Yoruba nation rally: Only dialogue can stop more protests, says Afenifere chieftain

Gboyega Adejumo, a chieftain of Afenifere, the Yoruba socio-political group, has called for a national dialogue to mitigate protests that may throw the country into turmoil.

He said the quest for self-determination by the Yoruba is a valid course of action, and added that the administration of President Muhammadu Buhari needs to address it with dialogue and not with bullets.

Adejumo said Buhari, in his first address to the United Nation’s general assembly in 2015, had supported the Palestinians’ clamour for a new country.

He added that if the president could support the cause, he should be ready to embrace the calls for Yoruba nation by engaging agitators in an elaborate dialogue.

Adejumo spoke on Sunrise Daily, a Channels Television programme, on Monday.

“The Yoruba has always been a nation. The agitation now is about self-determination. Some people may want to twist it but it is no more than that. The AU charter allows for it, the United Nation has 5 different organs to deal with indigenous people who have issues with the way they are being treated,” he said.

“I can remember even our president, when he came in 2015, on his first appearance at the UN, he was clamouring for a new nation out of Israel. He pleaded for the cause of the Palestinians. That they should have their own country. He did that because he believed the Palestinians had a case.

“If he thinks the Yoruba don’t have a case, then invite everybody to the table, let us put things in perspective.

“You don’t treat an issue like self-determination as if it is a crime, but this administration treats every problem as if it had to be solved with a gun, and every solution a bullet. And that is one thing history will not forget.

“What we need is a dialogue, but when the president is not agreeing to a dialogue, when the presidency seems to have only one option all the time when dealing with the Yoruba, and that is to say ‘I will let them know through the language they understand’.

“If this country is to progress then we should have a semblance of a dialogue. Presidents Obasanjo and Jonathan, at one point in their administrations, called for such dialogue.”