Prior to 1985 Nigerians were amongst the most literate,
intellectually-inclined, respected, well-informed, well-read and
well-educated people in the world and this had been so since the
mid-1800′s. Our education system was once the envy of the British
Commonwealth and in terms of academics Nigerians scored firsts wherever
they went. However as from 1985 everything changed in our country
including our attitude to life, our economic situation, our sense of
values, our perception of ourselves and what we stood for and our
education system. From that time everything appears to have gone to the
dogs and from that point it was just one period of degradation and
degenaration to another up until today.
Nothing was more affected by this unfortunate state of affairs than
our education system. Post-1985 the whole education system in our
country simply broke down. The result of this was predictable, swift and
startling as an attitude of disdain and derision for anything that lay
in the realm of education and particularly in the realm of the arts,
like literature and history, were treated with disdain and contempt by
our people. Simply put no-one was interested. As far as most Nigerians
were concerned it paid better to be a tomatoe puree importer and dealer
or a sugar trader than it did to be a scholar or a professional. The
result of this shameful attitude was devastating on our pysche as a
people and on our culture. We just degenerated in every conceivable way
and post-1985 we became a nation of traders and ceased to be a nation of
scholars.
The result of all this was as follows. I would conceede that there
are some exceptions to the rule but one of the weaknesses of the average
Nigerian today is that, generally speaking, he does not read widely, he
does not do much research, he knows little about literature and the
arts and he knows nothing about his own history or the history of his
country. Worse still because he does not have the discipline to do his
reserach and to read widely he is prepared to accept oral folk-lore and
self-serving revisionist folk tales as historical fact and to literally
swear by them. No group of people that I am aware of in the world today
suffer more from this strange affliction and this willful attempt to
ignore or to distort their own history as much Nigerians. To make
matters worse the average Nigerian honsetly believes that history does
not matter and that the fact that history is not taught in Nigerian
schools is no big deal. Is it any wonder that we are in a mess? They say
that those that do not know or do not learn from their own history are
bound to repeat its mistakes. And nowhere has this truism found more
relevance and veracity as it has in modern-day Nigeria. Some of the
consequence of this unfortunate mindset is the fact that the
manifestation of crass ignorance and the expression of pure falsehood
has taken pride of place and has become commonplace in our country when
we talk about our past. Few Nigerians know who they are, where they are
coming from, how their nation came about and who our heroes of the past,
our great nationalists and our founding fathers actually were. Great
names like Sapara Williams, Herbert Macauly, Adeyemo Alakija, Ajayi
Crowther, Akinwale Akinsanya, Ernest Ikoli, Charles Onyeama, Bode
Thomas, H.O. Davis, Adegoke Adelabu, Eyo Ita, Inua Wada, Mohammadu
Ribadu, Joseph Tarka, Aminu Kano, Ayo Rosiji, Isa Williams, Louis
Ojukwu, Alfred Rewane, Festus Okotie Eboh, S.O.Gbadamosi, S.G. Ikokwu
and so many others have little relevance or meaning to most young
Nigerians today. They just don’t know who these great men were or what
they did for our country. What a tragedy.
Yet nowhere has the confusion of our people been made more manifest
when it comes to our history than on the vexed question of who
successfully moved Nigeria’s motion for independence. There has been so
much misunderstanding and disinformation about who actually moved that
motion and I believe that it is time to to set the record straight and
bring this matter to closure. In order to do so successfully we must be
guided by facts and historical records and not by emotion, sentiment or
political considerations. The moment we allow our recollection of events
or our knowledge of history to be guided or beclouded by such perennial
considerations we are finished as a people.
The truth is that almost 90 per cent of Nigerians have been brought
up to believe that the motion for Nigeria ‘s independence was
successfully moved by Chief Anthony Enahoro, a man that is undoubtedly
one of our most revered nationalists and founding fathers. Though
nothing can be taken away from Enahoro in terms of his monumental
contributions in our quest for independence (I would argue that he
kicked off the process for that struggle with his gallant efforts in
1953) the fact remains that he was not the man that successfully moved
the motion for Nigeria ‘s independence.
Another group of Nigerians believe that Chief S.L. Akintola, another
great nationalist and elder statesman and the former Premier of the old
Western Region, was responsible for the successful movement of the
motion for Nigeria ‘s independence. Again though there is no doubt that
Akintola played a major and critical role in the whole process, he was
not the one that successfully moved the motion for Nigeria ‘s
independence.
There is yet another school of thought that says that it was Sir
Abubakar Tafawa Balewa, the much loved former Prime Minister of blessed
memory that was the first to successfully move the motion for Nigeria ‘s
independence. Again this is not historically accurate. Balewa’s 1959
motion was not the first successful motion for our independence and
neither was it in actual fact a motion for independence at all . It was
rather a motion to amend an already existing motion which had already
been successfully moved and passed by Parliament and which had been
accepted and aquiessed to by the British in 1958.
That successful 1958 motion was moved by none other than my late
father of blessed memory, Chief Remilekun Fani-Kayode, the former Deputy
Premier of Nigeria ‘s Western Region. Not only did he play a major role
in the movement of the motion for Nigeria ‘s independence but, as a
matter of fact, his was the first successful motion for independence in
Parliament that was acceepted by the British and it was actually the one
that got us our independence. His motion, which was moved in Parliament
on the platform of the Action Group on August 2nd 1958 , was actually
the landmark and most significant motion of all when it comes to the
issue of our independence.
