| The Tribalisation of Public Discourse |
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| Written by Taju Tijani | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Thursday, 12 June 2008 | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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In my last two contributions, “Sabella Abidde, Igbo Tribal Siren and Public Domain”, NVS 27 May 2008 and “A Yoruba Pacifist Confronts Biafran Apologists” NVS 7 June 2008, what was noticeable from the warring commentators was a worrisome tone of tribal authoritarianism which competed rather uneasily with genuine, progressive and detribalised impulses. The articles garnered more sceptics than converts about the deadly snare of tribal jingoism in the new Nigeria that is quietly evolving from the ashes of its past failings. There were so much rhetorical cover, or shall I say, Eastern solidarity for the furthering of Igbo tribalism by all means. It was clear that the unease the article brought about among some recalcitrant Igbo tribal apologists and washed up Internet commentators showed the unreadiness for a new paradigm shift among our cousins across the Niger. I detected a somewhat vintage Igbo strategic framing device that counters the strong tendencies of other tribes to regard Igbo as second rate, arrogant, stubborn, independent and ungrateful. What became so glaring was Igbo’s ongoing but confused social, moral and political objectives, seen more as weakness, which Yoruba and Hausa-Fulani nexus happily exploit. Boxed in by their ‘rankadede’ patronage toward the Hausa-Fulani, distrusted by the Yoruba, the Igbo are then forced to embark on tribal tantrums on the two tribes they perceived as enemies of their political fortune. In cold blooded truth, the Igbos are fighting unwinnable battle. The reason for their failure lies at the heart of our national politics. Our politics is fuelled by consensus but driven by a tiny band of cabal scattered across Nigeria. The inner working of that group could only be broken through a determined political wisdom, education and partnership with other tribes rather than being a lone ranger. It is quite clear that identity politics, as Igbos are wont to covet, belongs to a bygone era. The only way they can reclaim their political relevance is to drain away the copious flood of poison that still course through their tribal veins. Writers have written about modern man’s capacity to build physiological shield against shock. Only recently, Abati, the Guardian’s restless and eclectic muse also submitted to this observation and wrote about the agony of our frozen emotions, occasioned by the wasting death along Ikorodu road. If our capacity to experience shock had been deadened by the almost limitless tragedies of a post-modern world, what still shocks is the pervasive prevalence of tribalism among highly educated Igbos. I want to presume that most Igbo writers and commentators in NVS are highly intelligent, urbane, critical and savvy in matters of public discourse. The benchmark used for this paradigm exploded on my face when the articles mentioned above were rained down with so much tribal grenades from a burgeoning intellectual Diaspora, who, by tradition should be a collection of neutralising agents against old shibboleth like tribalism, the fiercest Nigeria’s mortal enemy. I was wrong. Igbo tribalists of all variants emerged from their comfortable closet and displayed shameless ethnic intolerance from far afield as Baltimore, New York, London, Lagos, Abuja and possibly Enugu. There was so much tribal rigidity in the form of support for an author’s specious argument for the Igbos and gaping paucity for my concern to unplug the noisome pestilence of tribal siren from public domain. What is amusingly strange is the automatic reflex on tribalism which still commands sizeable following among supposedly sophisticated commentators who are no longer guided by objectivity, fairness but by intuitive clannish affiliations. What emerged from the flurry of tribal venom across the cyber highway suggested to me that some Igbos are tribal mafias and that this kernel of truth needs to be told. Abidde’s right to spew rubbish from the comfort of his American suburbia, apology to Utomi, is not in question here. What really maddens me is the almost Pentecostal unity of his commentators who agreed with his banal argument of tribal superiority of the Igbos. In order words, there is still a sustained belief, nurtured through ignorance I guess, that the Igbos are just about the best tribe in Nigeria. When would Ndigbo see beyond this chimerical mist of self-delusion, no, self-deification? Abidde, the Igbo mouthpiece, alas, is an errand boy from the Ijaw tribe, who possibly looking for Igbo favour agreed to wash his intellectual dirty linen for the entire world to see. Tribalism and tribalists have held us hostage for too long and when supposedly enlightened writers and commentators are bent on furthering this ugly demon, where then is the hope for any intellectual to speak truth to power? I could not claim to have a complete and straight forward answer to this numbing perplexity. However, commentators and readers should remain the last redoubt of tribalism, given its destructive power. I am proudly Nigerian first, then Yoruba second. Even then, I do not see the need as a public commentator, to put on myopic arrogance of tribe and insult other tribes publicly thereby rumbling readers’ delicate high blood pressure. As writers, we need to rise up to the challenges of tribalism complexities and refuse to concede to politics of identity. Readers and commentators too need to pass through the tempting argument of tribalisation of the public discourse and refuse to be mired in its dirty lather. It is dispiriting, disquieting and unnerving to conclude that some enlightened Igbos still wear their tribal badges with fierce pride and shameless bravura. Tijani lives in London.
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Posted by Robot| 13.06.2008 03:37