“Igbo: Respect our culture or go home, “don’t be jealous of Lagos”

EVEREST EZIHE, Owerri

The recent threat by some Yoruba youths to deal decisively with Igbos resident in Lagos for allegedly insulting their Oba and desecrating their culture and traditional values, has taken another dimension as Chief Kenneth Nwaguma, has asked Yoruba leaders to warn their subjects to henceforth stop making further provocative attacks on Igbos in any part of Yoruba land including Lagos.

Nwaguma who is the National Coordinator of South East, South-South Political Forum, said this in Owerri on Monday while addressing journalists at Rock View Hotel along with some leaders of the group.

The National Coordinator of the socio-political group aimed at uniting the two geo-political regions, informed that when they read in the media about the threat on Igbos resident in Lagos that they used their networks to find out the genuineness of the Yoruba youths that were behind the hate speech against the Igbos.

He said that his organization’s finding revealed that the Yoruba youths making the provocative attacks are miscreants being used by some tribalistic chieftains of APC of Yoruba extractions to achieve some selfish political gains.

Nwaguma said his group is unperturbed on who is inciting or instigating the crisis against Igbos. “But we are issuing a serious warning to our fellow occupants of Lagos State that the Igbos and other ethnic groups are equal partners in Lagos State and nobody have the right to threaten any person or tribe residence in Lagos, especially those who have more investments than the so called owners of the land. No ethnic group owns monopoly of violence.

Lagos is a metropolitan city being developed by various stakeholders, and according to the 1999 constitution of the Federal Republic of Nigeria, any Nigerian citizen has right to reside and own property in any part of the country. So the Lagosians who are freed slaves according to history were repatriated from plantations of West Indies and America following the abolition of slave trade in 19th century,” he pointed out.

The activist reiterated the need for Yoruba leaders to caution against the hate attack and xenophobic tendencies, especially against the Igbos, whom he said are peaceful and enterprising where ever they are located. The Igbo are known as equal partners in the Lagos developmental project.”

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Nwaguma further disclosed that “we are mobilizing all the Igbos and other non Yoruba’s resident in Lagos State to be vigilant, sensitive, watchful and ready to match force with force, action for action, threat for threat as some of the Yoruba leaders seems to be adopting strategy of psychological humiliation, probably to hoodwink Igbos and other non Yoruba’s in Lagos State to abandon their investments and flee.

This may give the youths of Yoruba an effrontery to consider them as another abandoned property saga and repetition of what happened in 1974 as concerned Indigenization Decree” he noted.

It would be recalled that last week some Yoruba youths under the aegis of Oodua Nationalist Coalition (ONAC) and the Pan- Yoruba National Alliance (PAYNA), protested against Igbos resident in Lagos.

A leader of the group, Mr. Araonye Akinwunmi, told the Yoruba youth protesters that gathered at the entrance of Emzor, a major business outlet located in Asawani Road Isolo area of Lagos State, own by an Igbo Woman that; “This is a symbolic rally to warn against the assault on Yoruba heritage. We are sick of people who trample on our heritage even though they make their million on our territory”.

Hundreds of thousands of pamphlets were also distributed by the protesters, warning that the Yoruba “will no longer accept the conscious attempt to turn us into slaves on our own land”. Thus for several hours, the protesters prevented workers and clients of the Emzor Company from gaining entrance into the vast premises.

The protesters carried placards that read “Igbo: Respect our culture or go home, “don’t be jealous of Lagos”, create your own Lagos in the East”. “Stop the attacks on Yoruba business or we stop your businesses in Lagos”. We are here as indigenous Yoruba people in Nigeria, speaking for over 50 million Yoruba people in Nigeria and abroad”.

It is pertinent to further recall that for two years now, the relationship between the Yoruba’s and Igbos resident in Lagos have been anything but rosy. This followed the repatriation of Igbo destitute in Lagos to Onitsha Head Bridge in 2013 by the immediate past governor of Lagos State, Barr. Babatunde Fashola.

These people were treated by Lagos State government as if they were not Nigerians and the media and human rights organizations rose up in total condemnation of the act.

Again, during the 2014 general elections, the Oba of Lagos State threatened the Igbos to perish in the Lagoons if they failed to vote for his preferred governorship candidate, Governor Akinwunmi Ambode. This generated a lot of controversy as the Oba denied making the remarks against Igbo.

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