I don’t know whether people around the world, especially Nigerians have wondered why there has been too much progress in United States of America. There are many reasons adduced to the spate of progress and development in USA, but one that stands out is the unity of voice with which the American people defend America. Immigrants, who later become American citizens, join the foray because the intensity of defending America with the last blood of every Yankee and every cowboy is overwhelming.
Whether it is true or false of the promise that every American is equal before the law and the pursuit of happiness is open to everybody, not only the citizens but the residents both legal and illegal give the motivation for any man to die for the state. If you are out of job and you can prove citizenship or legal residency, you will be entitled to a monthly stipend before you get another job and you will not be asked whether you are from Texas, California, New York, Nevada, Arizona, and New Orleans, New Jersey or State of Alaska. The bottom line and what matters most is you are an American citizen or legal resident in that state you lost your job. In education, you are entitled to receive free first class education so to say from kindergarten to 12 grade whether you are a citizen, resident or illegal resident. You are provided with free textbook, free or subsidized meal all day depending on the income level of the parents.
You are free to work in any state you are living and you are entitled to all the goodies in that state. To bring it home, the guy from Imo State will enjoy all the benefits accruing to the so call son of the soil of Lagos State and vice versa. The man from Jigawa will not be different from the guy born and raised in Port Harcourt, whose parents are from Ikwerre. You don’t dare ask anybody in USA his or her state of origin, date of birth and religious affiliation before employment; you may be courting a law suit if you drag your foot along these lines; so shut up.
Little things may matter. If you want to feel the pulse of Nigerians, drag your lazy butt to the FRA grounds. FRA means Free Readers Association or read the comments online after any particular news item or commentary. At these two forums, you will hear and read how Nigerians hate themselves; the ethnic fights and near genocides if they have arms. Every Nigerian knows this but we just bury our heads like ostriches in pretense. Yoruba man does not want to see Igbo man and Igbo man wants a wish to kill all the Yorubas who they think stab them on the back at all times. The Hausa man if he has the power may like to throw hydrogen bomb on the Igbos and Igbo man sees himself as hamstrung to carry a calculated and due genocide on the Hausas who have been a pain in their butts since the creation of the sorry marriage called Nigeria.
The middle belt man sees the Hausas using them as canon folders, they don’t like to be called Hausa and they look on how to revenge the Hausas for the number of killings of their people during the military regime during coups and counter coups. No matter the Ikwerres are Ibos, they hate to be called that and they don’t like to see the core Ibos around them; and the only Ibos out of the South East states that want to be called Igbos are the Igbo Deltans, to me the original Igbos, but do the rest of the Igbos accept this as true. Nigeria is a place where your property would be labeled abandoned property if you built in a state other than yours; so pray that there is no outbreak of fracas in any time and space.
I think we have 777 Local Government Authorities if I am correct, and they don’t even like themselves. All the ethnic groups in Nigeria are either in subtle or open wars with one another. The founder of Holiday Inn and Suites visited many hotels with his family and he was uncomfortable and he decided to establish a hotel home away from home for families. No ethnic group has a home when any of them leaves his or her enclave to reside in another state other than his or hers, too bad.
The bad and sorry thing is that some of these haters are made ministers, commissioners, presidents, governors and heads of agencies; and they carry along with them the hatred they have in their armpits. This is the major reason why a president from the north is a president for the northerners and that one from the south is for the southerners. This trickles down to the governors, commissioners, ministers and heads of agencies; and this is the reason why Nigeria can never be one; because we hate ourselves and we are not our brother’s keepers.
In every state you are in America, you feel secured and you have every amenity that can make you happy, there are jobs and industries. There are almost seaports in all the states and airports scattered in every major cities. I heard it from the grape vine that Lagos State and the Federal government decided long time ago to make it impossible for functioning airports and seaports in the South East. How can we be together, we can never be one? Nigeria is a sitting bomb waiting to explode unfortunately.
