WHY YORUBAS ARE NIGERIA’S MOST HATEFUL TRIBE
By Dr. James C. Agazie,
The secret is out in the open. Awolowo, god of the Yorubas, is doing owambe in his grave. “Now, we had you where we wanted you, didn’t we?” Awo jeered at the Igbos of Nigeria whose children he starved to death to give easy victory for the other side. With a face full of whiskers, Awo danced owambe all night since going to bed was impossible . “Why are these starving, emaciated children with bloated stomachs tormenting me.?”Cold sweats broke out of his face and dripped off his whiskers to the soil as thousands of departed children crowded into his death chambers, some grabbing his legs, and others clinging onto his heaving, scarified chest Suddenly, almost clandestinely, the voices of dead Biafra children rang out softly in a somber one-line chorus:
Only the blood of Yoruba babies killed in Ofe Manu War in the West will satisfy us
Then, I opened my mouth and said: “Excuse me, children. I am not particularly fond of the Yorubas, and the more I research the behavior of this most underachieving, most troublesome tribe, I am not yet willing to lean towards disliking them as intensely as I would disdain the hebephrenic boko who explodes a suicide bomb at the door of the house I am sleeping in.” I am just Leary, weary, and leery of “them ofe manu” people. The word Leary comes from troublesome Dr. Timothy Leary (1930-1988). Dr. Leary was an American writer, psychologist, futurist and advocate of psychedelic/mind-altering drug research and use and whose university lectures encouraged experimentation in LSD and acids that claimed the lives and minds of countless people. This was at a time when American college students popped pills, injected fluids into veins, and sniffed glue, and we disciplined graduate students watched as our embattled Dr. Weaver, Chancellor, tried to contain activities of Dr. Leary. A banner hung out of a window on the seventh floor of the sorority women’s dormitory read:
Some people are leery of Leary; others are weary of Weaver
I had sense enough to avoid the use of drugs that were particularly dangerous during my graduate school years and it was imperative that I steered clear of “ofe manu” Yoruba undergraduate and graduate students. Some were dabbling in marijuana and occult. Do you know that I don’t cook with palm oil because I associate the cholesterol-packed reddish poison with iba (malarial fever). I am beginning to like some Yorubas but I could never stomach their fetish and sneaky behavior, prostrations, and bowing down to kiss the dirt. Although Awolowo gave them a head start in Federal Government corporate allocation and banking industry, Yorubas have stolen and sold off my country’s lucrative ventures. They lack the industriousness of the Igbos, the agribusiness of the Tivs, or the good naturalness of the Idomas. Aren’t the Yorubas something else? Hahahaha. Speaking of Chief Awo, it is funny the Yorubas changed that man’s name from Awolowo to Awo in their haste to deify mere mortal and clothe the man with the garb of immortality. Why does the Yoruba god’s name remind me of awo (Igbo word for the ugly, revolting toad that nobody but the Yorubas use in making potent poisons)? It could have been better had Yorubas been less insulting and kind enough to change their man’s name to mbala (Igbo name for toad’s more beautiful cousin, edible frog).
My initial assessments of the Yorubas had left a bitter taste in my mouth. The first Nigerian to rob me in Atlanta was a Yoruba man who owned a used car lot and masqueraded as a mechanic. With pseudo politeness, this Yoruba man would pester me with “Yes, Sir, Professor. Yes, Sir; Oga, Sir; Mazi; Chief; Dr Sir, and Sir.” I fell for this man’s flattery as one-eyed fool. He took $245 from me for a used Honda engine which he said was stored at a location on Old National Hwy and which he never delivered. He avoided me like a poison until I caught up with him, and then he kept promising more and eventually closed his shop and disappeared. Did the earth open up to swallow him? Did it engulf him into its sweltering bowels? . I hope my $245 turned into $1,000,000 for him so he would thank his witch doctor for providing him with effective charms that fooled a highly educated Igbo man. Hahaha.
The Yorubas are something else, for they have distinguished themselves as fomenters of troubles and crises in Nigeria since time immemorial. Yorubas have more lawyers than all the other tribes put together, and their lawyers write petitions to oppose anything they smell as having injustice against Yorubas. Remember the Mid-West crisis; Awolowo’s stockpiling weapons of mass destruction to earn a treasonable felony conviction; and the Akintola problems ending in the death of a son. What would have happened had god Awo succeeded in toppling the Federal Republic of Nigeria? Nigeria’s name would have been changed to Owambeland or Oduduwala. The Igbos could have been exiled forever Now, you see why Yorubas are angry with Igbos for pulling off the Republic of Biafra and succeeding where their god Awo had failed At least, Republic of Biafra once was and is still in the minds of millions, while Owambeland or Oduduwala never was and may never happen unless dead Biafran children’s prediction comes true. Know why the Yorubas are Nigeria’s most hateful tribe?
