nigerian gave up on the Nigeria State. Denied the benefits
of citizenship, the Nigerian lost the capacity to become
patriots; for true patriotism is found and birthed in the souls
of citizenship: how do you demand patriotism from the
persons to whom you have denied citizenship? The
Nigerian peoples, having little or no benefit of citizenship,
have become estranged from the country that the Fulani,
long desirous of their own homeland, covet and are
pillaging to provoke a pretext for war.

********

252
 ‘Dele Farotimi

Revolution: The alternative to War

THE Nigerian peoples have been badly divided and
distracted from what should be the existential battle for the
survival of the Nigerian homeland. As Nigeria burns from
one end of the country to the other, the peoples are busy
debating inanities; quarrelling over the most unimportant of
subjects, and debating how to break up the country that is
already being broken up by the incessant and unrelenting
combined actions of the Fulani and Boko Haram terrorists.
A violent gerrymandering of the Nigeria State is already
underway, and whilst we might have been distracted, the
map of Nigeria is being redrawn and old wars and
unfinished conquests are being prosecuted in the name of
the cow herders.
The Nigerian people have only one choice in the
unfortunate situation in which we have found ourselves: we
have to discover the Nigerian identity and character in the
furnace of these afflictions. We have to desire Nigeria more
than the Fulani Islamists. We have to want Nigeria and we
have to want it more than we hate the other Nigerian who
worships God differently, or speaks a different language
from mine. Nigerians have to want Nigeria enough to fight
for it, and enough to die for it, if we must.
Nigeria is nobody’s father. It cannot be anyone’s mother
either. Nigeria is a country of pain, a land that devours its
inhabitants and a most difficult place in which to dream,

253
Epilogue

birth or nurture. The dream of the Nigerian is to escape

Nigeria. Countless Nigerians have perished in their quest to
escape their homes. The Nigerian is traded in the slave
markets of Libya and in the Gulf Arab states. The parks of
the Champ Elyse are a market for the flesh of Nigerian
women, and the fields of Corsica have hosted the backs of
Nigerian belles who have earned €5 from grunting men to
pay humongous debts to those who have owned them in
their bid to escape.

********

THE Nigerian youth, labelled lazy and cowardly, journeys

through the Sahara and crosses the Mediterranean Sea. The
ones buried in the sands of the Sahara are the fortunate ones,
several did not get the benefit of a blanket of sand; left to be
picked up by scavenging birds and animals, until the bones
are bleached white and scattered in the sands, barely
recognisable or visible in the sands of time. They are victims
of an iniquitous state that has declared war on its own
peoples.
The fearlessness of the Nigerian youth came to the fore
during the #EndSARS protests, and I quickly discerned
something that I had not seen in my own generation. The
Nigerian youth of this generation is a different animal from
the ones of my own generation. Whilst my generation was
fearful, these ones are carelessly defiant, even in the face of

254
 ‘Dele Farotimi

the most brazen danger and or threats. I was intrigued by

this phenomenon, and this led me to study it a little closely.
What I found holds the likely key to the Nigerian
conundrum, and might be the required trigger for the
Nigerian revolution: the only thing that might save Nigeria
from its current path to cataclysmic disintegration.
The Nigerian situation is objectively bleak and hopeless.
The objective realities of the Nigeria State do not inspire
hope in any of the peoples trapped within its borders. And
those that have escaped, live sorry existences in foreign
lands where they are stigmatised and reviled, rendered
vagabonds by a wicked state and an even more wicked
ruling class. But it is in this hopelessness that hope resides
for the Nigerian enterprise, and this hope must be kindled
to spark the Nigerian revolution.

********

Trapped by Hope
HOPE renders a man cautious. But caution might become
cowardice when it restrains critically required interventions.
My generation grew up hopeful. We were impregnated with
the hopes invested in us by our parents, imbued with the
false hopes and vain promises of the Nigeria State, and
drunken on the fumes of the several heady perfumes of hope
that were peddled by the state as we became young adults.

255
Epilogue

The Nigeria State promised much as we became men in

our own right, and we were kept captive by Hope. By the
time we realised just how fickle and deceitful Hope is in
Nigeria, our youth was done; we had become jaded old men.
But the ones after us have learnt.
The Nigerian youth is hopeless. Nothing about the
objective realities of the Nigerian existence inspires hope.
The years have taught the youth not to dare to hope, and
jaded they have become. They watched their fathers,
mothers and their uncles and aunts, they saw them stripped
of the hopes that fuelled their youthful dreams and
aspirations. They watched some escape to saner climes, and
those would appear to have been the wise and the sane.
Shorn of hope, the Nigerian youth is also largely robbed of
the chains of fear. Having nothing to hope for, the young
have also thrown away their fears.
Being fearless is not enough to change the trajectories of
Nigeria, it would require far more than the loss of hope, and
the resultant absence of fear to save Nigeria from the
impending catastrophe. Hope in the possibilities of an
egalitarian and equitable, and law-ruled Nigeria need to be
rekindled before the peoples might be persuaded to fight for
its preservation. The Nigerian has to become enamoured
enough with their country to want to save it. The Nigerian
people must be offered citizenship before they might be
mobilised to save Nigeria from itself.

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 ‘Dele Farotimi

THE 1999 Constitution is a product of a crime against the

Nigerian people, and in spite of its declaration of the
involvement of the Nigerian people’s will in its pedigree, it
is in truth a mongrel of no determinable pedigree, the
encapsulation of a people’s frustrations with a governance
system and the fetters by which the people are held captive.
This constitution must be changed before the Nigerian
might acquire citizenship, and thereby be set free from the
systemised slavery of his current circumstances.
There are several eminently qualified Nigerians, by far
better men than myself, from across the length of the Nigeria
State, that have made attempts at crafting new pathways to
the Nigerian future. Most Nigerians, high and low, north
and south, have agreed upon the critical need to seek a
different way and to walk away from the evil texts known
as the 1999 Constitution. I make bold to say that we are not
stuck in reverse gear because of a paucity of ideas, but
because we have looked to the beneficiaries of the system to
change the system that has sustained and nurtured them.
The last expressed will of the Nigerian peoples is
enshrined in the 1963 Republican Constitution, it built on the
Independence Constitution of 1960, itself a product of
multiple constitutional conferences held in various locations
in Nigeria and the United Kingdom. The peculiarities of the
several ethnic nationalities were carefully recognised and
considered before certain structures and nuances were

257
Epilogue

adopted; religious and ethnic minority rights were carefully

ring-fenced to assuage their worries.
The Nigeria State, that was agreed, was founded on the
principles of multiparty parliamentary democracy based on
a federal structure; and with each of these regions able to
grow at a speed that is commensurate with the desires of the
people, and their capacities. The three regions at the point of
independence became four after the 1962 plebiscite, which
created the Midwestern Region out of the Western Region,
in partial fulfillment of the recommendations of the Willink
Commission on the rights of the minorities. The four regions
created by the 1963 constitution is what has today become
36 states.
The Nigeria nation that was fragmented by the January
1966 coup, was eventually killed by the several military
hegemonies and bandits that have ruled Nigeria. The truth
is: what we have today is a Frankenstein’s monster that
serves not the peoples it pretends to govern, but those who
have captured the state and peoples while pretending that it
is serving them. The 36 states have become as 36 Emirates;
the governors are nothing but feudal lords and pashas,
existing as a burden to be carried on the back of the victims.
The Nigeria State does not work for the Nigerian peoples.

********

258
 ‘Dele Farotimi

A return to the past…

THE path forward lies in a return to the abandoned past.
Ti iwaju o ba se lo, eyin a de se pa’da si.
If one does not know the way forward, or the road
becomes impassible, recourse must be found either in a
retreat or in retracing one’s steps to whence one has come.
The Nigerian path to the future has been pulverised by the
several contradictions birthed by the 1999 Constitution, and
the only viable alternative before Nigerians is a return to the
point of our derailment. The harder we have worked to
depart from the foundational agreements, the more
worrisome the Nigerian situation has become.

********

…A new, fresh deal

I HAVE worked with my longtime partner and friend, a
great patriot and a great legal mind, Mr. Ralph Nwoke to
produce a draft constitution for the Nigeria State and its
peoples. We had no illusions about the task that we have set
ourselves, and we have drafted and are making these
proposals in good faith, recognising that we are limited men,
and laying these proposals before you all, in the hope that it
might provoke the required debates, and perhaps galvanise
us all into peaceable actions.

259
Epilogue

The original version of the draft constitution, which was

annexed to the book, Do Not Die in Their War, has been
reworked and hopefully improved by the several
suggestions and corrections that have been invited by us.
We here offer the Nigerian peoples the new and hopefully
much improved version at the foot of the new book. It offers
a path to the future by going back to the past to recalibrate
the journey to the Nigerian future.
In place of the current 36 states governing structure that
is neither federal nor unitary, we have recommended a
return to federalism based on the strong federating regions
as it was the case under the 1963 Constitution. Taking into
consideration the recommendations of the pre-
independence Willink Commission on the rights of the
minorities and the reports of the Abacha, Obasanjo and
Jonathan’s Constitutional conferences, we have
recommended a six-regional structure for Nigeria, and a lot
of constitutional rearrangements designed to structurally
return Nigeria to where it was before the military
intervention of 1966.
The Nigerian peoples of all ethnicities and religious
persuasions are universally disenchanted with the 1999
Constitution; even the principal beneficiaries, the Nigerian
ruling class, have conceded that the current constitution is
ruinous, and represents a clear and present danger to the
sustainability of the Nigerian project. The complete lack of
national leadership and the political will to do the right

260
 ‘Dele Farotimi

thing have combined with the pervasive disenchantment

with the country that is prevalent among the many
indigenes that have been stripped of citizenship and;
rendered functionally stateless.
The path to the future lies in mobilising popular action
behind an agreed path forward based on a broadly agreed
roadmap. I have attached such a roadmap to the foot of this
treatise. It is my hope that we might be able to abridge time
and move forward with saving this blighted land before we
are enmeshed in a ruinous war that would be won by none
and lost by all. This gory future is avoidable if we shall dare
to confront the demons of our past.

261
 “
The Fulani hegemony has always been
masked behind entities larger than the
Fulani ethnic group. The Fulani are
done with the mask of Hausa-Fulani.
They have no more use for the lies of
Arewa; One North, and the time has
come to fulfill the larger ambition of
owning the Nigeria State and securing
it as a patrimony for the Fulani
peoples wherever they might come
from. Islam, the very excuse for the
colonisation of the Hausa peoples, the
reason why the Hausa peoples
rebelled against their kings and joined
the Uthman Dan Fodio Jihad of 1804,
is the new mask behind which the
Fulani agenda has found refuge.

262
 Addendum
Nigeria, Nigerians, and Religiosity

I
had submitted the manuscript for this book to my
editor several weeks before the inescapable need to
return to the manuscript to write this section was
crystallised and my laziness caught up with me. I shall
explain.
As I have examined the land of my birth and spent time
in contemplation of the many woes besetting it, the
preeminent role of religion in shaping its trajectories,
blighting it, and killing it became more obvious to me; I
realised the need to spend some time considering the role of
religion in the retardation of my country in particular and
Sub-Saharan Africa in general.
The peoples of the different ethnicities that have been
lumped together and named Nigeria were not religious, but
deeply spiritual. They were largely pantheistic in their
outlooks, even though they largely had a God-figure, who
decreed the foundations of the earth. This God was so
powerful that He, in most of the traditions, could not be
approached directly, but there are pantheons of gods and
goddesses through whom he rules and could be
approached.

263
Addendum

The African was a spiritual being, not a religious

creature. He would behold the majesty of a river and bow in
worship. But he worships the God of creation, not the river,
His creation. The connections between the physical and the
spiritual are central to African traditional religions. The cult
of the ancestors, Egungun to the Yoruba, is common to
almost every African ethnic group. The African was a
spiritual entity; everything in his sociopolitical traditions
emphasised this reality.
The first foreign religion to enter the space that is today
known as Nigeria was Islam. The history of Islam in the
space known as Nigeria has been told by better men than
myself hence, it is not my purpose to dwell much on the
subject, but I am compelled by our current realities to
examine how Islam has influenced the course of Nigerian
history and its relationship and competition with
Christianity, the second foreign religion, to affect the living
realities of the Nigerian peoples.
The trans-Saharan trade was built principally around the
trade in human cargo. Islam came to northern Nigeria
through the Sahel; it was the religion of the Barbers and the
Tuareg, itinerant traders and caravanners, who crisscrossed
the Sahara. Islam had already been established in Northern
Africa, and the Malian rulers had long established Islamic
empires that ranged wide. But the Hausa peoples of
Northern Nigeria and their kings remained largely

264
 ‘Dele Farotimi

practitioners of the African religion long after Islam had

been introduced into the kingdoms.
The Fulani, nomadic pastoralists and creatures of the
Sahel, had been exposed to Islam for a much longer time.
They were the scribes and clerics that had settled amongst
the Hausa and served in the royal courts as valued advisers
and counselors, spiritual guides to the pious and tutors to
the aristocracy, and it was their lot to islamise the Hausa
kingdoms. The stories and legends of Uthman Dan Fodio are
there for those in search of knowledge, but the feudal
theocracy that ruled vast swathes of Northern Nigeria was
established by the Jihad that he launched in 1804.
Feudalism is predicated on the presumption of a strict
stratification of sociopolitical and economic classes. There
are only ever two classes in true feudal systems: The feudal
lord and those who serves him, and the serfs. There is no
room for citizenship in feudal systems, and rights are what
the king and his court says they are at any point in time.
Feudalism is dependent on the continuing readiness of the
serfs to obey the diktats of the feudal lords and the men to
whom they would necessarily delegate authority; the entire
governance systems and the sociopolitical realities flow
through this prism.
To achieve mass compliance by the serfs, they are kept
deliberately ignorant; the rulers would deny education to all
but the religious classes who were always closely regulated
by the feudal lords and who owed their patronage to the

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Addendum

feudal lords. The Sokoto caliphate that was established by

Dan Fodio followed the classic pattern of every feudal
hegemony, even though it was established as a theocracy.
The Fulani rulers replaced the Hausa rulers at the head of
the totem pole. The aristocracy was Fulanised through a
deliberate process of assimilation aided by marriages. The
ruling class was largely Fulani, as were the clergy and the
head of the military classes; Islam was interpreted to the
people through the prism of the feudal need to preserve
power and to secure the obedience of the serfs.
The role of Islam in establishing the Sokoto Caliphate
cannot be lost on any serious student of history, but what
has often been ignored is the impact of the Islamist influence
in shaping the trajectories of the country. This is the purpose
of my exertions. I have offered historical context only as a
student of history and I do not presume any expertise in the
field.
“One North, one people, irrespective of religion, rank, or
tribe.” This was the motto of the Northern People’s Congress
(NPC), the Ahmadu Bello-led NPC. Deconstructing these
words with the benefit of the passage of time and the current
Nigerian realities would reveal a lot about the house built by
Uthman Dan Fodio, renovated by Ahmadu Bello, his
grandson, and being burnt down today by the hubris of
Muhammadu Buhari and the Fulani-Islamist irredentists.
Ahmadu Bello understood the delicate balance that had to
be maintained in order to retain the installed veto which is

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 ‘Dele Farotimi

unsustainable without the maintenance of the illusion of a

monolithic Northern Nigeria. The above-quoted motto of
the NPC in recognition of the need to create a northern
consensus was offering equality to those that had long been
denied exactly that.

********

Irrespective of religion?
THE history of Islam in Northern Nigeria is steeped in blood
and gore; slavery was a very important consideration in the
growth and trajectories of Islam in the north. The peoples of
the Benue trough and most of the parts that the southern
Nigerian would blithely refer to as the “Middle Belt”,
“Northern Christians” and such other descriptions were the
ones that either had enough natural defenses to resist Fulani
conquest and hegemonic exertions, or the ones that were left
deliberately unconquered as conquering them would mean
having to impose Islam on them which would consequently
render them unsuitable for enslavement under Islamic
traditions.
The parts of northern Nigeria where the ethnic groups
are Christians are the ones that were affected by either of the
above realities. The Beroms and several of the tribes on the
plateau were largely unconquerable because their terrain
neutralised the Fulani cavalry and its key military
advantage, rendering them unworthy of the risks, when

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Addendum

there were easy pickings elsewhere. The Benue trough was

another kettle of fish, and its plains offered relative
advantages to the Fulani cavalry, but the Fulani preferred to
retain garrison towns in strategic locations in the north
central and the middle belt, and thereby exert pressure and
influence on the region while raiding them for slaves
periodically in a manner that is reminiscent of free-range
ranching.
All the other “irrespective” might have been truly
irrespective, but the truth is that religion is everything in
Northern Nigeria. Then and now. The difference between
the two is to be found in the temperament of those that have
been charged with the duty of preserving the illusion. The
NPC and its promoters made the efforts to bring a sense of
inclusion to bear on policy issues in the north, and when the
time came to decide on the application of shariah laws in
Northern Nigeria, Ahmadu Bello settled for the Penal Codes
in the north, rejecting the demands of the like of Sheikh
Abubakar Mahmud Gumi for the application of full Islamic
laws in Northern Nigeria, in recognition of the multicultural
and multiethnic nature of the peoples that he was cobbling
together in a new identity. One North.

********

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 ‘Dele Farotimi

Irrespective of tribe?
TRIBE was and is still everything in northern Nigeria. It was
for a long time an indicator of religious choices and a tool of
ethnic nationalism. The tribe’s interactions with the Fulani
before the colonial times would usually be easy to glean
from the traditional rulership structure and the prevalent
religion in the tribe.
Islam was always part and parcel of the feudal construct
that has ruled northern Nigeria; while its influence has
grown exponentially over the years, the centrality of clergy
control has been largely lost, leading to serious
consequences for the Nigeria State.
The peoples of the north were simple men and women,
self-effacing and differential towards their rulers. The long
years of feudalism had established a rigid class structure
within which everyone generally knew their place and
stayed in their corner, order and peace maintained. The
peoples were largely farmers; there were established market
towns where rural dwellers bought and sold to each other.
The Emir’s word was law. The imams were clients of the
rulers; the Emirs were the rulers of the clergy class. The
Sultan of Sokoto remains the titular head of the Nigerian
Muslims in spite of the fact that Islam had been established
in Lagos, long before Uthman’s Jihad.
The powers that the traditional feudal system once had
over the Islamic clerics have been largely lost as the feudal

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Addendum

system itself has evolved with the passage of time, and as

the needs of the hegemonies have changed in the constantly
changing realities of Nigeria.
The Fulani hegemony has proven to be adroit and
extremely syncretic in its evolutionary capacities. It first
engaged and introduced itself as “The North”. When you
get to ask questions, the north dissembles and becomes the
“Hausa-Fulani.” In recent times, dovetailing with the
growth of the Fulani hubris and its increased assertiveness
during the reign of Buhari, the myth of a tribe known as the
Hausa-Fulani tribe has been abandoned for the Fulani-
Islamist toga. This metamorphosis of the Fulani agenda and
its fusion with the Islamist agenda is of extreme importance
in tracking the trajectories of Nigeria, and is deserving of
careful attention, proper definition, and deep cogitations. It
is what might yet kill Nigeria, where other factors have
failed.

********

What is the Fulani-Islamist agenda?

There is no Fulani-Islamist agenda. There is a Fulani agenda
to own Nigeria. To deny this in the face of Buhari’s crass
ethnoreligious biases would be sufficient to establish one’s
reputation as a liar whose words may never be trusted, but
the Fulani agenda is neither Islamist nor ethnic, even though
it has fraudulently appropriated the identity of the Fulani

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 ‘Dele Farotimi

peoples to perpetrate a most vile evil against the Nigeria

State and its peoples. I shall explain.
The Fulani hegemony arose out of a feudalised
theocracy. The rulers were Fulani, who had replaced the
Hausa rulers, but the soldiers were largely the Hausa, who
became subjects of the minority Fulani, who had to
weaponise Islam in order to retain their minority rule over
the Hausa majority. The clergy was largely Fulani; the need
to obey God’s laws and the rulers He had set over the people
became the preoccupation of the faithful. The Fulani had a
clear century to perfect the feudal system inherited from
Yunfa before the British would come. The British found a
colonial hegemony in place on conquering Northern Nigeria
in 1904, albeit one that was rooted in a theocratic construct.
The British colonial rule being predicated on indirect rule
and the feudal system developed by the Fulani mimicking
their own historical sociopolitical realities found the Fulani
to be a most ideal partner in the colonial experiences. If the
British would create Warrant Chiefs in the republican lands
of the Igbo peoples, you can imagine how they affected the
political landscape in the north. The emirates were left to
function as they always had while the Fulani hegemony was
enhanced, promoted and given succor by the British
colonists. The hegemony, never being separate from its
Islamist roots, grew more powerful under the careful
ministration of the British, retaining its tight leashes on the
Muslim clerics.