If the South East has functioning airports and seaports, most of the traffic in Lagos will be shifted to the sunrise states and a loss of revenue to the Lagos state and since the powers that be have hell bent(ly) decided that there would never be development in the sunrise states, the only unwelcome gift is increase poverty among Ndi Igbo, we can never be one. How can Ndi Igbo keeping on begging for new Niger Bridge? This is ridiculous. Infrastructure is part of national development and the Niger Bridge is the only link between south west and south east all the way to core south south. Does Okonkwo or Igboanugo need to cry for the right thing to be done? When a group of people is alienated deliberately and wickedly; it does not give hope to be one nation.
Boko Haram has ravaged North East for no reason and billon of dollars have been earmarked to rebuild those areas, good sense but when the South East was destroyed by the Federal Troops, all the areas laid prostrate, and nobody had the sense to rebuild the area. Visit some areas in the South East, the traces of the civil war still litter after forty five years. The Igbos were conquered people and most authoritative voices in Nigeria today still think that the Igbos should remain conquered, we can never be one.
Obi Nwakanma wrote in Vanguard that at a time, Lagos and Aba were at par in industrial layouts but in the rabid rush to punish Ibos, the industries in Aba were uprooted to Lagos and Kaduna and today, Nigeria has in her hand the greatest army of unemployed Igbo youths in history. We can never be one when some Igbos in Lagos state were deported and dumped in Onitsha Head Bridge by the former governor of Lagos State, Raji Babatunde Fashola, and who is now the minister of Power, Housing and Works. Will he not carry the same hatred to the South East, and refuse to work on the dilapidated roads in the South East, tell me how can we be one; it is difficult?
Our President, from what he said on the pages of newspaper said that the Igbos did not vote for him and Ndi Igbo claim that he hates them and he has shown this by shutting the Igbos out the power of his administration, though I like Buhari for his dogged anti-corruption war. I don’t like the struggle for the resurrection of Biafra, but the champions are frustrated and alienated youths, who have no hope for tomorrow in the Nigerian project. And how President Buhari handles the issue of Kanu and the Biafra struggle will determine a lot of things in the minds of the Igbos. If he does not look at this issue from the prism of the struggles of a marginalized people, he would be making a grievous mistake.
The question is this: do other ethnic groups have empathy for the people of South East, no they don’t have? Ojukwu said “because I am involved” We can never be one in Nigeria because we hate ourselves too much. I would love for us to be one.
During the Los Angeles riot of the early 1990s, the main victim, Rodney King quipped, “Can we all get along”? Why can’t the various ethnic groups in Nigeria get along with one another? The benefits of staying together as one indivisible nation outweigh the disadvantages. The root of all major problems in this world stems from selfishness and pride. There is always strength in diversity. Watch this, the product from a white and black couple is more beautiful than the offspring from black couple or white couple. Our population is our strength and that is one of the reasons why investors swam Nigeria, saved for our corruption that is tolling the death of our nation.
Let us respect one another, and our mosaic cultures. The Igbos should stop that nonsense attitude of having Eze Ndi Igbo in Yoruba land or Serkin this or that in Imo or Akwa Ibom States. If you want to be king or Eze of your ethnic group, then go to your locality.
The only way to be one nation in Nigeria is equal representation, equity, good conscience; what is good for the Fulanis should be good also for the Kalabaris, and nobody should be marginalized and let the merry go round. How can Igbo man or Yoruba man get a temporary appointment in the North, while the Arabian guy is given a permanent appointment in Kaduna or Maiduguri? Whether I am in Ewekoro or in Epe or in Enugu, I should be accorded the dignity and respect of being a Nigerian. A Yoruba man should feel at home in Owerri and an Igbo man should feel at home in Jos or in Port Harcourt. An Ikwerre man or Ishekiri man should be welcome and relax in Katsina or in Calabar. That is one of the processes how we can be one; otherwise, Nigeria can never be one nation.
When Green Eagles play an international match, Nigerians unite, sing with one voice and be happy when our national team wins but mourn collectively when we lose, let it be so in all aspect of our lives.
Chukwuma Iwuanyanwu writes from Los Angeles.