You may have read that portion of “You Must Set Forth At Dawn,” where its author, Nobel laureate Prof. Wole Soyinka, rued the reality of he, a Yoruba man, whose country’s lingua franca is the English language, found himself (almost) a stranger among his Yoruba kinsmen, in another country.
So, it is not really that strange for a Northern Nigerian Hausa, Fulani or Kanuri, who speaks Hausa is a Muslim, to also have bloodline relationships in the Niger Republic or the rest of the Sahel.
But to seem to prefer their Sahel relationships over his compatriot southern Nigerians, who are resident with him within the borders of the geographical expression that Lord Frederick Lugard, and his wife, Flora Shaw, fashioned out of the Niger River area, is a bit worrisome.
To be sure, most Africans are uncomfortable that their nations were dismembered and split into different territories. If a citizen of the Democratic Republic of Congo stands on the bank of the Congo River, he will cast nostalgic glances at Congo Brazzaville on the bank on the other side.
It, however, took the recent coup in the Niger Republic for the (seeming) lack of commitment to the Nigerian project by some Northern Nigerians, who are closet Nigeriens, to come out of the woodwork to openly express their choice of Niger Republic over Nigeria.
The next logical question that southern Nigerians should be asking their northern compatriots is whether they’d rather join their kith and kin in the Sahel and leave the Nigerian country that they hardly have fealty or regard for.
That Northern Nigerians, with filial and cultural consanguinity with the people of Niger Republic, and the rest of the Sahel, say that President Bola Tinubu will be on his own, and should count them out of any military action against the Niger Republic junta, is telling.
Interestingly, this disagreement with a policy, that is not even fully firmed up, with sentiments grounded on affinity with another country shows that the security of Nigeria could easily give way to bloodline conspiracy.
Probably misguided Col Gideon Orkar, and his fellow coup plotters, who announced the excision of Northwestern and Northeastern regions from Nigeria may have observed this tendency of the loyalty of the Far North to love the Sahel more than their southern compatriots in Nigeria.
It may mean that there was never a country called Nigeria, in the first place, and that all the mouthing of one Nigerian nation, with one destiny, is not quite true. It is only self-serving and expedient to serve a purpose that is sectional.
When you remember the idea about taking from the Nigerian Peter to pay the Nigerien Paul, you remember that former President Muhammadu Buhari made Nigeria take a loan in order to extend a railway line from Kano in Nigeria to Maradi in Niger Republic, his father’s country.
Yes, no one would want a balkanised Nigeria, not after reading “The Federalist Papers,” a collection of essays, written by three American statesmen under a single pseudonym, “Publius,” wherein they brilliantly argued the economic advantages of a country with a vast population, vast arable land, vast mineral resources and long coastal line, like Nigeria has been blessed with.
The economy of large-scale production that is available to a country with its own resources and a huge population is immeasurable. The benefits are never-ending for as long as the citizens agree to remain within one nation.
When, in 1966, young Lt Col Murtala Muhammed, who led the countercoup against Maj. Gen. JTU Aguiyi-Ironsi, wanted northern Nigeria to be separated from southern Nigeria, the American Ambassador and the British High Commissioner promptly explained to him that the North would lose direct access to the coast in southern Nigeria.
But maybe, just maybe, it is time to defy those, like Generals Olusegun Obasanjo and Ibrahim Babangida, who insist that the unity of Nigeria is not negotiable, and demand the question to be raised and addressed in an open and robust manner.
Maybe it is time to discuss the basis for the unity of Nigeria, or just give up on the Nigerian project, and tell everyone concerned, “To your tents O Israel,” and balkanise the country into whatever number of countries it splinters into.
Even though one may not want Nigeria to be divvied up as separatist agitators, like Indigenous People of Biafra and Yoruba Nation pressure groups may want it, northern Nigerians should understand that if the Niger Republic blood is thicker to them than the water of southern Nigerians, there may be no basis for keeping Nigeria as one country.
After all, the first Premier of Western Nigeria, Obafemi Awolowo, has argued that there is no Nigeria in the sense of a people, but a conglomerate of nations, Yoruba, Igbo, Ijaw, Edo, Hausa, Fulani, Kanuri, Kemberi and several others too numerous to enumerate here.
The attitude of the northern Nigerian political establishment in emphasising their affinity with the people of Niger Republic above their responsibilities to Nigeria is a telling Freudian slip, that may not be easily forgotten by the people of southern Nigeria for a long time.
They do not seem to be aware or even care, that there are some Yoruba, who are natives of Benin Republic, Sierra Leone, The Gambia, Togo and Ghana, countries that lie directly to the west of predominantly Yoruba Lagos, Ogun, Oyo and Kwara states of Nigeria.
If you witness the Egungun festival in faraway The Gambia or the live performance of an apala musician in Benin Republic you will think you are in any part of Yoruba South-West Nigeria. Yet, the Yoruba of Nigeria respect the border with their kin in those countries.
Everyone knows that the people of Cross River State have consanguinity and filial relationships with some of the peoples of southern Cameroun, Equatorial Guinea and even some other more easterly countries.
And though the blood of these eastward relationships may be thicker than the water of their relationships Nigerians on the west or north of River Niger, like their Yoruba compatriots, do not appear to choose the peoples of those other countries over Nigeria.
They respect the borders of Nigeria with their more easterly neighbours despite their close affinities with them. And they have good examples in the Germans and their kids spread across Central Europe.
If you visit Germany, Austria and the German-speaking part of Switzerland, you will observe that they are pretty much the same people in practically all aspects of their lives, yet they respect the borders between the countries in which they have found themselves.
And when you observe their conduct, the Germans of Switzerland do not choose the Germans of Austria and Germany over their French and Italian compatriots, who are just as native to Switzerland as they are.
And why northern Nigerians think they are the only ones who do not want military action against the Niger Republic junta, or the other recalcitrant country, like Guinea, Mali and Burkina Faso, for that matter, is surprising and deeply disappointing!
Every Nigerian knows that the dismal economy and the insecurity of the recent past do not put Nigeria in a good place to invest in a war. Nigerians are war-weary, with the unending Boko Haram insurgency, terrorism, banditry and herders-farmers clashes.
