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Our Ref: YorExit/UK6
 
8 September 2022
 
Mrs Liz Truss
Madam Prime Minister
10 Downing Street
London
SW1A 2AA
 
Dear Mrs Truss
 
We, members of Ilana Omo Oodua UK Chapter (IlanaUK) congratulate you on your election as the Conservative Party leader, and the third female Prime Minister of the United Kingdom. We further congratulate you for your appointing of the most diverse cabinet in the country’s history. IlanaUK is particularly gratified and proud of your appointment of Kemi Badenoch, a Yoruba like us, as Trade Secretary. Although we are not a partisan organisation, we nevertheless pray for you to succeed as you tackled the many socio-economic challenges ahead.
 
IlanaUK is a welfare organisation dedicated to achieving self-determination for the Yoruba people of Nigeria through lawful and non-violent means.
 
In your first speech as Prime Minister, you reiterated that what made the United Kingdom great was a ‘fundamental belief in freedom’. Madam Prime Minister, you pledged that your government would ‘stand up for freedom and democracy around the world’. We hold you to these pledges. And to this end, we seek your government’s immediate diplomatic recognition of the sovereignty of Yorubaland, and support for an independent homeland for the Yoruba people of Nigeria. What we seek is self-determination as guaranteed by the Charters of the United Nation and the African Union, and guaranteed by the domestic laws of Nigeria. Our request for your support for self-determination for Yorubaland is within the ambit of  the treaty of friendship that Queen Victoria signed on 3 July 1888 with Oba Adeyemi, the Alafin of Oyo and Head of Yorubaland.
 
Madam Prime Minister, there are four reasons for you to support our quest for a Yoruba Homeland. First, the Yoruba like the Jews have suffered a holocaust. Between 1400 and 1800, about 10 million Yoruba were forcibly removed from their homes and transported to the Americas. A third to a half of them died from inhumane treatment or were thrown overboard during the sea transport to the Americas. Similar numbers gave their lives, blood and sweat to develop America. Many British businessmen and organisations benefited from the misery of the enslaved Yoruba people. Britain supported the establishment of a Homeland for the Jews. Britain has the moral obligation also to support a Homeland for the Yoruba.
 
Second, the Yoruba Homeland fulfils the criteria for an independent state. There is a distinct well demarcated territory. The Yoruba Homeland is bounded to the north and east by the River Niger, to the south by the Atlantic Ocean and to the west by the Benin Republic. The Yoruba of Nigeria, today numbering 50 million in population, have occupied this territory since time immemorial. The Yoruba is a distinct ethnic nation with its own distinct conventions, culture, history, and traditions. The Yoruba have the same universal Orisa deities and the same universal Ifa oracles. The Yoruba have their own constitution, the Constitutional Oba, that is similar in essence to the Constitutional Monarchy of the United Kingdom. The Yoruba have their own laws that have survived intact through 40 years of colonialism and 60 years of Nigeria’s independence. The Yoruba have their own distinctive economic philosophy of ‘Kinshipism’.
 
Third, the Yoruba is an ancient civilisation that was present right at the very beginning of time. Scientific evidence confirmed the Yoruba myth that the earth initially was water world until Obatala brought down soil from above to create land. Other scientific evidence confirmed that the Yoruba were the first humans to graduate from hunter gatherers to agriculturalists.
 
Fourth, an independent Yoruba Homeland will benefit not just the Yoruba but also Africa and the world at large. Between 1954 and 1959 the Yoruba Homeland was self-governing as Western Nigeria. In that short period of time, development in the Yoruba Homeland was ahead of that of South Korea and Singapore. Chief Awolowo, the Premier, introduced free primary education and free healthcare for children. The Awolowo government established a television service before most countries in Europe had television. The Awolowo government built at Ibadan, the first skyscraper and the first Olympic stadium on the continent of Africa. Yorubaland has human and natural resources to catch up with South Korea and Singapore. An independent Yoruba Homeland would immediately put an end to the flight of our young people that has become an insoluble problem for the United Kingdom and Europe.
 
Madam Prime Minister, we respectfully request also that you constitute a Select Committee of the Houses of Parliament to review the legality of the Amalgamation of Nigeria. On 1 January 1914, Lord Lugard used ‘Letters of Patent and other instruments’ to proclaim the amalgamation of different ethnic nations to form the country Nigeria. There was no parliamentary scrutiny as required by Section 11 of the Foreign Jurisdiction Act 1890. The Yoruba were not consulted, and they were not a willing participant in the Amalgamation. The United Kingdom government has a moral obligation, and indeed the power, to repudiate the Lugard Proclamation. Madam Prime Minister, you have the unique opportunity to right the wrong caused to the Yoruba by the 1914 Amalgamation. You have the unique opportunity to write your name into history.
 
Madam Prime Minister, we at IlanaUK wish you well.
 
Respectfully Yours
 
 
 
 

Baasegun (Dr) Olusola Oni
Coordinator, IlanaUK