The greatest merit for Igbos in recent times is not simply the advent of the internet on the surface!
It is the social media aspect of the internet which now allows independent thinkers to challenge the lies of history.
In Nigeria, our little corner of the world, through social media presentations, scholars are now debunking the false stories perpetuated by the Yoruba press (with the help of the north who has always been paranoid about Igbos).
The Yorubas took advantage of their civil war to take-over of the press to rewrite the history of Nigeria as it favors them..., and if you believe them, "every post independence success in Nigeria was Awolowo influenced" and every problem in Nigeria was "instigated by Azikiwe, Ojukwu and the Igbos!"
"The truth is reluctantly coming out" and Igbos are gradually being vindicated!!! In this masterpiece below by Professor Tekena Tamuno, a great historian and former Vice - Chancellor University of Ibadan.
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| Late Prof. Tekena Tamuno |
The problem with writing skewered history is that it equally misinforms its target: Kayode Esho was a great jurist, but Akunne Oputa was the "Socrates" of the Supreme Court. Enahoro was a young editor, but Azikiwe made him that young editor with Osita Agwuna as his assistant, at his paper, the Southern Nigerian Defender in Ibadan, where my own father incidentally started as a rookie before shortly abandoning journalism for the stable berth of the civil service. The myth of Awolowo as building the first this and that does not match the documented economic history of the period.
Between 1954 and 1964, Eastern Nigeria was described as
"the fastest growing economy in the world," by the Harvard Review;
faster than China, faster than Singapore, and all the so-called "Asian
Tigers." Awolowo is often credited with "free education".
But no one yet has pointed out any surviving school
buildings of the period built by Awo. But all over the East there were quality
schools built by the various communities using the Town Development Unions from
1954, and accessing the matching grants of the Eastern Nigeria Development
Corporation. And this was the East with the poorest revenue resources of any of
the regions. The Mbaise secondary school exists, the National High School
Okigwe exists, the Ngwa High school exists, the Enyiogugu Grammar School
exists, etc. These were solid schools built all over the East with matching government
grants. But where are the buildings of the Modern schools in Western Nigeria?
They do not exist. They were makeshift.
The Catholic Church forced the Azikiwe government from its
scholarship program, but it is also on record, that the Eastern government was
the only government in the world that invested 45% of its revenues in
education. The East had the highest number of schools; the highest school
enrollment; the broadest penetration of medical services; and the best modern
road network in West Africa.
Indeed if we look carefully, the only public hospitals and
most of the schools still standing in the East today, at various stages of run
down are the schools and hospitals built by Azikiwe/Okpara. Every division of
the East had a Joint Hospital as part of the Eastern Medical services. So it is
often claimed Awo built the first television station; the first sky scraper,
and the first Sports stadium, the liberty stadium in Ibadan. Well, these are
prestige or white elephant investments.
First, the Eastern Outlook, the government paper of Eastern
Nigeria was the first newspaper established by any government in Nigeria, and
it was of such quality and impact that the literacy level of Easterners and the
depth of public information retailed by Outlook was without compare. This is
besides the fact that Western Nigerian Broadcast Services, WNBS-TV founded in
1958 only preceded the ENBC-TV founded in 1959, by only seven months. But
Outlook preceded Sketch by about 15 years.
Now Azikiwe built the Onitsha Modern market, the first
modern mall or trade emporium in West Africa. Onitsha was effectively Dubai before
Dubai. People traveled all over Africa, from as far as the Congo and Sudan and
Egypt, to come and buy and trade in Onitsha. The economic impact of this was
humonguous. So, give me the vast Onitsha modern market over Cocoa House in
Ibadan. Azikiwe built the first Nigerian University at Nsukka with the first
School of Law, the first School of Engineering, the first Business School; the first
school of journalism, and the first school of music and performance, etc. By
the time its first graduates took the Nigerian civil service exams in 1963,
everybody began to raise the cry of "Igbo domination" starting with
Akintola and Ayo Rosiji. Give me UNN over Liberty stadium.
Azikiwe began the first modern library system in West Africa. The East had a system of city libraries starting with the very modern Ziks Library in Enugu. I literally grew up in the Umuahia Divisional Library. These libraries were built all over the East. Schools in the East were built with libraries. Moreover the Eastern Nigerian Library Board had a system of rural and mobile libraries. There was nothing like it anywhere else in Nigeria: kids having library cards and able to borrow or order books from the public library. Give me the first library over the first TV. I do not by this mean that Awolowo did not make his contributions, but the regular skewering of the facts, and angling of contemporary national narratives often makes it seem these days like the greatest contributor to the founding of Nigeria and its development is Awolowo and the Yoruba, when the actual facts speak differently.
The great Ibadan historian, Tekena Tamuno, was unambiguous in stating once at NIPPS, Jos, that " the Igbos are the makers of moderm Nigeria. When they abandoned their project, Nigeria collapsed."
We must remind Nigerians, particularly Igbo
children, daily of these fact, to achieve what Achebe called " a balance
of stories." And that also means we must read beyond the surface of
things. Babarinsa's Guardian essay is angled carefully to maintain a
revisionist narrative. And that is to be always challenged, however innocent it
might seem.
Even today, most Yoruba think that Awolowo founded the Universities
of Ibadan and Lagos. No one has reminded them that it took Azikiwe's pressures
for a university for Nigeria, in his meeting with Arthur Richards in 1946 that
led to the constitution of the Eliot commission and subsequently the founding
of the University College, Ibadan. This fact is even clearly conveyed in Michael
Crowder’s eponymous book, The Story of Nigeria. Nsukka was Azikiwe's critique
of what he felt to be the conceptual limitations of Ibadan. The University of
Lagos was the result of NCNC's ideological contributions to the federal policy
during the ill-fated coalition government with the NPC. UNILAG was an NCNC
project, shepherded by Aja Wachukwu as minister for education. Even the great
UNILAG in her 50th anniversary failed to mention Prof Eni Njoku as the pioneer
Vice Chancellor of the university, a man that layed the solid foundation of
what made UNILAG is today.
These facts must be made known and put as forcefully across as possible. Again, until the lion tells his own story, the story of the hunt will belong to the hunter.
*Contributed by Prof. Tekena Tamuno, a great historian and former Vice - Chancellor University of Ibadan.
Yoruba never disputed what Asikwe did for Eastern regions but only eulogising what Awo did in the western region. And those achievements stand the test of time till date. Even you failed to mention University of Ife named after Awolowo as part of his achievements
ReplyDeleteProfessor Tamuno is angered by the international recognition of Awolowo and the Yoruba; why? Western Region was clearly the most progressive and well-led region in Nigeria.
ReplyDeleteNoone prevented Igbo media from constantly blowing the trumpet of their Azikiwe and the Igbo.
Why doeesn t Prof Tamuno write a book on. The achievements of his own Rivers State leaders, and of his own?