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Addendum

When the colonists were preparing to leave, and political

parties were being formed, the place of Islam as a tool of
political mobilisation was taken as a given, resulting in the
power dynamics that have ruled northern Nigeria since
1804. Islam was the glue that bound the Fulani and Hausa
peoples, and the several other ethnicities that had embraced
Islam in the north, forming the base upon which the
Sardauna of Sokoto, Ahmadu Bello built the concept of One
North. The Hausa language is the lingua Franca of the
northern peoples; every tribe in the north, every ethnicity,
have their distinct languages, but all, with few exceptions,
spoke Hausa language. Political astuteness demanded that a
pan-northern identity was built as a bulwark against
southern Nigerian politicians and their machinations, and
the emerging Arewa political class pre independence,
embraced secularism in public life, in an act of forbearance
and realpolitik lost on the current leadership of the north.
Nigerian Muslims have always been a diverse lot. The
role of Islam and its political traditions are varied as one
travels around the country. The Fulani are largely Sunni
Salafists who have largely looked to the Saudi clerics for
religious directions. The overwhelming influence of the
Fulani Islamist clergy, from whose ranks came Uthman Dan
Fodio, ensured that the Sunni Muslim are the undisputed
majority of the Muslim population of northern Nigeria
while the Shia, are only an important bellwether for the
measurement of religious tolerance and or intolerance in

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 ‘Dele Farotimi

Nigeria. They are a microscopic minority in the north, and

practically invisible in the south.
Power and religion have always coexisted in northern
Nigeria. The theocratic roots of the feudal system had
assured that the entire governance systems were
consequently islamised, where they were impossible to
fulanise. The influence of the Christian missionaries that
followed in the wake of the merchants, slave traders and
raiders and recently the colonists soared in spite of the best
efforts of the colonists at inhibiting the works of the
missionaries and the objections of the theocratic feudal
lords. The parts of the north that had been either
unconquerable or deliberately left unconquered for
economic reasons were rapidly Christianised. Religion
became part of the tapestry of ethnic identity in northern
Nigeria and a dangerous weapon of political mobilisation.
The effect of religion on local politics in the north is
inseparable from the tribal identities of the various
ethnicities found in northern Nigeria. Amongst the Berom,
Anga, Langtang and several tribes on the plateau,
Christianity was embraced as a counterforce to the Islamic
faith of the old enemy. The story was little different in the
Benue trough, the Mambilla Plateau, the Cameroon
mountain homes of the peoples of present-day Adamawa
state, the Zuru people of Kebbi, and the Jukuns of Taraba
state. The long-repressed peoples, who had hitherto been
silent, embraced Christianity and western education, and

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Addendum

were to become a particular inconvenience for the colonial

administration, who blamed the missionaries for making
their own jobs difficult by educating the “pagans and
animists” beyond their station in the country being
constructed. Chapter 21 of Sharwood-Smith’s book dealt
with this at length.
Every politics is local. Even the politics of religion is
local. The first effect of the Nigerian independence – the
introduction of adult suffrage and the flirtation with
citizenship suggested by the sanctity of the vote – led to the
Sardauna’s avoidance of his Islamist instincts and posture.
The readiness to embrace secularism was informed by the
need for consensus. But religion remained the factor for
deciding who gets what, even as the public protestations of
the ruling hegemony declared the north as secular. It is in
the area of national politics that the north has never
pretended to be secular, it has engaged with the rest of
Nigeria as though it were a monolithic bloc in its religiosity.
The north is unabashedly Islamist in engaging with the
rest of Nigeria, but until the coming of the Buhari regime, it
had rarely been irredentist in these engagements; what had
never been done blatantly in daytime has become
commonplace in Buhari’s Nigeria. Muhammadu Buhari is
the first self-confessed Islamist in the seat of Nigerian power,
but Islam has been the point of engagement between the
northern Nigerian political class and the collaborators in the

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 ‘Dele Farotimi

southern parts whether the southern partners were aware or

not.
When Yerima declared the Islamist Republic of
Zamfarastan, and the other governors began to fall over
themselves in defiance of the clear provisions of the
fraudulent 1999 Constitution, how come Obasanjo forgot
about his oath to protect the integrity of the constitution that
was the basis for the existence of his office? He knew better
than to make any such presumptions, he declared it
“political shariah” and allowed the seeds of insanity to
flourish. That was the signal moment for the assertion of the
northern prerogative in the latest republic, and Obasanjo’s
impotence incubated the insanity.
Moshood Kashimawo Olawale Abiola, now, that was a
man. And then some. He understood the mentality of the
northern street. He understood the pivotal place of Islam in
the life of the northern hordes. He came from poor stock. He
understood poverty from being related to it. He knew what
it meant to be hungry... To be desperate... To be hopeless. He
understood poverty intimately. His was the true rags to
riches story. He was the poor boy made good. But he never
forgot his roots, and the early education in the Quran
coupled with his own near photographic memory meant
that he could hold his own against any sheikh. His
stupendous wealth that he evidently deployed to the benefit
of the poor and the religious made him a darling of the poor
wherever they might be found in Nigeria. He was one

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Addendum

southerner that could not be legitimately labeled a Kaffir or

Monafik. MKO won across the length of the north, defeating
his opponent in his home state of Kano. Kashimawo scared
them. But that is another story for another day.
The influence of Islam as a tool of political mobilisation
in the southern parts of Nigeria is largely restricted to the
Yoruba-speaking states where Muslims and Christians are
largely the same in number, and have the highest level of
religious tolerance in the entire country. The religious
tolerance and liberalism of the Yoruba Muslims are largely
perceived as evidence of religious syncretism by the
northern Muslims, who have preached these divisive
messages in preservation of the sanctity of the northern
clergy rights to decide who the true Muslims are, which
equally serves as a gateway against the infiltration of the
northern hordes by the progressive teachings of the
southern sheiks and Islamic clerics.
The Yoruba people have endured for centuries; they
belong to an ancient civilisation that had evolved
jurisprudence and religious literature going back several
centuries. The Yoruba identity is much stronger than the
religious identity as the sociopolitical sophistication of the
Yoruba nation had worked to weaken the capacity of
religion to be used as an open tool of political mobilisation.
However, that was until recent times; several factors, some
that are consequences of historical realities, and yet more
that are consequences of deliberate actions and inactions

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 ‘Dele Farotimi

have changed the narrative. We should also look at

unintended consequences of deliberate actions and
deliberate inactions.
The Yoruba leadership recruitment system that was in
place before the independence of Nigeria, and which
provided the leadership of the Yoruba peoples that attended
the negotiations leading to Nigeria’s Independence
Constitution and the place of the Yoruba nation in the newly
established country couldn’t have been more careless about
the religious protestations of anyone of the lot. It is not
uncommon amongst the Yoruba to have the wife attend the
Muslim Jumaat service on Friday, dropped off by the
husband, who then attends church on Sunday after
dropping the children off at the Quranic school. Such was
the religious liberality of the Yoruba peoples. While the
objective realities have been drastically altered in recent
years; it is critical to understand the historical context.
Yorubaland has always had its Islamists. The general
ineffectuality of the Islamist agenda in Yorubaland until
recent years is a direct consequence of the egalitarianism
that had hallmarked the leadership of the ethnic group
within the Nigerian experience. Religion, particularly Islam,
with its demand for the adherents to study the Quran, is
difficult to weaponise against educated minds. The
leadership of the Yoruba nation had focused on education
as a defence against the forces of feudalism, which had
become one with the fulanised Muslim clerics in the north.

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Addendum

Yoruba political leaders saw the marriage of feudalism and

religion very early, and did all in their power to decouple
Islam in Yorubaland from the political influence of the
caliphate.
Islam was a tool of political mobilisation in parts of
Yorubaland where there were already sizable Muslim
populations; this was the overt case in parts of what is today
Osun state and the larger Ibadan metropolis. The Ede/ Iwo/
Ikirun/Ikire axis have always been largely Muslim. In the
early years of the Action Group, Islam was a tool used to
curtail its growth until notable Muslims such as Chief Bisi
Akande of Ila-Orangun became arrowheads of the AG, and
thereby blunted the capacity of the would-be Islamists to
employ Islam as a political weapon. The rise of Pentecostal
Christianity in the south in the last 3 decades, particularly in
Lagos and amongst the Yoruba, its projection of political
powers and influence, and the resultant reactions and
responses of the Muslims in the region have given oxygen to
the rise of the otherwise latent Islamist tendencies in the
southern part of the country.
During the years of the military hegemonies in power,
particularly from immediately after the removal of the
Shagari regime, Nigeria was ruled by a succession of
Muslim dictators. The Buhari administration that was
installed after the coup that ended the 2nd Republic was as
the current one, Islamist in instinct, but it did not stay long
enough to have discernible effect on the religious balance in

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 ‘Dele Farotimi

southern Nigeria. The Babangida regime that followed was

a different kettle of fish. Babangida took Nigeria into the
Organisation of Islamic Cooperation, OIC in his bid to retain
himself in office. He was blatantly Islamist in his bid to
appease the theocratic feudalists in whose names he ruled,
and in whose hands, lay the control of the northern hordes.
Babangida was not only in office, he was also in power but
he was a proxy who knew his limits when it came to control
of the northern streets.
A lot of historical factors are responsible for the rise of
political Islam in the south, and more particularly amongst
the Yoruba. The rise of the Islamist agenda in Yorubaland is
connected to the rise of political Islam in the region, and the
two might be used as synonyms, even as they are also not
the same. The likes of “Hi Brother”, Professor Ishaq Akintola
of MURIC have been around long before the current
democratic experiment was launched in 1999. He was a
member of the LASU faculty in my days in the university,
an object of curiosity to a lot of students and his colleagues,
beloved by all for his easygoing ways, but generally
considered eccentric for his Arabic headdress and seemingly
quixotic demands for Muslim rights. The hot button issues
for the southern based Islamists were never of concern to the
mainstream Yoruba Muslims who have always considered
religion the private business of the adherents.
Demands for a work-free Friday, the increasing
proliferation of the hijab in schools and public spaces, the

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Addendum

rapid construction of mosques in public institutions, the

projection of Muslim power in the political space, the
aggressive and sometimes abrasive use of these powers are
phenomena that have become increasingly commonplace in
the last 18 years or thereabouts. These occurrences are
directly traceable to the collapse of the leadership
recruitment system in Yorubaland and the upward
trajectory of, first the Obasanjo Tsunami Gang, and then the
Jagaban Franchise, both of which have effectively created a
new class of leadership in Yorubaland that recognises the
political powers of Islam and plays the game to varying
degrees. Islam has become a factor in the politics of the
Yoruba peoples; the Islamists have established a beachhead
that is critical to the Fulani-Islamist agenda.
The Fulani hegemony has always been masked behind
entities larger than the Fulani ethnic group. The Fulani are
done with the mask of Hausa-Fulani. They have no more use
for the lies of Arewa; One North, and the time has come to
fulfill the larger ambition of owning the Nigeria State and
securing it as a patrimony for the Fulani peoples wherever
they might come from. Islam, the very excuse for the
colonisation of the Hausa peoples, the reason why the Hausa
peoples rebelled against their kings and joined the Uthman
Dan Fodio Jihad of 1804, is the new mask behind which the
Fulani agenda has found refuge.

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 ‘Dele Farotimi

…The Sheikh kneeling on our identity

SHEIKH Isa Ali Pantami. He is a Muslim cleric and the
current minister in charge of the national databases and
extremely sensitive projects such as the National
Identification Number (NIN) and General Multi-Purpose
Cards (GMPC). Problem is, Pantami is a self-declared
terrorist sympathiser. He is on record expressing support for
international terrorist organisations and known terrorists
including Osama Bin laden. Mr. Pantami is the Islamist
riposte to the presence of Pastor, Professor Yemi Osibajo in
the federal cabinet; his closeness to General Buhari has been
well-established and advertised. That Buhari is executing a
clear Fulani agenda is beyond any contestation, but
Pantami’s key role in the execution of that agenda is only
beginning to emerge. “Shekere Garuba’s” apologies to
Professor Soyinka have silenced any doubts as to whose
pleasures Mr. Pantami serves.
The Pantami episode interests me for only one reason; its
exposure of the dangers posed by an entrenchment of
Islamist sympathies in promoting the subjectivisation of an
issue, because of the Muslim faith of the persons involved
and a resultant conflation of personal interest for the
collective good of the religion. The marriage of feudalism
and theocratic governance, which had ruled the north for
centuries, has taken hold where it was once decried and
resisted. In spite of the fact that Mr. Pantami admitted to

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Addendum

what he could not have denied in the face of the objective

realities that would indict the Buhari regime for complicity
in the activities of the rampaging Fulani hordes and the
obvious compromise of our national security by the
continuing presence of Pantami in his position, no Yoruba
Muslim political actor of note has demanded his removal.
That Pantami is a Muslim has immunised him against
scrutiny in the eyes of a critical mass of Yoruba Muslims,
something that would have been unthinkable less than a
decade ago.
The rise of Pentecostal Christianity with its pop culture
and aggressive evangelical activities is what has awakened
a critical mass of Yoruba Muslims, who had become
increasingly alarmed by the Pentecostal overreach, and had
responded by launching a revival within Islam in the
western part of Nigeria. The rise of Pentecostalism coincided
with the return to civil rule hence, the churches with their
huge numbers during their different congregations began to
exert influence on the political class. Churches became the
new Mecca for politicians of all religious persuasions, and
pastors began to emerge as critical voices in national
discourse. These were to have direct consequences down the
line, and some of the consequences include the birth of
Muslim organisations such as Nasrul-lahi-li Fathi Society of
Nigeria (NASFAT) and several others that have preferred to
be less obvious.

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 ‘Dele Farotimi

The role of Islam as a tool of political mobilisation was

embraced very early by the new crop of political leadership
in Yorubaland. Nowhere is this more obvious than in Lagos
State where rightful demands for equality found astute
political actors, resulting in the political annexation of the
Muslim clergy in Lagos State, rendering them clients of the
governing hegemony in the state. This weaponisation of
Islam was never intended to serve the purpose of the
Islamists, but was a political opportunity too good to be
passed up, but it has today become the foothold long desired
by the Islamist forces.
In taking on Oyinlola in Osun State, Aregbesola tapped
into the existing Islamist network in the state, deploying vast
resources to ensure mobilisation of the mosques and
madrassas. That he was running against a Christian
incumbent made the job easier; that Chief Bisi Akande, the
old warhorse of Osun politics, the same one instrumental in
dismantling Muslim opposition to Awolowo and the AG
was batting in his corner, made the job even easier. The
margin of Oyinlola’s loss in the Muslim strongholds of Ede,
Iwo, Ikire, Ikirun and Osogbo areas is not unrelated to the
massive riggings that both parties facilitated, but the overtly
Islamist postures of the Aregbesola regime, spanning both
terms, speak to the extent of the collaboration, and how vital
the Islamist support is in the retention of power in the state
by the APC.

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Addendum

The role of Christianity in Nigeria’s Mess

LET me reiterate for the benefit of the intellectually indolent
and the mischievous, my sole interest in either of the
imported religions of Islam and Christianity is to track their
effects on shaping the political trajectories of the Nigeria
State, with particular emphasis on its effect on the efforts to
revolutionise Nigeria, and its power plays with Islam in the
contestations for political influence and power in the current
republic, only dwelling on the history, solely to offer context
as may be required to provide clarity. Better qualified men
and women have written and are writing church history in
Nigeria, my purpose is to track its effects.
The ‘Animal Called Man', Obasanjo, the same man who
coined the phrase, unwittingly unshackled the forces that
assail Nigeria today. After the death of Abacha, with the
decision having been taken by the powers behind the
Abdusalami’s throne to murder Abiola and replace him
with another Yoruba man; the Earnest Shonekan interim
arrangement and its chief arranger quickly emerged the
commonsensical choice. Aremu was sprung out of jail,
granted a state pardon, had myths and legends spun around
his imprisonment for being an arrogant know-it-all that
Abacha could not tolerate, and almost emerged as some sort
of Mandela figure, who was promptly casted to play the
Mandela role in the new democratic experiment. Problem is,

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 ‘Dele Farotimi

Aremu is nobody’s Mandela; his promoters had

miscalculated badly.
Obasanjo’s religious protestations in the days leading up
to his coronation in 1999 were loud and vociferous. His
embrace by the Christian south, particularly in the land of
Ndigbo, where Obasanjo earned more votes than in his own
Yorubaland, and where religion is a major issue in national
and local politics, made it easy for Obasanjo to be labelled a
Christian president in the run up to the 2003 elections and in
the struggle against his 3rd-term agenda.

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286
 Appendix
Proposed
Constitution
of the Federating States
of Nigeria
by Ralph Nwoke

287
 “
We the peoples and tribes of the
amalgamated territories known and
geographically defined as Nigeria, in
our bid to build one united country
governed by law do declare, enact and
give to ourselves the following
Constitution:

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 Ralph Nwoke

CHAPTER 1: SUPREMACY OF THE CONSTITUTION,

NIGERIA AND ITS TERRITORIES

Effect of this Constitution

1. This Constitution shall have the force of law
throughout Nigeria, if any other law (including the
constitution of a Region) is inconsistent with this
Constitution, this Constitution shall prevail, and the
other law shall, to the extent of the inconsistency,
be void.

Establishment of the Federal Republic

2. Nigeria shall be a Federation comprising of Regions
and a Federal Territory and shall be a Republic by
the name and style of the Federal Republic of
Nigeria.

Territories of the Federation

3. (1) The Federal Republic of Nigeria shall consist six
(6) territories and a federal capital territory.
(2) The territory of the Federal Republic of Nigeria
shall consist of the North Western Region, North
Eastern Region, South Eastern Region, South Southern
Region, South Western Region and the Federal Capital
Territory of Abuja.

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Appendix

(3) The Regions and Federal Capital Territory shall

consist of the areas indicated in Schedule 1 to this
constitution.

Alteration of this Constitution

4. (1) The House of Representatives may alter any of the
provisions of this Constitution provided that a bill of
the House of Representatives altering this Constitution
shall not come into operation unless each legislative
house of at least four Regions have passed a resolution
adopting such alteration and the President has
assented to the bill on the advice of the Prime Minister.
(2) A bill for an Act of the House of
Representatives altering the provision of this
constitution, shall not be passed in the House of
Representatives unless it has been supported on
second and third readings by the votes of not fewer
than two-thirds of all the members of that House of
Representatives.
(3) Alterations to section 3 of this Constitution for
the purpose of establishing new Regions out of other
territories shall be effected only in accordance with the
following procedure:
(a) A proposal for the alteration shall be submitted
to the House of Representatives by the Government of
the Region seeking the creation of a new Region from

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 Ralph Nwoke

its territory or by a community of not fewer than one

hundred thousand people, within the Region.
(b) The proposal shall contain the proposed name,
estimated population and map of the new Region, duly
endorsed by a Surveyor in the Civil Service of the
Federation designated by the Prime Minister for this
purpose.
(c) A proposal summited pursuant to Section
4(2(a) above shall be debated in the House of
Representatives and if supported on second and third
readings by the votes of not fewer than two-thirds of
all the members of that House of Representatives, the
proposal shall be submitted to the legislative houses of
all the Regions for adoption by resolution of the
majority of members of the Legislative Houses of all the
Regions and if so adopted, the proposal shall become
an act of Parliament amending Section 3 and Schedule
1 of this Constitution to create the Region as proposed.

Provisions relating to Regional Constitutions

5. (1) The peoples of the Region shall adopt for
themselves a Regional Constitution, which shall,
subject to the provisions of this Constitution, have the
force of law throughout that Region and if any other
law is inconsistent with that constitution, the provisions
of that constitution shall prevail, and the other law
shall, to the extent of the inconsistency, be void.

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(2) Subject to the provisions of this constitution, the

constitution of a Region may be altered only by a law
enacted by the legislature of that Region.(3) A bill for a
law to be enacted by the legislature of a Region altering
any of the provisions of the constitution of that Region
shall not be deemed passed unless it is supported on
second and third readings by the votes of not less than
two-thirds of all the members of the legislative house
of the Region and then presented to the Governor of
the Region for assent.
(4) Where a new Region is established the House of
Representatives may make laws for the peace, order
and good government of that Region with respect to
maters not included in the Legislative Lists (including
provision for the constitution of that Region) for a
period of six months after the establishment of that
Region or for such period as the legislative house of
the region is duly constituted, but thereafter the House
of Representatives shall have only such powers to make
laws for that Region as it has in relation to the other
Regions: Provided that nothing in this section shall
preclude the legislature of that Region from' making
laws in accordance with the provisions of this
Constitution and the constitution of the Region, after
the due constitution of the legislative house of the
Region.

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6. Subject to the provision of this Constitution, the

constitution of the Region shall in accordance with
basic democratic tenets establish the system of
government for Regions, which must include a fully
representative legislative house and a system of
executive power.

CHAPTER II: CITIZENSHIP

7. (1) The following persons are citizens of Nigeria by

birth, namely –
(a) every person born in Nigeria before the date
of independence, either of whose parents or any of
whose grandparents belongs or belonged to a
community indigenous to Nigeria; Provided that a
person shall not become a citizen of Nigeria by virtue
of this section if neither of his parents nor any of his
grandparents was born in Nigeria.
(b) every person born in Nigeria after the date of
independence either of whose parents or any of whose
grandparents is a citizen of Nigeria; and (c) every
person born outside Nigeria either of whose parents is
a citizen of Nigeria.
(2) In this section, "the date of independence"
means the 1st day of October 1960.

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8. (1) Subject to the provisions of section of this

Constitution, a person to whom the provisions of this
section apply may be registered as a citizen of Nigeria,
if the Prime Minister is satisfied that -
(a) he is a person of good character;
(b) he has shown a clear intention of his desire to
be domiciled in Nigeria; and
(c) he has taken the Oath of Allegiance prescribed
in the Second Schedule to this Constitution.
(2) the provisions of this section shall apply to-
(a) any woman who is or has been married to a
citizen of Nigeria; or
(b) every person of full age and capacity born
outside Nigeria any of whose grandparents is a citizen
of Nigeria.

