Igbos must speak up

"N-Assembly has not ruled out state creation – AYOGU EZE" (vanguard newpaper, 6/18/13)

Igbos must speak up

Gowon wisely and rightly understood that a-no-victor and no-vanquished end of the war proclamation was the only way to effectively bring the civil war to final and comprehensive end otherwise the guerrilla warfare that would have issued would either be raging till today or Nigeria would have for long disintegrated or the entire Igbo race would have been by now exterminated. Because no people, not myself would live, accept, sit and do nothing in a society where I am rated, treated like second class defeated person. I for one would lay full claim to my Rights and defend my birth and citizenship Rights because neither my father nor my grand fathers nor my ancestries were strangers to the land I live in. So Igbo marginalization is Igbo making and is the result of the lack of courageous visionary selfless Igbo leadership. Until such time visionary, courageous leaders emerges, Igbos would continue to wallow on self pity of defeatism, continue to relegate themselves as second class and continue to clamor for a none viable Biafran State. Unreservedly, for their fair share of the National cake, Igbos and indeed any Nigerian ethnic nationality must be prepared to deploy all its arsenal, political, legal and civil disobedience for perceived injustice. To be effective, groups must show unity of purpose, consistency, determination and not selfishly fractional.

States and local governments should be created base on population of people in an area. However since area population is dynamic and constant state and local government creation is impracticable; congressional districts or representation should be used to balance, compensate and remedy population shifts. As such federal allocation should be apportioned base on congressional districts in a local government or in a state

To achieve a reasonable state, local government creation and congressional district apportionment and federal allocation, a national ID card backed by biometrics is an imperative. Until such a time we secure reliable national ID card, for equity today, each of the existing 6 geo-political zones in the country should have 7 states and equal number of local governments; I am not a fan for the creation of more states or local governments per say, but I also recognize that existing state cannot be scraped for parity among the zones hence a 7 state per zone remedy is what is achievable now for equity and fairness among the 6 zones. If the North West zone insists on having an additional state then an 8 states solution per each of the 6 zones is advised.

After the credible national ID scheme has be achieved, or true fiscal federalism
adopted, more states, local governments may or may not be necessary since federal allocation, if any, will then be based on congressional districts (which in turn are based on actual population) in a local government or state. Because population is a dynamic phenomenon, a headcount or census every eight to ten years must be conduct so as to adjust the number of congressional districts per area or per state. The number of congressional districts per states also accords a state its fair share of federal allocation and the number of congressional delegations for the federal house.

Under the pseudo fiscal federalism in Nigeria today federal allocation that is given on state and local government bases means that, the more states and or local governments a zone or state has the more money it gets from the center. The current state and local government partitions in Nigeria were all executed by Northern military dictatorial regimes and were skewed; as one would imagine, favored the old Northern region. What were the bases or criteria for the creation of the existing states and local governments by the military dictatorships? No criteria whatsoever, perhaps I should say that the creation of the existing states and local governments were based on arbitrary war time military strategy, expediency, nepotism, tribalism and or political manipulation.  If military dictatorship is an aberration so are the political structures and partitions done by the dictatorships. Once again what were the bases for the creation of the present 36 state structure and 774 local governments?

Under the current flawed divisionary indigenous acts in most states in Nigeria an Ibo man living in any other part of Nigeria outside Igbo land is counted as an indigene of one of the Igbo states, a stranger to his state of residency. So in states creation and or local governments creation such Ibo man should be assigned to an Igbo states and not to the state where he resides until such a time the regressive indigenous laws in the states are changed. But this was not the case when the present states and local governments were created by the Northern Military Juntas. For instance, Kano has more than 40 local governments which perhaps took into account none indigenes living in Kano. However these none indigenes are not accorded ‘indigene-ship’ or security. So if there are 3000000 Ibos for example living in Kano and it becomes necessary that these Ibos move back to their states as is the case with Boko Haram attacks in the north, then Kano state would lose 30000000 residents but still keeps its 44 local governments. While the states where these Ibos relocated still maintain their twice less the number of local governments as in Kano State. This arrangement is not only unfair but also wrong. With this arrangement Kano State has it both ways and there is sound legal ground to legally and politically challenge the current geo-political arrangement and partitions in Nigeria. This is an example of nepotism, tribalism, cronyism that the Januarys 1966 rebels and Gideon Orkar group complained about, it still exists and in a worse form. South East zone have only five States while the other zones have either 6 or 7 states and the national cakes are given out on state bases. Does anybody honestly believe that each of the three zones in the north is more populated than the Ibo population in Nigeria? This kind of injustice demands courageous leadership and unity of purpose. If civil disobedience, political, legal pressures fails to halt Igbo marginalization and disparity in federal to zone allocation, then social disengagement along with UN actions seeking Igbo autonomy should precede economic and political disengagement from the center. And this mass political movement will need courageous leadership, the type that is currently lacking in Nigeria and in Igbo land in particular.

A constitution, law, policy, decree, allocation, and even rights that are discriminatory or that encourages discrimination is worse than lawlessness itself and worth less than the paper they are scribbled on. Such constitutional provisions or legal illegalities must be abrogated, amended or repealed. Regardless of its acclaimed form, any government that refuses to abrogate discriminatory laws must be sacked by any means necessary. This kind of injustice was what the January 15, 1966 and orkar coups d'état were all about.

With consistent, extensive and intensive mass agitations, political movement, legal actions, and political alliances with other geo-political zones or groups that seek the same or different political fairness as do Igbos, the disparity in the plurality of states in the zones can be undone. And this is where Igbo legislators come in.  For example, we know that Middle Belt, which is the North Central states, the David Mark’s Idoma nation in Benue state in particular are agitating for one or two states in the Middle Belt.

So South East with the help of South South, South West, North Central zones can enter into political alliance and rob each other’s back to secure their political aspirations. For example South South, South West, North Central each has 6 states while South East has 5 and North West has 7 states. I do not see how South West and South South will refuse if South East approaches these zones and ask their support for a 7 state solution for each of the 6 political zones in the country. Such request from South East is not only reasonable and fair but it will benefits South West, South South, North Central and even North East zone with 6 states. The only zone that may oppose this request is North West but these other zones do not need North West to secure their demand. Again, if the North West zone insists on having an additional state then an 8 states solution per each of the 6 zones is advised. Even in the court, South East has a strong case of marginalization in this regard and will prevail under the grounds of none discrimination act and or equal protection under the law, that is
universal.