We used to trade stories about this Yoruba man from Ijebu Ode who took an Igboman to meet his daughter whom the Igbo wanted for a wife; how Mgbati turned Anyamiri into a black goat which he took to the market for sale after deciding that having Naira was more important than having Yorigbo grandchildren. Yorubas have the persecution mentality which enables them to always cry foul play and marginalization when they fail to get what they covet. Like the chameleon, the Yorubas can change skin color at will and can vacillate at random between Christian and muslim worlds whenever the spirit hits them. The vacillation is akin to the abracadabra of a sworn homosexual who might screw a man today, a woman tomorrow, or an animal the next time. You never could tell. According to Sanusi Lamido Sanusi, Governor of the Central Bank of Nigeria, Yorubas are the problem with Nigeria, as Sanusi’s words attest:
In sum, the Yoruba political leadership, as mentioned by Balarabe Musa, has shown itself over the years to be incapable of rising above narrow tribal interests and reciprocating goodwill from other sections of the country by treating other groups with respect. Practically every crisis in Nigeria since independence has its roots in this attitude.( Via Elombah.com 05/25/2009 -11.01).
The Yorubas are a people choking in the vomit they have created with hatred and fear of the Igbos. They envy the Igbos who have done the impossible – standing up to their enemies; and exercising their inalienable rights to self preservation. As cowardly and sheepishly docile as Yorubas are , Yorubas are a spineless people unable to stand up for a justifiable cause other than to fish in troubled water in search of decomposed leftovers. They are overjoyed the Igbos lost the Biafran War which afforded Yorubas the opportunity to scramble for “abandoned” Igbo belongings and misplaced Federal pieces of property they quickly pilfered with the blessings of Awolowo whom the Yorubas consider god of money, but whom I crown with title “Devourer of Dead Children.” Yorubas cannot fight but would run into juju shrines with human body parts in search of protective charms. What a group of superstitious bushmen! Lamido Sanusi continues:
The Igbo people of Nigeria have made a mark in the history of this nation. They led the first successful military coup which eliminated the Military and Political leaders of other regions while letting off Igbo leaders. Nwafor Orizu, then Senate President, in consultation with President Azikiwe, subverted the constitution and handed over power to Aguiyi-Ironsi. Subsequent developments, including attempts at humiliating other peoples, led to the counter-coup and later the civil war. The Igbos themselves must acknowledge that they have a large part of the blame for shattering the unity of this country.
Sanusi is totally mistaken here in assuming that Nigerian was united before the so-called unity was shattered. I was a young boy when barely literate buffoon named Ahmadu Bello came to a teacher training college the Igbos helped to establish and ordered that the Igbo principal be replaced with a non-Igbo. What effrontery, what impudence and disregard for commonsense ( “It is better to keep your mouth shut and let people think you are a fool than to let it open and make people know you are indeed a fool”) Bello’s Northernization Policy effectively disenfranchised me and denied me the opportunity to complete Higher School at my secondary school up in the hills of Dutsen Lamba . I missed Ahmadu Bello University which the Sadauna had declared a harem for unqualified Northern nerds and smeaky Oromas (Yorubas that eat oranges). Yorubas, as usual, had set aside the University of Ibadan for the mgbatis with awakaonu (deep cat-like markings around the mouth and other terrible body disfigurements). Psychologists call these markings scarifications which are remnants a superstitious past, The Yorubas were determined to ingratiate themselves with the Hausas at any cost at the expense of their superiors, the Igbos. Sanusi continues his analysis:
Having said that, this nation must realise that Igbos have more than paid for their foolishness. They have been defeated in war, rendered paupers by monetary policy fiat, their properties declared abandoned and confiscated, kept out of strategic public sector appointments and deprived of public services. The rest of the country forced them to remain in Nigeria and has continued to deny them equity.
What concerns me the most about the Yorubas is the degree of trade in human body parts that goes on in the West. Have you read the news of two Yoruba brothers who killed their third brother and were selling his body parts piece by piece? Their mother had been missing for three years and neighbors believed the hideous boys had eaten Mom or sold her parts, including suckling breasts and vagina, to witch doctors for the making of ogwu ego (medicine for money). Had the two brothers not been arrested, one would eventually kill the other, so the winner would attempt to beat the Igbo in accumulating the largest amount of money the world could only imagine. Hey, did you read about the Yoruba man who died in a London hospital and whose penis and scrotum sack were found missing? The Yoruba nurses were up in arms when questioned “Where de penis and basket?” The parts were neatly sliced off and flown out to Ijebu Ode to be cooked and mixed in some ola-kassimous (made-up word for strongest) charms). Chai.
