Stella Oduah: Tribalism , ethnicity, bane

Stella Oduah: Tribalism , ethnicity, bane
of Nigeria’s development
on october 28, 2013 at 12:38 pm in viewpoint
By Taiwo Bello
For the past weeks since the incumbent Aviation
Minister, Ms. Stella Oduah, was reported to have
purchased, through the Nigerian Civil Aviation
Authority (NCAA), her two latest and most
expensive bullet proof vehicles- BMW 760 Li HSS-
at the abnormal price of N255m ($ 1.6m), Nigerians,
both at home and abroad have been displeased by
this act of flamboyancy and many- the living, dead,
deaf, blind, lame and disable and the poor- have
reacted on different platforms.
However, despite the fact that this act of
mismanagement as many have described it has
generated a lot of debates among ‘patriotic’
Nigerians, the focus of this write-up is not to
expose Nigeria’s shame before the world, but to
state in clear terms, why Nigeria has failed to
develop despite the plethora of resources it
possessed- if we like we say ‘oil’ amongst others.
The only answer one can give is the existence of
tribalism and ethnicity among leaders and followers
in the country.
This has robbed Nigerians of the spirits of
nationalism of the late 1950s to early 1960s in
exchange for parochialism and selfism that have
pervaded our political, economic and social climates
since the mid-1960s: the 1966 military coup in
Nigeria.
Tribalism and ethnicity have penetrated deeply into
the fabrics of the Nigerian nation and have
distracted many, especially the youth who claim to
be leaders of tomorrow, from pondering
development as well as gathering the tools to
instigate one: that is if they have access to the
needed tools. These two are enemies of the
Nigerian state and have deprived Nigeria its rightful
positions in the world’s stage. Nigeria might be
considered as a developing country by the
international community, but the Nigerians
themselves know that the country is far from that.
In short, if there is any qualification below
underdeveloped, Nigeria will be glad to embrace this
status.
Nigeria emerged after independence in the 1960s
as one of the major powers on the African continent
and even dominated the political, economic and
social arenas in Africa especially with its roles in
the founding of the Organization of African Unity
(now AU) in 1963 and subsequently, its relentless
fight against the white rule in Africa. Further, in
1975, Nigeria also played a very important role in
ensuring that an economic body called the Economic
Community of West African States (ECOWAS) was
founded in order to foster trade relations and
cooperation amongst the countries found on the
Western part of Africa. Nigeria was Africa’s voice on
the international scene. Nigeria possessed both
human and material resources that other African
countries lacked and this was why some smaller
countries such as Gabon and Ivory Coast decided to
work towards its bifurcation by pitching their tents
along with the French in support of the Biafrans
against her during the Nigerian Civil War of
1967-1970; a war that had its root in Tribalism and
Ethnicity! Nigeria was the dream of many foreigners
and tourists destination because of its beautiful
climate and resources. At this period, many
Nigerians were proud of their roots and the Nigerian
passport was cherished like gold, silver and
diamond. Nigerians stayed in their country, went
about their businesses, had access to the best of
academic materials and qualified teachers and
professors that were competing on the international
arena then, and many Nigerians would dare to say
‘to hell with foreign countries and their passports’
because Nigeria was even a model to some so
called developed countries today!
But where are all these values, pride and comfort
today? The answer is that they have been buried in
the womb of Tribalism and Ethnicity. Or better still,
consumed by these long-standing enemies of the
Nigerian state. What then is Tribalism and Ethnicity?
These two enemies are different but share very
close domain. According to the Oxford Advanced
Learner’s Dictionary 7th edition, Tribalism is
defined as ‘behaviour, attitudes, etc. that are based
on being loyal to a tribe or other social group’, while
Ethnicity is defined as ‘belonging to a particular
race’. These two have long been harmonized to
determine the course of events in the political,
economic and social relations amongst Nigerians.
Though these enemies called tribalism and ethnicity
had been whining and dining with Nigeria long
before the Nigerian Civil War, their modern images
and dynamism as we experience on broad scales
emerged as a consequence of the Nigerian Civil War
and the subsequent perceived ‘marginalization’
among the Igbos by the other tribes. Marginalization
could be in both economic and political senses.
Hence, even in Nigeria and overseas, whenever
Nigerians are asked of their country, they give the
opposite: they mention first their tribal or ethnic
affiliation instead of their country, Nigeria. An Igbo
person would say he is Igbo, therefore, he is
different from a Yoruba or Hausa man. An Igbo man
wants to form his association only with other Igbos,
and the other tribes want to do the same, instead of
having a larger group comprising of Nigerians. An
Igbo man sees no reason why he should not defend
and support his clansmen and women in power
even if such person’s action is detrimental to the
growth and development of the country: Nigeria.
