Chief Emmanuel Iwuanyanwu is the President-General of Ohanaeze Ndigbo. In this monitored interview, the leader of the Igbo apex socio-cultural organization says he thinks the demolition of properties belonging mainly to Igbo people in Abule Ado area of Lagos State was politically influenced. Iwuanyanwu also speaks on former President Olusegun Obasanjo’s visit to him, alleged marginalization of Ndigbo in Nigeria, restructuring, detention of Eze Nwajiaku in Lagos as well as the reason Ohanaeze leadership set up the Peace and Reconciliation Committee. Excerpts:
You recently played host to former President Olusegun Obasanjo at your residence in Owerri, Imo State. The meeting was described as symbolic. Would you like to share some of those issues of mutual interest that the leadership of Ohanaeze Ndigbo discussed with Obasanjo?
The visit was purely a private one obviously but the situation in Nigeria today is so bad, so critical that it must be discussed when leaders meet and I don’t think anybody needs to be told the situation of the country. Things are not good and it is important to underline the fact that it is not proper to blame this government for what is happening because this is a combination of errors and failures of many past administrations. But the worst situation is in not taking step, not taking action.
I believe that the government in the past few days has taken some steps which have given some confidence to Nigerians. When they have taken step to suspend somebody who actually was suspected to have done a wrong thing, mind you, she has not been convicted by any law court but it’s normal to suspend her and if she is free, that is, if she is not found guilty, she will come back to her job. The government has taken practical steps to show they identify with the sufferings of the masses by cutting down the entourage because the entourage of Mr President’s recent visit abroad was embarrassing. We are talking about over 500 people following an entourage, it is very embarrassing.
Amalgamation
One thing is clear, in 1914 when Lugard amalgamated Nigeria, the country had ethnic nationalities, people with different cultures, languages and religions. It was clear to us at that time that the survival of Nigeria would depend on our ability to manage our differences. And of course, our forebears, before independence, were able to manage it. The military intervention in 1966 was absolutely very unfortunate; it was the saddest thing that ever happened to Nigeria. Unfortunately, that was blamed on the Igbo but there was no reason for Igbo to topple that government but it was blamed on us.
Now, that particular government before independence had a constitution, a true federal constitution, a constitution that could actually apply without a lot of strain to a people who have diverse backgrounds like Nigeria. We had a true federal constitution in 1960/1963 that worked for us. Later on, they changed to unitary constitution which is not right.
Now, that is why we in Igbo land are saying please, let us have a true federal constitution. What we are operating today is a unitary government. It doesn’t work for a people who have diverse backgrounds.
Take many countries for instance, if you go to a place like Britain, you have Scotland, you have Wales, and you have England. They have a constitution that binds them together and it’s working for them. If you go to America, we are supposed to be following their kind of constitution, what they have is not a unitary government.
Every state in America has got a certain level of autonomy. Now, I believe that the government of Bola Tínubu should take steps to see if we can actualize this restructuring of Nigeria. Without a proper restructuring, Nigeria will continue to have problems. There is no way this country can survive. Today, everybody is talking of presidency; in a restructured Nigeria, the presidency will not attract so much attention as it does today. Because today, every power is vested in the President.
Rail Project
As I said last time, for example, a child who is born in South-South or South-East in the past 30 to 40 years has not even seen a train before. He doesn’t know what it’s all about. But we have borrowed money and the whole money we borrowed was invested in railway line from Western Nigeria to North -West. So these are some of the problems we have because South-East and South-South were not in power. Now, coming specifically to one of the Igbo, our own is very serious. It’s very, very serious. We feel very sad about what is happening to us.