For a polity that is tension-soaked, with the most divisive, bitter and destructive form of ethnic and religious identity politics, Afenifere’s adoption of the Golden Rule going into the 2023 elections is as interesting as it is refreshing. Ahead of the primary elections of Nigeria’s political parties, Afenifere, the pan-Yoruba socio-political and cultural organisation, along with Ohanaeze, Pan-Niger Delta Forum and Middle Belt Forum, had demanded for a shift of presidential power to the south of Nigeria after an eight-year stint in the north of the country. This demand was premised on the need for inclusion, equity, justice and fairness in order to preserve the national unity of Nigeria and sustain its continuous corporate existence.
With a number of Yoruba politicians in the race for the 2023 presidential election, prominent among who were incumbent Vice-President Yemi Osinbajo and Asiwaju Ahmed Bola Tinubu, the national leader of the ruling All Progressives Congress (APC), not a few Nigerians believed that Afenifere was merely posturing for the emergence of a President of Yoruba extraction under the guise of a clamour for southern presidency. This was because a tribal socio-political and cultural group like Afenifere was expected to always put the interest of the Yoruba ethnic group ahead of any other consideration at all times and under all circumstances.
Afenifere, which was led by prominent Yoruba leaders like Abraham Adesanya, Bola Ige, Ganiyu Dawodu, Olu Falae, Adebayo Adefarati, Reuben Fasoranti and many others, is the oldest, most influential socio-political and cultural group among Nigeria’s Yoruba people of the South West and North Central Nigeria. And indeed the group has often risen to the occasion of providing guidance and leadership at critical times for Nigeria’s ethnic Yoruba nationality, most notably in the aftermath of the annulment of the June 12, 1993, presidential election, which was won by MKO Abiola, a Yoruba.
The group’s agitation along with other pro-democracy groups for the restoration of the June 12 democratic mandate eventually culminated in the transition from military to democratic rule in 1999 with the election of Olusegun Obasanjo, a Yoruba, as replacement for the late MKO Abiola, who died in military custody before his mandate could be restored. And Afenifere’s support for the Alliance for Democracy (AD) party ensured its victory throughout Yorubaland in the six states of the South West.
However, Afenifere seems to be by playing by the Golden Rule this time, by putting national interest ahead of the sectional interest of the Yoruba. The universal definition of the Golden Rule is to desire for others what you desire for yourself and, contrary to expectations, Afenifere, under the leadership of Ayo Adebanjo, decided to play the 2023 politics of presidential succession only by the Golden Rule. To this end, the Adebanjo-led Afenifere did not only work with other socio-cultural groups to demand for power shift to the South after President Muhammadu Buhari’s eight-year rule for the North, the group has also succeeded in convincing others that the presidency should be narrowed down to Nigeria’s Igbo-speaking South East as the only geo-political zone in the South which has not produced an elected President since the end of the civil war in 1970.
The Golden Rule is embedded in every ethical culture, religion and secular law. It is the foundation of social justice, without which there cannot be unity, peace, security and prosperity. The Golden Rule is captured in the Nigerian Constitution, in Section 14[1], thus: “The Federal Republic of Nigeria shall be a State based on the principles of democracy and social justice.” And in furtherance of the course of democracy and social justice, Section 14[3] states: “The composition of the government of the federation or any of its agencies and the conduct of its affairs shall be carried out in such a manner as to reflect the federal character of Nigeria and the need to promote national unity, and also to command national loyalty, thereby ensuring that there shall be no predominance of persons from a few states or from a few ethnic or other sectional groups in that government or in any of its agencies.”
By departing from the expected, Afenifere is set to play its most consequential role in Nigerian politics after the struggle for the actualization of the annulled June 12, 1993, presidential election and the subsequent restoration of democracy in 1999. Despite having one of its own, Tinubu, as the presidential candidate of the ruling APC, with all the advantages of incumbency, the Adebanjo-led Afenifere has looked beyond ethno-geographic sentiments to extend a hand across the Niger in support of the presidential candidate of the Labour Party of Nigeria, Peter Obi, an Igbo from Nigeria’s South East geo-political zone.
In arriving at its decision to endorse Peter Obi of the Labour Party above Tinubu of the APC, Afenifere stated its reasons as: “The South-West has produced a President and currently sits as Vice-President; the South-South has spent a total of six years in the Presidency, but the Igbo people of the South-East have never tasted presidency in Nigeria, and now that the power is due back in the South, equity demands that it be ceded to the Igbo.
“We cannot continue to demand that the Igbo people remain in Nigeria while we, at the same time, continue to brutally marginalise and exclude them from the power dynamics.
“Peter Obi is the person of Igbo extraction that Afenifere has decided to support and back; he is the man we trust to restructure the country back to federalism on the assumption of office.
“We will not compromise this principle of justice, equity and inclusiveness because one of our own, Asiwaju Bola Tinubu, is a frontline candidate. It is on this same principle we condemn the Peoples Democratic Party for sponsoring Atiku Abubakar, a northern Fulani Muslim, to succeed General Muhammadu Buhari, another Fulani Muslim.”
In putting national interest above sectional interests, Afenifere does not seek to sacrifice the interest of the Yoruba ethnic nationality for the interest of the Igbo people of Nigeria, going into the 2023 presidential election. Rather, what Afenifere is seeking to do is to situate the interest of the Yoruba within a pan-Nigerian nation, where justice and peace reign for all. At 94 years of age, Pa Ayo Adebanjo, a lawyer, veteran politician and puritan Awoist, has seen enough of Nigeria in his lifetime to know that there has to be a nation first before Yoruba sectional interest can be met. And it is that Nigerian nation that Pa Adebanjo is working hard to preserve through the adoption of the Golden Rule.
The Igbo people of southeast Nigeria have long complained about their marginalisation and exclusion from the highest office in the land. This has rekindled the spirit of Biafra separatist agitations in the region as the people are increasingly feeling alienated from the scheme of things. Following the demand for power shift to the South in 2023 after eight years in the North, many Nigerians had expected the main opposition Peoples Democratic party (PDP) to pick its presidential candidate from the South East, especially as the zone has been its strongest support base since 1999. But when the PDP picked a northerner and former Vice-President Atiku Abubakar as its candidate, Afenifere threw its weight behind the Labour Party whose candidate is from the South East.
Afenifere’s noble gesture may not guarantee the full Yoruba support for Candidate Peter Obi but the moral symbolism of the endorsement of an Igbo man by a Yoruba socio-political group has no doubt doused rising tension in the polity and melted the ice-cold relationship between the Yoruba and their Igbo brethren since the 1914 amalgamation. And the rest of Nigeria will do well to ponder on the Golden Rule that Afenifere has adopted ahead of the all-important 2023 presidential election as a means of resolving the unresolved Igbo question.
Peter Obi, a businessman, politician and former governor of Anambra State, is reputed to be a disciplined public administrator and frugal manager of public resources and is considered by many Nigerians as meeting the leadership needs of a country in distress like Nigeria. He should not be limited in his aspiration for the highest office in the land because of his ethnicity. To deny Peter Obi the presidency of Nigeria because of his Igbo ethnicity would be a form of tribalism that is far worse than racism and will lift the moral burden on the Nigerian state to continue to deny the Igbo people of Nigeria’s South East region their right to self-determination.