Let us look at the history, the records and the facts. Chief Anthony
Enahoro moved a motion for ”self rule” in the Federal House in 1953
which proposed that we should have our independence in 1956.
Unfortunately it was rejected by Parliament and it therefore failed. It
also resulted in a walk out by the northern NPC parliamentarians who
were of the view that Nigeria was not yet ready for independence. The
tensions and acrimony that came from all this and the terrible treatment
that was meted out to the northern parliamentarians and leaders that
were in the south as a result of the fact that they would not support
Enahoro’s motion resulted in the infamous Kano riots of 1953.
In 1957 Chief S.L. Akintola moved a second motion for independence in
Parliament and asked for us to gain our independence from the British
in 1959. This motion was passed by the Federal House but the British
authorities refused to acquiese to it and consequently it failed. In
1958 my father moved the third motion for Nigeria ‘s independence in the
Federal Parliament and he asked that Nigeria should be given her
independence on April 2nd 1960 . The motion was not only passed by
Parliament but it was also acquiesed to by the British and was therefore
successful. That was indeed a great day and a great achievement for
Nigeria .
However in 1959, at the instance of the British Colonial authorities
who said that they needed a few more months to put everything in place
before leaving our shores, Sir Tafawa Balewa moved a motion for a slight
amendment to be made to the original 1958 motion that had been passed
and approved to the effect that the date of independence should be
shifted from April 2nd to Oct. 1st instead. Sir Tafawa Balewa’s motion
for amendment was seconded by Chief Raymond Njoku, the Minister of
Transport, and it was acquiesed to by the British. That is how we
arrived at the date October 1st 1960 for our independence.
The details of all this can be found in Hansard (which are the
official record of proceedimgs of Parliament) and they can also be found
in what in my view is one of the most detailed, authoritative and
well-researched history books that has ever been written when it comes
to the politics of the 40′s, 50′s and 60′s in Nigeria titled “Nigerian
Political Parties: Power in an Emergent African Nation” by the respected
American historian, Professor Richard L. Sklar. Sklar actually lived in
Nigeria throughout much of that period. On page 269 of his book he
wrote the following “in July 1958, Barrister Remi Fani-Kayode had the
distinction of moving the resolution for independence on April 2nd 1960,
which was supported by all the parties in the Federal House of
Representatives”.
Another excellent book that covers this topic and era very well is
titled “Glimpses Into Nigeria ‘s History” and was written by Professor
Sanya Onabamiro, a highly distinguished elder statesman and nationalist
in his own right, who was a regional Minister and one of the main
political players at the time. On pg.140 of his book and in reference to
Sir Ahmadu Bello, the Premier of the Northern Region, Onabamiro wrote:
“he was the bridge between the north and the south, between the old and
the new, between the fast and the slow. Without such a bridge to swing
the votes of the Northern members of the House of Representatives in
support of the southern members, there was little hope that the crucial
motion on ‘independence on April 2nd 1960″ moved by an Action Group
member of the House of Representatives in July 1958, would receive the
unanimous endorsement of all the parties in the House as it did”.
Professor Onabamiro was writing about the Fani-Kayode motion of April
2nd 1958 and the “Action Group member” that he was referring to was my
father. This is contrary to the assumption of some, including my dear
egbon Chief Ladi Akintola (the distinguished son of the late Chief S.L.
Akintola) who, in an article titled, “Between Akintola and Enahoro”
which was written in 2001, wrote that when Onabamiro wrote this he was
writing in reference to the motion that his father had previously moved
on the same issue in !957. Ladi Akintola was wrong. The 1957 motion
which Akintola moved had asked for our independence in 1959 and though
it was indeed passed by the Federal House it was not accepted or
acquiessed to by the British. Consequently, just like the Enahoro motion
of 1953, it failed and this is why we did not get our independence in
1959.
From the foregoing you can see that the successful movement of the
motion for our independence in Parliament was as a result of the
collective efforts of a number of prominent and notable people from
different parts of the country and from different political parties that
worked closely together on this issue over a period of time in the
Federal House and that my father was one of those people. As a matter of
fact he played a key and critical role in the proceedings. His 1958
motion for independence was highly significant because it was the only
successful one and it was the one that actually got us independence in
1960. As I said earlier Tafawa Balewa’s motion was not a motion for
independence but rather a motion to slightly amend the original one that
had already been approved by the House and acquiesed to by the British.
The simple answer to the question as to who moved the motion to
Nigeria’s independence, in my view, is that Anthony Enahoro, Samuel
Ladoke Akintola, Remi Fani-Kayode, Abubakar Tafawa Balewa and Raymond
Njoku, together with their respective political parties (Action Group,
NPC and NCNC respectively) all played major and key roles in this
exercise and the credit for the successful passing of that motion should
go not just to all those who, at different times, moved or attempted to
the move the various motions but also to every single member of
Parliament that sat on the relevant days and that voted for the various
motions to be passed.
DailyPost
