Former Attorney General Says 'It Is Too Late For Nigeria To Break Up'

Former Nigerian Attorney General Richard Akinjide of the Second Republic has said that it is fiction that sections of the West African state can breakaway after 2014. The country was engineered by British imperialism nearly a century ago., a photo by Pan-African News Wire File Photos on Flickr.

‘It Is Too Late For Nigeria To Break Up’

SATURDAY, 13 APRIL 2013 00:00
YEMI OGUNSOLA AND AJIBOLA AMZAT
Nigerian Guardian

AS Nigeria continues with the centenary celebration of the amalgamation signed by Lord Frederick Lugard , rumour is rife that the 1914 amalgamation document stipulates that the constituents can part ways if they so wish a hundred years after the union. YEMI OGUNSOLA and AJIBOLA AMZAT spoke to the Second Republic Attorney-General and Minister of Justice, Chief Richard Akinjide, (SAN) on the possibility of breaking up amidst the spate of sectarian crisis in the country.

The amalgamation paper we were told stipulates that after a hundred years, each party can go their separate ways if they so decide. Are you aware of such document?

I am not aware of it. I don’t believe that is true. What you are told is fiction. Amalgamation took place in 1914 because the British wanted the North and the South to become one. By 1897, the South became one because the Oba of Benin Ovonramwen was conquered. About 1900 we had Southern Nigeria completely. So between 1900 and 1914, there were two Nigerias: Southern Nigeria and Northern Nigeria. But one person was ruling both. All these were well documented and they are now in public domain. So anyone giving you this fiction is taking you for a ride. If we have intelligent and serious researchers there is no reason we cannot write a book on this issue. They are no longer secret document. We have access to these documents in foreign office, the colonial office, and public document office. When I was handling Nigeria-Cameroon I went there and had access to all the documents. Amalgamation was just an order in Council. Lugard prepared memo for the colonial secretary and went back to Nigeria and turned it into an order in Council, which amalgamated both Northern and Southern Nigerias.

You noted in your book, “The Path to Nigeria’s Future: Legal and Political Thought of Richard Akinjide” that amalgamation was badly advised, what would you advise if Nigerians are to reconsider their togetherness?

It is too late to reconsider our togetherness. We have become one family. And there is no way we can ask for a demolition contractor to demolish the country. We have been together for a long time. Anyone who thinks he can just wake up one morning and break up the country must be joking. Ojukwu tried it and he couldn’t do it. It will not happen because there are so many interwoven forces that will not allow it to happen. One, the commercial interest of the East and the West, of the North and the South, and the Delta and the rest of the country will not allow it to happen. Also there are so many inter-marriages among different ethnic regions in this country. We have become one big family. And don’t forget the karo conference where Sovereign states in Africa decided that all the boundaries protected by the colonial power should be left untouched. It is one of the important resolutions made at the Karo conference. And that has become part of the international law. All the sovereign countries including Nigeria agreed that there would be no change in the boundaries. Therefore cannot wake up one day and demolish the structure.

But Southern and Northern Sudan broke up and became independent states. In Eastern Europe, former Republic of Soviet Union was fragmented into different units, and life goes on thereafter. Why do you think Nigeria case is different?

Soviet Union was an amalgamation of independent sovereign soviet states. When Gobachev became the head of the Soviet Union he and the government discovered that, the continued amalgamation wasn’t possible and therefore went to London and spoke to Mrs. Thatcher about it and took her into confidence that he was going to be a demolition contractor of the Soviet. Eventually, the Soviet collapsed. But in the case of Nigeria, the constituents were not sovereign states before they were amalgamated. That is why the kind of disintegration you are talking about is not going to be possible.

But the British signed treaties with the colonies in the pre amalgamated Nigeria as sovereign states, and that invalidates any imposition of amalgamation. Don you think?

At that time we were not sovereign states in the modern sense. Don’t get things mixed up. The ethnic nations in Nigeria were not sovereign states in the modern sense. They were independent in the sense that they were running their affairs. But they were not sovereign entities in international law. For example, they were not member of the League of Nations.

But they had the locus standi to enter into treaties with British government as sovereign parties.

What they called a treaty then was a treaty in inverted coma. If it were a treaty, it would be known to international law. And there would not have been a Nigeria. Therefore the Karo conference which Balewa, the first Prime Minister attended would have been impossible.

In The Path to Nigeria’s Future, you wrote: “Nigeria as amalgamated has not been able to find either love, or unity or workable machinery for democracy and the challenges of successions.” But now you appear to be much optimistic about the amalgamation that has failed virtually all Nigerian ethic nationalities. What has changed between 2001when you wrote the book and now.

Amalgamation in the sense I described it in the book means we could not provide a state like America. It does not mean that Nigeria is not one country, but one country without being sovereign. You could say the amalgamation is not working very well. And that is not new, the same thing happens in the United States. They have 50 America states, it didn’t work. That is why Abraham Lincoln had to go to war. The Southern States in the USA wanted to break away. Lincoln insisted that the country would not break, and it didn’t happen. They wanted to continue trading slaves, Lincoln said no. everybody in America must be free.

Chief, I hope your responses are not unduly influenced by political considerations.

No, it is not. And let me say this again: anybody who tells you Nigeria will break up is a joker. In all nations, there are forces that make breaking up a difficult task. There was a time that the French-speaking part of Canada wanted to break away from Canada, the President of France, Charles De Gaulle even went to Canada and started praising the French speaking Canadians. But that never led to break up of Canada. In all nations, you have such forces at work that call for break up. You can’t avoid it. But there are always greater forces to arrest it.

In your book, you said “The June 12 crisis was the epitome of the 1914 amalgamation fraud.” What do you mean?

June 12 failed because they did not want Abiola to be president. They want the North to continue ruling. It is not that they want the country to break up. They want the country to remain one. In order to solve the dilemma of that time, they routed for Obasanjo to become president. Nigeria cannot break up. If the country beaks up, the evil that will follow will be far greater than the problems introduced by amalgamation. For example, how do you redraw the boundaries, how do you divide the army, the police? It is a wishful thinking of some elements. Those one are infinitesimal.

Some people already have been labelling Nigeria as a failed state. What is your view?

Nigeria is not a failed a state. A failed state is a state where all the machinery of government has collapsed. You cannot say that of Nigeria. Local governments are still working. The federal government is still working. So you cannot say Nigeria is a failed state.

There was an attempt to organize a sovereign national conference and you among others opposed it. Why?

I did not oppose National conference as such. You possibly do not understand what I said. I was trying to differentiate between sovereign national conference and national conference. Many people don’t understand the difference. When you have sovereign national conference, it means the conference will be the government of the country –at the national level and at the state level. Sovereign conference means sovereign. But you have sovereign national conference without the word sovereign, you can do election as you like, you can amend the constitution. So what I support is national conference. But again, how many conferences can you have? We have been having conference since independence, how many conferences do you need before you get the country together?