RE: WHEN THE NORTH MET

Going by certain historical records, written and video, one can easily point out certain areas of disagreement with the "founding fathers" of what is still referred to as Northern Nigeria. The late Ahmadu Bello, the Sardauna of Sokoto was just one of them. They had a singlemindedness of pursuing northern interests, to the exclusion of all others. Consistently pursued, the idea would have resulted in a very different Nigeria from what we have today. My objection and that of many have been the deeply entrenched ambivalence towards the Nigerian project. It has obviously not worked as the inheritors of the norther enterprise continued to cut corners aiming at personal aggrandizement.

Since the northern elite successfully pulled the religious and ethnic wool over the eyes of their people, they had no idea, that is until recently, of what hit them. Thus the Boko-Haram plague, which has been more than five decades in the making, has simply come home to roost. People like Paul Unongo have quite recently publicly accused southern political opponents of formenting Boko-Haram to torment the north. Really? That shows how far the northern elite is prepared to turn away from reality. How can the problems of the north, with which the rest of Nigeria is shackled, simply disappear if only we ignore them long enough?

On the economic front, I have in the past expressed the view that based on the existing structures, the north will make absolutely no headway even if ALL funds derived from the Niger Delta oil are handed over to the north. I alluded to the well known Resource Curse. Put another way, I had responded to a certain Ekiti State professor who posed the question, "Who said that the North is feeding fat on Niger Delta oil?" My conclusion was that while the north was feeding all right, it is not and CANNOT get fat doing so. That was not to say that the individual top dogs are not helping themselves. Just check out the billionaires list.

Some busybody American, writing in Foreign Affairs journal, had come to the strange conclusion that, among other things, southerners were not investing enough in the Nigerian north-east. As far as I know, no northern elite has countered that falsehood. I even proposed that all development projects in the north should be reserved for northerners, to be executed on an extended time frame of when they can arrange for the peaceful environment to do so. Strangely enough, a few northerners objected to that. What again do they want? I have stated on different platforms that not one of my grandchildren will risk life and limb, after the rigours of school, to go do a development project up north, a project in which the northerners themselves have absolutely no interest!

The security element whereby murder and mayhem of fellow citizens is regarded as routine, where the perpetrators are coddled by the governments, has been covered so much. I doubt if there is much new information to add. The fear is that people may soon resort to self help. Any belated involvement of the military may lead to mutiny and insurrection, a possible death knell for Nigeria, a nation that has existed almost only in paper.