YE ARE FOOLS

I recently read an article on the perception of the northerners from a typical southerner and that spurred this write. That writer did justice to the article. You see, all images of an ideal northerner can be likened to how the oyibo's perceive Africans. They still think africans don't wear clothes, that africans dance naked around fire with chalk marking on their face. Some think that our young girls walk around naked with small pointed breasts and the older women walk around carrying babies on their bare back or a child sucking from their pendulum breasts while some white men take pictures of them. No, africa is developing. We love good music, we know good music and we sing good music; we have electricity though epileptic. We have beautiful ladies with well packaged breasts, for Christ sake we wear clothes o and since i was born i've never seen naked people dance around fire. We have won the miss world pageant. We have our babies born in hospitals, I was born and circumcised in a hospital. We have great writers, we have business moguls. Undoubtedly, governance in our continent is still lackluster. This isn't to exonerate africans in the eyes of the oyibo's, this is to remove the stick in our eyes before trying to remove the log of wood in the oyibo's eye.

Many of us are like the westerners, the oyibo, the europeans, the americans. Thinking less of another race or tribe. Abeg judge yourself, no lie o, how have you considered someone from northern Nigeria. If a man is said to be Adamu from kaduna, what would you think. The interpretation of that man will be: he is hausa, he is a muslim, he is uneducated, he is dark skinned, no very black skinned, he doesn't understand english language, he is a gateman, sells onion or a cattle rearer. He calls fifty naira pipty naira, he loves violence and so on. They forget that Adamu could be of the Jukun tribe, though speaks Hausa but isn't hausa by tribe, a Professor of Surgery, speaks the english language with good diction even after been schooled in Nigeria. He might be dark skinned but his siblings are light, has a calabar cook, an Igbo driver, a Yoruba gateman and his hausa christian wife hates violence.

One essence of the youth service is integration and the opportunity to experience it was provided for me when i was posted to Taraba state for my youth service back in 2008. My year serving the nation made me realise that like many I have seen the hausa from a singular perspective.  Chimamanda Adichie's 'danger of a single story' perfectly illustrates this. In Taraba I learnt that pride wasn't a peculiar character like we have in the southern part, I learnt that hausa was only a lingua franca of the north generally but not their indigenous language, I learnt that of all the over 250 tribes in this country that more that hundred is in the north. For instance, I was opportuned to serve in jalingo, capital of Taraba state and in my compound was a man and his family from Karim-lamido, they're from a tribe that spoke their own language yet understood hausa, next to my room was papa manzo and his family from Gasso, a christian, with a different language and tribe. Again was a woman I nicknamed madam from Sardauna where mambilla plateau is located and in her local government alone they had more than 20tribes with their different languages. She didn't even undertsand hausa fluently and made me understand that many of them didn't understand hausa either. Although for everyone of them to express themselves in our compound meetings they had to speak hausa, including me o. Now will you call them 'awon hausa' because of the geographical location. Sitting there nodding my head to any agreement made me realise that I have faulted. There, I was in the north, in a compound meeting with people who spoke hausa yet were not hausa's and mostly not muslims. It therefore made me realisa that it is my responsibility to recognise my heritage as a Nigerian and not just as 'omo igbo'. We should understand the real difference between southern kaduna and northern kaduna, we must realise that Fulani is not Hausa but Fulani. I have tried on different occasions to buy 'fura de nunu' from the fulani ladies that hawk it with my little hausa knowledge but their response was always 'ba hausa'.

It is salient to state that this is also demonstrated in the southern part of Nigeria too and amongst themselves. I see it as pathetic and unfair that someone from Akwa-ibom, Edo, Cross-river, Bayelsa, Rivers, Delta(even pure warri boy o) is addressed as 'awon Igbo' or 'ndi Igbo'. This is not to alienate them from an Igbo tribe but this is simply to make us realise the truth, which is: they are not igbo's. They have their own tribes which must be respected. Some of them are efik, urhobo, Ibibio, itshekiri, calabari and many more. So I perceive that it is insulting and very offensive when you address an Efik man as an Igbo man. Therefore, my conclusion is that the individual mixing things up doesn't have a firm understanding of Nigerian tribes, it shows that such individual is creating a ridiculous caricature of tribes, it is that minority groups are inconsequential if you merge then up and call them a certain people, this character humes disrespect for the roots and culture of an individual. Also, it shows that the oyibo's are not fools to call us naked people that run around fire singing to a god, we are perhaps the bigger fools not to understand the truth about our mileu.

I do not expect us to cram the over 250 tribes but we must call people as they are. It is our responsibility to understand even peripherally, about tribes, languages, religion and culture. There is obviously a great danger when a story is viewed singularly. I must state very emphatically that our president isn't an Igbo man even though he bears 'Ebele', He is from Bayelsa, an Ijaw man. The Igbo's are therefore right to seek a presidency though I care less about the origin of a president, I want someone that will deliver, man or woman, old or young, dark or fair, shoe or no shoe; but I would rather prefer one with shoes on.


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