By Kayode Emola
Last week, we witnessed another kidnapping of one of our Yoruba son enroute Lagos to Abuja. This was not just another kidnapping as it was the youth leader of the revered Afenifere Yoruba Cultural group. Just to put it in context, Afenifere is the foremost Yoruba group that speaks on behalf of the Yoruba people since the days of Chief Obafemi Awolowo.
However, since the Alliance of Democracy led by Tinubu destroyed the Afenifere group, it has since lost it potency on the Yoruba matter. Today, it is a pity that the Afenifere cannot take a stand whether to unite and fight for an independent Yoruba nation, a restructured Nigeria, or a regional government.
Until such time that the Afenifere makes up their mind as to their direction of travel, we on the Yoruba self-determination struggle will continue to unequivocally ask for our independent Yoruba nation. We believe it is our moral duty to demand from the Nigerian government our inalienable rights to self-determination as enshrined in Article 1 of the United Nations Charter.
This is the only sure guarantee to lasting peace in our Yoruba land and our future prosperity. We cannot afford to continue in this state of anarchy in Nigeria and pretend as though the country is working for the benefit of all.
Video of the released Afenifere Youth leader was widely circulated in social media. However, the release was not without the parting of huge sums of money to the kidnappers. The monies paid to the kidnappers will then go on to purchase more sophisticated weapons to continue in their dastardly act of kidnapping where they await their next victim.
I do not know how much was eventually paid as ransom to the kidnappers before he was released but their initial demand was ₦100M equil $67,000 to be produced within 3 days. If we on the Yoruba struggle had called on the Yoruba people to raise $100,000 to support our local vigilante, it may take us forever to come up with one-tenth of such resources.
Whilst I am happy that my brother Ojajuni has been freed from the kidnappers den, I believe strongly that this is the time for us to act decisively. We each need to reflect of the current situation of insecurity in our environment and ask ourselves what can we do to stop kidnapping in Yorubaland.
We need to be better prepared to tackle this issue of insecurity in Yorubaland and ensure that this ugly incidence do not repeat itself. Every community in Yorubaland need to come together to form a community defence team to tackle this menace. They need to link their defence team with their neighbours to ensure that when one community is attacked, the next community is ready to rise up to the occasion in solidarity.
It is only when we come together in unity that we can achieve a meaningful result in terms of tackling the menace of insecurity. No one community can achieve success on their own without the support and solidary of the next.
We must all come to a place where an attack on one is seen as an attack to all and everyone must rise to the occasion. If we continue to think that the attack on our fellow Yoruba citizens does not concern us, then the day it will be our turn, there may be no one left to help us.
Above all, we must begin to earnestly work together for the greater good of our Yorubaland and the liberation of our people. Without the total liberation of Yorubaland from Nigeria, these sort of events will not be totally eradicated from our land. I am taking this opportunity to call on everyone who cares that this is the time for us to double our efforts in our self-determination struggle, God willing, we will come out victorious in the not too distant future.