9. (1) Subject to the provisions of section 8 of this

Constitution, any person who is qualified in accordance
with the provisions of this section may apply to the
Prime Minister for the grant of a certificate of
naturalisation.
(2) No person shall be qualified to apply for the grant
of a certificate or naturalisation, unless he satisfies the
Prime Minister that -
(a) he is a person of full age and capacity;
(b) he is a person of good character;

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(c) he has shown a clear intention of his desire to

be domiciled in Nigeria;
(d) he is, in the opinion of the Governor of the
State where he is or he proposes to be resident,
acceptable to the local community, in which he is to live
permanently, and has been assimilated into the way of
life of Nigerians in that part of the Federation;
(e) he is a person who has made or is capable of
making useful contribution to the advancement;
progress and well-being of Nigeria;
(f) he has taken the Oath of Allegiance prescribed
in the second Schedule to this Constitution; and
(g) he has, immediately preceding the date of his
application, either- (i) resided in Nigeria for a
continuous period of fifteen years; or
(ii) resided in Nigeria continuously for a period of
twelve months, and during the period of twenty years
immediately preceding that period of twelve months
has resided in Nigeria for periods amounting in the
aggregate to not less than fifteen years.

10. (1) Subject to the other provisions of this section, a

person shall forfeit forthwith his Nigerian citizenship if,
not being a citizen of Nigeria by birth, he acquires or
retains the citizenship or nationality of a country, other
than Nigeria, of which he is not a citizen by birth.

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(2) Any registration of a person as a citizen of Nigeria

or the grant of a certificate of naturalisation to a person
who is a citizen of a country other than Nigeria at the
time of such registration or grant shall, if he is not a
citizen by birth of that other country, be conditional
upon effective renunciation of the citizenship or
nationality of that other country within a period of not
more than five months from the date of such
registration or grant.

11. (1) Any citizen of Nigeria of full age who wishes to

renounce his Nigerian citizenship shall make a
declaration in the prescribed manner for the
renunciation.
(2) The Prime Minister shall cause the declaration
made under subsection (1) of this section to be
registered and upon such registration, the person who
made the declaration shall cease to be a citizen of
Nigeria.
(3) The Prime Minister may withhold the
registration of any declaration made under subsection
(1) of this section if -
(a) the declaration is made during any war in
which Nigeria is physically involved; or
(b) in his opinion, it is otherwise contrary to public
policy.

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(4) For the purposes of subsection (1) of this

section, "full age" means the age of eighteen years and
above;

12. (1) The Prime Minister, deprive a person, other than

a person who is a citizen of Nigeria by birth or by
registration, of his citizenship, if he is satisfied that such
a person has, within a period of seven years after
becoming naturalized, been sentenced to
imprisonment for a term of not less than three years.
(2) The Prime Minister shall deprive a person,
other than a person who is citizen of Nigeria by birth,
of his citizenship, if he is satisfied from the records of
proceedings of a court of law or other tribunal or after
due inquiry in accordance with regulations made by
him, that -
(a) the person has shown himself by act or speech
to be disloyal towards the Federal Republic of Nigeria;
or
(b) the person has, during any war in which
Nigeria was engaged, unlawfully traded with the
enemy or been engaged in or associated with any
business that was in the opinion of the Prime Minister
carried on in such a manner as to assist the enemy of
Nigeria in that war, or unlawfully communicated with
such enemy to the detriment of or with intent to cause
damage to the interest of Nigeria.

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13. For the purposes of this Chapter, a parent or

grandparent of a person shall be deemed to be a
citizen of Nigeria if at the time of the birth of that
person such parent or grandparent would have
possessed that status by birth if he had been alive on
the date of independence; and in this section, "the date
of independence" has the meaning assigned to it in
section 6(2) of this Constitution.
13. (1) The Prime Minister may make regulations, not
inconsistent with this Chapter, prescribing all maters
which are required or permitted to be prescribed or
which are necessary or convenient to be prescribed for
carrying out or giving effect to the provisions of this
Chapter, and for granting special immigrant status with
full residential rights to non- Nigerian spouses of
citizens of Nigeria who do not wish to acquire Nigerian
citizenship.
(2) Any regulations made by the Prime Minister
pursuant to the provisions of this section shall be laid
before the House of Representatives from adoption by
voice vote resolution.

CHAPTER III: FUNDAMENTAL RIGHTS

14. (1) Every person has a right to life, and no one shall
be deprived intentionally of his life.

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(2) A person shall not be regarded as having been

deprived of his life in contravention of this section, if he
dies as a result of the use, to such extent and in such
circumstances as are permitted by law, of such force as
is reasonably necessary -
(a) for the defence of any person from unlawful
violence or for the defence of property:
(b) in order to effect a lawful arrest or to prevent
the escape of a person lawfully detained; or
(c) for the purpose of suppressing a riot,
insurrection or mutiny.

15. (1) Every individual is entitled to respect for the

dignity of his person, and accordingly -(a) no person
shall be subject to torture or to inhuman or degrading
treatment;
(b) no person shall he held in slavery or servitude;
and
(c) no person shall be required to perform forced
of compulsory labour.
(2) for the purposes of subsection (1) (c) of this
section, "forced or compulsory labour" does not
include -
(a) any labour required in consequence of the
sentence or order of a court;

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(b) any labour required of members of the armed

forces of the Federation or the Nigeria Police Force in
pursuance of their duties as such;
(c) in the case of persons who have conscientious
objections to service in the armed forces of the
Federation, any labour required instead of such service;
(d) any labour required which is reasonably necessary
in the event of any emergency or calamity threatening
the life or well-being of the community; or
(e) any labour or service that forms part of -
(i) normal communal or other civic obligations of
the well- being of the community.
(ii) such compulsory national service in the armed
forces of the Federation as may be prescribed by an Act
of the National Assembly, or
(iii) such compulsory national service which forms
part of the education and training of citizens of Nigeria
as may be prescribed by an Act of the National
Assembly.

16. (1) Every person shall be entitled to his personal

liberty and no person shall be deprived of such liberty
save in the following cases and in accordance with a
procedure permitted by law -
(a) in execution of the sentence or order of a court
in respect of a criminal offence of which he has been
found guilty;

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(b) by reason of his failure to comply with the

order of a court or in order to secure the fulfilment of
any obligation imposed upon him by law;
(c) for the purpose of bringing him before a court
in execution of the order of a court or upon reasonable
suspicion of his having committed a criminal offence,
or to such extent as may be reasonably necessary to
prevent his committing a criminal offence;
(d) in the case of a person who has not attained
the age of eighteen years for the purpose of his
education or welfare;
(e) in the case of persons suffering from infectious
or contagious disease, persons of unsound mind,
persons addicted to drugs or alcohol or vagrants, for
the purpose of their care or treatment or the protection
of the community; or
(f) for the purpose of preventing the unlawful
entry of any person into Nigeria or of effecting the
expulsion, extradition or other lawful removal from
Nigeria of any person or the taking of proceedings
relating thereto. Provided that a person who is charged
with an offence and who has been detained in lawful
custody awaiting trial shall not continue to be kept in
such detention for a period longer than the maximum
period of imprisonment prescribed for the offence.
(2) Any person who is arrested or detained shall
have the right to remain silent or avoid answering any

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question until after consultation with a legal

practitioner or any other person of his own choice.
(3) Any person who is arrested or detained shall
be informed in writing within twenty-four hours (and in
a language that he understands) of the facts and
grounds for his arrest or detention.
(4) Any person who is arrested or detained in
accordance with subsection (1) (c) of this section shall
be brought before a court of law within a reasonable
time, and if he is not tried within a period of -
(a) two months from the date of his arrest or
detention in the case of a person who is in custody or
is not entitled to bail; or
(b) three months from the date of his arrest or
detention in the case of a person who has been
released on bail, he shall (without prejudice to any
further proceedings that may be brought against him)
be released either unconditionally or upon such
conditions as are reasonably necessary to ensure that
he appears for trial at a later date.
(5) In subsection (4) of this section, the expression
"a reasonable time" means-
(a) in the case of an arrest or detention in any
place where there is a court of competent jurisdiction
within a radius of forty kilometres, a period of one day;
and

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(b) in any other case, a period of two days or such

longer period as in the circumstances may be
considered by the court to be reasonable.
(6) Any person who is unlawfully arrested or
detained shall be entitled to compensation and public
apology from the appropriate authority or person; and
in this subsection, "the appropriate authority or
person" means an authority or person specified bylaw.
(7) Nothing in this section shall be construed -
(a) in relation to subsection (4) of this section, as
applying in the case of a person arrested or detained
upon reasonable suspicion of having committed a
capital offence; and
(b) as invalidating any law by reason only that it
authorizes the detention for a period not exceeding
three months of a member of the armed forces of the
federation or a member of the Nigeria Police Force in
execution of a sentence imposed by an officer of the
armed forces of the Federation or of the Nigeria police
force, in respect of an offence punishable by such
detention of which he has been found guilty.

17. (1) In the determination of his civil rights and

obligations, including any question or determination
by or against any government or authority, a person
shall be entitled to a fair hearing within a reasonable
time by a court or other tribunal established by law and

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constituted in such manner as to secure its

independence and impartiality.
(2) Without prejudice to the foregoing provisions
of this section, a law shall not be invalidated by reason
only that it confers on any government or authority
power to determine questions arising in the
administration of a law that affects or may affect the
civil rights and obligations of any person if such
law -
(a) provides for an opportunity for the persons
whose rights and obligations may be affected to make
representations to the administering authority before
that authority makes the decision affecting that person;
and
(b) contains no provision making the
determination of the administering authority final and
conclusive.
(3) The proceedings of a court or the proceedings
of any tribunal relating to the maters mentioned in
subsection (1) of this section (including the
announcement of the decisions of the court or tribunal)
shall be held in public.
(4) Whenever any person is charged with a
criminal offence, he shall, unless the charge is
withdrawn, be entitled to a fair hearing in public within
a reasonable time by a court or tribunal: Provided that
-

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(a) a court or such a tribunal may exclude from its

proceedings persons other than the parties thereto or
their legal practitioners in the interest of defence,
public safety, public order, public morality, the welfare
of persons who have not attained the age of eighteen
years, the protection of the private lives of the parties
or to such extent as it may consider necessary by
reason of special circumstances in which publicity
would be contrary to the interests of justice;
(b) if in any proceedings before a court or such a
tribunal, a Minister of the Government of the
Federation or a commissioner of the government of a
State satisfies the court or tribunal that it would not be
in the public interest for any mater to be publicly
disclosed, the court or tribunal shall make
arrangements for evidence relating to that mater to be
heard in private and shall take such other action as may
be necessary or expedient to prevent the disclosure of
the mater.
(5) Every person who is charged with a criminal
offence shall be presumed to be innocent until he is
proved guilty; Provided that nothing in this section
shall invalidate any law by reason only that the law
imposes upon any such person the burden of proving
particular facts.
(6) Every person who is charged with a criminal
offence shall be entitled to - (a) be informed promptly

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in the language that he understands and in detail of the

nature of the offence;
(b) be given adequate time and facilities for the
preparation of his defence; (c) defend himself in person
or by legal practitioners of his own choice;
(d) examine, in person or by his legal practitioners,
the witnesses called by the prosecution before any
court or tribunal and obtain the attendance and carry
out the examination of witnesses to testify on his behalf
before the court or tribunal on the same conditions as
those applying to the witnesses called by the
prosecution; and
(e) have, without payment, the assistance of an
interpreter if he cannot understand the language used
at the trial of the offence.
(7) When any person is tried for any criminal
offence, the court or tribunal shall keep a record of the
proceedings and the accused person or any persons
authorised by him in that behalf shall be entitled to
obtain copies of the judgement in the case within seven
days of the conclusion of the case.
(8) No person shall be held to be guilty of a
criminal offence on account of any act or omission that
did not, at the time it took place, constitute such an
offence, and no penalty shall
be imposed for any criminal offence heavier than the
penalty in force at the time the offence was committed

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(9) No person who shows that he has been tried

by any court of competent jurisdiction or tribunal for a
criminal offence and either convicted or acquitted shall
again be tried for that offence or for a criminal offence
having the same ingredients as that offence save upon
the order of a superior court.
(10) No person who shows that he has been
pardoned for a criminal offence shall again be tried for
that offence.
(11) No person who is tried for a criminal offence
shall be compelled to give evidence at the trial.
(12) Subject as otherwise provided by this
Constitution, a person shall not be convicted of a
criminal offence unless that offence is defined and the
penalty therefor is prescribed in a written law, and in
this subsection, a written law refers to an Act of the
National Assembly or a Law of a State, any subsidiary
legislation or instrument under the provisions of a law.

18. The privacy of citizens, their homes,

correspondence, telephone conversations and
telegraphic communications is hereby guaranteed and
protected.

19. (1) Every person shall be entitled to freedom of

thought, conscience and religion, including freedom to
change his religion or belief, and freedom (either alone

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or in community with others, and in public or in private)

to manifest and propagate his religion or belief in
worship, teaching, practice and observance.
(2) No person attending any place of education
shall be required to receive religious instruction or to
take part in or attend any religious ceremony or
observance if such instruction ceremony or observance
relates to a religion other than his own, or religion not
approved by his parent or guardian.
(3) No religious community or denomination shall
be prevented from providing religious instruction for
pupils of that community or denomination in any place
of education maintained wholly by that community or
denomination.
(4) Nothing in this section shall entitle any person
to form, take part in the activity or be a member of a
secret society.

20. (1) Every person shall be entitled to freedom of

expression, including freedom to hold opinions and to
receive and impart ideas and information without
interference.
(2) Without prejudice to the generality of
subsection (1) of this section, every person shall be
entitled to own, establish and operate any medium for
the dissemination of information, ideas and opinions:

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Provided that no person, other than the Government of

the Federation or of a State or any other person or
body authorised by the President on the fulfilment of
conditions laid down by an Act of the National
Assembly, shall own, establish or operate a television
or wireless broadcasting station for, any purpose
whatsoever.
(3) Nothing in this section shall invalidate any law
that is reasonably justifiable in a democratic society
(a) for the purpose of preventing the disclosure. of
information received in confidence, maintaining the
authority and independence of courts or regulating
telephony, wireless broadcasting, television or the
exhibition of cinematograph films; or
(b) imposing restrictions upon persons holding
office under the Government of the Federation or of a
State, members of the armed forces of the Federation
or members of the Nigeria Police Force or other
Government security services or agencies established
bylaw.

21. Every person shall be entitled to assemble

freely and associate with other persons, and in
particular he may form or belong to any political party,
trade union or any other association for the protection
of his interests: Provided that the provisions of this
section shall not derogate from the powers conferred

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by this Constitution on the Independent National

Electoral Commission with respect to political parties to
which that Commission does not accord recognition.

22. (1) Every citizen of Nigeria is entitled to move

freely throughout Nigeria and to reside in any part
thereof, and no citizen of Nigeria shall be expelled from
Nigeria or refused entry thereby or exit therefrom.
(2) Nothing in subsection (1) of this section shall
invalidate any law that is reasonably justifiable in a
democratic society-
(a) imposing restrictions on the residence or
movement of any person who has committed or is
reasonably suspected to have committed a criminal
offence in order to prevent him from leaving Nigeria;
or (b) providing for the removal of any person from
Nigeria to any other country to:-
(I) be tried outside Nigeria for any criminal offence, or
(ii) undergo imprisonment outside Nigeria in execution
of the sentence of a court of law in respect of a criminal
offence of which he has been found guilty:
Provided that there is reciprocal agreement between
Nigeria and such other country in relation to such
mater.

23. (1) A citizen of Nigeria of a particular

community, ethnic group, place of origin, sex, religion

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or political opinion shall not, by reason only that he is

such a person:-
(a) be subjected either expressly by, or in the
practical application of, any law in force in Nigeria or
any executive or administrative action of the
government, to disabilities or restrictions to which
citizens of Nigeria of other communities, ethnic groups,
places of origin, sex, religions or political opinions are
not made subject; or
(b) be accorded either expressly by, or in the
practical application of, any law in force in Nigeria or
any such executive or administrative action, any
privilege or advantage that is not accorded to citizens
of Nigeria of other communities, ethnic groups, places
of origin, sex, religions or political opinions.
(2) No citizen of Nigeria shall be subjected to any
disability or deprivation merely by reason of the
circumstances of his birth.
(3) Nothing in subsection (1) of this section shall
invalidate any law by reason only that the law imposes
restrictions with respect to the appointment of any
person to any office under the State or as a member of
the armed forces of the Federation or member of the
Nigeria Police Forces or to an office in the service of a
body, corporate established directly by any law in force
in Nigeria.

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24. Subject to the provisions of this Constitution,

every citizen of Nigeria shall have the right to acquire
and own immovable property anywhere in Nigeria.

25. (1) No moveable property or any interest in an

immovable property shall be taken possession of
compulsorily and no right over or interest in any such
property shall be acquired compulsorily in any part of
Nigeria except in the manner and for the purposes
prescribed by a law that, among other things -
(a) requires the prompt payment of compensation
therefore and
(b) gives to any person claiming such
compensation a right of access for the determination
of his interest in the property and the amount of
compensation to a court of law or tribunal or body
having jurisdiction in that part of Nigeria.
(2) Nothing in subsection (1) of this section shall
be construed as affecting any general law.
(a) for the imposition or enforcement of any tax,
rate or duty;
(b) for the imposition of penalties or forfeiture for
breach of any law, whether under civil process or after
conviction for an offence;
(c) relating to leases, tenancies, mortgages,
charges, bills of sale or any other rights or obligations
arising out of contracts.

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(d) relating to the vesting and administration of

property of persons adjudged or otherwise declared
bankrupt or insolvent, of persons of unsound mind or
deceased persons, and of corporate or unincorporated
bodies in the course of being wound-up;
(e) relating to the execution of judgements or
orders of court;
(f) providing for the taking of possession of
property that is in a dangerous state or is injurious to
the health of human beings, plants or animals;
(g) relating to enemy property;
(h) relating to trusts and trustees; (i) relating to
limitation of actions;
(j) relating to property vested in bodies corporate
directly established by any law in force in Nigeria;
(k) relating to the temporary taking of possession
of property for the purpose of any examination,
investigation or enquiry;
(l) providing for the carrying out of work on land
for the purpose of soil- conservation; or
(m) subject to prompt payment of compensation
for damage to buildings, economic trees or crops,
providing for any authority or person to enter, survey
or dig any land, or to lay, install or erect poles, cables,
wires, pipes, or other conductors or structures on any
land, in order to provide or maintain the supply or
distribution of energy, fuel, water, sewage,

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telecommunication services or other public facilities or

public utilities.
(3) Notwithstanding the foregoing provisions of
this section, the entire property in and control of all
minerals, mineral oils and natural gas in under or upon
any land in Nigeria or in, under or upon the territorial
waters and the Exclusive Economic Zone of Nigeria
shall vest in the Government of the Federation and shall
be managed in such manner as may be prescribed by
the National Assembly.

26. (1) Nothing in sections 18, 19, 20, 21 and 22 of

this Constitution shall invalidate any law that is
reasonably justifiable in a democratic society
(a) in the interest of defence, public safety, public
order, public morality or public health; or
(b) for the purpose of protecting the rights and
freedom or other persons
(2) An act of the National Assembly shall not be
invalidated by reason only that it provides for the
taking, during periods of emergency, of measures that
derogate from the provisions of section 33 or 35 of this
Constitution; but no such measures shall be taken in
pursuance of any such act during any period of
emergency save to the extent that those measures are
reasonably justifiable for the purpose of dealing with
the situation that exists during that period of

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emergency: Provided that nothing in this section shall

authorise any derogation from the provisions of
section 33 of this Constitution, except in respect of
death resulting from acts of war or authorise any
derogation from the provisions of section 36(8) of this
Constitution.
(3) In this section, a " period of emergency" means
any period during which there is in force a
Proclamation of a state of emergency declared by the
President in exercise of the powers conferred on him
under section 305 of this Constitution.

27. (1) Any person who alleges that any of the

provisions of this Chapter has been, is being or likely to
be contravened in any State in relation to him may
apply to a High Court in that State for redress.
(2) Subject to the provisions of this Constitution, a
High Court shall have original jurisdiction to hear and
determine any application made to it in pursuance of
this section and may make such orders, issue such writs
and give such directions as it may consider appropriate
for the purpose of enforcement or securing the
enforcing within that State of any right to which the
person who makes the application may be entitled
under this Chapter.
(3) The Chief Justice of Nigeria may make rules
with respect to the practice and procedure of a High

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Court for the purposes of this section. (4) The House of

Representatives -
(a) may confer upon a High Court such powers in
addition to those conferred by this section as may
appear to the National Assembly to be necessary or
desirable for the purpose of enabling the court more
effectively to exercise the jurisdiction conferred upon it
by this section; and
(b) shall make provisions-
(i) for the rendering of financial assistance to any
indigent citizen of Nigeria where his right under this
Chapter has been infringed or with a view to enabling
him to engage the services of a legal practitioner to
prosecute his claim, and
(ii) for ensuring that allegations of infringement of
such rights are substantial and the requirement or need
for financial or legal aid is real.

