| On December 5, 2011 · In News
Father of Nigeria’s nationalism, Dr Nnamdi Azikiwe’s exchange with the leader of the Northern establishment, Alhaji Ahmadu Bello, is often referred to. “Zik” urged Nigerians to “forget” their differences and build a great nation. Bello, the Sardauna of Sokoto corrected him, saying Nigerians should “understand” their differences, for it was the only way to build a great nation. The third leg in the Nigerian traditional tripod, Chief Obafemi Awolowo, chipped in by observing that Nigeria was “a mere geographical expression”. That Nigerians have never shared national interests is all too evident through our history. The 1960’s decade, our first after independence from colonial Britain, was a critical period when, through practical politics, our diversity was put to test. The result showed that the “Zik” model of diversity management (“forgetting”, or “rising above” the diversity) failed. It started with his own failure to assume executive leadership of Nigeria after leading the independence struggle. Nigeria became the only example of such on the African continent. | The Igbo/Eastern Nigerian political leadership, riding on the nationalist philosophy of the National Council for Nigerian Citizens (NCNC) did not understand the agendas of their coalition partners from the North and West. They “forgot” our differences. They acted as if those differences did not exist and were taken out of the tripod for forty years. This factor obviously (mis)guided young military officers from the South to plot the January 15th 1966 military coup. The naive idea was to remove a “corrupt and inept” elected federal government controlled by political leaders from the North and hand over power to a perceived left-of-centre leadership (with Chief Awolowo … |
Copyright, Blaise APLOGAN, 2010,© Bienvenu sur Babilown
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