My dear Muhammed Sanusi II, Emir of Kano,

I read your speech at the book-launch of Chief Olaniwun Ajayi at Muson-Park, Lagos. I found your speech very splendid and revealing. And since you made generation an issue in the speech, I believe it is necessary for me to respond, because I belong to your generation. I am also responding because I belong to a tribe that doesn’t go home to seek response.

My dear emir, I will not want to go to issue of objectivity of your speech, because there is always a contradictory view of an object.

You made your speech as a Fulani man and a Nigerian, while I am going to respond as a Yoruba man and a Nigerian. I am a Yoruba man and I am proud to be. My dear emir, as you said about the Northern history, that before colonialism, there was no Northern Nigeria, so also I would say that before colonialism, there was no Western Nigeria. As you mentioned intra-tribal wars then in what we know as Northern Nigeria today, so were intra-tribal wars in what we now call Western Nigeria.

My dear emir, you made emotional statement in your speech that the colonialists didn’t encourage the northerners to go to school because they didn’t want them to be educated like Muslim Indians and Egyptians. If I got you right, I believe you’re talking of Western education and not Islamic education that Othman Dan Fodio bestowed to the North.

Let me inform you, my dear emir, that the colonialist did not encourage education in Western Nigeria also. It was as the Jihadists that gave the north, Islamic education, so also the European missionaries gave the Yoruba Christian education. It was Chief Obafemi Awolowo, in 1955, that made landmark achievement, by introducing free and compulsory education in (Western) Nigeria.

My dear emir, you got it wrong by saying there is no heroic leader in Yoruba land, after Chief Obafemi Awolowo. Let me give you a bit of account of my biography. In 1979, the year of election into Nigeria’s Second Republic, I was just a secondary school leaver experiencing politics for the first time. I rejected Unity Party of Nigeria (UPN), because I believed it was predominantly Yoruba party. I adopted National Party of Nigeria (NPN), because I believed it was nationally spread. On October 1, 1979, I could not believe what I heard when Chief Bola Ige declared free education at all levels in Oyo State. The second day, I read it in the newspapers: “Jakande cancels afternoon school session in Lagos State.” My dear emir, Lagos, Oyo, Ondo, Bendel, Ogun (LOOBO) states’ governors of UPN were heroes of the Second Republic.

My dear emir, I went to school in the North. I attended Federal Polytechnic, Bauchi. I witnessed squandering of riches in the north and I can boldly say the greatest misfortune of the Yoruba has been the central governments of the country. The Yoruba are egalitarian by nature and culture. It is on the platform of the Yoruba culture of egalitarianism that Awolowo built his government of social welfares. The Yoruba have never been comfortable and can never be comfortable in this profligate and squander-maniac Nigeria.

My dear emir, as an economist, or do I say as a former Central Bank of Nigeria governor, have you ever thought and inquired cerebrally how and when we got it wrong in the economic history of this country? Could you trace this jeopardy to the mismanagement and apologetic economic policy in the early 70s at the beginning of oil boom? How many southerners were in the Supreme Military Council then? Was the Supreme Military Council then not dominated by northern officers? Why did the Military Government then frustrate Chief Obafemi Awolowo – who managed the Nigerian economy during the civil war without borrowing one kobo from foreign countries – out of government? Why did the Supreme Military Council then reject Chief Obafemi Awolowo’s advice to spend the oil boom on free education at all levels, rural integration, industrialisation and free health services? Why did the Military Government then, instead of taking to the sage’s advice, took to the profligate policy of importation of finished goods, construction of roads, bridges and skyscrapers? I put it to you that the reasons were political, ethnic politics.

My dear emir, I feel very disappointed by your criticism of Babangida’s regime’s economic policy. Though I know that the worst critics of the Structural Adjustment Programme (SAP) were the Hausa/Fulani, because of their hitherto domineering privileges on government establishments, which deregulation reduced. However, I believe, as an economist, you should show some understanding. The only economist I knew that was critical of SAP was Dr Aluko: “There Is Always Alternative To Everything, Even Life Has Alternative. The Alternative To Life Is Death.” That was Dr Aluko.

Meanwhile, when Dr Aluko became Abacha’s economic adviser, he could not formulate alternative to SAP. Another great critic of SAP was General Olusegun Obasanjo, who stated: “Badamosi! This Your SAP Must Have Human Face.” When Obasanjo became president of Nigeria, he executed SAP more than Babangida who established it. My dear emir, please tell me any government after Babangida that has not, privatised, deregulated, liberalised government companies? I know you know better. You just castigated Babangida’s economic policy because of Olu Falae and Kalu Idika Kalu who are southerners.

My dear emir, there is no ethnic group that is serious about exiting the country. What the agitators’ desire is a nation belonging to everybody. A nation where everybody would have a sense of belonging; A nation where there will not be marginalisation. A nation of free enterprise, that government would not be regulating standard of living through quota system and federal character. I am sure you know that in order to achieve such a country, we have to review our constitution towards political restructuring. We need to install a political structure that will take into consideration our complexities. We have American Constitution or Switzerland political structure to reflect on.

My dear emir, I have these questions for you to ruminate on: Tell me any nation that has experienced Islamic insurgency that has fully gotten over it? Tell me of any nation that has a great deal of Muslim population that is practicing democracy that is not experiencing Islamic insurgency? Please, tell me any developed democracy that is multi-cultural and multi-lingual?

My dear emir, are we going to face reality or continue to waste lives and resources?

Thank you!

•Folu Oyeleye, whose photo appears alongside this piece, is an author and entrepreneur. He writes from Ibadan.

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