CHAPTER IV: THE PRESIDENT OF THE REPUBLIC

Establishment of office of President

28. (1) There shall be a President of the Republic
who shall be appointed from the House of Elders in
accordance with section

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_ of this Constitution and shall be the Head of State of

the Federation and the Commander-in- Chief of the
armed forces of the Federation.

Election and removal of the President

29. (1) A person shall be eligible for election as
President if he is a citizen of Nigeria is qualified to be a
member of the House of Elders and possess at least a
first-degree qualification or its equivalent from any
higher institution recognized by the relevant agency of
the Government of Nigeria;
(2) The office of the President shall be rotated
amongst the Regions of the Nigeria. Every region shall
be entitled to hold the office for a period of 2 years and
no region shall be entitled to hold the office of
president after the completion of a 2-year term, until
all other regions have held the office for two years each.
(3) The President shall be elected by secret ballot
of member of the Legislative House of the Region
entitled to produce the President of Nigeria from
member of the House of Elder representing the region.
(4) Where there is a tie on the ballots cast for two or
more members of the House of Elders for the office of
President, the Governor of the Region shall select
amongst the eligible candidates the President of
Nigeria.

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30 (1) A person elected as the President shall not begin

to perform the functions of that office until he has
taken and subscribed the oath of allegiance and such
oath for the due performance of those functions as
may be prescribed by the House of Representatives.
(2) The oaths aforesaid shall be administered by the
Chief Justice of Nigeria or the person for the time being
appointed to exercise the functions of the Chief Justice.

31. The President shall cease to hold office if:

(1) he ceases to be a member of the House of
Elders;
(2) if he is found by the investigative committee
set up by the Chief Justice of Nigeria pursuant to
Section of this constitution to have committed an act
of grave misconduct or by reasons of infirmity of mind
or body is unable to discharge his function as president
of the Federal Republic of Nigeria.

32. (1) for the purpose of Section 31(2) of this

constitution, the Chief Justice of Nigeria shall, upon, the
resolution of two third of all members of the House of
Representatives that the president is unfit to hold
office, by reasons of misconduct or infirmity of mind or
body, constitute an investigative committee of 7
(seven) highly reputable and accomplished citizens of
Nigeria, who are neither public or civil servant and have

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never held a political office or appointment and have

never been members of a political party, to investigate
an allegation of misconduct or a committee of 7
(seven) highly qualified medical doctors, to investigate
an allegation of infirmity of mind or body.
(2) The President shall be deemed removed from
office, if the investigative committee reaches a
conclusion that the conduct of the president is grave
and warrants the removal from office or that the
president is unfit to hold to hold office by reasons of
infirmity of mind or body. (2) Where it is alleged that
the President has committed an act of misconduct, the
Chief Justice shall designate one member of the
committee, who shall be a legal practitioner of not less
than 15-year post call experience, to serve as chairman
and any other member of the panel as secretary of the
investigative panel.
(3) Where it is alleged that the President suffers
from such infirmity of body and mind as not to be able
to discharge his functions, the Chief Justice shall
appoint a medical doctor with not less than 20 years
medical practice experience to serve as chairman and
any other member of the panel as secretary of the
investigative panel.
(4) The investigative panel is required to conclude
its siting within 1 months from the date of
commencement of siting.

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(5) all members of the panel shall be entitled to

receive not more than two- month total emolument of
a Federal High Court Judge as remuneration.

CHAPTER V: PARLIAMENT

Part 1: Composition of Parliament

Establishment of Parliament
33. There shall be a Parliament of the Federation,
which shall consist of the House of Elders and a House
of Representatives.

Composition of the House of Elders

34. (1) The House of Elders shall consist of five
members representing each Region, and three
members representing the Federal Capital Territory,
who shall be traditional rulers, retired military officers
of ranks not less than the rank of Major General or its
equivalent in any of the armed forces, retired police
officers of rank not less than the rank of Deputy
Inspector General of Police, university professors,
retired civil servants who had attained the rank of
Director in the Federal or Regional civil service or its
equivalent, retired Chief Executive Officers of any
company quoted on the Nigerian stock exchange; (2) A

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member of the House of Elders shall have attained the

age of 55 years on the date of appointment into the
House of Elders and shall serve for term of 4 years and
may be repointed subject to further nomination by the
head of government of his Region and confirmation by
the legislative house of the Region.
(2) The members of the House of elders shall be
appointed by the Head of Government of each Region
subject to confirmation by the legislative house of the
Region.
(3) the Prime Minister shall appoint members of
the House of Elders for the Federal Capital Territory,
subject to confirmation by the House of
Representatives.

Composition of the House of Representatives

35. The House of Representatives shall consist of
10 members representing each Region of the
Federation and 6 members representing the Federal
Capital Territory.

36. A person shall be qualified for election as a

member of the House of Representatives if he is a
citizen of Nigeria and has attained the age of twenty-
one on the date of nomination to stand for election as

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a member of the House of Representatives and

possesses a minimum of Senior School Certificate or its
equivalent on the date of his election.

Disqualifications of membership of House of

Representatives
37. (1) No person shall be qualified for election to
the House of Representatives-
(a) if under any law in force in any part of Nigeria
he is adjudged to be a lunatic or otherwise declared to
be of unsound mind;
(b) if he is under a sentence of death imposed on
him by any court of law in Nigeria or a sentence of
imprisonment (by whatever name called) exceeding six
months imposed on him by such a court or substituted
by competent authority for some other sentence
imposed on him by such a court;
(c) if he is convicted of any felony by any court in
Nigeria or in any democratic country in the world;
(d) if he is an undischarged bankrupt, having been
adjudged or otherwise declared bankrupt under any
law in force in any part of Nigeria;
(e) if he is a member of the public service of the
Federation or the public service of a Region, a member
of the armed forces of the State or the holder of any
other office or emolument under the State; or

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(e) if he is a member of the House of Elders or a

legislative house of a Region.

Chairman of the House of Elders

38. (1) There shall be a Chairman for the House of
Elders, who shall be elected by the members of the
House of Elders.
(2) No person shall be elected as Chairman of the
House of Elders unless he is a member of the House of
Elders and is not from the same Region as the President
of Nigeria.
(3) The Chairman of the House of Elders shall
vacate his office-
(a) if, having been elected from among the members of
the House of Elders, he ceases to be a member of the
House of Elders;
(4) No business shall be transacted in the House
of Elders (other than an election to the office of the
Chairman of the House of Elders) at any time when the
office of Chairman of the house of Elders is vacant.
(5) The Chairman of the House of Elders shall
coordinate the business of the House of Elders.

Speaker of the House of Representatives

39. (1) There shall be a Speaker of the House of
Representatives, who shall be elected by the members
of that House.

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(2) No person shall be elected as Speaker of the

House of Representatives unless he is a member of the
House of Representatives.
(3) The Speaker of the House of Representatives
shall vacate his office-
(a) if he ceases to be a member of the House of
Representatives;
(b) if he becomes a Minister of the Government of
the Federation; or
(c) if he is removed from office by a resolution of
the House supported by the votes of two-thirds of all
the members of the House.
(4) No business shall be transacted in the House
of Representatives (other than an election to the office
of Speaker) at any time when the office of Speaker is
vacant.
(5) The Speaker of the House of Representatives
shall coordinate the Business of the House of
Representatives.

Establishment of Electoral Commission

40. (1) There shall be an Electoral Commission for
the Federation.
(2) The members of the Electoral Commission of
the Federation shall be-
(a) a Chief Electoral Commissioner, who shall be
chairman; and

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(b) a member representing each Region.

(3) The members of the Electoral Commission of
the Federation shall be appointed by the Chief Justice
of Nigeria subject to the confirmation of the House of
Elders.
(4) A person shall not be qualified to hold the
office of a member of the Electoral Commission of the
Federation if he is a member of either House of
Parliament, a member of a legislative house of a
Region, a Minister of the Government of the
Federation, a Minister of the Government of a Region
or a member of the public service of the Federation or
the public service of a Region or member of any
political party.
(6) Subject to the provisions of this section, a member
of the Electoral Commission of the Federation shall
vacate his office
(a) at the expiration of five years from the date of
his appointment; or
(b) if any circumstances arise that, if he were not a
member of the Commission, would cause him to be
disqualified for appointment as such. (7) A member of
the Electoral Commission of the Federation may be
removed from office by the President, acting in
accordance with the advice of the Prime Minister, for
inability to discharge the functions of his office

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(whether arising from infirmity of mind or body or any

other cause) or for gross misconduct.
(8) A member of the Electoral Commission of the
Federation shall not be removed from office except in
accordance with the provisions of this section.
(9) In the exercise of its functions under this
Constitution the Electoral Commission of the
Federation shall not be subject to the direction or
control of any other person or authority.
(10) The registration of voters and the conduct of
elections shall be subject to the direction and
supervision of the Electoral Commission of the
Federation.

Constituencies
41. (1) There shall be 10 constituencies in each
Region of Nigeria in accordance with boundaries
delineated by the Electoral Commission.
(2) No constituency shall form part of more than
one Region.
(3) The House of Representative may, on the
written advice of the Electoral Commission that
population increase necessitates the creation of new
constituencies, by resolution supported by two third of
all members of the House of Representatives create
more constituency in Nigeria. Provide that no

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constituency shall be created except an equal number

of constituencies is created for all other Regions of
Nigeria.
(4) Each constituency shall be represented by a
member in the House of Representative, who shall be
popularly elected by the peoples of the constituency.

Determination of questions respecting membership

of Parliament
42. (1) The Federal High Court shall have original
jurisdiction to hear and determine any question
whether-
(a) any person has been validly selected as a
member of the House of Elders or elected as a member
of the House of Representatives; or
(b) the seat in the House of Elders or the seat in
the House of Representatives of a member of that
House has become vacant.
(2) The House of Representatives may make
provision with respect to-
(a) the persons who may apply to the Federal High
Court for the determination of any question under this
section;
(b) the circumstances and manner in which, and
the conditions upon which, any such application may
be made; and

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(c) the powers, practice and procedure of the

Federal High Court in relation to any such application.

Clerks to Houses of Parliament and their staffs

43. (1) There shall be a Clerk to the House of Elders
and a Clerk to the House of Representatives:
(2) Subject to the provisions of any Act of the
House of Representatives, the office of the Clerk of
each House of Parliament and the members of his staff
shall be offices in the public service of the Federation.
(3) The Clerks to the Houses of Elders and
Representatives shall be the head of administration in
each of the Houses.

Procedure in Parliament
Oaths to be taken by members of Parliament
44. (1) Every member of either House of
Parliament shall, before taking his seat in that House,
take and subscribe before the House the oath of
allegiance in the form set out in Schedule _ of this
Constitution. Provided that a member may before
taking that oath take part in the election of a Chairman
of the House of Elders or a Speaker of the House of
Representatives, as the case may be.

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Presiding in House of Elders

45. (1) There shall preside at any siting of the
House of Elders- (a) the Chairman; or
(b) in the absence of the Chairman, the Vice
Chairman; or
(c) in the absence of the Chairman and the Vice
Chairman such member of the House of Elders as the
House may elect for that purpose.
(2) The House of Elders may from time to time elect a
member of the House of Elders to be Deputy Chairman
and any person so elected shall hold office as such until
he ceases to be a member of the House or is removed
from office by the House.

Presiding in House of Representatives

46. (1) There shall preside at any siting of the
House of Representatives
(a) the Speaker; or
(b) in the absence of the Speaker, the Deputy
Speaker; or in the absence of the Speaker and the
Deputy Speaker, such member of the House 'as the
House may elect for that purpose.
(2) The House of Representatives may from time to
time elect a member of the House to be Deputy
Speaker and any person so elected shall hold office as
such until he ceases to be a member of the House or is
removed from office by the House.

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Quorum in Houses of Parliament

47. If objection is taken by any member of a House of
Parliament present that there are present in that House
(besides the person presiding) fewer than one-sixth of
all the members of that House and, after such interval
as may be prescribed in the rules of procedure of the
House, the person presiding ascertains that the
number of members present is still less than one-sixth
of all the members of the House, he shall thereupon
adjourn the House.

Use of English in Parliament

48. The business of Parliament shall be conducted
in English.

Voting in Parliament
49. (1) Any question proposed for decision in a
House of Parliament shall be determined by the
required majority of the members present and voting;
and the person presiding shall cast a vote whenever
necessary to avoid an equality of votes but shall not
vote in any other case.
(2) Save as otherwise provided in this
Constitution, the required majority for the purposes of
determining any question shall be a simple majority.
(3) The rules of procedure of a House of
Parliament may provide that the vote of a member

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upon a question in which he has a direct pecuniary

interest shall be disallowed.

Mode of exercising legislative power

50. (1) The power of Parliament to make laws shall
be exercised by bills passed by the House of
Representatives and assented to by the President on
advice of the Prime Minister. Provided that a bill shall
be deemed duly assented to if passed by Parliament
and transmitted to the president with a written advice
from the Prime Minister to assent to the bill and the
President fails to assent to same within 30 days of
receipt of the bill.
(2) When a bill is presented to the President for
assent, he shall signify that he assents or that he
withholds assent. Provided that the President may only
validly withhold assent on the written advice of the
Prime Minister.
(3) In the event that assent is withheld by the
President on the advice of the Prime Minister, or such
advice is not received within 30 days of passage of the
bill, the bill shall, at the motion of any member of the
House of Representatives be read again on the floor of
the House of Representatives and vote taken, and if
supported by two third of all members of the House of
Representatives, the bill shall on the date of the vote
become an Act of the House of Representatives.

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(5) A bill shall not become law unless it has been duly
passed and assented to in accordance with this
Constitution.

Part 3: Sessions of Parliament

51. (1) Each session of Parliament shall be held at
such place within Nigeria.
(2) Parliament, unless sooner dissolved, shall continue
for six years from the date of its first siting.
(3) At any time when the Federation is at war,
Parliament may from time to time extend the period of
six years specified in subsection (2) of this section for
not more than twelve months at a time: Provided that
the life of Parliament shall not be extended under this
subsection for more than three years.
(4) In the exercise of his powers to dissolve
Parliament, the President shall act in accordance with
the advice of the Prime Minister, so however that if the
Prime Minister recommends a dissolution in a case not
falling within subsection (5) of this section and the
President considers that the government of the
Federation can be carried on without a dissolution and
that a dissolution would not be in the interests of the
Federation he may refuse to dissolve Parliament.(5) The
President shall dissolve Parliament -
(b) if the House of Representatives passes a resolution
supported by two third of all the members of the House

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 Ralph Nwoke

of Representatives that it has no confidence in the

Government of the Federation and within the period of
three days beginning with the day on which the
resolution is passed the Prime Minister does not resign
or recommend a dissolution or does recommend a
resolution;
(c) if the office of Prime Minister is vacant and the
President considers that there is no prospect of his
being able, within a reasonable time, to appoint to that
office a person who can command the support of the
majority of the members of the House of
Representatives.
(d) For the purpose of Section 5(b), a vote of no
confidence shall only be effective if adopted by
resolution of a simple majority of all members of the
House of Elders.

Part 4: Legislative powers

Powers of House of Representatives to make laws

52. (1) House of Representatives shall have power
to make laws-
(a) for the peace, order and good government of
Nigeria (other than the Federal territory) or any part
thereof with respect to any mater included in the
Exclusive and Concurrent Legislative List; and (b)for the
peace, order and good government of the Federal

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territory with respect to any mater.

(2) The power of House of Representatives to make
laws for the peace, order and good government of the
Regions with respect to any mater included in the
Exclusive Legislative List shall be to the exclusion of the
legislatures of the Regions.
(3) The Powers of the House of Representatives to
make law in relation to anything contained in the
concurrent list is concurrent with the powers of the
legislative House of the Region to make laws in relation
to such matters and if any law enacted by the
legislature of a Region is inconsistent with any law
validly made by House of Representatives on such
matters contained in the concurrent list, the law made
by the House of Representatives shall prevail and the
Regional law shall, to the extent of the inconsistency,
be void.
(4) The Legislatives Houses of the Region shall
have exclusive powers to make laws on all maters not
contained in the exclusive and concurrent list in
relation to their region, to the exclusion of any other
legislative bodies.

Special powers of House of Representatives in

relation to emergencies
53. (1) Parliament may at any time make such laws
for Nigeria or any part thereof with respect to maters

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not included in the Legislative Lists as may appear to

Parliament to be necessary or expedient for the
purpose of maintaining or securing peace, order and
good government during any period of emergency:
Provided that upon the passage of such bill, a version
shall be sent to the House of Elders for adoption and
shall only take effect upon the adoption of two third of
all members of the House of Elders and assented to by
the President.
(2) Any provision of law enacted in pursuance of
this section shall have effect only during a period of
emergency: Provided that the termination of a period
of emergency shall not affect the operation of such a
provision of law during that period, the validity of any
action taken thereunder during that period, any
penalty or punishment incurred in respect of any
contravention thereof or failure to comply therewith
during that period or any proceeding or remedy in
respect of any such penalty or punishment.
(3) In this section "period of emergency" means
any period during which- (a) the Federation is at war;
(b) there is in force a resolution passed by each
House of Representatives declaring that a state of
public emergency exists; or
(c) there is in force a resolution of each House of
Representatives supported by the votes of not less than
two-thirds of all the members of the House declaring

335
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that democratic institutions in Nigeria are threatened

by subversion.
(4) A resolution passed by a House of
Representatives for the purposes of this section shall
remain in force for twelve months or such shorter
period as may be specified therein: Provided that any
such resolution may be revoked at any time or may be
extended from time to time for a further period not
exceeding twelve months by resolution passed in like
manner.

Implementation of treaties, etc.

54. The House of Representatives may make laws
for Nigeria or any part thereof with respect to maters
not included in the Legislative Lists for the purpose of
implementing any treaty, convention or agreement
between the Federation and any other country or any
arrangement with or decision of an international
organisation of which the Federation is a member:
Provided that any provision of law enacted in
pursuance of this section shall not come into operation
in a Region unless the Head of Government of that
Region has consented to its having effect.

Titles of Honour etc.

55. (1) Subject to provisions of this section, House
of Representatives may make laws for Nigeria or any

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part thereof with respect to titles of honour, decoration

and other dignities.
(2) Any such law providing for the award of title,
decoration or other dignity shall confer the power to
make the award upon the President, with the approval
of the House of Elders.

CHAPTER VI: EXECUTIVE POWERS

Exercise of executive authority of Federation

56. (1) The executive authority of the Federation
shall be vested in the President and subject to the
provisions of this Constitution, shall be exercised on his
behalf by the Prime Minister.
(2) Nothing in this section shall prevent House of
Representatives from conferring functions on persons
or authorities other than the President.

Extent of executive authority of Federation

57. The executive authority of the Federation shall
extend to the execution and maintenance of this
Constitution and to all matters with respect to which
House of Representatives has for the time being power
to make laws.

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Executive authority of Regions

58. The executive authority of a Region shall
extend to the execution and maintenance of the
constitution of the Region and to all matters with
respect to which the legislature of the Region has for
the time being power to make laws but shall be so
exercised as not to impede or prejudice the exercise of
the executive authority of the Federation or to
endanger the continuance of federal government in
Nigeria or the unity of the Federation of Nigeria.

Ministers of Government of Federation

59. (1) There shall be a Prime Minister of the
Federation, who shall be elected by a majority vote of
members of the House of House of Representatives
from the party with majority control of the House of
Representatives.
(2) for the purpose of subsection 1 above, a party shall
be deemed to have majority control if it has more
elected members of the House of Representatives than
any other political party in the House of
Representatives or if, in coalition with any other
political party or independent members of the House
of Representatives, it has more members than any
other political party in the House of Representatives.
(3) There shall be, in addition to the office of Prime
Minister, such other offices of Minister of the

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Government of the Federation as may be established

by the House of Representatives.
(4) Appointments to the office of Minister of the
Government of the Federation other than the office of
Prime Minister shall be made by the Prime Minister,
who shall appoint ministers amongst members of the
House of Representatives and subject to the approval
of the House of Elders, from persons who are not
members of the House of Representatives.
(5) Any person appointed as a Minister pursuant
to subsection 2 above, not being a member of the
House of Representatives shall be entitled to attend the
proceedings of the House of Representatives and
contributing in same without the powers to vote.
(6) A person shall not hold office at the same time
both as a Minister of the Government of the Federation
and as a Minister of the Government of a Region.
(7) The office of the Prime Minister shall become
vacant if-
(a) if a vote of no confidence is proposed by any
member of the House of Representatives and passed
by at least two-third of all; members of the House of
Representatives and adopted by a simple majority of
the House of Elders; or
(b) if he ceases to be a member of the House of
Representatives.

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(8) The office of a Minister of the Government of

the Federation other than the Prime Minister shall
become vacant if the office of Prime Minister becomes
vacant.
(9) The Ministers of the Government of the
Federation shall hold office during the President's
pleasure but the President shall not remove a Minister
from office except in accordance with the advice of the
Prime Minister.
(10) If the office of the Prime Minister before the
general elections, the House of Elders shall convene
and appoint a new Prime Minister from the party with
majority membership in the House of Representatives.
The Speaker of the House of Representatives shall act
Prime Minister pending the appointment of a new
Prime Minister.
(11) The new Prime Minister shall, not later than 2
weeks taking the oath of office as Prime Minister,
appoint new Ministers of the Government of the
Federation.
(12) where a Prime Minister is pursuant to clause,
the Electoral commission shall not later than 3 months
from the date of the appointment of the Prime Minister
conduct a general election.

