Obviously, peoples of the Lower Niger Bloc want to exit unitary Nigeria
By Ndidi Uwechue [Retired Metropolitan (London) Police Officer]
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If you were to ask me, I think that the peoples of the Lower Niger Bloc, that is the South-South and South-East together, have had enough of Nigeria. I think they are just totally sick of it! This is the Bloc where my own heritage is from.
I know for sure that our forefathers would never have agreed to be part of the Union of Nigeria prior to Independence, had they known that Bello, the Premier of the Northern Region, had vicious designs and an ugly future planned for them.
It was a future where the ancestral lands of the Lower Niger Bloc would be an estate of those who can call Usman Dan Fodio their grandfather, that is, the Fulani, an immigrant and settler people, to whom Bello belonged.
Although it sounds quite crazy, Bello, a supposed leader of a new Africa, setting itself free from foreign colonialism, had been recorded as saying just twelve days after Independence that the South, which is where the Lower Niger Bloc is, would be “a conquered territory”, and the peoples would never be allowed “to have control over their future”.
Going on now for over sixty years, that racist agenda of foreign master-slave has become a reality for the indigenous peoples of the Lower Niger Bloc.
As I keep on saying, “The opposite of self-determination is slavery”. The peoples of the Lower Niger Bloc have had their self-determination hijacked by being within Nigeria. That was done through Military Decrees, then now, through the 1999 Constitution.
Being the oil and gas producing area, the Lower Niger Bloc has been the most maltreated and most subjugated part of Nigeria. The peoples’ afflictions began in 1966 when the Military seized power, and it continues still.
The series of illegitimate documents i.e. Decrees and then the 1999 Constitution, foisted on the peoples, seized the very rich resources of the Bloc, and at the same time kept the peoples in poverty and under-development, even to ecological destruction of their ancestral lands.
Today, what for me worsens the situation is that the middle class and the elite know that the 1999 Constitution is a forgery.
They know that it is a source of the miseries of their people, yet, they partake in the deceit of pretending the 1999 Constitution is valid by either their silence, or by actually promoting it as if it was a legitimate social contract!
Furthermore, the Lower Niger Bloc is known as the Christian area of Nigeria. Yet, who has been a voice for the voiceless poor who are the worst victims of this 1999 Constitution? One wonders about the silence of the Church.
I find it astonishing that Christian leaders in Nigeria instruct their congregations to seek miracles as a solution to their miseries, when they know that it is the 1999 Constitution that is the source of their wretchedness!
Having been crushed and beaten down since 1966, the situation for the peoples of the Lower Niger Bloc is exactly what Bello had hoped for. None of the rich resources of the Bloc have ever benefitted the peoples.
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The 1999 Constitution makes them to live as enslaved peoples. A slave is a completely conquered person who cannot control his present or his future.
He is disinherited so has no property (because it is seized), he has no social welfare, he lacks basic amenities e.g. electricity, and his life counts for nothing.
In recent years the situation has worsened for the peoples of the Lower Niger Bloc.
Fulani herdsmen, plus bandits and terrorists from Arewa Bloc and the Sahel have invaded their farms and forests, and just as in the Mid-Belt, these invaders are a “mortal danger” to the indigenous owners of the land.
In history, the slave master was always frightened that his slaves would escape – and they ALWAYS did escape! Unitary Nigeria is a deadly and squalid slave camp for the indigenous ethnic nations of the Lower Niger Bloc. So be sure, they will escape it.
The peoples of the Lower Niger Bloc will get their liberty through the ORDERLY PROCESS of Constitutional Force Majeure (Confom). The Confom follows United Nations (UN) protocols, and will decommission the repudiated 1999 Constitution.
That is via a Transitional Government when Regional Referendums by ethnic nations will allow “we the people” to decide whether to re-commit to, or to exit the Union.
The process started on 16th December 2020 with the declaration of the Confom by NINAS, the alliance of indigenous peoples of Lower Niger Bloc, Oodua Bloc, and Mid-Belt Bloc.
The Confom is based on international law and UN procedures, so violent conflict is not part of it. Most of us in the Lower Niger Bloc are Christians so we are familiar with Biblical history.
Just as Moses led the Hebrews out of slavery without war, the NINAS Confom is the non-violent pathway to freedom. So, to be safe and to also keep our communities safe, the peoples of the Lower Niger Bloc should follow the guidance of NINAS.
