The minority question: Some thoughts on identity, justice and the politics of incorporation in Nigeria (4) (Contined from last week)

4: The Politics of the Birth of the Midwest: I have tried to establish two main points. First, that human rights are at the centre of our common existence. Secondly, that their realization makes us human and that without them, human beings will resist. How people react depends on many factors. The most important is […]

4: The Politics of the Birth of the Midwest: I have tried to establish two main points. First, that human rights are at the centre of our common existence. Secondly, that their realization makes us human and that without them, human beings will resist. How people react depends on many factors. The most important is the consciousness of who am I or who we are? When people have been oppressed for a long time, they grow to accept their conditions sometimes as the will of God and they believe that the best they can do is to be good slaves.
Somehow, circumstance change either by some of their members being exposed to other realities, (almost like the consciousness of men in Plato’s cave), people suddenly realize that their conditions are not the will of God. For example, when one looks at the records of the 1st and 2nd world wars, there are no records of how many Africans died, no records of how many were wounded and so on. Despite these, the end of that war triggered off a feeling by the African soldier of some measure of equality with the white man along whom he had fought.  Africans saw white men cry and die in battle and that enhanced their confidence and taught them a lesson or two about the dubious myth of the superiority of the white man. That consciousness is largely triggered the anti-colonial resistance in some parts of Africa.
Sometimes, the changes and the sense of injustice and injury occur through the experience of education. The first generation of African political elites who fought for independence did so with the oxygen of the education they gained abroad and the quality of life that they also saw. They therefore wanted the same for their people back home and that is why the struggle for independence became so intense and relentless.
In the case of the Midwest, the tripod of injustice hoisted by the three big tribes sowed the seeds for discontentment among the Minorities across Nigeria. Under their weight, the Minorities reacted differently. The fight of the northern Minorities fell on deaf ears because the colonial state was more enamoured of the Hausa Fulani ruling class their co-collaborators in the exploitation of the region. Whereas the Sardauna was enthusiastic about the creation of the Midwest State, it is curious that he suddenly realized that what was good for the Minorities of the Midwest was not healthy for the Minorities in the north. Unfortunately, the Minorities in the North had not had the early exposure to missionary education that had emboldened their southern counterparts.
We cannot but admire and appreciate why the Midwest had to get its region. First, it had managed to line up a group of first class men and women who had already excelled in education and other professions even before the colonial state. They had men and women in almost every stratum of national life but most importantly in politics and the bureaucracy. They had men and women of wealth and means and so they did not suffer the inferiority complex engendered by poverty, late education that the northern Minorities suffered. Their struggle was unstoppable and irreversible because of the caliber of the team they had lined up. This is not the place for us to go into the story as I am rather inadequate to undertake such a task.
The story of the struggle for the Midwest region was gingered by the introduction of party politics in Nigeria. The creation of Provinces consolidated the domination of the Igbos and the Yorubas added to the anxiety of the people of the Midwest and intensified their consciousness of the increasing erosion of their power. Things came to a head with the introduction of the Richards Constitution in 1947, a move that saw the emergence of Regions as the key administrative units of governance in Nigeria and confirmed the subordinate status of the Minorities in the various regions.
The formation of the National Council for Nigeria and the Cameroons, NCNC, the first political platform in Nigeria attracted some of the educated elites from the Benin area such as Chief Anthony Enahoro, ON Rewane, Arthur Prest, Gaius Obaseki among others. Chief Awolowo and Michael Ajasin formed the Egbe Omo Oduduwa in 1947. After the death of Macaulay, people like Anthony Enahoro left the NCNC and went over to Chief Awolowo whose Tribal association had now emerged as the Action Group Party.
The introduction of the Macpherson Constitution in 1952 created Legislatures. The Benin Area of course was aligned with the West. Indeed, at the opening of the business in the Western House of Assembly, 21 out of the 24 members of representatives from the Midwest area were members of the NCNC. It is said that two critical issues led to the intensification of the struggle for the Midwest. First was the fact that the insignia of the Mace (represented by four swords) represented the authority of the Yoruba chiefs. It was also stated that when the House opened for official business and the Lt. Governor, Sir Hugo Marshall finished speaking, the next person to speak was the Alake of Abeokuta who rather inelegantly stated: On my right sits the Oni of Ife, on my left, the leader of Government, Obafemi Awolowo. The voice of the west is complete.
Earlier on, people like the late Chief Anthony Enahoro had left the NCNC and joined the AG because it was claimed that Dr Azikiwe had become too preoccupied with Igbo superiority. Dr Azikiwe was quoted as having said: It would appear that the God of Africa has created the Ibo nation to lead the children of Africa from the bondage of ages. The people of what would be the Midwest felt caught between a rock and a hard place as both the Igbos and the Yorubas had become too overbearing and dominating.