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Attorney-General of the Federation

60. (1) There shall be an Attorney-General of the
Federation, who shall be the chief law officer and the
chief prosecutor of Nigeria and shall be appointed by
the Prime Minister on the advice of the National
Judicial Commission.
(2) A person shall not be qualified to hold or
perform the functions of the office of Attorney-General
of the Federation unless he is qualified to practice as a
barrister and solicitor of the Supreme Court of Nigeria
has been so qualified for not less than fifteen years.
(3) There shall be a Deputy Attorney-General of
the Federation, who shall be the assistant Chief
Prosecutor of the Nigeria and shall be appointed by the
Prime Minister on the advice of the National Judicial
Commission.
(4) A person shall not be qualified to hold or
perform the functions of the office of Deputy Attorney-
General of the Federation unless he is qualified to
practice as barrister and solicitor of the Supreme Court
of Nigeria has been so qualified for not less than twelve
years.
(5) If the person holding the office of Attorney
General is for any reasons unable to perform the
functions conferred upon him by this Constitution or
any other law, those functions shall be performed by

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the Deputy Attorney General or any other officer in the

office of the attorney General.
(6) Where the Office of the Attorney General
becomes vacant by reasons of incapacitation,
resignation death or removal in accordance with the
provision of Section _ of this constitution, the Prime
Minister shall on the advice of the National Judicial
Commission appoint a person to the office of Attorney
General within 3 weeks of the office becoming vacant.
The Deputy Attorney General, or where the Deputy is
unable to act, the most senior officer in the office of the
Attorney General shall act in place of the Attorney
General until a substantive Attorney General is
appointed.

Removal of the Attorney General

61. The Attorney General or Deputy Attorney may
only be removed from office by reasons of
incapacitation or gross misconduct.

62. A notice for the removal of the Attorney

General or the Deputy Attorney General stating
reasons for removal must be adopted by a simple
majority vote of the House Elders and the House of
Representatives and then delivered to the National
Judicial Commission for investigation.

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63. A copy of the notice must also be served on

the Attorney General or Deputy Attorney General.

64. The National Judicial Commission, shall in the

course of its investigation, invite the Attorney General
or Deputy Attorney General to the hearing for
investigation of the allegations contained in the notice
and may invite any persons, bodies or organizations to
make presentations at the hearing.

65. After the hearing, determine the veracity or

otherwise of the allegations against the Attorney
General or the Deputy Attorney General and where it is
determined that the allegation have not been proven,
the Attorney General or Deputy Attorney General shall
be deemed exculpated from the allegations and the
decision of the National Judicial Commission shall be
final.

66. Where the National Judicial Commission

determines that the allegations have been duly proven,
it recommends to the Prime Minister, the appropriate
punishment to be adopted, which may include
dismissal or suspension from office for period of not
more than 3months.

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Establishment of Council of Ministers

67. (1) There shall be a Council of Ministers for the
Federation, whose function shall be to advise the
President in the government of the Federation, and
which shall consist of the Prime Minister and such other
persons, being Ministers of the Government of the
Federation, as the President, acting in accordance with
the advice of the Prime Minister, may from time to time
appoint.
(2) A person appointed as a member of the Council of
Ministers shall vacate his seat in the Council if he ceases
to be a Minister of the Government of the Federation
or if the President, acting in accordance with the advice
of the Prime Minister, so directs.

Collective responsibility
68. (1) The Council of Ministers shall be collectively
responsible to Parliament for any advice given to the
President by or under the general authority of the
Council and for all things done by or under the
authority of any Minister of the Government of the
Federation in the execution of his office.

69. The Prime Minister, may assign to any other

Minister of the Government of the Federation
responsibility for any business of the Government of

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the Federation, including the administration of any

department of government.

Performance of functions of Prime Minister during

absence or illness
70. (1) Whenever the Prime Minister is absent from
Nigeria or is by reason of illness unable to perform the
functions conferred upon him by his Constitution, the
President may authorize some other member of the
Council of Ministers of the Federation to perform those
functions (other than the functions conferred by this
section) and that member may perform those functions
until his authority is revoked by the President.
(2) The powers of the President under this section shall
be exercised by him in accordance with the advice of
the Prime Minister: Provided that if the President
considers that it is impracticable to obtain the advice
of the Prime Minister owing to his absence or illness he
may exercise those powers without that advice.

President to be informed concerning matters of

government
71. The Prime Minister shall keep the President
fully informed concerning the general conduct of the
government of the Federation and shall furnish the
President with such information as he may request with

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respect to any particular mater relating to the

government of the Federation.

Oaths to be taken by Ministers, etc.

72. A member of the Council of Ministers, Minister
of the Government of the Federation or Parliamentary
Secretary to such a Minister shall not enter upon the
duties of his office unless he has taken and subscribed
the oath of allegiance and such oath for the due
execution of his office as may be prescribed by
Parliament.

Permanent Secretaries
73. Where any Minister of the Government of the
Federation has been charged with responsibility for any
department of government, he shall exercise general
direction and control over that department; and,
subject to such direction and control, the department
shall be under the supervision of a permanent
secretary, whose office shall be an office in the public
service of the Federation: Provided that two or more
government departments may be placed under the
supervision of one permanent secretary.

Delegation of executive authority of Region

74. (1) The Head of Government of a Region may,
with the consent of the President, entrust either

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conditionally or unconditionally to the President or to

any officer or authority of the Federation functions in
relation to any mater to which the executive authority
of the Region extends.
(2) A law enacted by the legislature of a Region may
include provision conferring powers or imposing
duties, or authorising the conferring of powers or the
imposition of duties, upon the President or any officer
or authority of the Federation: Provided that no
provision made in pursuance of this subsection shall
have effect unless the President has consented to its
having effect.

Prerogative of mercy
75. (1) The President may -
(a) grant to any person concerned in or convicted
of any offence created by or under an Act of Parliament
a pardon, either free or subject to lawful conditions;
(b) grant to any person a respite, either indefinite
or for a specified period, of the execution of any
punishment imposed on that person for such an
offence;
(c) substitute a less severe form of punishment for
any punishment imposed on that person for such an
offence; or(d) remit the whole or any part of any
punishment imposed on that person for such an

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offence or of any penalty or forfeiture otherwise due to

the State on account of such an offence.
(2) Subject to the provisions of subsection (3) of this
section, the powers of the President under subsection
(1) of this section shall be exercised by him in
accordance with the advice of such member of the
Council of Ministers as may from time to time be
designated in that behalf by the President, acting in
accordance with the advice of the Prime Minister.

Public prosecutions
76. (1) There shall be a Director of Public
Prosecutions for the Federation, whose office shall be
an office in the public service of the Federation and
shall serve in the office of Attorney General of the
Federation.
(2) The Director of Public Prosecutions of the
Federation shall, under the direction of Attorney
General have power in any case in which he considers
it desirable so to do -
(a) to institute and undertake criminal
proceedings against any person before any court of law
in Nigeria other than a court martial in respect of any
offence created by or under any Act of Parliament;
(b) to take over and continue any such criminal
proceedings that may have been instituted by any
other person or authority; and

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(c) to discontinue at any stage before judgment is

delivered any such criminal proceedings instituted or
undertaken by himself or any other person or authority.
(3) The powers of the Director of Public
Prosecution under this section may be exercised by the
Attorney General in person and through the Director of
Public Prosecutions of the Federation acting under and
in accordance with the general or special instructions
of the Attorney-General, and through other officers
that the Attorney General may designate.
(4) The Attorney-General of the Federation may
confer a general or special authority upon the
Attorney-General of a Region to exercise, subject to
such conditions and exceptions as he may think fit, any
of the powers conferred upon him by this section in
relation to prosecutions in that Region and may vary or
revoke any such authority.
(5) The powers conferred upon the Attorney-
General of the Federation by this section shall be
vested in him to the exclusion of any other person or
authority: Provided that, where any other person or
authority has instituted criminal proceedings, nothing
in this subsection shall prevent the withdrawal of those
proceedings by or at the instance of that person or
authority at any stage before the person against whom
the proceedings have been instituted has been
charged before the court.

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(6) In the exercise of the powers conferred upon

him by this section the Attorney-General of the
Federation shall not be subject to the direction or
control of any other person or authority.
(7) For the purposes of this section any appeal
from any determination in any criminal proceedings
before any court of law or any case stated, or question
of law reserved for the purposes of any such
proceedings to any other court or to The President in
Council shall be deemed to be part of those
proceedings.
(8) The provisions of this section shall apply–
(a) in relation to any offence created by or under
any law in force in the Federal Capital Territory;
(b) any offence created by the Act of the House of
Representatives; and
(c) any offence created by the Legislative Houses
of the Region, in respect of which no prosecution has
been commenced by the Legislative House of the
Region.

CHAPTER VII: POLICE

Establishment of Nigeria Police Service

77. (1) There shall be a police Service for Nigeria, which
shall be styled the Federal Police Service.

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(2) Subject to the provisions of this Constitution,

the Federal Police Service shall be organised and
administered in accordance with such provision as may
be made in that behalf by House of Representatives.
(3) Subject to the provisions of this Constitution,
the members of the Federal Police Service shall have
such powers and duties as it relates to the enforcement
offences and laws created by the House of
Representatives, and on the invitation of the
Government of the Region, enforcement of offences
created by the laws of a Region.
(4) Subject to the provisions of this section, there
shall be a police Service for each Region, which shall be
created by the constitution of the Region and shall be
responsible for the enforcement of law and orders in
the Region and enforcement of laws made by the
Legislative Houses of the Region.
(5) subject to the provisions of the constitution of
the Region, the Governor of the Region may invite the
Federal Police Service to enforce laws created by the
Legislative House of the Region or to carry out law
enforcement duties within the territory of the Region.

Control of Federal Police Service

78. (1) There shall be an Inspector-General in
charge of the Federal Police Service, whose offices shall
be offices in the public service of the Federation. (2) The

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Prime Minister or such other Minister of the

Government of the Federation as may be authorised in
that behalf by the Prime Minister may give to the
Inspector-General of the Nigeria Police such directions
with respect to the maintaining and securing of public
safety and public order as he may consider necessary
and the Inspector-General shall comply with those
directions or cause them to be complied with.
(3) There shall be such other offices in the Federal
Police Service, as the House of Representatives may
deem necessary for the effective running of the Federal
Police Service.

CHAPTER VIII: COURTS

Part 1: The Supreme Court of Nigeria Establishment

of the Supreme Court
79. (1) There shall be a Supreme Court of Nigeria.
(2) The justices of the Supreme Court shall be –
(a) the Chief Justice of Nigeria; and
(b) such number of Justices of the Supreme Court
(not being less than
7) as may be prescribed by the House of
Representatives.

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(3) The Supreme Court shall be a superior court of

record and, save as otherwise provided by Parliament,
shall have all the powers of such a court.
(4) The Supreme Court shall sit in the Federal
territory and in such other places in Nigeria as the Chief
Justice of Nigeria may appoint. Appointment of Chief
Justice of Nigeria and Justice of the Supreme Court.

80. (1) The Chief Justice of Nigeria and the Justices

of the Supreme Court shall be appointed by the Prime
Minister on the advice of the National Judicial Council.
(2) A person shall not be qualified to hold the
office of Chief Justice of Nigeria or a Justice of the
Supreme Court unless he is or has been called to the
Nigerian Bar and has remained qualified to practice as
a legal practitioner in Nigeria for not less than fifteen
years; or
(3) If the office of Chief Justice of Nigeria is vacant
or if the person holding the office is for any reason
unable to perform the functions of the office, then, until
a person has been appointed to and has assumed the
functions of that office or until the person holding the
office has resumed those functions, as the case may be,
those functions shall be performed by the most senior
Justice of the Supreme Court until a new Chief Justice
is designated by the Prime Minister on the advice of
the National Judicial Council. (4) The Prime Minister

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shall from time to time on the advice of the National

Judicial Council appoint persons into the office of
Justices of the Supreme Court to fill up vacancies that
may have been created by the death, removal from
office or retirement of Justices of the Supreme Court.

81. (1) Subject to the provisions of this section, a

person holding the office of Chief Justice of Nigeria or
a Justice of the Supreme Court shall vacate that office
when he attains such age as may be prescribed by
House of Representatives: Provided that the Prime
Minister, may permit a Justice to continue in office for
such period after attaining that age as may be
necessary to enable him to deliver judgment or to do
any other thing in relation to proceedings that were
commenced before him before he attained that age.

Original Jurisdiction of the Supreme Court

82. The Supreme Court shall, to the exclusion of
any other court, have original jurisdiction in any dispute
between the Federation and a Region or between
Regions if and in so far as that dispute involves any
question (whether of law or fact) on which the
existence or extent of a legal right depends.

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Questions as to interpretation of this Constitution

83. (1) Where any question as to the interpretation
of this Constitution in any proceedings in any court of
law in any part of Nigeria and the court is of opinion
that the question involves a substantial question of law,
the court may, and shall if any party to the proceedings
so requests, refer the question to Regional Supreme
Court having jurisdiction in that part of Nigeria and the
Regional Supreme Court shall –
(a) if it is of opinion that the question involves a
substantial interpretation of this constitution, refer the
question to the Supreme Court; or
(b) if it is of opinion that the question does not
involve a substantial interpretation of the constitution,
remit the question to the court that made the reference
to be disposed of in accordance with such directions as
the Regional Supreme Court think fit to give.
(c) Where any question is referred to the Supreme
Court in pursuance of this section, the Supreme Court
shall give its decision upon the question and the court
in which the question arose shall dispose of the case in
accordance with that decision.

Appeals to the Supreme Court from High Courts

84. (1) The Supreme Court shall have jurisdiction,
to the exclusion of any other court of law in Nigeria, to

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hear and determine appeals from the Supreme Court

of a Region.
(2) An appeal shall lie from decisions of the Supreme
Court of a Region to the Supreme Court as of right:
(b) where the ground of appeal involves the issues
of fundamental rights or the right of peoples in any
part of Nigeria;
(c) where the mater appealed includes a sentence
of imprisonment for life; (d) decision on any civil or
commercial dispute where the total amount claimed or
awarded by the court is not less than
N100,000,000,000.00 or any amount prescribed by the
Chief Justice of Nigeria from time to time;
(e) where the mater appealed is between any
person and the Government of the Region; (f) such
other cases as may be prescribed by any law in the rules
to be enacted by the Chief Justice of Nigeria: Provided
that nothing in paragraph (a) of this subsection shall
confer any right of appeal –
(i) from any order made ex parte;
(ii) from any order relating only to costs; or
(iii) from any order made with the consent of the
parties.
(3) Any right of appeal to the Supreme Court from
the decisions of the
Supreme Court of the Region conferred by this section-

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(a) shall be exercisable in the case of civil

proceedings at the instance of a party thereto or, with
the leave of the High Court or the Supreme Court, at
the instance of any other person having an interest in
the mater and in the case of criminal proceedings at
the instance of an accused person.

The Federal High Court

85. (1) There shall be a Federal High Court for
Nigeria, (2) The judges of the Federal High Court shall
be -
(a) the Chief Judge of the Federal High Court; and
(b) such number of Judges of the Federal High
Court as may be prescribed by the House of
Representatives.
(3) The Prime Minister shall appoint the judges of
the Federal High Court on the advice of the National
Judicial Council.
(4) A person shall not be qualified to be appointed
as a judge of the Federal High Court unless he is
qualified to practice law in Nigeria and has been so
qualified for not less than ten years.
(5) The Federal High Court shall be a superior
court of record and, save as otherwise provided by
Parliament, shall have all the powers of such a court.
(6) The Federal High Court shall have Judicial
Divisions in all Regions of Nigeria and in such places as

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the Chief Judge of the Federal High Court may

prescribe.
(7) The Federal High Court shall be duly
constituted by one Judge of the Federal High Court.
(8) The Federal High Court shall have jurisdiction
throughout the territory of Nigeria to determine issues
relating to aviation, maritime, customs and excise and
the enforcement of any laws made by the House of
Representatives.

86. The Federal High Court shall have exclusive

jurisdiction in the trial of criminal offences committed
within the territory of more than one Region and
offences bothering on treason, offences committed in
Airplanes, Airports and waterways in Nigeria.

87. An appeal shall lie from the decision of the

Federal High Court to the Federal Court of Appeal in all
cases except in ex parte decisions, consent judgments
and decisions relating to cost.

Federal Court of Appeal

88. (1) There shall be a Federal Court of Appeal for
Nigeria. (2) The justices of the Federal High Court shall
be -
(a) the President of the Federal Court of Appeal;
and

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(b) such number of Justices of the Federal Court of

Appeal as may be prescribed by the House of
Representatives.
(3) The Prime Minister shall appoint Justices of the
Federal Court of Appeal on the advice of the National
Judicial Council.
(4) A person shall not be qualified to be appointed
as a Justice of the Federal Court of Appeal unless he is
qualified to practice law in Nigeria and has been so
qualified for not less than twelve years.
(5) The Federal Court of Appeal shall be a superior
court of record and, save as otherwise provided by
Parliament, shall have all the powers of such a court.
(6) The Federal Court of Appeal may sit anywhere
in Nigeria and may be divided into such divisions as the
House of Representatives may prescribe.
(7) The Federal Court of Appeal shall be duly
constituted by three Justices of the Federal Court of
Appeal.
(8) The Federal Court of Appeal shall have jurisdiction
to hear appeals from the Federal High Court. Provided
that no appeal shall lie where issue appealed relates to
consent judgment of parties.

89. (1) The Supreme Court shall have jurisdiction,

to the exclusion of any other court of law in Nigeria, to

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hear and determine appeals from the Federal Court of

Appeal.
(2) An appeal shall lie from decisions of the Federal
Court of Appeal to the Supreme Court
(b) where the ground of appeal involves the issues
of fundamental rights or the right of peoples in any
part of Nigeria;
(c) where the mater appealed include
imprisonment for more than 3 years of any citizens;
(c) decision on any civil or commercial dispute
where the total amount claimed or awarded by the
court is not less than N100,000,000.00 or any amount
prescribed by the Chief Justice of Nigeria from time to
time;
(d) decisions in any civil or criminal proceedings
on questions as to whether any of the provisions of
Chapter III of this Constitution has been contravened in
relation to any person;
(e) such other cases as may be prescribed by any law in
the rules to be enacted by the Chief
Justice of Nigeria: Provided that nothing in
paragraph (a) of this subsection shall confer any right
of appeal –
(i) from interlocutory matter;
(ii) from any order relating only to costs;
(iii) from any order made with the consent of the
parties; or

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Part 2: Courts of the Region

The Regional Supreme Court

90. (1) There shall be a Supreme Court for each
Region.
(2) The judges of the Supreme Court of the Region
shall be - (a) the Chief Judge of the Region; and
(b) such number of judges (not being less than five) as
may be
prescribed by legislative Houses of the Regions.
(3) The Supreme Court of the Regions shall be a
superior court of record and, save as otherwise
provided by legislative houses of the Regions, shall
have all the powers of such a court.
(4) The Supreme Court of the Regions shall sit
within the territory of the Regions. Appointment of
Chief Judge of the Region and Judges of the Supreme
Courts of the Region

91. (1) The Chief Judges of the Region and the

Judges of the Supreme Court of the Region shall be
appointed by the Head of Government of the Region
on the advice of the Regional Judicial Commission.
(2) A person shall not be qualified to hold the office of
Chief Judge of a Region or a Judge of the Supreme
Court of a Region unless he is or has been called to the

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Nigerian Bar and has remained qualified to practice as

a legal practitioner in Nigeria for not less than 10 years.
Vacancy in the office of the Chief of a Region

92. If the office of Chief Judge of a Region is vacant

or if the person holding the office is for any reasons
unable to perform the functions of the office, then, until
a person has been appointed to and has assumed the
functions of that office or until the person holding the
office has resumed those functions, as the case may be,
those functions shall be performed by the most senior
Judge of the Supreme Court of the Region until a new
Chief Judge is designated by the Governor of the
Region on the advice of the Regional Judicial Council.

93. The Head of Government of the Region shall

from time to time on the advice of the Regional Judicial
Commission appoint persons into the office of Justices
of the Supreme Court of the Region to fill up vacancies
that may have been created by the death, removal from
office or retirement of Justices of the Supreme Court.

94. (1) Subject to the provisions of this section, a

person holding the office of Chief Judge of a Region
or a Justice of the Supreme Court of a Region shall
vacate that office when he attains such age as may be
prescribed by the Legislative House of the Region:

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Provided that the Governor, may permit a judge to

continue in office for such period after attaining that
age as may be necessary to enable him to deliver
judgment or to do any other thing in relation to
proceedings that were commenced before him before
he attained that age. (2) A person holding the office of
Chief Judge of a Region or a Judge of the Supreme
Court may be removed from office by the Governor of
a Region if – (a) there are presented to the Regional
Judicial Council an address from the Legislative House
of the Region praying that that person be so removed
for inability to discharge the functions of the office in
question (whether arising from infirmity of mind or
body or any other cause) or for misbehavior; and
(b) the address from the Legislative House bears a
certificate which is signed by the person who presided
at the meeting of that House at which at which the
motion for the address was passed and which states
that not less than two-thirds of all the members of that
House voted in favour of the motion;
(c) Upon receipt of the address, the Regional
Judicial Council shall cause the allegation to be
investigated and may invite the judicial officer to
appear before it to defend the allegation contained in
the address and where the allegations are duly proved
the judicial officer shall vacate the office.