The same applies to the Yoruba and Hausa’s in the
country. And with these tribal and ethnic mindsets,
Nigeria has been relegated to the position of ‘no-
growth and no-development’. In saner climes and
other countries around the world, people hardly
identify themselves by their tribes or ethnicity, but
their countries. For instance, an American when
asked of his country, will not give such as wrong
answer as ‘I am from Ohio or Philadelphia’, but the
answer will be that ‘I am an American’. The same
with the British, Romanians, French, Greeks, and
many more and these are signals that the leaders,
even if they are conscious of their ethnic or tribal
affiliations, embrace first the national values and
inculcate that in their citizens including the unborn.
Unfortunately, such is the opposite in Nigeria and
amongst Nigerians: we have put ethnicity and
tribalism at the core of our relations and this is
mostly playing to our disfavour and degeneration in
the recent times as well as constituting blockades
to our development.
How do the above relate to the broader picture this
write-up intends to portray? In a country where the
youth unemployment rate is alarming, citizens are
suffering, there are many beggars, lack of heath
care facilities and poverty has become a ‘tradition’,
there is high crime rates and burglars, there are
deadly insurgents emerging from the blues, there is
wide gender gap and immensurable injustices, a
country whose citizens are fleeing through the seas
and oceans in search for greeneries in foreign
lands and many are currently locked in jail for
actions enforced on them by the hardships in their
own lands, and whose average citizens’ intelligent
quotient (IQ) is below normal: an appalling situation
triggered by lack of learning infrastructure and non-
payment of emoluments to universities professors
by the successive governments and for which
teachers go on strike for at least twice in a year, a
so-called Minister of Aviation, who must have
sworn to help contribute to the country’s
development during her tenure, being conscious of
all that the country has been going through in the
last decades, could still have the guts to appropriate
or squander the public wealth on expensive BMW
cars for the sake of personal protection. This, as
hinted above, has generated reactions from
‘patriotic’ Nigerians. However, such reactions have
been uneven mainly because of the culprit’s tribal
and ethnic affiliation: an idea that negates the ethics
of development or patriotism.
Ms. Stella Oduah is from Ogbaru, Anambra State;
one of the major Igbo dominated states in Nigeria.
On Saturday, October 26, 2013, Ms. Stella Oduah,
through the dint of her being from the Igbo nation,
enjoyed the support of her people who protested
against the ‘will’ of several Nigerians advocating for
her removal or expulsion from the seat as the
country’s Aviation Minister because of her
‘shameless’ and profligacy. The protesting group is
called the ‘Igbo Progressive Union (IPU). According
to the Punch newspaper published on October 27,
2013, speaking in defense of the Minister at the
Akanu-Abiam International Airport in Enugu, the
leader of the movement, Emeka Agbo, emphasized
that ‘this is a woman that has given the aviation
sector a new face since she came into office.
Today, our airports can compete with airports in
foreign countries. Before she came to office, we
were hearing about international airports but today,
it has become a reality in igboland. We are ready to
swim and sink with her’. This statement is far from
the truth. Nigeria had had airports several years
even before independence and Nnamdi Azikiwe
airports situated in the East, the Igbo domain, had
been in existence prior to Oduah’s assumption of
office in 2011: so which airport did she enlarge or
construct in the East? More so, it will be hyperbolic
to state that Nigerian airports can now compete with
airports in foreign countries: which indicators did
Mr. Emeka apply before coming up with this
unconvincing conclusion? This argument had been
sparked by nothing other than tribalism and
ethnicity. Mr. Emeka Agbo did not even hide that
fact that the future and development of the country
is secondary to him as one can see when he stated
that ‘we are ready to swim and sink with her’. It is
only on Nigeria this can happen! The youths who
are supposed to be at the fore front of change and
development campaign, are now, for the sake of
ethnic and tribal associations, siding with a national
culprit and still had that guts to say such words.
This shows the level to which the Nigerian youths
have been brainwashed on tribal and ethnic lines to
the detriment of the country. They will say ‘your
people first, before Nigerians’. What a pity indeed!
These enemies called tribalism and ethnicity have
also deprived Nigeria, on several occasions, of its
political and economic positions on the international
scene. Today, because of our tribal and ethnic ego,
Nigeria has lost a lot of valuables that would have
contributed to its development and if these enemies
are not arrested and prosecuted, Nigeria may not
reach its dream in the next decades. Nigeria will
continue to sink, while smaller countries in Asia,
Latin America and Europe will appear consistently
on the flags of sustainable development. These
must be arrested and the young generation must be
orientated on a unity line; not ethnic or tribal lines as
we have today. Citizenship, history and the need for
patriotism should be inculcated in the curriculum at
both primary and tertiary levels and in this way, the
youths will develop sense of oneness. Because if
this attitude continues, the corrupt leaders in public
offices will see no point in having a re-think and we
will all wake up one day to realize that Nigeria is no
more!
Taiwo Bello wrote from Switzerland and can be
contacted: taiwoola83@yahoo.com.