FOSAD Decries Anti-Igbo Narratives in Prof Ahmed Bako's Inaugural Lecture at Usman Danfodio University

The Forum of Southeast Academic Doctors (FOSAD) has expressed its dismay at the content of the 50th Inaugural Lecture, titled "The Igbo Factor in the History of Intergroup Relations and Commerce in Kano: Opportunities and Challenges Revisited," recently delivered by Professor Ahmed Bako at the Usmanu Danfodio University, Sokoto (UDUS).

According to the group, Professor Bako misrepresented historical facts at various points in his lecture, and also engaged in typical Igbo profiling, teasing a xenophobic position that negates the integrative spirit of the Nigerian constitution.

As an academic advocacy group in part dedicated to understanding the diverse peoples of Nigeria and the broader tapestry of Nigerian history, FOSAD says it had looked forward with great interest when Professor Bako's impending lecture was announced.

The group says it had expected that, as a professional historian, the professor would present the history of Igbos in Kano - and their broader history in northern Nigeria - with depth and dispassion.

To be fair to Professor Bako, FOSAD says, he met the expectation to a degree at various points in his presentation.

Citing credible scholarly sources, according to the group, Professor Bako correctly historicized the impetus behind Igbo emigration to other parts of colonial and post-colonial Nigeria.

FOSAD also says the professor correctly portrayed the enterprising nature of the Igbos who left their homeland over a hundred years ago to take advantage of opportunities presented in the colonial administration of Kano and other parts of the North.

Despite this incontestable historiography, FOSAD says Professor Bako - for reasons it cannot fathom - advanced some arguments that are not supported by historical evidence or contemporary fact.

One of the controversial and historically dubious claims made by Professor Bako, according to FOSAD, is his statement that Igbos set out in the colonial era to dominate Nigeria.

As the professor put it in his lecture: "The Igbo in actual fact from the 1950s started sending their sons and daughters to Europe and America for higher education; all with the hope of eventual domination of the country; not necessarily for developing it for the benefit of the nation."

FOSAD says this is a provocative and historically inaccurate statement which calumniates the Igbos and misconstrues their legitimate attempt to compete in colonial and post-colonial Nigeria.

The academic group disputes the claim that Igbos ever sought to dominate Nigeria, pointing out that Professor Bako never provided historical evidence to back up his controversial assertion.

The group also says that Igbos are known to invest in and improve any locality where they are domiciled, sometimes even at the expense of their homeland.

FOSAD disputes Professor Bako's statement that Igbo traders, with their supposedly aggressive trade practices and insular trade groups, displaced indigenous traders in Kano or anywhere else in the colonial and post-colonial North.

The group recalls many collaborative ventures between Igbos and indigenous people of Kano and elsewhere in the North, and argues that the more than century-old sojourn of Igbos in northern Nigeria would not be possible with the alleged Igbo aggressiveness.

The group also points to the successful settlement of northerners in parts of Igboland which continues to this day, despite the terrorisation of Igboland by Islamic bandits and militant cattle herders from the North.

Similarly, FOSAD decries Professor Bako's silence on events that led to the Nigerian civil war, his selective account of the devastations and after-effects of the war, and his rather rosy depiction of the post-war policy of indigenisation which short-changed the Igbos but, in his recounting, was depicted as entirely beneficial to them.

Professor Bako broached the issue of Igbo dispossession through the "abandoned property" saga; but nowhere in his historiography, according to FOSAD, was there a mention of the grim prospects faced by Igbos who had to scratch up a new existence in post-war Nigeria with the £20 given to them whatever their pre-war bank account balance. 

According to FOSAD, the most vexatious part of Professor Bako's lecture is his suggestion that Igbos self-marginalized themselves in the Nigerian political arena by focusing almost exclusively on commercial and mercantile pursuits in the post-war period.

This couldn't be further from the truth, FOSAD says, as Igbos have fully participated in the politics of the country, despite the fact that there has yet to emerge - fifty-four years after the civil war - a Nigerian president of Igbo extraction.

In this regard, FOSAD says it strongly condemns Professor Bako's labeling of Ohanaeze Ndigbo, a socio-cultural organization seeking to promote Igbo unity and interests in Nigeria, as a secessionist outfit.

Although the professor disclaimed an interest in contemporary politics, he nonetheless made a pointed reference to "current contestations on the question of power shift as well as agitations for separation by Igbo political platforms such as the IPOB, the Ohanaeze Ndigbo worldwide and other Igbo separatist groups."

FOSAD says this is a gross mischaracterisaton of Ohanaeze's - and, by extension, broader Igbo - political outlook.

The academic group says this is more worrying given that Professor Bako concluded by saying he hoped his lecture "generates greater interest in the history of Igbo Diaspora in different parts of the country," and that the lecture was delivered for "the northern elites to know what actually happened so that necessary arrangements are made."

FOSAD says it wonders why an academic of Professor Bako's standing should be wondering whether Igbos would ever depart northern Nigeria, despite the integrative aspiration of the Nigerian constitution (1999) which at Section 41(1) provides that "Every citizen of Nigeria is entitled to move freely throughout Nigeria and to reside in any part thereof, and no citizen of Nigeria shall be expelled from Nigeria or refused entry thereby or exit therefrom."

FOSAD calls on all Nigerians to celebrate their shared citizenship, and to embrace their common interest in building a great country which could become the pride of Africa and beacon of Black civilization.

FOSAD Research & Documentation Team: Dr Chudi Okoye Dr Marcel Mbamalu Dr Chris Belonwu Signed Dr Stephen Nwala, FOSAD President Dr Uzor Ngoladi, FOSAD, Secretary General www.fosads.org