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Regional Court of Appeal

95. (1) There shall be a Court of Appeal for each
Region,
(2) The justices of the Court of Appeal for each
Region shall be -
(a) the President of the Regional Court of Appeal;
and
(b) such number of Justices of the Court of Appeal
as may be prescribed by the Legislative Houses of the
Regions.
(3) The Governor shall appoint Justices of the
Regional Court of Appeal on the advice of the Regional
Judicial Council.
(4) A person shall not be qualified to be appointed
as a Judge of the Regional Court of Appeal unless he is
qualified to practice law in Nigeria and has been so
qualified for not less than twelve years.
(5) The Regional Court of Appeal shall be a
superior court of record and, save as otherwise
provided by Legislative Houses of the Region, shall
have all the powers of such a court.
(6) The Regional Court of Appeal may sit
anywhere within the Region and shall hear appeals
from the Regional High Court
(7) The Regional Court of Appeal shall be duly
constituted by three Justices of the Regional Court of
Appeal.

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96. (1) The Regional Supreme Court shall have

jurisdiction, to the exclusion of any other court of law
in Nigeria, to hear and determine appeals from the
Regional Court of Appeal.
Provided that nothing in paragraph (a) of this
subsection shall confer any right of appeal –
(i) from any interlocutory decision;
(ii) from any order relating only to costs;
(iii) from any order made with the consent of the
parties; or

High Courts of the Region

97. (1) There shall be a High Court for each Region
of Nigeria, (2) The judges of the Regional High Court
shall be -
(a) the Head Judge of the High Court; and
(b) such number of Judges of the High Court as
may be prescribed by the Legislative Houses of the
Region.
(3) The Governor shall appoint the judges of the
High Court on the advice of the Regional Judicial
Council.
(4) A person shall not be qualified to be appointed
as a judge of the High Court of a Region unless he is
qualified to practice law in Nigeria and has been so
qualified for not less than ten years.

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(3) The Regional High Court shall be a superior

court of record and, save as otherwise provided by
Parliament, shall have all the powers of such a court.
(4) The Regional High Court shall have Judicial
Divisions in cities of the Region and in such places as
the House of Representatives may prescribe. (5) The
Regional High Court shall be duly constituted by one
Judge of the Regional High Court.
(6) The Regional High Court shall have jurisdiction
throughout the territory of the Region on all maters
subject to the provisions of this Constitution, the
constitution of the Region or any other law by the
Houses of Assembly of the Region.

Part 4: General Establishment of courts

98. The House of Representatives may establish
inferior courts of record for the Federal Capital territory
or any part of the territory of Nigeria for the
enforcement of any law enacted by the House of
Representatives.

99. The Legislative Houses of the Regions may

establish inferior courts of record for the Region or any
part of the territory of Nigeria for the enforcement of
any law enacted by the House of Representatives.

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100. No judicial officer shall enter upon the duties

of his office unless he has taken and subscribed the
oath of allegiance and such oath for the due execution
of his office as may be prescribed by Parliament.

Armed Forces of the Federation

101. (1) There shall be an armed force for the
Federation which shall consist of an army, a navy, an Air
Force and such other branches of the armed forces of
the Federation as may be established by an Act of the
National House of Representatives.
(2) The Federation shall, subject to an Act of the House
of Representatives| made in that behalf, equip and
maintain the armed forces as may be considered
adequate and effective for the purpose of -
(a) defending Nigeria from external aggression;
(b) maintaining its territorial integrity and securing
its borders from violation on land, sea, or air;
(c) suppressing insurrection and acting in aid of
civil authorities to restore order when called upon to
do so by the President acting on the advice of the
Prime Minister, but subject to such conditions as may
be prescribed by an Act of the House of
Representatives; and
(d) performance of such other functions as may be
prescribed by an Act of the House of Representatives.

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102. (1) The powers of the President as the

Commissioner-in-Chief of the Armed Forces of the
Federation shall include power to determine the
operational use of the armed forces of the Federation,
acting at all time at the advice of the Prime Minister.
(2) The powers conferred on the President by
subsection (1) of this section shall include power to
appoint, on the advice of the Prime Minister, the Chief
of Defence staff, the Chief of Army Staff, the Chief of
Naval Staff, the Chief of Air Staff and heads of any other
branches of the armed forces of the Federation as may
be established by an Act of the National Assembly. (3)
The House of Representatives shall have power to
make laws for the regulation of -
(a) the powers exercisable by the President as
Commander-in-Chief of the Armed Forces of the
Federation; and
(b) the appointment, promotion and disciplinary
control of members of the armed forces of the
Federation.

103. (1) The Federation shall establish and maintain

adequate facilities for carrying into effect any Act of the
House of Representatives providing for compulsory
military training or military service for citizens of
Nigeria.

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(2) Until an Act of the House of Representatives is made

in that behalf the President on the advice of the Prime
Minister may maintain adequate facilities in any
secondary or post-secondary educational institution in
Nigeria for giving military training in any such
institution which desires to have the training.

CHAPTER IX: FINANCE

Part 1: Public funds of the Federation Establishment

of Consolidated Revenue Fund
104 (1) All revenues or other moneys raised or received
by the Federation (not being revenues or other moneys
payable under this Constitution or any Act of
Parliament into some other public fund of the
Federation established for a specific purpose) shall be
paid into and form one Consolidated Revenue Fund.
(2) No moneys shall be withdrawn from the
Consolidated Revenue Fund of the Federation except
to meet expenditure that is charged upon the Fund by
this Constitution or any Act of House of
Representatives or where the issue of those moneys
has been authorised by an appropriation Act or an Act
passed in pursuance of section of this Constitution.
(3) No moneys shall be withdrawn from any public
fund of the Federation other than the Consolidated

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Revenue Fund unless the issue of those moneys has

been authorised by an Act of Parliament.
(4) No moneys shall be withdrawn from the
Consolidated Revenue Fund or any other public fund
of the Federation except in the manner prescribed by
Parliament.

Authorisation of expenditure from Consolidated

Revenue Fund
105. (1) The Minister of the Government of the
Federation responsible for finance shall cause to be
prepared and laid before both Houses of
Representatives in each financial year estimates of the
revenues and expenditure of the Federation for the
next following financial year.
(2) The heads of expenditure contained in the
estimates (other than expenditure charged upon the
Consolidated Revenue Fund by this Constitution or any
Act of House of Representatives) shall be included in a
bill, to be known as an appropriation bill, providing for
the issue from the Consolidated Revenue Fund of the
Federation of the sums necessary to meet that
expenditure and the appropriation of those sums for
the purposes specified therein.
(3) If in respect of any financial year it is found–
(a) that the amount appropriated by the
appropriation Act for any purpose is insufficient or that

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a need has arisen for expenditure for a purpose for

which no amount has been appropriated by the Act; or
(b) that any moneys have been expended for any
purpose in excess of the amount appropriated for the
purpose by the appropriation Act or for a purpose for
which no amount has been appropriated by the Act, a
supplementary estimate showing the sums required or
spent shall be laid before House of Representatives and
the heads of any such expenditure shall be included in
a supplementary appropriation bill.

Authorisation of expenditure in advance of

appropriation
106. Parliament may make provision under which,
if the appropriation Act in respect of any financial year
has not come into operation by the beginning of that
financial year, the Minister of the Government of the
Federation responsible for finance may authorise the
withdrawal of moneys from the Consolidated Revenue
Fund of the Federation for the purpose of meeting
expenditure necessary to carry on the services of the
Government until the expiration of three months from
the beginning of that financial year or the coming into
operation of the Act, whichever is the earlier.

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Contingencies Fund
107. (1) The House of Representatives may provide
for the establishment of a Contingencies Fund for the
Federation and for authorising the Minister of the
Government of the Federation responsible for finance,
if satisfied that there has arisen an urgent and
unforeseen need for expenditure for which no other
provision exists, to make advances from the Fund to
meet that need.
(2) Where any advance is made in accordance with
subsection (1) of this section a supplementary estimate
shall be presented and a supplementary appropriation
bill shall be introduced as soon as possible for the
purpose of replacing the amount so advanced.

Remuneration Judicial Officers and Other Officials

108. (1) There shall be paid to the holders of the
offices to which this section applies such salary as may
be prescribed by House of Representatives.
(2) The salary and allowances payable to the
holders of the offices to which this section applies shall
be a charge on the Consolidated Revenue Fund of the
Federation.
(3) The salary payable to the holder of any office
to which this section applies and his terms of office
other than allowances shall not be altered to his
disadvantage after his appointment.

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(4) This section applies all judges of courts created

by this constitution, member of the Electoral
commission of the Federation, Attorney General and
Deputy Attorney General of the Federation, Chairman
of the Electoral Commission.

Accountant General of the Federation

109. (1) There shall be an Accountant General of the
Federation, whose office shall be an office in the public
service of the Federation.
(2) The public accounts of the Federation and of
all officers, courts and authorities of the Federation
shall be audited and reported on by the Accountant
General of the Federation and for that purpose the
Director or any person authorised by him in that behalf
shall have access to all books, records, returns and
other documents relating to those accounts.
(3) The Accountant General of the Federation shall
submit his reports to the Minister of the Government
of the Federation
responsible for finance, who shall cause them to be laid
before both Houses of Parliament.
(4) In the exercise of his functions under this
Constitution the Accountant General of the Federation
shall not be subject to the direction or control of any
other person or authority.

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Public debt
110. (1) The public debt of the Federation shall be
secured on the revenues and assets of the Federation.
(2) In this section references to the public debt of the
Federation include references to the interest on that
debt, sinking fund payments in respect of that debt and
the costs, charges and expenses incidental to the
management of that debt.

Part 2: Allocation of Revenue Levies on Export and

Import
111. (1) Where under any Act of parliament a duty
is levied in respect of the import into Nigeria or export
out of Nigeria of any commodity the Federal
Government shall, in respect of each quarter, credit to
a special account, maintained by the Federal
Government and referred to in this Constitution (to be
called "the Distributable Pool Account)" a sum equal to
fifty per cent of the proceeds of that duty for that
quarter.
(2) For the purposes of this section the proceeds of a
duty for a quarter shall be the amount remaining from
the receipts from that duty that are collected in that
quarter after any drawbacks, refunds or other
repayments relating to those receipts have been made
or allowed for.

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Mining royalties and rents

112. (1) There shall be paid by the Federal
Government to each Region a sum equal to seventy
percent of -
(a) the proceeds of any royalty received by the
Federation in respect of any minerals extracted in that
Region; and
(b) any mining rents derived by the Federation
during that year from within that Region.
(2) The Federal Government shall credit to the
Distributable Pool Account a sum equal to twenty per
cent.
(a) the proceeds of any royalty received by the
Federation in respect of minerals extracted in any
Region; and
(b) any mining rents derived by the Federation
from within any Region. (3) For the purposes of this
section the proceeds of a royalty shall be the amount
remaining from the receipts of that royalty after any
refunds or other repayments relating to those receipts
have been deducted therefrom or allowed for.
(4) Parliament may prescribe the periods in
relation to which the proceeds of any royalty or mining
rents shall be calculated for purposes of this section.
(5) In this section "minerals" includes mineral oil.

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(6) For the purposes of this section the continental

shelf of a Region shall be deemed to be part of that
Region.

Value Added Tax

113. The House of Representatives shall pass an Act
prescribing such sum that may be chargeable on good
and services and value added tax.

114. There shall be paid by the Federal Government

to each Region a sum equal to seventy percent of the
Value added tax collected from the Region.

115. The Federal Government shall credit to the

Distributable Pool Account a sum equal to twenty
percent of the Value Added Tax Collected.

Distribution of funds in Distributable Pool Account

116. There shall be paid by the Federal Government
to the Regions an equal share of the amount standing
to the credit of the Distributable Pool Account at that
date.

117. Each Region shall in respect of each financial

year pay to the Federation an amount equal to such
part of the expenditure incurred by the Federation
during that financial year in respect of the department

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of customs and excise of the Government of the

Federation for the purpose of collecting the duties and
Value Added Tax as is proportionate to the share of the
proceeds of those duties received by that Region under
those sections in respect of that financial year.

118. (1) Any sum that is required by this Chapter to

be paid by the Federation to a Region may be set off
by the Federation in or towards the payment of any
sum that is due from that Region to the Federation in
respect of any loan made by the Federation to that
Region.
(2) The right of set-off conferred by subsection (1) of
this section shall be without prejudice to any other
right of the Federation to obtain payment of any sum
due to the Federation in respect of any loan.

Sums charged on Consolidated Revenue Funds

119. Any payments that are required by this
Chapter to be made by the Federal Government to a
Region shall be a charge on the Consolidated Revenue
Fund of the Federation and any payments that are so
required to be made by a Region to the Federation
shall be a charge on the Consolidated Revenue Fund of
that Region.

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Provisions with regard to payments

120 (1) Where any payment falls to be made under this
Part of this Chapter, the amount payable shall be
certified by the Accountant General of the Federation:
Provided that a provisional payment may be made
before the Accountant General has given his certificate.
(2) The House of Representatives may make provision
as to time and manner in which any payment falling to
be made under this Part of this Chapter shall be
effected and for the making of adjustments and
provisional payments.

CHAPTER X: THE PUBLIC SERVICE OF THE FEDERATION

Establishment of Public Service Commission

121. (1) There shall be a Public Service Commission
for the Federation, which shall consist of a chairman
and not less than two or more than four other
members.
(2) The members of the Public Service
Commission of the Federation shall be appointed by
the President, acting in accordance with the advice of
the Prime Minister.

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(3) A person shall not be qualified to hold the

office of a member of the Public Service Commission of
the Federation if he is a member
of either House of Parliament, a member of a legislative
house of a Region, a Minister of the Government of the
Federation, a Minister of the Government of a Region
or the holder of an office in the public service of the
Federation or the public service of a Region.
(4) Subject to the provisions of this section, a
member of the Public Service Commission of the
Federation shall vacate his office -
(a) at the expiration of five years from the date of
his appointment; or
(b) if any circumstances arise that, if he were not a
member of the Commission, would cause him to be
disqualified for appointment as such.
(5) A member of the Public Service Commission of
the Federation may be removed from office by the
President, acting in accordance with the advice of the
Prime Minister, for inability to discharge the functions
of his office (whether arising from infirmity of mind or
body or any other cause) or for misbehaviour.
(6) A member of the Public Service Commission of
the Federation shall not be removed from office except
in accordance with the provisions of this section.
(7) A person who has been appointed to be a
member of the Public Service Commission of the

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Federation shall not thereafter be eligible for

appointment to any office in the public service of the
Federation.

Appointment, etc., of officers in public service

122. (1) Power to appoint persons to hold or act in
offices in the public service of the Federation (including
power to make appointments on promotion and
transfer and to confirm appointments) and to dismiss
and exercise disciplinary control over persons holding
or acting in such offices shall vest in the Public Service
Commission of the Federation:
Provided that the Commission may, with the approval
of the Prime Minister and subject to such conditions as
it may think fit, delegate any of its powers under this
section to any of its members or to any officer in the
public service of the Federation.
(2) This section shall not apply in relation to any of the
following offices- (a) the office of Judge or Justice of
any court created by this Constitution; (b) except for
the purposes of making appointments thereto, the
office of the Accountant General of the Federation.
(c) any office in the Nigeria Police Force; or
Appointment, etc., of principal representatives of
Federation abroad.

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 Ralph Nwoke

123. (1) Power to appoint persons to hold or act in

the offices to which this section applies (including
power to make appointments on promotion and
transfer) and to remove persons so appointed from any
such office shall vest in the President, acting in
accordance with the advice of the Prime Minister.
(2) Before tendering any advice for the purposes
of this section in relation to any person who holds any
office in the public service of the Federation other than
an office to which this section applies, the Prime
Minister shall consult the Public Service Commission of
the Federation.
(3) The offices to which this section applies are the
offices of any Ambassador, High Commissioner or
other principal representative of the Federation in
countries other than Nigeria.

Appointment, etc., of permanent secretaries

124. (1) Power to appoint persons to hold or act in
the office of permanent secretary to any department of
government of the Federation and to remove persons
so appointed from that office shall vest in the President,
acting in accordance with the advice of the Prime
Minister.
(2) Before tendering any advice for the purposes of this
section the Prime Minister shall consult the Public
Service Commission of the Federation.

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Appointment and tenure of office Accountant

General
125. The Account General of the Federation shall be
appointed by the President on the advice of the Prime
Minister subject to reactivation by majority vote of the
House of Representatives and at least 4 legislative
Houses of the Region.

126. (1) No Person shall be appointed to the office

of the Account General of Federation, except he is a
Citizen of Nigeria and is qualified to practice as a
chartered accountant in Nigeria and has been qualified
for not less than 10 years.
(2) Subject to the provisions of this section, a
person holding the office of Accountant General of the
Federation shall vacate that office when he attains such
age asmay be prescribed by Parliament.
(3) A person holding the office of Director of Audit
of the Federation shall be removed from office by the
President if a resolution is passed by the House of
Representatives recommending his removal from office
for inability to discharge the functions of his office
(whether arising from infirmity of body or mind or any
other cause) or for misbehaviour.
(4) A person holding the office of Accountant
General of the Federation shall not be removed from

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 Ralph Nwoke

office except in accordance with the provisions of this

section.

Powers relating to Clerks of Houses of Parliament

127. Before exercising any of its powers in relation
to the Clerk to the House of Elders the Public Service
Commission of the Federation shall consult the
Chairman of the House of Elders and before exercising
any of its powers in relation to the Clerk to the House
of Representatives the Commission shall consult the
Speaker of that House.

Protection of pension rights

128. (1) Any person having retired from the public
or civil service of the Federation or the defunct states
of Nigeria prior to the coming into effect of this
constitution, not having been elected into a public
office, shall be entitled to the such pension as was due
to them prior to the enactment of this constitution.
For the purpose of section above, the Regions shall
inherit the pension liabilities of the defunct states
forming part of the Region.

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Appendix

CHAPTER XI: TRANSITIONAL PROVISIONS

Powers and procedure of Federal Commissions

129. All existing law, that is to say, all law which,
whether being a rule of law or a provision of an Act of
National Assembly, military decree being in force as an
Act of the National Assembly, or laws made by a state
House of Assembly or of any other enactment or
instrument whatsoever, is in force immediately before
the date of the commencement of this Constitution or
has been passed or made before that date and comes
into force on or after that date, shall, until that law is
altered by legislative authority having power to do so,
have effect with such modification (whether by way of
addition, alteration or omission) as may be necessary
to bring that law into conformity with this Constitution
and the Constitution of each Region.

130. Where there are laws of the defunct states of a

Region on the same subject matter, the Region
Assembly shall by Resolution supported by a simple
majority of members and published in the gazette of
the Region adopt one of the laws for Region wide
application and upon adoption all other laws on the
subject matter shall be deemed repealed by the
Regional Legislative House.

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 Ralph Nwoke

131. (1) Where no resolution is passed by the

Regional Legislative House pursuant to clause the law
latest in tine shall be deemed applicable to the whole
region until such resolution is passed.
(2) The legislative authority, for the purpose of Section
above, shall be the House of Representatives, with
respect to laws made by the National Assembly or
military decrees and the Regional House in respect of
laws made by the State Houses of Assembly.

Civil Service of the Region

132. Members of the Civil Service of the Region Civil
Service of the defunct states shall be deemed to
members of the Civil Service of the New Regions, on
the commencement of this constitution, provided that
the Region shall be at liberty to retain such member of
the Civil Service as the New Regions may deem
necessary for the operation of the Government of the
Region.

The Court
133. Subject to Section of this Constitution, the
Federal Court of Appeal shall be the successor of the
Court of appeal under the 1999 Constitution of Nigeria
and all appeals already filed before the Court of Appeal
before the commencement of this Constitution shall
continue before the Court of Appeal and appeal

385
Appendix

therefrom shall proceed to the Supreme Court of

Nigeria.

134. All proceedings commenced before the

commencement of this constitution, which by virtue of
this constitution or any Act of the House of
Representatives or the Legislative Houses of the
Region, should have been commenced before any
other court, shall continue in such court where the
proceeding was commenced as if duly filed before that
Court.

Region of Origin
135. Every Nigerian shall be deemed an indigene of
the Region of his birth and shall be accorded every
right of an indigene of that Region. Provided that upon
the attainment of the age of 18, anyone may be
declaration sworn before a magistrate adopt of the
Region where is father was born as his Region of Origin.

136. Anyone born to a Nigerian father outside the

shore of Nigeria shall be an indigene of the Region of
his father.

137. Anyone born to Nigerian mother, not having a

Nigerian Father, shall be an indigene of the Region of
his mother.

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 Ralph Nwoke

138. Every Nigerian shall be deemed to be an

indigene of any region where he has lived in and paid
tax for three years.

