Restructuring, a precipice to war

Many Nigerians seems to be unaware of the dangers associated with the call for restructuring of Nigeria. This is because restructuring as it’s today agitated for, remains as a subtle cliff that may collapse when the tempo of the existing peace and harmony presently felt within the country is destroyed. Before going into the details […]

Many Nigerians seems to be unaware of the dangers associated with the call for restructuring of Nigeria. This is because restructuring as it’s today agitated for, remains as a subtle cliff that may collapse when the tempo of the existing peace and harmony presently felt within the country is destroyed.

Before going into the details of why restructuring is a keg of a gun powder, we need to understand that everything about Biafra was only conceptualized, but the aims and the objective of the agitators was to achieve restructuring of Nigeria. 

The danger associated with this position is based on various varied assumptions housed in the hearts of many Nigerians from both side of the divides. To a typical southeast and south-south aborigine, especially the gullible, Biafra would be a country of its own, where milk and honey will flow for their consumption. To the elites, Biafra was only a decoy and should be used to achieve restructuring only, and restructuring in their own dream means only one thing and that thing is resource control. This is where the problem started and this remained the first trigger that may explode the keg of the powder.

On the other hand, the North still maintained the political power, whose instruments is what is required to formulate and execute the laws that can make restructuring possible. The political power in the grip of northern #Nigeria was a long history of consistency on the part of the northerners, a consistency maintained for more than 50 years is enough evidence that you need to be politically savvy and crafty to remain relevant in the scheme of things. 

The war has already started, with a cold one ongoing right now, only few people can see it coming. The war will start from verbal confrontation, then it will metamorphose into a table dialogue, the dialogue may not achieve it aims, thus, it may turn to another verbal war, the only difference between the former and the latter is that this verbal conflict will be a call to war. 

A report published  October 12, by Vanguard News and many other mainstream media quoted Kaduna State governor and chairman of ruling All Progressives Congress, APC, Committee on True Federalism, Mallam Nasir El-Rufai, declaring that it would be a grave injustice to agitate for “equal unequals”. 

“The greatest injustice is trying to make equals unequal and unequals equal; things are not done like that.” El-Rufai further stated that, “Though the representatives of the agitators were few in number, the majority must always win”. Many in the north do share El-Rufai’s position and it remained the last thing they may accept.

On September 22, President of the NEF, Dr. Paul Unongo, disclosed the group’s position at a news conference in Abuja, a day after El-Rufai’s comments. “The North recognizes and acknowledges that there are demanding and legitimate questions on the current operations of the

Nigerian state. The North has very clear ideas on all issues and positions that the nation sees as challenges and is willing to dialogue on all of them.

“What the North will not allow, however, is to be stampeded into adopting an agenda and grand

designs from other parts of Nigeria, which will hurt its basic interests,” he added. 

The Arewa Research and Development Project (ARDP) in conjunction with 4 or 5 other northern groups on Wednesday, kick started the northern debate on restructuring. These are northern bodies fully occupied by the northern elitist. Northern Governors, ACF, NEF, almost everyone who claims position in the decision process of the North was there and the theme of the event was “The North and future of Nigerian Federation”. 

Governor Waziri Tambuwal of Sokoto State chaired the opening ceremony and equally said in his speech “In my view, if restructuring means taking stock of our arrangement to ensure that no state takes a disproportionate amount of the resources, or most of the available space in the education or job sector, or subjugate the others’ culture or religion, or lords it over the other so that the number of the poor and uneducated whose future is circumscribed by their circumstance is shared proportionately, then we are game” meaning that resource control should not have a place in the dialogues, a position the South will do everything not to accept.

The fireworks was finally ignited by former Vice Chancellor of Ahmadu Bello University (ABU), Zaria, and spokesman of Northern Elders Forum (NEF), Professor Ango Abdullahi, when he maintained the position that, “The northern region was not afraid to go its separate way if the entire country insisted on restructuring”. This is it; the bomb is now waiting to explode. Millions of northerners believed and share this position too, this is why whenever the dialogues started it may end with no results. Prof.  Ango Abdullahi further said “if we want to restructure Nigeria, we have to start from the beginning, 1914, North and South, let’s go our separate ways”.

Like other Nigerians with a third eye, many may not see what we have seen, but the bitter truth remains that, with agitation for restructuring, Nigeria may not be the same again. Soon, very soon, the South will retaliate viciously, we should all start watching it from that point.

Comrade Dambatta wrote this piece from Abuja.