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Yoruba Summit Group.

By Muyiwa Adeyemi (Head South West Bureau),
The Guardian

13 September 2020
• Declares Oct 1 As “Unhappiness Day”
• Calls For Boycott Of 2023 Election
• Alleges President Buhari Of Anti-restructuring Stance
• Reiterates Calls For Self-determination

The Yoruba Summit Group (YSG) has called on the international community and multinational lending institutions to cease and desist forthwith, from any further disbursement of loans and grants to Nigeria because of the bleak future of the country.

The group said the call became necessary because “subsequent disbursements shall not be countenanced as part of assets and liabilities of the Nigeria country that would most sooner than later be reconfigured or dissolved.”

The group has also reiterated its call to Yorubas to boycott the 2023 general elections just as they are advised to henceforth, consider October 1 as a day of “unhappiness” when they must tie ribbon on their arm as a sign of declaring Nigeria as a failed state.

The Yoruba Summit Group (YSG) in its reaction to what it described as “anti restructuring” stance of President Muhammadu Buhari, said the country looks irredeemable and it will be a waste of time to vote in the 2023 general elections.

The self determination group in a communique signed by its Publicity Secretary, Mogaji Gboyega Adejumo noted that the time has come for the Yoruba to begin to think outside the contraption called Nigeria.
The group also dismissed efforts by the federal government to review the 1999 Constitution as a “wasteful exercise”, noting that the ethnic composition of the members of the National Assembly cannot bring the desired restructuring. The group also alleged the National Assembly as an appendage of the federal government.

YSG said, “The totality of the Nigerian 1999 Constitution must be jettisoned and a fresh document produced, which will truly reflect the wishes of “we the people”.

As a way forward, the group urged the federal government to set up a “Technical Constitution Drafting Committee (TCDC)” to work out within three months a new framework into a document as basis for all ethnic nationalities to live in peace as collaborative neighbours, using existing documents in the public domain.

YSE said the TCDC should have the mandate to produce guidelines that will facilitate the voluntary reconfiguration and realignments by “ethnic nationalities, sub-ethnic nationalities, clans and communities as would later form the basis of their mutual accommodation to live together in a true federation or to actively seek self-determination in order to actualize their God-given human rights under international laws.

“The outcome of the TCDC effort is to be the subject of a National Referendum in order to secure the consent of the Nigerian people. The National Assembly is to adopt the Doctrine of Necessity once again, by making the Law with provisions on processes to guide the historic transition from the 1999 Constitution until the enactment of a new Constitutional order is attained. The new order shall be the basis of any further elections in Nigeria.

“The YSG also re-affirms its earlier position that notwithstanding the ambition by a very tiny household in our midst, the Yoruba Nation and her peoples should not be part of another charade in the name of 2023 Federal Elections. We should not confer legitimacy to an exercise in futility at the end of which the gloating message of the conqueror shall be: “go to court.” We therefore wish our peoples to be wary of the insolent offers of Presidency positions, pitting South East against South West Regions. It is a ruse!

The statement reads further, “The YSG strongly believes that the current exercise to amend the Nigerian Constitution is a needless, irresponsible and surreptitious gambit to distract the various Nigerian ethnic nationalities agitating for restructuring, true federalism or self-determination.

“How can you ask people to submit memoranda to amend a fatally flawed constitution which ab-initio contains contrived clauses and entrenched imbalances which will nullify the aspirations of many major ethnic groups in the country, especially in the southwest?

“There is an unfair representation of many ethnic nationalities
in the NASS because of our flawed census figures and unfair geographical division of the country into states and local governments done by military fiat by soldiers of northern extraction following successive coups.

“For example, the current situation whereby all the federal legislators in the southeast region, originally one third of the tripod that held Nigeria together, add up to just the number of legislators in Kano State should not be employed to amend a constitution which requires a 2/3 majority vote of the National Assembly. Similar distortions also exist in the southwest when we compare the 20 local governments in Lagos to that of Kano with 44. As it is, the North has been given a veto power over all the other regions combined. This shouldn’t be. That is why there is always the refrain “go to the national assembly” from the North whenever unfairness or imbalances in the polity are pointed out.”

The group said that every signal from the government, contradicts a desire for genuine change – from the President’s pronouncements since he came, his various actions, “the way various bills being smuggled into and sometimes by the legislature into the NASS, particularly, the vexatious Water Bill.”
YSG said it is unfortunate to note that the “Global Terrorism Index screams “Nigeria has Emerged as The Most terrorised country in Africa and ranked third in the world”.

“All our peoples, along with those of other regions are hereby advised to regard
“YSG being a Federation of Yoruba bodies hereby enjoin all member groups to think creatively and execute passive, peaceful ways and means of asserting their human rights. This may include the wearing of RED BANDS on the wrist or shoulders in commemoration of the blood of the innocents that have been spilled. These activities should commence.”

• https://guardian.ng/news/yoruba-summit-group-to-international-community-stop-giving-nigeria-loans/