Call to arms: Yoruba and Igbo diasporas!
This would be my 1000th tweet! I joined Twitter in October 2020 in response to the massacre of the #EndSARS protester at #LekkiTollGate. I also wrote http://chng.it/QJp8yJ6hPs a petition to the UN for self-determination for the Yoruba people of Nigeria. That petition has now received nearly 2,500 signatures. Please encourage family, friends, colleagues etc to sign http://chng.it/QJp8yJ6hPs
The Yoruba and Igbo people today feel lost, helpless, and alone. They believe that their efforts will make no difference. They have developed the Stockholm syndrome. It is the duty and the responsibility of the diaspora to come to the rescue just as the Jews did for the state of Israel. The diaspora has over the years built an ‘economic Birdsnest’, which has been protecting our people from hunger and starvation. The diaspora must now build a ‘political Birdsnest’ to gestate self-determination that will protect our people from almost certain socio-political annihilation at the hands of the Fulani.
The Yoruba and Igbo diasporas underestimate their power. They remit $25 billion to Nigeria every year; equivalent to 6% GDP or 80% of the Federal Government budget or 8x the foreign aid. Remittances (‘economic Birdsnest’) help relatives meet basic needs, finance education, fund investments and businesses. The Yoruba Diaspora is a large one; perhaps the same number as the number of people currently residing in their ancestral home of Yorubaland. To sustain their urban settlements, the Yoruba of yore had established long-distance trading (Aje) in addition to their local markets (Oja).
Mobilisation of the people. This is the instrument of politics. Acquisition of political understanding is an educative process. The diaspora must encourage our people to rise up by using any means at their disposal. The idea is to motivate via billboards, pamphleteering, mega rallies, directed media campaigns, ad hoc meetings, and chat groups. The diaspora has the responsibility to fund these mobilisation efforts. However, these must be local efforts and initiatives, not for the diaspora to initiate or organise. Public education must be constant and unrelenting. The emphasis must be on the basic concepts of self-determination as was done for the Midwest in 1964; a solid wad of information is quickly forgotten.
Mobilisation of potential allies. This is the megaphone politics. The whole world knows that Nigeria is a failed state. Governments around the world as well as international organisations know about Nigeria’s problems, but they have chosen to do nothing. The diaspora must mobilise peoples in the host countries to pressurise their governments into action. The diaspora must employ and pay lobbyists - one in London, one in Washington - to put our case for self-determination directly to lawmakers. The diaspora must appoint sympathetic celebrities as ‘ambassadors at large’. Diasporans must themselves mount campaigns and petitions to their host governments and international bodies.
The diaspora must persuade Nigeria’s neighbours, and refugee organisations such as UNHRC, UNICEF, Red Cross etc, that self-determination for the ethnic nations of Nigeria is the solution to the developing problem of Nigerians seeking refuge outside their country. There is a ‘spill over effect’ of the violence in Nigeria into the neighbouring countries. Yoruba and Igbo refugees, mostly women and children, currently number about half a million in the neighbouring countries of Benin and Cameroon. More refugees are inevitable from the ongoing and unrelenting violence in Nigeria, and there will be economic costs to the neighbouring countries as well as to international organisations.
Mobilisation of the diaspora. Positive outcomes will motivate the inactive and ‘silent’ diaspora. Activities in the host countries such as protests, rallies, blogs, newsletters, and virtual meetings etc are positive outcomes. Activities keep all informed of what the ‘activist’ diaspora is doing. Activities remind the diaspora that it is legitimate to pursue the case for self-determination outside of Nigeria. The diaspora should combine scattered actions into one solid act. The diaspora must organise major invited lectures, symposia, and students’ union debates - in London and in Washington - to espouse that self-determination benefits not just the Yoruba and Igbo nations, but also the rest of the world. The diaspora must use socio-political events in their localities as opportunities to publicise the case for self-determination. Yoruba-born and Igbo-born influencers, change makers, opinion formers and politicians in the host countries also are diasporans to be mobilised.