Obafemi Awolowo

By Obafemi Awolowo

The aim of a leader should be the welfare of the people whom he leads. I have used ‘welfare’ to denote the physical, mental and spiritual well-being of the people. With this aim fixed unflinchingly and unchangeably before my eyes I consider it my duty to Yoruba people in particular and to Nigerians in general, to place four imperatives before you this morning. Two of them are categorical and two are conditional. Only a peaceful solution must be found to arrest the present worsening stalemate and restore normalcy.

The Eastern Region must be encouraged to remain part of the Federation. If the Eastern Region is allowed by acts of omission or commission to secede from or opt out of Nigeria, then the Western Region and Lagos must also stay out of the Federation. The people of Western Nigeria and Lagos should participate in the ad hoc committee or any similar body only on the basis of absolute equality with the other regions of the Federation.

I would like to comment briefly on these four imperatives. There has, of late, been a good deal of sabre rattling in some parts of the country. Those who advocate the use force for the settlement of our present problems should stop a little and reflect. I can see no vital and abiding principle involved in any war between the North and the East. If the East attacked the North, it would be for purpose of revenge pure and simple. Any claim to the contrary would be untenable. If it is claimed that such a war is being waged for the purpose of recovering the real and personal properties left behind in the North by Easterners two insuperable points are obvious.

Firstly, the personal effects left behind by Easterners have been wholly looted or destroyed, and can no longer be physically recovered. Secondly, since the real properties are immovable in case of recovery of them can only be by means of forcible military occupation of those parts of the North in which these properties are situated. On the other hand, if the North attacked the East, it could only be for the purpose of further strengthening and entrenching its position of dominance in the country.

If it is claimed that an attack on the East is going to be launched by the Federal Government and not by the North as such and that it is designed to ensure the unity and integrity of the Federation, two other insuperable points also become obvious. First, if a war against the East becomes a necessity it must be agreed to unanimously by the remaining units of the Federation. In this connection, the West, Mid- West and Lagos have declared their implacable opposition to the use of force in solving the present problem. In the face of such declarations by three out of remaining four territories of Nigeria, a war against the East could only be a war favoured by the North alone.

Second, if the true purpose of such a war is to preserve the unity and integrity of the Federation, then these ends can be achieved by the very simple devices of implementing the recommendation of the committee which met on August 9 1966, as reaffirmed by a decision of the military leaders at Aburi on January 5 1967 as well as by accepting such of the demands of the East, West, Mid-West and Lagos as are manifestly reasonable, and essential for assuring harmonious relationships and peaceful co-existence between them and their brothers and sisters in the North.

Some knowledgeable persons have likened an attack on the East to Lincoln’s war against the southern states in America. Two vital factors distinguish Lincoln’s campaign from the one now being contemplated in Nigeria. The first is that the American civil war was aimed at the abolition of slavery – that is the liberation of millions of Negroes who were then still being used as chattels and worse than domestic animals. The second factor is that Lincoln and others in the northern states were English-speaking people waging a war of good conscience and humanity against their fellow nationals who were also English speaking. A war against the East in which Northern soldiers are predominant, will only unite the Easterners or the Ibos against their attackers, strengthen them in their belief that they are not wanted by the majority of their fellow-Nigerians, and finally push them out of the Federation.

The Eastern Region must be encouraged to remain part of the Federation. If the Eastern Region is allowed by acts of omission or commission to secede from or opt out of Nigeria, then the Western Region and Lagos must also stay out of the Federation. The people of Western Nigeria and Lagos should participate in the ad hoc committee or any similar body only on the basis of absolute equality with the other regions of the Federation

We have been told that an act of secession on the part of the East would be a signal, in the first instance, for the creation of the COR state by decree, which would be backed, if need be, by the use of force. With great respect, I have some dissenting observations to make on this declaration. There are 11 national or linguistic groups in the COR areas with a total population of 5..3 millions. These national groups are as distinct from one another as the Ibos are distinct from them or from the Yorubas or Hausas.

Of the 11, the Efik/Ibibio/Annang national group are 3.2 million strong as against the Ijaws who are only about 700,000 strong. Ostensibly, the remaining nine national group number 1.4 millions. But when you have subtracted the Ibo inhabitants from among them, what is left ranges from the Ngennis who number only 8,000 to the Ogonis who are 220,000 strong. A decree creating a COR state without a plebiscite to ascertain the wishes of the peoples in the area, would only amount to subordinating the minority national groups in the state to the dominance of the Efik/Ibibio/Annang national group. It would be perfectly in order to create a Calabar state or a Rivers state by decree, and without a plebiscite. Each is a homogeneous national unit. But before you lump distinct and diverse national units together in one state, the consent of each of them is indispensable. Otherwise, the seed of social disquilibrium in the new state would have been sown.

On the other hand, if the COR State is created by decree after the Eastern Region shall have made its severance from Nigeria effective, we should then be waging an unjust war against a foreign state. It would be an unjust war, because the purpose of it would be to remove 10 minorities in the East from the dominance of the Ibos only to subordinate them to the dominance of the Efik/Ibibio/Annang national group. I think I have said enough to demonstrate that any war against the East, or vice versa, on any count whatsoever, would be an unholy crusade, for which it would be most unjustifiable to shed a drop of Nigerian blood. Therefore, only a peaceful solution must be found, and quickly too to arrest the present rapidly deteriorating stalemate and restore normalcy.

With regard to the second categorical imperative, it is my considered view that whilst some of the demands of the East are excessive within the context of a Nigerian union, most of such demands are not only wellfounded, but are designed for smooth and steady association amongst the various national units of Nigeria.

…Speech that Chief Obafemi Awolowo made in Ibadan to the Western leaders of thought, on the eve of the Nigerian 1967 Civil War, 1 May 1967.. (quoted from “Crisis and Conflict in Nigeria (Volume 1), January 1966-July 1971” by A. H. M. Kirk-Greene. )