In case you are wondering why two northerners are competing, no violence in the North and plenty in the South. Well, it’s because or a little history lesson we may have missed.
Please permit me to teach a little history in the language my generation will understand. I will interweave it with personal stories, and try to keep it short and punchy so that the average gradually lowering attention span doesn’t get lost on unnecessary long essays.
I went to a unity school you see, in what you can argue is North Central or Southwest, depending on which argument you want to take - Federal Government College Ilorin. This school being North-ish and Southwest-ish, allowed us to have a mixture of the major tribes. We were also blessed in my set with having a couple of students with disability - blind and deaf. I believe this gave a good foundation into understanding a little of Nigeria, outside of books and articles read.
Somehow the average westerner, biased by state quotas and low numbers of Northerners in schools, thinks that Northerners are less intelligent than they are. After-allall, for common entrance exams, for Jamb score requirements and wall what not, the Northern scores are so much lower, one tends to imagine if there is any sense in the north at all. Well, in my over 30 years of interaction, I have learnt that that assumption of Northern stupidity is the South’s stupidity.
Now let me try and list it out for you so you don’t get bored.
1. Differently intelligent: There are different types of intelligence, and because someone is not intelligent like you, doesn’t make them dumb. The Southerners - West, East and South had some good educational advantage and exposure early, making many of them book smart. The hallo effect of book smart is that it tends to want to confer smartness on other areas where you are actually ignoramus. While the South is Book smart no doubt, the North is strategically smart and if you will permit me to intimate you with a new smart - Politically smart. Now these smartness have components, more on this later.
2. Evolution of Governance: The British tactically handed over Nigeria to the North. Many southerners are gradually beginning to realize this and whine about it. The question you need to ask yourself is why? Unfortunately the reason why the British waited for the North to be ready and handed over Nigeria to them tactically is still as true today 58 years after as it was back then. The reason was simple, the British did not have the capacity to man Nigerians one on one, so they created a model called indirect rule. The idea behind indirect rule was basically to work with already constituted authorities who were already economically advanced in their development to already have a system of taxation, and consequently leadership that the people submitted to. (Now forgive my ratios, these are purely mine for illustration purposes). In the North the leadership structures and taxing structures already existed, and with 1 English, over 400 Northerners can be governed. In the South West, the leadership structures were a bit more fragmented, there were more Kings in the SouthWest than Emirs in the North. Also the taxation system wasn’t really organized. The English realized they would need 1 to 50 in the South West. In the South East, there were chiefs, but they did not have absolute power. There was a council of elders and it was based on the discussions in these meetings that the chief took decision on behalf of all. Everyone was almost a leader. (Caveat, these are systems people evolved based on their history, none is better or worse, but one suits a political agenda best). The English realized it would be a logistic nightmare to administer the South East and South South. Mathematically speaking, the lots fell easily to the North. Unfortunately, if you analyze our harmonized political structures in Nigeria today, we are yet to be free from our realities in 1914.
3. Religion: I won’t like to say much in this area, let me keep it brief and understandable. The teaching of Islam are quite strong on submitting to God’s will and consequently authority - this suited indirect rule perfectly. The teachings of Christianity at the time, were more NGO oriented and suited to education and provision of services - Healthcare e.t.c. This fostered a value for human life and the development of an enlightened middle class. It wasn’t only mosquitoes that kept the missionaries in the south, Lord Lugard’s crew is suspected to also have. There were pros and cons to these, and very instructive to what both faiths need to learn going forward. I am a christian, and honestly there is a lot to learn for those are called by Christ’s name. Today, the 3 strong and visible political structure holders in Nigeria today are Muslims. If you know you know.
4. Elites and their problems: Another key element that was missing in the North that aided the conferment of supremacy on them by the British was a missing middle class. These were very present in the Southern belt of Nigeria. The middle class are a blessing to the economy and country, but they come with their bad habits, habits that have not changed in 100 years. Habits that need to change. Now what is the good side of the elites? These elites were trained by the British, and because of these training they possessed the mental capacities to challenge the policies that did not favour their people. The Elites kept the British Governments and indeed every government on their toes. They are the quiet enemies of the political class - warrant chiefs, back then. For them it’s not about “what?”, it’s first about “why?”. The bad habits of the elite however is that somewhere in their minds, their education and smartness made them too high for politics and rather than coalescing together to form a formidable force, the outrightly play the ostrich and don’t participate in political process. Of course it’s a two sided coin, the designers of the political structure deliberately sidelined them, as they were quite a handful, and then in the design of what needs to be done to gain political power, the processes are so demeaning - queue in the sun for hours, inconvenience yourself, e.t.c., so they gradually became arm chair analysts. A few elites from the South against all these odds dared to participate - the Awo’s and the Ziks, stories for another day.
5. Southern arrogance: Intelligence can be a curse, particularly when it blinds your eyes from realizing that there is a lot you don’t know, and a lot you don’t have. This I believe is a significant challenge for the south. The Yorubas, Igbos, Uhrobos, and tribes in the South (please forgive me for not writing yours) are in silent war of supremacy. They are smart in similar ways, and feel that the world is sliced loaf of bread baked in their favor. They are in demand around the world, their intelligence invented the internet, performed brain surgeries, and did a lot of wonderful things. However as this unannounced feud developed in the South, they were literally at each others throats, and both unfortunately would regularly have the North as the bride they courted as allies to fulfill their political dreams. So without even doing anything, the South competes together to offer the North supremacy. The North however is not dormant, while the South is driven by it’s arrogance and battling it out with themselves, the North strategically positions itself with population and local governments to ensure that by the time the South gets together, it will be too late to wrestle power from the North.
What is the solution to all of these? Restructuring. We can have the Nigeria of our dreams, we all have to be involved, all tribes, all faiths and all sexes. A New Nigeria is possible. The ballot box will do its part, but we must not wait for a 4 year cycle to organize our country. That journey has started already, and it’s time to collaborate. I do not claim any superior knowledge, I’m open to learn from you as well, enough of the arrogance, let’s accept our stupidity and learn from each other. North, South, East, West.
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