Igbos in Lagos State – Senator Adeseye Ogunlewe Shares His Vision

Senator Adeseye
Ogunlewe, a former Nigerian minister for
Works and Housing, expresses his vision
on the issue of Igbos deportation:
Lagos State belongs as much to the
ethnic Igbo as to the Yoruba, Ijaw,
Hausa, Fulani, Efik, Idoma, Urhobo,
Itshekiri, Edo, and so on who live in it,
pay tax, identify with it, and settle in it.
That compact was made the moment
Nigeria became a single nation, and a
successor power to the old principalities
who were subdued and who ceded their
sovereignty for the new commonwealth
of Nigeria.
It was pragmatic. The Igbo had the skill
and the industry, and Lagos was the seat
of the Federal Government of Nigeria
and its major port. The Igbo have lived
in Lagos since the 15th century when
the Aro and other Igbo first settled in
good number in a place we now call
"Oyingbo" in the era of Benin and the
Portuguese trade.
The arrival of Dr. Namdi Azikiwe to Lagos
in 1937 from Accra after his studies in
the United States, stimulated the
political and cultural environment of
Lagos as no other has before or after
him. Zik literally resurrected the wizard
of Kirsten hall from political death. Zik
represented Lagos in the western house.
The NCNC was the power in Lagos, and
not the Action Group. The Igbo were
prominent in the governance of Lagos in
the Lagos City Hall.
The institutional development of Lagos -
the railways, the ports and ship yards;
the education and research facilities; the
Banking and Commodities Exchange, the
development of towns like Yaba,
Surulere, Ebutta-Metta, Festac Town,
Victoria Island, and now increasing the
Ajah-Lekki axis, and of course, the
ghettoes along the Orile-Badagry axis,
have profound Igbo imprimatur.
The circulation of the image of Lagos is
to date best reflected in the
cosmopolitan Igbo imagination of one of
the greatest African writers of the 20th
century, Cyprian Ekwensi, a thorough
Lagosian if there was any. Igbo have
built industries in Lagos and have been
drivers of commerce and exchange.
Interestingly, I was born at plot number
8, Okoya Street, Idumagbo-Lagos, while
the Ojukwu families were residing at
number one to three on the same
street. I grew up to know the father of
Odumegwu Ojukwu. Chimbizie and
Azuka grew up with us on the same
street. Even the Chibeze small parking
space at the end of Okoya Street is
called Ojukwu.
I later attended St. Patrick Primary
School, Idumagbo, where I had very
amiable classmates of Igbo origin in the
persons of Azubike Ezenwa and Damian,
Ihekuna, both now professors and
doctors of today. They were brilliant,
resourceful and friendly.
When we were playing bamboo and Tene
Felele at Orikoriko at Onola playing
ground, the Igbo participated actively. In
the area of sports, school football and
athletes, Igbo were dominant at Kings
College, St. Gregory school, St. Finbars,
Akoka, Igbobi College and Ahmadiyya
College, Agege. Such boys, Njokwu,
George Amu, Stephen Keshi, Henry
Nwosu, Patrick Noquapor, Peter Anieke
and Sammy Opone were dominant on
the field of football, while Asiodu,
Empire Kanu were prominent on the
field of athletics.
Anytime we went to watch football
match at Onikan stadium, my darling
team, Stationery Stores and our
adversary team I hated most was the E.
C. N, where the centre forward, Paul
Hamilton, the National Team, Fabian the
captain who bit the dust. Our greatest
captain was Duru, Oduah Onyenrekwa,
Onyeador Onyeali and Opel, the greatest
outside right Nigeria ever had, Cyril
Azuluka. So, during my early life at
primary school, the Igbo were always
there and delightful to watch, both in
athletes and on the football field.
When I listened to radio at that time,
both the commentary and drama series,
the Igbo were there for you. The likes of
Chris Ndaguba, Ernest Okwonkwo, Ralph
Okpara 'Alawo Sekiseki the traveller'.
The episode will end with - The script
was written by Ralph Okpara and edited
by Yemi Lijadu.
Anytime I visited where I was born
today in Idumagbo at Lagos Island, the
entire place is covered by Igbo traders in
their thousands. They were never
troublesome but decent and
accommodating. They have virtually
taken over all properties of the
indigenes. They succeeded in developing
all our properties, married to most of our
children even from the royal families.
There is no single house you will visit
without an Igbo man selling wares there.
So, who is saying something else? Only
the strangers in our midst will not notice
participation of economic development
in our state by the Igbos. Most houses
and shops in Lagos Island have been
purchased, developed and occupied by
the Igbos. The value of their
investments in Lagos Island alone is in
trillions of naira.
Instead of deporting the Igbos, whose
contributions to the development of
Lagos state are immensurable, you must
keep on praising and encouraging them
to keep on developing Lagos State.