2015: Orji Kalu and raging Northerners

By Odimegwu Onwumere 

The many voices from the northern part of the country are deliberately banging that power must return to the north in 2015. The undoing of these voices is the unrepresentative tune that has pervaded to tell Nigerians which part of the north they expect the power to return to, unlike Dr. Orji Kalu has always sounded not misleading that power must return to the South-East of the country.

As we may know, the Hausa/Fulani see power as their inheritance that must not be tasted by other Nigerians, let alone, by minorities in the north. But they are good at calling on all northerners to fight for a collective cause, such as the illusory yearning that power must return to the north in 2015.

It is evident that the matrix ‘born to rule Nigeria’, as has been associated with northerners, is not the conviction of all the peoples of the north, but the credence of Hausa/Fulani dominating north, who see Nigeria as their legacy that must be self-interestedly protected by them, but using the minorities of the North, as prepared instruments.

They also see the people from the Southern part of the country as defeated peoples that must be controlled in the country as long as it lasts. It was this hindsight that perhaps ignited the comment that was credited to Francois Duvalier, then President of Haiti, March 22, 1969, which substantiated that the “Federal Nigeria has never since her independence shown the distinctive mark of a united nation. It has been impossible for her to silence tribal rivalries – to achieve that mixture of ethnic/cultural blend required to forge National Unity.”

But what President Duvalier saw around 1969, was the aim and object of Hausa/Fulani hegemony in the north, which in 1952, Sir Abubakar Tafawa Balewa had addressed the Northern House of Assembly, and purportedly submitted that: “The Southern people who are swamping into this region daily in such large numbers are really intruders; we don’t want them and they are not welcome here in the North.

“Since 1914, the British Government has been trying to make Nigeria into one country. But the people are different in every way, including religion, custom, language and aspirations... we in the North take it that Nigeria unity is only a British intention for the country they created. IT IS NOT FOR US.”

Known for their (Hausa/Fulani) ground-breaking appetite in hostilities, Sir Ahmadu Bello apparently approached the Colonial Secretary in the same year, and said, “If you want us (the North) to be part of this Nigeria you have in mind, then we want 50% of the membership of the National Assembly.”

Out-of-control, many Hausa/Fulani anti-truths have tried by magic or design to defend or discredit these comments credited to their personalities, but could not. They, however, resorted to labeling anybody who referred them to such comments as anti-Northerners, or something. But a keen observer of the Nigerian politics would attest to the fact that Hausa/Fulani peoples of the north have always been in disagreement that the manifold ethnic-groups in the country is the ultra of all the realities that formed Nigeria.

We could recall that when President Goodluck Jonathan on the 15th September 2010 made his aim known that he needed the mandate of his party and Nigerians for another four years, the Hausa/Fulani went on rampage. They threatened fire and brimstone through many avenues of which one was an advertorial put up in a national daily by one group with the name Northern Elders Forum/Assembly.

In the same manner, Dr Dikko was said to have made the following comment to Abiola in 1983: “Presidency is not for sale”. The Hausa/Fulani peoples of the north have always been bigheaded with statements that were tailored to churlish the people from across the Niger from becoming President of Nigeria.

But what Hausa/Fulani have always forgotten or remembered but are reluctant to hold onto truth are the political supports they have garnered from places like Ijaw, Ibibio,  Efik, Ikwerre, Kalabari, Ogoni, Ndigbo and so on from the present South-East and South-South, since December 1959 till 2007. They have only paid the South-South and South-East zones with unacceptable coin of born-to-rule thoughtless mindset, hence killings and destruction to property of Ndigbo in the north becomes fad.

This is the reason all and sundry must support Dr. Kalu who has been shouting above his natural voice that 2015 should be for the South-East, because the people from this political zone have compromised much with the political equation in the country and are not ready for such again.

Without doubt, Kalu is not using selfishly, any ethnic minorities in the South as instrument for this cause just as the Shylockic voices from the north are not proportionate with the truth of where they want the power to be rested should the presidency return to the north. They are now involving all the minorities in the north, when it is obvious that Hausa/Fulani peoples would not allow any minority from there to be a civilian president.

Dr. Kalu had formed the Peoples Progressive Alliance, PPA, when it was obvious that he wanted an Igbo presidency, but his kinsmen like ex-Gov. Ikedi Ohakim and Gov. T.A Orji, who were overwhelmingly voted by Ndigbo in their respective states of Abia and Imo, because a personality like Kalu was involved, jumped ship at last and worked against the party, but they could not submerge it.

Ndigbo have to align with Kalu since it is obvious that he is the lone voice now championing for Igbo Presidency in 2015, because Ndigbo are not sure when their role in defending their lives and their aboriginal land in the pogrom targeted against them that is christened Nigeria/Biafra war will be forgiven by the powers that be in Nigeria.

Kalu is calling for synergy and corporation to move Nigeria forward. It is not sure what has made other Igbo politicians and dignitaries to be mute. He does not want Ndigbo to bear grudges against any tribes in Nigeria for all the pains they have been enduring in Nigeria, because he is of the principle that his movement for Igbo presidency will never be unproductive.

Odimegwu Onwumere, a Poet/Writer, writes from Rivers State.