Response to Mr Tayo Mabeweje
By Baasegun (Dr) Olusola Oni
Writes from Leicester, United Kingdom
On the petition by Yoruba
Self-determination to Downing Street, London
When I was a child, my grandmother taught me that those who resort to abuse and insults when arguing have nothing meaningful to say. Tayo Mabeweje offered only intellectual froth in his article in which he spewed a lot of bile in the direction of Igboho for having the temerity to go to Downing Street. Luckily for us Yoruba, Igboho is not a coward like Mr Mabeweje who hides behind his pen.
What was Igboho’s sin that annoyed Mr Mabeweje so much? Igboho sought an appointment with Downing Street to deliver a letter to the UK prime minister about Yoruba-self-determination. He was granted that appointment. Igboho, a man Mr Mabeweje would have us believe is a nonentity, was granted an appointment by the UK’s prime minister’s office. Yes, Igboho was granted an appointment by the UK’s prime minister’s office. President Tinubu’s office heard about it and was sufficiently panicked to call in the UK High Commissioner for reassurance. Yes, Nigeria’s government believed the event to be so momentous that they called in the UK High Commissioner for reassurance. Let that sink in for a moment. Downing Street has never granted such direct access to any non-governmental Yoruba leader. Downing Street could have refused to grant Igboho access, yet they didn’t. Why?
Before 12 October 2024, like many others, I have written to the UN Secretary General, to Buhari and Tinubu, and to UK prime ministers and got nowhere. It was not until Igboho delivered a letter to Downing Street at 2pm on that fateful day that the whole world knew of the desire of the Yoruba to exit Nigeria. For the very first time, Abuja and London made the public and other countries officially aware that the Yoruba seek to leave Nigeria. Even if as Mr Mabeweje claims, albeit wrongly, that the petition was rejected, people now know that a petition on Yoruba self-determination was submitted to the UK.
I probably have more by way of education than Mr Mabeweje. I was a student leader at Ibadan in the early 1970s. I have qualifications in medicine, surgery, law, administration, education and training, from 4 universities and 4 surgical colleges. I was leader of Ilana Omo Oodua in London. I initiated the Ekiti/Osun law suits in 2022 to challenge the legality of the 1999 constitution. I am the leader of the Yoruba Party in the UK. Inspite of all that, on 12 October 2024, I was proud to be in the rally that accompanied Igboho to Downing Street. I happily deferred to Igboho, a man Mr Mabeweje would have us believe is an ignorant thug, because Igboho was doing something that sadly no Yoruba leader, intellectual or otherwise, in recent times has had the balls to do. Mr Mabeweje and his ilk are all mouth no trousers.
Since the 1950s, Nigeria has daily humiliated us Yoruba – 1960 Awolowo not invited to the Independence celebrations, 1962 emergency declared in Yorubaland,1963 Midwest Region carved out of Yorubaland,1963 Awolowo imprisoned on trumped up charges and Yoruba leadership decapitated,1966 Akintola murdered in a coup,1998 Abiola’s victory annulled, and so many assassinations, and since 2015, Fulani savages have raped and murdered in Yorubaland with impunity. In all of this, our dumb do-nothing Yoruba intellectuals stand idly by navel-gazing doing nothing concrete until Igboho came along. Our so-called intellectuals like Mr Mabeweje are jealous of Igboho. They cloak their jealousy in fuzzy logic and empty rhetoric.
Igboho rightly tells us Yoruba to take our destiny in our own hands and fight for our self-determination. I see no problem with that at all. Igboho took up the mantle of leadership because our ‘more learned, qualified and equipped’, to who Igboho often humbly deferred, are yellow-bellied empty shells. Igboho, who Buhari tried and failed to assassinate in 2021 with state-hired thugs, is more man than 10 million Mabeweje. What explains Igboho’s rise is not ‘populism’ but the realisation that the ‘learned’ Yoruba are too self-absorbed and too self-emasculated to champion the Yoruba cause. We Yoruba have at the top a generation of emotional dwarfs and the intellectually bleached. God help us!