The Yorubas have charms for everything, including love portions, pregnancy inducers, barrenness inhibitors, cures for ogbanje, protection from gun wounds and poisonings. Despite their heavy groundings in the underworld Yorubas cannot equal the Igbos in capitalization, wealth, bravery, influence, or physical attractiveness. Yoruba charms are a cover-up for cannibalism, a subterfuge for wickedness of the most primitive category . So, what do their stupid charms do for them ? They rob Igbo stores in Lagos, organize riots to provide opportunities to ransack Igbo stalls, sell body parts to Igbo traders eager to amass billions of Naira they leave behind at death for the Yoruba witch doctors.
The Yorubas invented the Ogboni Society for Nigerian illiterates eager to own more money than God. I hear Ogboni members are required to sacrifice family members or chosen others to stay protected and in wealth. If Yoruba charms really work, why don’t they protect them from being arrested while marketing human body parts? Why don’t the jujus give the Yorubas the smartness and acumen the Igbos used to turn N1,000 given shortly after the War into billions a few years later? Why didn’t the charms clean the gutters, sanitize the squalor, and cure malaria and small pox infesting Yorubaland? Why don’t they fare better in WAEC papers without being the purveyors of Expo? Why? Why? The Yorubas are a conniving people; they have conspired with the Hausas to rob and marginalize the Igbos. Sanusi of the Central bank of Nigeria states:
The Northern Bourgeoisie and the Yoruba Bourgeoisie have conspired to keep the Igbo out of the scheme of things. In the recent transition when the Igbo solidly supported the PDP in the hope of an Ekwueme presidency, the North and South-West treated this as a Biafra agenda. Every rule set for the primaries, every gentleman´s agreement was set aside to ensure that Obasanjo, not Ekwueme emerged as the candidate. Things went as far as getting the Federal Government to hurriedly gazette a pardon. Now, with this government, the marginalization of the Igbo is more complete than ever before. The Igbos have taken all these quietly because, they reason, they brought it upon themselves. But the nation is sitting on a time-bomb.
I never fancy Yoruba girls. They are a sneaky, slimy bunch who would warm their ways into a man’s heart to collect the man’s sperm in plastic to take to a witch doctor to whom they pay a heavy fee to prepare ojo-valentiurinal (invented word for the most powerful) concoctions that would hold the man married to them for life). One Igbo man at Abuja ran into a pretty Yoruba akwunakwuna (woman of ill repute) who moved in with him and ended breaking up his marriage to Igbo wife at Lagos. Igbo wife fought hard to reclaim her husband. Igbo husband fought hard to evict Yoruba woman . Igbo man died inexplicably in the process, and his Igbo relatives believed the Yoruba woman caused the death. Did she poison our stupid brother or did he drown in her flowery discharge? This Yoruba woman is still at Abuja seeking another man to devour. If I ever come across her in Nigeria, I know what to do. Send her to America as special envoy or embassy attaché’ responsible for seizing passports and assets of Igbo millionaires. Hahaha.
My first encounter with the Yorubas was as a 4-year-old pre-schooler at Igbo Camp in former Benue Plateau State of Nigeria in the family of one Mr. Asiegbu (or Osiegbu, I don’t remember the correct spelling) who was a travelling teacher under the Methodist Central School where I started ABC (pre-kindergarten). Mr. Asiegbu’s mother had a family business that brought neighborhood kids armed with bowls to collect akara balls and agidi that the ancient Yoruba woman cooked . I didn’t like Mr. Asiegbu too well because he was too thin, arrogant, and a ferocious introvert. An introverted person is shy, recluse; a person best described as hermit, loner, outsider, or ascetic. His kids were like their father: thin and lanky with a hideous swagger where one could not help noticing bony, emaciated buttocks. That was before kwasiokor became a household word. Was someone sucking the kids’ blood while they slept? Was it Grandmother Ayo Asiegbu, the akara fryer? Jokes aside, all things are possible among Nigeria’s neighbors in the West. You dare not put anything including wizardry past them.
I didn’t trust Mr.Asiegbu and hated queuing up to buy oily akara balls from his mother whom I saw as the stealthiest person on earth. Stealthy in the sense that Mother Asiegbu and son were furtive, silent, surreptitious, quiet, sly, cautious, sneaky or simply crafty. Words spread around the Igbo Camp that Mother Asiegbu “na agwo ogwu” (prepared charms and fetish stuffs Yorubas are best known for in Nigeria. Come to think of it, I never saw Mr. Asiegbu’s wife who produced his three bony, lanky, emaciated, and swaggering children. Nobody ever talked about Asiegbu being unmarried. We just assumed he was. Where was his wife? Then the word got out: Mr. Asiegbu didn’t need to remain married. He received all his sexual gratification from Igbo underage school girls he used his mother’s akara balls as potent bribery to seduce.
