PUNCH
Akinwunmi Adesina is presently the President of the African Development Bank. The cerebral economist was also once a Minister of Agriculture in Nigeria. In his traverse and travels as a minister, he must have seen a whole lot. One of the things that I am certain Adesina must have experienced firsthand is the divisiveness of Nigeria as a country and the polarisation that’s rife among Nigeria’s diverse ethnic groups. He must have also seen Nigeria’s innate potential for gargantuan economic growth and deft developments in all areas of our national life if certain things are positioned and fastened in the proper place, and the government is run by politicians and civil servants with the love of ordinary Nigerians in mind.
Against the backdrop of what Adesina’s eyes have seen and ears have heard, he sincerely believes that changing the name of Nigeria from the “Federal Republic of Nigeria” to “The United States of Nigeria” will usher in a change in the mindsets of a people who are finding it hard to sincerely get along. Adesina suggested the rebranding odyssey when he received the 2024 Obafemi Awolowo Prize for Leadership sometime last month.
“Instead of the Federal Government of Nigeria, we could think of The United States of Nigeria. The old would give way to the new,” these were the words of Adesina.
How viable will Adesina’s suggested experiment be? Will a mere name change alter the fundamental reasons why there are always ethnic suspicions, bountiful bellicosity, and abounding belligerence in every area of Nigerian life? Will a name change wake up natural haters and prod them to hate no more even if someone else who is not their kith and kin is running things in the purlieu of command and control of power and authority? With the extant swirling katzenjammer of ethnic schism and metastasising cries for the Balkanisation of our country, is a united Nigeria possible? I’d love to sit down face to face with Adesina and ask him how hatred can flip to love overnight because we are rechristening Nigeria.
Whether he hails from the northern part of the country or the South, it is a telling and towering truth that the present structural and political arrangement in the Giant of Africa is not working for the ordinary citizen. It is also true that most Nigerians see our togetherness as a callous coercion of an incompatible people by the British, and a cruel continuation of the unworkable arrangement by Nigerians who have always been in the position of leadership.
Ask regular northerners, they’ll tell you that severing their entire region from Nigeria is a welcome idea. Ask the same question in the South-West; its people are just waiting for a signal to leave the fold and flag off the Oduduwa Republic. Take a trip to the South-South and conduct an opinion poll within its people, they feel cheated and robbed by Nigeria, and they prefer to stay independent in steering their crude oil ship. There is no breathing being in the world that does not know where the South-East stands. The Igbo consider Nigeria an entrapment and a starkly unfair and unjust overlord. They want out of what they call a contraption like yesterday, and they’ve once dared it in a civil war that unfortunately claimed millions of lives. How truly united will The United States of Nigeria be as suggested by Adesina? Is a name change the magic wand we’ve always been waiting for so that Nigeria will fulfil its destiny?