These experiences, along with perceived feeling of domination and expression of superiority by the Yoruba, drove the people of Benin Province, led by Oba Akenzua to seek freedom with a greater sense of urgency. The decision by Chief Awolowo to restore the title, Olu of Itsekiri to the Olu of Warri further muddied the waters and created more tension. Non-Itsekiris did not take this well and the matter was resolved by renaming the Province, Delta Province. This intensified the struggle and the feeling of urgency for the creation of the Midwest region, spearheaded by the Urhobos. It is here that people like Chief Osadebay and his colleagues came into the fray with gusto.
In 1953, Oba Akenzua 11, delivered a speech that clearly demonstrated his frustration with the game that the British were playing. Among other things, he stated: The divide and rule policy of the British Government had done much harm to the national solidarity of Benin-Delta Province in the past but as God now wants things to be what they were before the advent of the British Government, that is, the Yoruba State for the Yorubas and Benin-Delta State for the “BENDELITES”, that is, the inhabitants of the Benin-Delta Province, steps should now be taken without further delay or fear to move the British Government to repair the damage they have done by restoring the national status of Benin-Delta Province before they transfer power back to the Nigerians from whom they have taken it
Another prominent fighter of the time, Chief Omo Osagie’s searing comments captured the frustration of the moment for the people of the province. He wrote in an article in the West African Pilot: The people of the Midwest would willingly submit to the use of nuclear weapons, devastating bombs or machine guns to annihilate them, rather than remain in a self governing West.
When the date came, there was no doubt that the process and the anticipated outcome. Clearly, the process was at best, a trial by ordeal for all his subjects. Ahead of the referendum, Oba Akenzua11, warned his subjects in an address on March 12, 1963. He warned: Whoever does not drop his or her ballot paper into the WHITE ballot box will be condemned by future generations. Even those who die before the plebiscite takes place will be condemned in the other world, if they die with the bad intention of voting against or persuading people to vote against the creation of a Midwest region . By all counts, this speech made President Obasanjo’s do or die warning sound like an altar boy’s psalm.
Today, we know the rest is history because, specifically, on July 13rd, the plebiscite took place and the Midwest region was born on August 9, 1963 with 89.07% Yes votes. It is instructive to pose the questions; Why was the Midwest State created? Was it to do justice? Why did the other Minorities not get justice then? Or were they the children of a lesser god?
Well, the people of the Midwest were lucky, far luckier than their counterparts elsewhere in the country. It will be recalled that the move for regional or state creation was based on the sentiments expressed to the Minority Commission. The Minorities in the South wanted a Calabar-Ogoja-Rivers Region while the Minorities in the North wanted a Middle Belt region. None of these regions were created for reasons that somehow, the big boys did not want states to be created for reasons of politics and the  need for the Igbos and the Hausas to protect their power bases. The Midwest had made a good case, but luck and other factors conspired in their favour.
First, the fact that Awolowo was in prison and with no chance of wielding any influence at all created a vacuum. Having kept Awolowo away, it seemed quite convenient that the Midwest should be created so as to further weaken his political base. It is here that both Osadebay and Festus Okotie Eboh did a lot of good work in lobbying giants like  Muhammadu Ribadu and Ahmadu Bello to overlook things and approve the creation of Midwest State. Akintola had tried to make Tafawa Balewa understand that the creation of a Midwest state would haunt the north, but it was too late. The details of these diplomatic shuttles lie elsewhere. What remains for us is to thank God that men of such caliber appeared at the appropriate time and changed the course of history. What lessons or legacies can we take away? It is to this that we shall now turn.

5: Summary and Conclusion: When we look back at history, the feelings are basically the same and the challenge is often what happens the day after. For example, a student prepares for a day he would be ordained a priest, a man and a woman prepare for their wedding day, and the days come and pass. The day after, you ask, what has changed? How do you feel? You realize that the ordination is not the priesthood, the wedding is not the marriage and that you have only partially crossed one river only to set out on a long journey with perhaps many, many more rivers to cross, some even more treacherous and you wonder, was this what it was all about?
To return to the intentions implied in the title of this paper, it is clear that the issues of common citizenship has to be assumed before a nation can inspire its people to a common vision. Nigeria has had a rather convoluted and turbulent crisis over the issues of patriotism and unity largely because the elites have not been able to create the myth of a common narrative based on a vision. This vision is often created around certain myths of identity. These identities become rallying points and they can be created or manufactured fro the myth of ancestry (we are children of Oduduwa, say the Yoruba), or my of religion (we are Muslims and descendants of Usman Dan Fodio, Yan Arewa), or region (we are Bendelites, Minorities, Middle Belters or Midwesterners.)