Why must a Christian Igbo want his family to eat from or associate with persons that had hands in the underworld? Christianity is accommodating in the sense that it offers a sinner the opportunity to redeem his evil ways. Mr. Asiegbu doubled as a travelling teacher and a respected Sunday School teacher. Papa, my Papa, was a fanatic believer and church worker even when his co-worker Mr. Asiegbu was suspected to be attending church services and dabbling in witchcraft at the same time. That’s why, as a Nigerian student without Green Card, I rejected the offer of church scholarship that would enable me to combine my BS program in mathematics with a divinity program leading to ordination at a United Methodist Seminary. I balked with a capital NO. Reasons were Mr. Asiegbu ‘s activities in the church and experiment with herbs and Satan.. Tufia kwa! The real reason is my hatred for anything having to do with juju, charms, alusi, voodoo, Yoruba culture, and Satanic powers. How do I get myself to love charm-riddled Yorubas?
Secondary school started for me at a private boarding school hidden in the rocky hills 60 miles north of the capital of a Northern state of Nigeria. I didn’t believe Yorubas were as unhygienic as the Hausas always are, but the small pox of the Yorubas gets me worried . Growing up, I associated Hausas with kwarikwata, magic, leprosy, money doubling, the supernatural ,and the unexplained. I avoided the Yorubas as carriers of small pox and ugly, unsightly, and rough skins. I had always prided myself with looking clean with smooth beautiful skin unlike the Yorubas who seemed to be less educated, less attractive, more underachieving and more troublesome than the Igbos. Call it prejudice if you like, but I have a right to hold opinions, and it is not a crime.
At the secondary school, there were many Yorubas from all over Nigeria. The majority seemed to be “Northern Yorubas” from the region known then as Kwara. The Yorubas were loud, obstreperous, showy, and appeared to be distant cousins of enwe achako (dark-faced monkeys). Each morning, one stupid Yoruba boy named Femi would stand in the middle of the quadrangle to scream “ Yisa, wa; Kadiri, wa; Oloruntoba, wa” followed with some other hideous words ending with a loud “ah.” I didn’t like their juju language, but they were some of my smartest classmates with a large number of them becoming physicians and professors. One classmate Olusola (fictitious) pissed me off in class and at exams times.
At the end of each exam, Olu would rush out shedding crocodile tears to obtain our sympathy. “What did you write? I messed up. Oh, my god, oh my goodness.” I found this behavior particularly disturbing since I needed to rest and turn my mind to subsequent exams instead of dwelling in the past. Olu posted the best WAEC result for our class, the first set to take the examination at the end of just five years. I wouldn’t put it past the Yorubas to do “Expo”, bring charms to the exam halls, or buy exam papers from cousins who worked at the Lagos Exam Council buildings. One Yoruba chap entered the WAEC hall with charms he was told would split the papers into question and answer sections. The jujuman had warned him: “Copy only from the answer section.” Not seeing the answer section and being exasperated as most Yorubas are, the chap started talking out loud to command the juju to work. Invigilators grabbed him and ejected him out the large hall. Atama aja (I don chop sand. I don die-o). Hahahahh.
Concerning Olu my Yoruba classmate who posted the best WAEC result in my class, I am proud he also posted the best results at University of Ibadan medical school where he was awarded the Bachelor of Medicine/B. Chem. Then after serving as Professor and Dean of a Northern Nigerian medical school, Olu denounced Christianity, became a Moslem and went to serve as medical officer in Saudi Arabia. How could a bastard schooled in a Christian environment suddenly convert to Islam? Olu’s motive was money and the feeling that he knew better than all his mates. I hear that the Saudis treated Olu badly like an African monkey with a red tail. For one thing, Olu is far from being handsome. He is oogley (unattractive in the superlative form). Olu is far from being the smartest classmate. He has only the MB, BChem. Others are holders of the MD, PhD in medicine. Where’s Olu now? He is back in Nigeria, angry with the Saudis for disgracing his monkey face. Serves him right. Haha.
Excuse me. I have got to go to write other essays I will come again if you continue to disparage Igbos who are recognized as Nigeria’s chosen tribe.
© COPYRIGHTED 10/21/2012. NOT TO BE REPRODUCED IN ANY FORM OR SOLD