387
388
 Index
Addis Ababa, 388 Adeleke, 325
Abacha, 94, 142, 158, 161, Ademola, 267, 272
172, 189, 190, 228, 231, 232, Adenije-Adele, 273
233, 234, 235, 236, 237, 238, Adeniji-Adele, 267, 268, 272,
239, 241, 242, 249, 263, 265, 273, 274
268, 272, 273, 289, 290, 301, Adesanya, 159
415, 448 Adesina, 291
Abadina, 74, 75 Adetoun, Ix
Abdulsalami, 158, 162, 238, Adewusi, 76
243, 249, 322 Adhere, 372
Abia, 113, 180, 340 Adjourn, 505
Abiodun, 304 Aeinstein, 379
Abiola, 68, 69, 93, 117, 159, Afenifere, 159, 160, 163, 242,
231, 238, 241, 243, 249, 265, 243, 269, 272, 273, 274, 284,
434, 448 293, 343
Abraham, 159 Affray, xlix
Abubakar, 168, 212, 238, 241, Afolabi, xii
246, 304, 353, 424 Afolarin, x
Abuja, 147, 258, 267, 271, 451 Africa, 64, 67, 77, 319, 335,
Aburi, 183, 184 388, 392, 417, 419
ACN, 70, 282, 302, 303, 304, African, 66, 140, 346, 386,
312 388, 402, 418, 419
Adagun, xlviii Africans, 82, 120
Adamawa, 137, 169, 199, 202, Afrobeat, xli
246, 432 Agbaje, 281, 284, 326
Adams, 116 Agbalumo, 237
Adamu, 222 Agege, xxxv, xlviii
Adanla, 362 Agenda, 117, 211, 220, 234,
Addendum, Viii, 416 260, 343, 345, 390, 400, 401,
Ade, lxi 403, 427, 437, 440, 442, 443,
Adebanjo, 278 449
Adedibu, 158 Agitation, 174, 234, 256, 336,
Adedun, 358 383
Adegboruwa, xxxvi Aguiyi, 183, 196, 201, 204

389
Index

Ahmadu, 128, 132, 141, 142, Apartheid, 64, 388, 392

296, 421, 424, 429 APC, 70, 164, 261, 263, 282,
Ahmed, 94, 95, 163, 164, 166, 283, 284, 302, 304, 307, 311,
180, 263, 264, 266, 267, 268, 312, 329, 447
270, 271, 274, 275, 276, 281, Apoplexy, 302
315, 354 Appeals, 539, 544, 550, 551,
Airin, 100 578
Aisha, xxxiii Aregbesola, 446
Ajibola, x Aremu, 216, 448
Akande, 160, 271, 272, 325, Arewa, 129, 196, 250, 430, 442
439, 446 Arisekola, 158
Akenzua, 184 Aristocracy, 210, 218, 248,
Akin, 129, 132, 192, 347 403, 419, 421
Akinlami, 367 Aristocratic, 200, 321
Akure, 399 Aristocrats, 210
Alaba, 82 Army, 89, 110, 136, 137, 138,
Alao, 158 140, 146, 153, 169, 193, 194,
Alausa, xxxiii, xxxv, xlviii, l, lv 195, 199, 200, 202, 230, 248,
Albatross, 252 297, 553
Alhaji, 166, 246, 272, 273 Asa, l
Al-Islam, 126 Asaba, 153
Aliyu, 229 Asian, 365
Allah, 300 Asians, xxxviii
Ally, 279 Assimilation, 402, 421
Aluta, 79 ASUU, 99, 100, 101, 105
America, 66, 120, 121, 210, Ataoja, 305
329 Ateke, 115
American, 120, 121, 189, 196, Atiku, 241, 246, 247, 249, 250,
202, 379 258, 263, 353
Americans, 120 Attorney, 105, 520
Anambra, 324, 340 Attorney-General, 105
Anarchy, 330 Audu, 304, 305
Anglo-Saxon, 120 Avian, 362
Annulment, 68, 69, 93, 117 Awodi, l
Antediluvian, xv, xlv Awoist, 325
Anti-Corruption, 181 Awoists, 163, 268, 277, 278
Anti-Igbo, 197

390
 Index

Awolowo, 135, 156, 185, 205, Beast, lv

221, 223, 224, 249, 265, 266, Beleaguered, 351
271, 275, 276, 277, 278, 279, Bello, 128, 132, 141, 142, 296,
325, 446 305, 422, 424, 429
Ayo, 305 Benue, 127, 168, 298, 319,
Azikiwe, 135, 198 342, 349, 399, 401, 423, 432
Baba, 117, 359 Beroms, 423
Baba Enikan Ii, 117 Bestialities, xxxvii
Babafemi, 204 Biafra, 145
Babangida, 80, 97, 98, 99, 103, Biafran, 111, 340
104, 105, 106, 108, 110, 142, Bilateral, 345
157, 172, 216, 226, 227, 228, Bill Of Right, 255, 256
229, 230, 232, 233, 235, 236, Bill Of Rights, 256
237, 239, 247, 274, 288, 289, Binokonu, 160
290, 292, 300, 301, 440 Bird, 362, 363
Babatunde, 270 Birdcage, 362
Badamasi, 97, 103 Birth, 94, 120, 123, 131, 136,
Badamosi, 80 165, 167, 186, 192, 226, 232,
Bakare, 217 261, 308, 309, 324, 336, 366,
Bako, 224 406, 417, 445, 456, 460, 461,
Balewa, 168, 199, 203, 212, 462, 463, 481, 579
222 Bornu, 125, 168, 319
Ballot, 489 Boycotts, 375
Bamaiyi, 173 Brahman, 379
Banditry, 102 Brigadier, 224
Bandits, 114, 342, 402, 404, Brigandage, 175
412 Brinksmanship, 355
Bangladesh, 133 Britain, 133
Barewa, 200, 210 British, 91, 121, 122, 124, 126,
Barracks, 85 127, 128, 129, 130, 131, 132,
Barrel, 280 133, 134, 135, 141, 151, 154,
Barrister, 519, 520 167, 168, 170, 177, 182, 183,
Base, 119, 237, 301, 429 188, 196, 202, 205, 207, 295,
Bauchi, 137, 169, 202 319, 321, 335, 400, 428
Bayelsa, 399 Brother-In-Law, 267, 272
Bayo, xii Brutal, 93, 233, 237, 311
BBC, 291

391
Index

Brutally, 69, 77, 81, 146, 220, Candidate, 138, 222, 224, 244,
233, 234, 235, 277 263, 268, 304, 306, 327
Bryan, 371 Cannibalised, 258
Buba, 154 Cannibalistic, 348
Buhari, 69, 70, 71, 95, 96, 104, Cantonment, 215
138, 143, 162, 164, 170, 171, Capital, 153, 470
181, 188, 217, 224, 225, 226, Caravanners, 419
234, 247, 259, 261, 262, 263, Cardinal, 335, 374
264, 265, 270, 275, 279, 283, Cards, 262
284, 286, 287, 288, 289, 290, Cashcow, 235
291, 292, 301, 302, 303, 306, Casualties, 244
309, 328, 329, 350, 398, 399, Cataclysmic, 407
400, 403, 422, 426, 427, 433, Central, 117, 149, 153, 183,
439, 443, 444 238, 261, 342, 418, 423
Buharididirin, 70 Central Beneficiary, 238
Buharist, 70 Central Body, 153
Bukola, 302 Central Government, 183
Bulwark, 430 Central Hegemony, 149
Buratai, Lvi, Lvii Central Idea, xxv
Bureaucrats, 210 Central Proverbs, 117
Burgeoning, xxxviii, 355 Centrepiece, 295
Burma, 133 Centuries-Old, 202, 207
Bwari, 267 Chairman, 272, 290, 491, 492,
Bylaw, 469, 478 498, 568
Bypassing, 300 Chairmanship, 160
Cabinet, 300, 443 Charters, 385
Cable, Xx Cheated, 258
Cadres, 212, 390 Check, 105, 110, 152, 207
Cadreship, 390 Chicanery, 305
Calabar, 340 Chief, 179, 448, 519
Caliphate, 127, 319, 421 Chief Arranger, 448
Cameroon, 168, 319, 432 Chief Of Staff, 179
Campaign, 205, 221, 241 Chief Prosecutor, 519
Canaan, 396 Chief Protagonists, xvii
Cancer, 144 Chiefs, 115, 154, 340, 345
Candidacy, 224, 263, 305, 326 Child, 129, 137, 305
Childhood, 78, 80

392
 Index

Childhood Crush, 78 470, 471, 483, 491, 493, 539,

Childhood Home, 78 540, 544, 545, 554, 575
Children, 75, 127, 128, 129, Civil Process, 483
139, 170, 172, 437 Civil Right, 83, 314, 328, 470,
Chinese, 120 471
Choice, 71, 86, 116, 136, 159, Civil Rights, 83, 314, 328, 470,
194, 205, 215, 224, 229, 244, 471
251, 263, 292, 337, 360, 387, Civil Service, 145, 155, 194,
397, 405, 448, 468, 473 493, 575
Chukwumerije, 117, 234 Civil Society, 330, 345
Church, 316, 318, 437, 447 Civil War, 98, 144, 145, 146,
Ciroma, 222 152, 172, 184, 186, 197, 208,
Citizen, 178, 189, 333, 355, 211, 214, 217, 233, 250, 298,
456, 457, 458, 460, 461, 462, 331, 337, 383, 398, 404
463, 479, 480, 481, 487, 488, Civilian, 105, 143, 293, 322
495 Civilians, lvii
Citizenry, 331, 371 Civilisation, 359, 436
Citizens, 76, 77, 80, 81, 82, 83, CJN, 311
92, 123, 154, 179, 181, 186, Clad, 361
209, 232, 256, 280, 312, 314, Clerics, 295, 299, 300, 327,
324, 335, 343, 348, 351, 365, 419, 426, 429, 430, 436, 438
366, 456, 463, 466, 476, 480, Clerk, 502, 503, 574
481, 491, 544, 556 Clerks, 502, 503, 574
Citizenship, 69, 104, 111, 112, Clientele, 148, 149, 155, 156,
123, 125, 178, 189, 242, 256, 158, 161, 176, 236, 290
312, 314, 331, 335, 348, 364, Coalesce, 96, 164, 195, 292
382, 398, 404, 410, 415, 420, Coalesced, 114, 189, 222, 226,
433, 460, 461, 462, 463 239, 259
Citizenship Levels, 104 Coalescing, 71, 96, 122
Citizenship Rights, 123, 312, Coalition, 208, 214, 222, 223,
314, 348, 398 224, 226, 516
Civic, 466 Coalition Of Forces, 224
Civil, 83, 98, 144, 145, 146, Coalition Of Interests, 214
152, 155, 172, 184, 186, 194, Coalition Of Powers, 208
197, 208, 211, 214, 217, 233, Collectively, 69, 293, 344, 524
250, 298, 314, 328, 330, 337, College, 77, 200, 210, 272, 361
345, 373, 383, 398, 404, 445, Colonel, 244, 245

393
Index

Colonial, 103, 192, 194, 297, Decapitation, 210

319, 335, 425, 428, 432 Dele, vi
Colonialism, 335 Delegitimise, 334
Colonialists, 317 Delegitimises, 88
Commander-In, 488, 555 Delta, Xxxi, Xxxii, 102, 114,
Commander-In-Chief, 555 115, 153, 233, 235, 342, 349
Commentators, 184, 192, 234 Demands, 93, 101, 183, 333,
Commission, 111, 519, 561 338, 366, 384, 386, 424, 441,
Commissioner-In-Chief, 554 445
Constitution, 70, 72, 150, 159, Democracy, 71, 123, 134, 221,
176, 185, 186, 188, 193, 255, 225, 232, 285, 307, 309, 314,
292, 322, 365, 410, 412, 413, 322, 350, 352, 411
414, 415, 434, 450, 452, 454, Democrat, 255
455, 456, 490, 515, 521, 532, Demystification, 255
533, 538, 552, 561, 575, 577, Deputy, 159, 217, 246, 251,
578 252, 257, 266, 268, 304, 401
Council, 66, 291 Derrière, 331
Current, 160, 191, 271, 300, Detention, 87, 468, 469, 470
307, 308, 309, 310, 325, 339, Deziani, xv
343, 345, 349, 350, 365, 366, Diaspora, xviii
373, 398, 407, 410, 414, 415, Dictate, 149, 152, 311
418, 422, 430, 439, 440, 443, Dictator, 219, 236, 237
447 Dictatorship, 80, 232
Cursory, 342 Disenfranchised, 77, 91, 102
Custody, 467, 468 DSS, 245
Dangerous, 69, 245, 304, 306, Dubai, xiv
312, 350, 401, 431, 483 Duke, 252
Dangote, 178 Durotoye, 72
Danjuma, 217, 239, 244, 245, Dynamics, 213
249 Eagle, 267, 271, 272
Dapo, 268 Eagle-Eyed, xliv
Dare, 409, 416 Earlier, 67, 79, 95, 106, 166,
Daura, 399 168, 177, 182, 184, 191, 249,
Death, Lvi, 85, 158, 191, 224, 272, 385, 560
237, 238, 253, 261, 263, 266, East, 95, 102, 131, 150, 324
285, 291, 349, 388, 448, 485, Eastern, 102, 113, 157, 322
495, 521, 536, 547

394
 Index

Ebele, 182, 252, 253, 254, 255, 253, 257, 279, 280, 281, 282,
258, 262, 263 283, 304, 305, 306, 392, 488,
Ebonyi, 340 494, 495, 497, 498, 503, 519
Ebun, xxxvi Elections, 67, 231, 239, 267,
Economic, 68, 106, 127, 275, 281, 284, 307, 329, 449, 500,
337, 351, 354, 355, 373, 380, 518
382, 385, 420, 431, 484 Electoral, 69, 76, 282, 283,
Economic Interests, 382 304, 305, 355
Economic Meltdown, 354 Electoral Process, 283
Economic Power, 127 Electoral Rights, 69
Economic Relief, 106 Electorate, 262
Economic Stimulus, 351 Elite, 298, 299
Ede-Iwo, 325 Emir, 141, 142
Education, Xix, 87, 91, 156, Emirate, 188
168, 194, 319, 322, 351, 382, Emirs, 138, 139, 141, 295
384, 385, 420, 432, 435, 438, Enactment, 575, 576
466, 467, 476, 477 Endsars, 407
Educational, 203, 377, 556 Enforcement, 482, 486, 532,
Educationally, 112, 220 533, 541, 553
EFCC, 401 Enforcement Officers, xl
Effect, 112, 118, 193, 227, 247, Engineer, 369, 387, 388, 389
259, 329, 346, 431, 432, 439, English, 121, 122, 287, 505
447 Enikan, 359
Efficiency, 335 Epe, xiv
Egalitarian, 371, 409 Episode, 76, 86, 190, 291, 444
Egalitarianism, 343, 355, 438 Equality, 68, 333, 334, 338,
Egemonies, 124 371, 422, 446, 506
Egotistic, 276 Equality Of Citizenship, 333,
Egungun, 418 335, 338
Einstein, 379 Establish, 291, 304, 337, 360,
Ejo, 100, 117 427, 456, 477, 552, 553, 555
Ekiti, 305, 401 Establishment, 132, 160, 161,
Ekweremadus, 340 455, 560
Elders, 116, 494 Esther, xi
Election, 67, 68, 69, 70, 71, 72, Ethiopia, 388
76, 92, 93, 94, 96, 117, 162, Ethnic, 68, 71, 171, 180, 198,
224, 230, 231, 232, 241, 246, 206, 207, 255, 256, 265, 297,

395
Index

301, 320, 326, 328, 334, 335, Federal, 96, 145, 147, 148, 149,
337, 341, 349, 400, 401, 402, 151, 152, 196, 276, 281, 411,
403, 411, 418, 423, 425, 427, 414, 443, 451, 516
431, 438, 442, 480, 481 Federal Capital, 147, 451
Ethnic Group, 206, 207, 255, Federal Government, 96, 148,
326, 334, 335, 341, 402, 403, 281, 516
418, 423, 438, 442, 480, 481 Federal Level, 149, 152
Ethnic Groups, 206, 255, 326, Federal Power, 196
334, 335, 341, 403, 423, 480, Federal Structure, 411
481 Federalism, 346, 347, 414
Ethnic Irredentist, 71, 265 Federation, 105, 107, 134, 135,
Ethnic Majorities, 335 136, 155, 173, 194, 206, 271,
Ethnic Minorities, 207, 297, 323, 332, 365, 470
337 Fela, 72, 73, 85
Ethnic Nationalism, 301, 425 Femi, 160, 271, 272
Ethnic Nationality, 180 FESTAC, 268
Expenditure, 353, 557, 558, Feudal, 115, 143, 151, 156,
559, 560, 566 158, 166, 178, 181, 183, 191,
Extremism, 296, 298, 299, 322, 219, 220, 229, 270, 275, 289,
326 294, 307, 308, 314, 315, 319,
Eyin, 413 321, 323, 331, 343, 350, 352,
Face, 218, 246, 270, 362, 369, 400, 412, 419, 420, 425, 426,
398, 407, 427, 444 428, 431
Face Of The Objective Feudal-Fascist, lix
Realities, 444 Feudalisation, 104, 118, 155,
Fajuyi, 201 157, 163, 196
Faleke, 304, 305 Feudalised, 123, 285, 322, 350,
Family, 128, 298, 354 365, 428
Fanatical, 265, 290, 301, 303 Feudalism, 109, 123, 141, 144,
Fashola, 270, 311 146, 156, 158, 159, 163, 164,
Fathi, 445 166, 176, 179, 181, 184, 185,
Fayemi, 305 249, 264, 275, 320, 328, 365,
Fayose, 305 425, 438, 444
Fear, 65, 66, 197, 198, 206, Feudalist, 221
233, 305, 358, 359, 409 Feyisayo, xii
Fischer, 373
Fragmented, 171, 412

396
 Index

Franchise, 269, 276, 278, 280, 205, 208, 215, 218, 221, 222,
303, 307, 312 223, 225, 228, 229, 239, 245,
Fraternities, 108 253, 257, 260, 278, 280, 281,
Free, 64, 242, 296, 354, 363, 287, 292, 316, 339, 341, 343,
386, 410, 424, 441, 527 345, 353, 383, 388, 392, 455,
Freeborn, 327 456, 470, 471, 472, 480, 494
Freedom, 81, 82, 83, 84, 88, Gowon, 136, 137, 138, 139,
146, 294, 377, 389, 392, 395, 140, 145, 172, 173, 183, 184,
476, 477, 485 204, 208, 211, 215, 221, 298
Freedom Fighter, xvi Gubernatorial, 267, 268, 305,
Fufu, 87 340
Fulani-Islamist, 400, 422, 427, Gusau, 288
442 Gwadabe, 229
Fulanis, 113 Haram, 404
Fulanisation, 400 Hassan, 167
Funmi, Hausa, 82, 110, 125, 145, 146,
Funsho, 278 169, 170, 194, 199, 200, 207,
Fusion, 157, 427 209, 210, 227, 229, 289, 291,
Future And Trajectory, 121 292, 298, 318, 402, 403, 419,
Gandhi, 64, 373, 374, 377 421, 426, 428, 429, 442
Ganiyu, 116 Hausa-Fulani, 145, 146, 194,
Garba, 213 199, 200, 207, 209, 211, 227,
Gateway, 436 229, 289, 292, 318, 403, 426,
Gazette, 576 442
GDP, 354 Headquarters, 210
GEJ, 253, 254, 259, 261 Hegemonies, 120, 121, 123,
Ghandi, 370 130, 144, 146, 153, 158, 182,
Gideon, 235 188, 192, 246, 258, 259, 265,
Global, 345, 352, 354 296, 302, 308, 341, 412, 426,
Global Citizen, 439
Goodluck, 95, 181, 252, 253, Hegemony, 120, 121, 122, 123,
255, 258, 262, 263 124, 127, 131, 132, 134, 136,
Gore, 422 138, 139, 140, 142, 146, 149,
Government, 64, 67, 96, 98, 151, 152, 161, 174, 185, 186,
100, 105, 106, 142, 143, 146, 190,
147, 148, 150, 171, 173, 178, Helen, x
183, 185, 186, 188, 193, 201, Herders, 405

397
Index

Herdsmen, 254, 291, 320, 342, Ibrahim, 80, 97, 98, 172, 216,
399, 401, 402, 404 224, 247, 288, 290, 311
Herdsmen Crises, 254 Idiocy, 86, 88, 331, 361
Herdsmen/Bandits, 399 Ife, 78, 79, 272, 361
Herdsmen/Militia, 399 Igbati, 80
Hierarchy, 136 Igbayilola, x, xi
Hijab, 441 Igbo, 82, 108, 110, 111, 112,
Historical, 129, 136, 170, 192, 113, 135, 145, 146, 150, 154,
194, 195, 215, 255, 264, 278, 170, 183, 184, 194, 195, 196,
304, 319, 325, 354, 400, 421, 197, 198, 201, 203, 206, 207,
428, 436, 437, 440 208, 209, 211, 220, 223, 234,
Historical Enslavers, 319 236, 324, 327, 330, 331, 337,
Historical Parallels, 264, 278 338, 340, 349, 383, 428
Historical Perspective, 194 Igboho, xvi, xvii
Historical Realities, 170, 215, Igbos, 145, 337
436 Ige, Ix, 76, 159
Historical Sociopolitical, 428 IGP, Xli
History, 65, 67, 92, 103, 108, Ija, 359
111, 113, 119, 120, 124, 125, Ijaw, 253, 337
131, 145, 152, 159, 164, 184, Ikeja, 196, 215
192, 193, 206, 207, 224, 227, Ikenne, 266, 277
231, 239, 266, 269, 279, 296, Ikire, 438, 446
300, 306, 308, 318, 319, 320, Ikirun, 438, 446
326, 337, 418, 421, 422, 447 Ikorodu, liv, 340
History Of Brutal, 296 Iku, 100
History Of Colonisation, 319 Ikwere, 340
History Of Feudalism, 320 Ilabe, xli
History Of Venal, xxxvii Ila-Orangun, 439
Hitler, 288 Ile-Ife, 77
Hoodlums, xxxvi Ile-Oluji, 399
Hostage-Takers, Li Ilorin, 337
Hubris, 247, 255, 260, 422, 426 Imams, 318, 321, 322, 426
Ibadan, 74, 75, 78, 180, 201, Immigrant, 463
208, 291, 339, 438 Immunities, xlii
IBB, 81, 103, 110 Incarcerated, 205, 371
Ibogun, 399 Independence, 134, 137, 138,
141, 151, 169, 212, 255, 322,

398
 Index

346, 370, 412, 414, 430, 432, ISBN, vi

437, 456, 457, 463, 471, 478 Ishak, 440
India, 133 ISIS, 345
Indian, 64, 133, 189, 237, 370 Islam, 125, 126, 251, 292, 295,
Indigene, 579 299, 318, 321, 325, 326, 327,
Indigene-Ship, Xxi, Xxii 418, 419, 421, 422, 425, 426,
Injustice, 104, 111, 112, 134, 428, 429, 430, 433, 434, 435,
206, 214, 348, 376 438, 440, 442, 445, 447
Injustices, 333, 341 Islamic, 98, 125, 126, 295, 301,
Insanities, 250 319, 321, 322, 326, 342, 396,
Insanity, 349, 434 419, 423, 424, 426, 432, 436,
Insecurities, 440
Insecurity, 330, 342, 350 Islamise, 296
Institutional, 213, 262, 309, Islamised, 431
333, 339, 350 Islamist, 325, 349, 400, 402,
Institutional Hegemony, 213 403, 421, 427, 429, 430, 433,
Institutional Inequities, 351 434, 437, 439, 440, 443, 444,
Institutional Levers, 262 446
Institutional Wickedness, 333 Islamists, 397, 403, 405, 437,
Insurance, 241 439, 441, 442, 446
Insurgency, 349 Ivy, 210
Insurrection, 464, 554 Iwaju, 413
Interim, 448 Iwo, 325, 438, 446
International Community, 241 Iya, L
International Terrorist, 443 Iyale, 331
Intra-Hegemonic, 250 Iyawo, 331
IPOB, 112 Iyiola, Lxi, 306
Ireland, 122 Jagaban, 280, 307, 313, 315,
Irish, 120, 122 327, 344, 441
Iron, 361 Janus, 293
Ironsi, 183, 193, 195, 196, 201, Jihad, 125
202, 204 Jihadist, 318
Irredentism, 169, 286, 398 Jihadists, 125
Irredentist, 160, 226, 234, 259, Jimi, 281, 284, 326
329, 433 Joda, 166
Irredentists, 162, 167, 339, 422 Jonathan, 71, 95, 182, 252,
Isa, 443 253, 254, 255, 256, 257, 258,

399
Index

261, 262, 263, 281, 283, 302, Katsina, 251

307, 329, 415 Kayode, 245
Jos, 298, 399 Kebbi, 173, 298, 432
Joseph, 213 Ken, 114, 233, 235
Judicial, 187, 311, 549, 553 Keturahs, 128
Judiciary, 150, 187, 188, 269, Kogi, 112, 304, 305, 337
304, 307, 309, 310, 311, 312, Koja, 117
316 Kokori-Led, liii
Jukuns, 432 Koran, 300
Jumaat, 437 Kotun, 272, 273
June, 69, 92, 94, 230, 231, 232, Kukah, 167
234, 239, 352, 353, 384 Kukuma, x
Junta, 82, 85, 339 Kunle, 84
Jurisdiction, 469, 475, 482, Kwame, 90
486, 487, 502, 537, 538, 541, Kwara, 112
542, 543, 544, 551, 552 KWENU, 340
Justice, xxvii, 68, 150, 208, 250, Ladipo, 272
312, 371, 376, 378, 472 Ladoke, 164, 266
Kaduna, lvi, 65, 107, 139, 142, Lagos, 80, 95, 96, 102, 154,
195, 210, 212, 213, 214, 220, 164, 267, 268, 269, 270, 272,
222, 223, 238, 271, 323 274, 280, 281, 311, 326, 328,
Kaffir, 435 340, 362, 426, 439, 445
Kagara, 399 Lam, 291
Kalakuta, 85 Lamidi, 158
Kalu, 158, 309 Lamido, 142, 166
Kampala, 140 Lanka, 133
Kanem, 125, 168, 319 Lanko, 117
Kankanfo, 116 LASU, xii, lii, 82, 83, 84, 267,
Kankara, 399 362, 440
Kano, 142, 166, 200, 290, 435 Latin, 64, 66, 294
Kano-Born, 290 Legal, xii, 311, 364, 413, 468,
Kanu, li 472, 473, 487, 491, 535, 537,
Kanuri, 110, 127, 171, 205, 546
228, 290, 301, 341 Legislative, 172, 187, 323, 452,
Kanus, 113 453, 455, 456, 494, 496, 499,
Karambosa, 82 506, 511, 546, 569, 573, 576,
Kashimawo, 434 577

400
 Index

Legislature, 454, 455, 511, 515, Martyr, 387

527 Martyrdom, 388
Legitimacy, 139, 225, 240, Marwa, 154
250, 264, 330 Maryanne, xii
Lekki, vi, xxxiii, xxxv, xxxvi, MASSOB, 112
xxxvii, xxxviii, xxxix, xlviii, Matthew, 167
xlix, lv Maverick, xli
Lekki-Ikoyi, xxxvi Mazi, li
Liberalism, 436 MD, xli
Libya, 406 Mediterranean, 406
Lieutenants, 200, 237 Mercantilism, 309
Lingua, 429 Messiah, 367, 384
Linguistic, 63, 91, 151, 198 Middle-Belt, 199, 204, 215
Lion, 85 Middle-Class, xviii
London, xv Militant, 299
Loot, 218, 288, 339 Misconduct, 490, 491, 500, 521
Louis, 373 Miscreants, xxxiv, xlvi
Lowowo, 100 MKO, 290, 435
Luther, 374 Mobola, xii
Maami, Ix, 360 Modakeke, 78
Maccido, 142, 236 Moghalu, 72
Machinery, 276, 281, 328, 369 Mohammed, 136, 137, 139,
Mafia, 223 140, 211, 213, 214, 215, 216,
Magistrates, 187 218, 221
Mahmud, 424 Mohammed’s, 140
Mainstream, lvi, 155, 159, 297, Mokola, 75
441 Monaco, xv
Make-Up, 151, 243 Monafik, 435
Malaise, 329, 404 Monarchy, 120
Malians, 326 Montgomery, 376
Mama, 87 Mother-Hen, 81
Mamalari, 200 Muhammadu, 95, 104, 138,
Mambila, 298, 349 164, 169, 181, 217, 224, 263,
Mambilla, 297, 432 264, 265, 275, 284, 286, 287,
Mandela, 64, 247, 370, 386, 288, 303, 422, 433
387, 388, 392, 394, 448 Muhammed, 140, 173, 200,
Maria, Ix 205, 299

401
Index

Muhammedans, 168 Niger, 102, 114, 115, 124, 169,

Multiethnic, 424 170, 224, 233, 235, 342, 349
Multilateral, 345 Nigeria, 65, 66, 67, 68, 72, 73,
Murtala, 136, 139, 140, 172, 74, 76, 77, 78, 79, 80, 81, 84,
173, 200, 205, 211, 213, 214, 88, 89, 91,93, 94, 95, 97, 98,
215, 216, 218, 220, 223, 239, 99, 102, 103, 104, 105, 106,
287, 299 107, 108, 109, 110, 111, 112,
Murtala-Obasanjo, 218, 239, 113, 114, 115, 117, 118, 123,
287 124, 125, 126, 127, 128, 129,
Musa, 217, 223, 226, 249, 251, 130, 131, 132, 133, 135, 136,
252, 257 140, 142, 143, 144, 146, 147,
Muslim, 68, 93, 109, 126, 180, 149, 150, 151, 152, 153, 154
203, 297, 299, 302, 429, 430, NIN, 443
437, 438, 439, 441, 443, 444, Niyi, 361
445, 446 Nko, 339, 340
Muslims, 137, 169, 202, 291, Nkrumah, 90
317, 324, 327, 426, 430, 435, Nnamdi, 113, 135
439, 441, 444, 445 NNPC, 114
Mustaphas, 250 Nomadic, 419
Myanmar, 133 Non-Muslim, 203
Myth, 213, 303, 403, 426 Non-PDP, 301
NA, 81, 270, 300, 331, 362, Non-Poisonous, 65
403, 405, 451, 453, 495 Non-Profit, 379
NADECO, 93, 315 Normalisation, 175
NANS, 99 North, 95, 102, 131, 139, 143,
NASFAT, 445 144, 149, 153, 155, 162, 168,
Nasrul-Lahi-Li, 445 169, 170, 171, 172, 185, 194,
Nationalism, 122, 286, 336 195, 198, 201, 211, 213, 225,
Nationhood, 338, 348 244, 265, 283, 287, 290, 296,
Naturalisation, 458, 460 297, 298, 300, 318, 319, 320,
Navy, Lii 321, 322, 342, 410, 423, 424,
NBA, 105 425, 426, 429, 430, 431, 433,
NCNC, 198 435, 438, 444
Ncos, 201 Northeast, 342
Ndi, xxxi, xxxii North-East, 95, 102
Nelson, 64, 370, 386, 388, 392 Northern, 98, 107, 109, 125,
Nepotism, 306 128, 130, 131, 132, 136, 137,

402
 Index

138, 142, 143, 145, 152, 167, 287, 292, 293, 294, 296, 299,
168, 196, 197, 201, 203, 205, 302, 307, 315, 344, 346, 415,
207, 213, 224, 228, 239, 261, 434, 441, 448
262, 289, 293, 294, 297, 298, Obembe, 361
299, 301, 303, 318, 321, 322, Ode-Olo, 75
341, 354, 401, 419, 422, 423, Odili, 252
425, 429, 430, 431, 432, 434, Ogoni, 115, 235
436, 440 Ogun, 180, 291, 339
Northerner, 251 Ogundipe, 204
Northerners, 110, 112, 129, OIC, 440
136, 137, 298, 341 Oil, 280, 343, 349, 354, 565
Northernise, 199 Oil-Soaked, 343
Northwest, 342 Ojo, 82
North-West, 102 Ojoo, 74
NPC, 138, 145, 193, 201, 212, Ojota, 94, 95
218, 421, 424 Ojukwu, 183
N-PDP, 302 Okeho, 339
NPN, 77, 222, 224 Oke-Ogun, 180, 291, 339
NPN-Appointed, 77 Okokomaiko, xii
Nwoke, 413 Okomaiko, lii
Nzeogu, 65 Okun, 337
Nzeribe, 158 Okuntimo, 235
Oba, 184, 252, 253, 257 Okutimo, 115
Obafemi, 135, 156, 185, 205, Okuwobi, lvii, lviii
221, 223, 224, 249, 265, 266, Oladele, 359
275, 325 Olatunde, xii
Obama, 329 Olawale, 434
Obas, 340 Ole, 316
Obasanjo, 85, 94, 140, 149, Oleh, 166
162, 166, 172, 180, 190, 192, Oligarchy, 218, 222, 264
201, 209, 211, 216, 217, 218, Olooyi, 80
219, 220, 221, 222, 223, 228, Olorogun, 76
238, 239, 240, 241, 244, 245, Olufunmilayo, x
246, 247, 248, 249, 250, 251, Olufunmilola, x
252, 253, 254, 255, 256, 257, Olukole, Ix
258, 259, 260, 261, 269, 270, Olusegun, 192, 219
275, 276, 280, 281, 283, 284, Omisore, 306

403
Index

Omo, 100 Pandemic, 178, 179, 307, 342,

Omolara, x 350
Omoyele, 63, 72 Pan-Nigeria, 68, 143, 198, 234
Ona, 116 Pan-Nigerian, 68, 198, 234
Ondo, 78, 281, 337, 401 Pan-Northern, 430
Onifufu, 87 Pantami, 443, 444
Oniyanrin, 75 Passports, xvi
Onnoghen, 311 Patriotism, 404
Oodua, 339 Paucity, 411
Origin, 154, 180, 191, 227, Pawns, xlvii
238, 256, 333, 401, 480, 481 PDP, 71, 95, 159, 160, 161,
Orji, 158, 309, 340 162, 163, 243, 244, 258, 259,
Orlu, 399 260, 261, 268, 273, 276, 278,
Osama, 443 280, 281, 282, 284, 301, 302,
OSCAS, 77, 78, 79, 361 304, 307, 311
Osha, xlviii Pecking, 129, 218, 304
Oshiomhole, lxi Pecking Order, 129, 218, 304
Oshogbo, 305 Pedigree, 116, 274, 410
Osibajo, 443 Penal, 297
Osogbo, 86, 446 Penalties, 483
Osun, 160, 271, 305, 325, 438, Penalty, 292, 474, 475, 512,
446 528
Osuntokun, 129, 132, 192, 347 Penury, xli
Otueke, 399 Pesky, 340
Otuoke, xiv Peter, 252
Oyingbo, lii Populist, 288
Oyinlola, 446 Potomac, xiv
Oyo, 76, 77, 180, 208, 272, Poverty, 201, 322, 323, 371,
281, 339, 361 434
Pa, 70, 100, 130, 131, 137, 168, Power, 66, 67, 71, 77, 85, 96,
199, 413 104, 105, 108, 113, 124, 132,
Pacifism, 360 138, 139, 140, 141, 142, 143,
Pagan, 126 145, 146, 149, 153, 161, 163,
Pagans, 137, 169, 202, 204, 167, 172, 174, 175, 176, 181,
298, 432 183, 184, 193, 196, 199, 205,
Pakistan, 133 209, 211, 214, 217, 218, 219,
Pan-African, 388 220, 221, 222

404
 Index

Power Concentric, 205, 211, Public Affairs, 146

218, 219, 223, 233, 253, 261 Public Debt, 563
Power Dynamics, 217, 283, Public Domain, 153, 216, 287
429 Public Fund, 556, 557
Power Elite, 174 Public Health, 351, 485
Power Game, 108, 228, 229, Public Morality, 472, 485
253, 305 Public Policy, 461
Power Plays, 175, 229, 447 Public Safety, 472, 485, 533
Power Structure, 161, 172, 174, Public Service, 496, 499, 503,
236, 321 526, 528, 533, 562, 569, 570,
Presidency, Xiii, 71, 72, 105, 571, 572
187, 252, 254, 270, 275, 299, Pulaku, 290
305, 307, 308, 329 Quarter, 563
President, 73, 100, 138, 139, Quota, 200
179, 189, 219, 244, 245, 247, Quran, 435, 438
250, 253, 258, 260, 283, 293, Quranic, 437
323, 449, 489, 490, 491, 507
Presidential, 72, 162, 185, 188, Race, Xix, 72, 330, 365
224, 258, 302, 323, 399 Racial, 376
President-In-Waiting, 139, 247 Racism, 329
Press, 87, 270, 282, 303, 306, Racist, 120, 329
307, 309, 311, 316, 328, 330, Raji, 270, 311
354 Rally, 325
Presumption, 89, 420 Ratification, 346
Primary, Xxvii, 74, 163, 180, Realpolitik, 205, 217, 223, 430
196, 214, 228, 230, 240, 282 Recall, 73, 116, 164, 267, 361,
Prism, 286, 311, 420, 421 362
Pro-Democracy, 309, 314 Recommendation, 199, 336
Pro-North, 221 Recruitment, 137, 200, 437,
Protestations, 317, 433, 437, 441
448 Re-Election, 76, 224, 241, 246,
Protesters, xxxiv, xxxv, xxxvii, 279
xliii, xliv, xlv, xlvi, xlvii, xlviii, Regime, 91, 94, 220, 221, 223,
xlix, li, liv, lvii 231, 232, 234, 237, 238, 249,
Protesting, 87, 319 256, 306, 398, 399, 400, 433,
Protests, 77, 80, 82, 107, 372, 439, 444, 447
383, 407

405
Index

Republic, 159, 161, 214, 300, Secularism, 430, 433

314, 339, 434, 439, 447 Seyi, Xii
Retribution, xlii Shagari, 105, 222, 223, 225,
Riot, 81, 260, 464 439
Rivers, 376 Sharwood, 130, 131, 137, 168,
Rohingya, 133 173, 184, 191, 192, 199, 203,
Rule Of Law, 150, 304, 371, 212, 297, 432
575 Sharwood-Smith, 297, 432
Rwandese, 349 Shehu, 105, 217, 222, 223, 226,
Sacrifice, 216, 387 249, 252
Sahara, 406, 419 Sheiks, 321, 436
Saheed, 267, 272 Shenanigans, 221
Sahel, 168, 402, 419 Shia, 430
Sahistory, 373 Shiite, Lvi
Saki, 339 Shinkafi, 161, 271
Salawe, 267, 272 Silhoun, 192
Sani, 189, 300 Smith, 130, 131, 137, 173, 184,
Sanusi, 142, 166 191, 192, 199, 203, 212, 297
SAP, 82, 106 Sociopolitical, 418, 420, 436
Saraki, 71, 302 Soetan, xii
Sardauna, 138, 141, 191, 209, Sokoto, 142, 264, 295, 319,
212, 264, 429, 433 420, 421, 426, 429
Saro-Wiwa, 114, 233, 235 Sola, 358
SARS, xxxii, xxxix, xliii, xliv, xlv, Solebo, xii
xlvi Somalia, 349
Sarumi, 268 Sonowo, 84
Satan, 266 South, 102, 157, 342, 411, 431,
Satyagraha, 373 435, 439, 440, 448
Saudi, Xv, 430 Southeasterners, 146
Savannah, 272 Southern, 102, 108, 109, 126,
Scamdemic, 351 128, 129, 131, 136, 150, 153,
Secession, 136, 196, 202, 334, 157, 169, 195, 233, 255, 324,
337, 341 332, 341, 423, 430, 434, 435,
Secessionism, 341 439, 440, 441
Secessionist, 135, 207, 331, Southerner, 435
333, 334, 336, 337, 342 Southerners, 110, 287
Secular, 433 Southerners-Owned, xlvi

406
 Index

South-Southern, 102, 157 Two-Thirds, 452, 453, 455,

South-West, 102 498, 513, 549
Sowore, 63, 72, 86 Tyranny, 313
Strategy, 279, 372 Uche, 117
Stratification, 420 Uganda, 140
Sudan, xv Uhuru, 395
Tafawa, 168, 199, 203, 212 UK, 210
Tailor-Made, 197, 293 Umar, 229, 251, 252
Taiwo, 367 Ummah, 321
Taraba, 432 Unions, 100, 101, 110
Tax, 280, 482, 565, 579 Unitarisation, 193
Taxation, 280, 319 Usman, 125
Thanopiates, 308 Uthman, 419, 422, 426, 430,
Theocracy, 420, 421, 428 442
Theocratic, 428, 431, 440, 444 Utomi, 276
Tinubu, 69, 94, 95, 96, 163, Utopia, 340
164, 180, 263, 264, 266, 268, Utopian, 339
269, 270, 271, 274, 275, 276, Uzor, 309
277, 278, 279, 280, 281, 282, Vagabonds, 408
283, 302, 303, 304, 305, 306, Vanguard, 83
307, 309, 311, 312, 315, 325, Vatsa, 229, 235
328, 330, 339, 354 Venal, 404
Tollgate, xxxiii, xxxv, xxxvi, Veto, 129, 130, 132, 133, 134,
xxxvii, xxxviii, xlix, lv, lvii 135, 138, 139, 143, 144, 147,
Tom, 115 150, 152, 158, 161, 163, 170,
Tompolo, 115 171, 172, 173, 184, 191, 196,
Trajectory, 119, 122, 159, 173, 204, 205, 211, 212, 218, 228,
174, 186, 230, 240, 248, 265, 233, 244, 321, 323, 422
286, 441 Veto Power, 161, 172
Tran-Saharan, 126 Vice-Presidential, 224
Trans-Saharan, 318, 419 Vote, 70, 71, 208, 263, 267,
Tribal, 117, 162, 169, 171, 198, 268, 273, 306, 433, 463, 506,
277, 318, 333, 341, 431 507, 509, 516, 517, 518, 521,
Tribalism, 121, 203, 291 573
Tribunal, 462, 470, 471, 472, Voted, 68, 70, 549
473, 474, 475, 482 Voter, lx
Tsunami, 162, 269, 344 Voters, 281, 500

407
Index

Votes, 68, 449, 452, 453, 455, Yele, 86

498, 506, 513 Yesufu, xxxiii
Voting, 95, 506 Yewa-Awori, 339
WAEC, 79 Yorubaland, 116, 279, 282,
Wahhabi, 403 325, 326, 343, 350, 437, 438,
Wahhabis, Lvi 440, 441, 445, 449
Washington, Xiv Yorubas, 278
Wemimo, Vi, 367 Youth, 81, 87, 406, 407, 409
West, 102, 120, 150, 264, 283 Yunfa, 428
Western,131, 156, 157, 168, Yusuf, lvi
194, 242, 282, 319, 432, 445 Za, 373
Wikipedia, 372 Zamfarastan, 434
Willink, 412, 414 Zaria, lvi
Willinks, 336 Zealotry, 326
Ya, x Zuru, 137, 169, 173, 202, 205,
Yahaya, 305 298, 432
Yakubu, 145, 183, 204

408
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