Oyo Yoruba aren’t minimalists

There is that strident call online from some quarters that the Yoruba should withdraw into a cocoon and be hostile to anyone else. Here, I respond to the call by stating that Oyo Yoruba aren’t minimalists because they think large-scale, and all Yoruba think long-term. I shall explain why I have two Yoruba categories. No doubt, people’s background informs orientation and attitude. We know there are different backgrounds to the Yoruba ethnic nationality, as one can see from the arguments presented by some, which make a separation between Oyo Yoruba and other Yoruba subgroups. We know though, that there’s hardly any town of the sub-groups that doesn’t contain Oyo Yoruba, many of whom migrated after the collapse of old Oyo and the capital city of the Oyo Empire in the 19th century.

Oyo Yoruba form the majority in Ibadan, even though the composition of Ibadan and other major Yoruba cities is more complex. I won’t go into details because it’s not my focus here. Meanwhile, I differentiate between Oyo Yoruba and other Yoruba sub-groups because of the effort some make to assert their independence by claiming that their origin wasn’t where Oyo Yoruba had theirs. Incidentally, I notice that many of those who call for cocoons for the South West are from such sub-groups who have reasons to dislike Oyo Yoruba due to their historical antecedence. No problems about that. The fact, however, is that “A ji se bi Oyo la a ri, Oyo ki i se bi baba eni kankan.” Oyo Yoruba aren’t dictated to; Oyo Yoruba always dictate the pace, something that the Oyo State vehicle number plate also captures—the Pacesetter State. And Oyo Yoruba aren’t minimalists; we accept others because we believe “Ka rin ka po, yi ye ni ye ni.” The more people you have, the more respect. Our cultural orientation makes us respect others; we’re circumspect, so others in turn feel comfortable being part of us.

There’re towns outside the South West today that trace their roots back to Oyo Yoruba. It’s because of who we are—large-hearted, open-minded, willing to create just one more room to accommodate that one more person who feels good to be one of us. That was one way my forebears—the Alaafin Oyo—were able to build an empire, not a kingdom. So only those who have taste for a small kingdom would advocate a cocoon for the South West, a call that I consider extremist. I shall give a background to this point too, but let me state that wherever I pause I shall pick the rest next Friday.

There’s no better way to start expressing my view than to refer to a comment made by the late Alaafin Oyo, Oba Lamidi Adeyemi. His comment years ago followed almost a similar situation that spurred this piece. There were criminal attacks attributed to herdsmen in parts of Oyo State, and there was the usual call by some to run out of town people who looked and sounded like herdsmen. Oba Adeyemi reminded those who made the call that the Fulani people who were being demonised had for centuries made significant contributions to the Oyo Empire and also Oyo, the capital of his domain. He didn’t want people to extend blame for the activities of a few criminals to others who had been living peacefully in Yorubaland. It happened that for a couple of years before then, I had been making a similar argument on this page that criminals should be treated as criminals and good people shouldn’t be accused for what criminals did.
My calls then were also against the backdrop of herdsman attacks not only in the South West but in several parts of the north. But the calls by some to chase Fulani people away from the South West continued, and proponents sometimes based their argument on how the Oyo Empire lost Ilorin in the 19th century. That argument never impressed me, for my history book showed that internal disloyalty to my forebears happened; outsiders only capitalised on internal fragmentations. A similar argument of pushing them out is being made in the brouhaha over who owns Lagos State after some Ndigbo elements were quoted as provocatively saying “Lagos is No Man’s Land” and that Ndigbo singlehandedly developed Lagos.
Severally, I’ve condemned such comments. It was part of my observations when I serially wrote here, “Ndigbo’s latest outing” (from December 15, 2023). In it I stated that it was indelicate, lacking in tact, for anyone to make comments that could get people in the parts of the country they reside upset. Yet I believe it’s not every Ndigbo who encourages disrespectful comments to people. The foregoing had made me make comparisons in the past in how differently ethnic groups delicately handled cross-cultural relations. I don’t need to reference the Yoruba because it’s obviously one reason they’re generally at peace with the people they live with across the world. But I’ve seen other people who’re like the Yoruba in that regard. The Fulani. I don’t praise. I cite examples.

Among tribes in the north that were outside the control of emirates in the 19th century, the British colonial enterprise needed a large-scale form of administration, which many such tribes didn’t have. In these areas, the British attempted to form federation or confederation among different minority tribes in order to have some level of centralised administration. They made the different tribes select one of them as the leader. In many places, these tribes disagreed and instead agreed to have a Fulani person they knew from the closest emirate lead them for many years. The Fulani person who was likely to be a titleholder in the emirate would therefore collect taxes and pass information down to the people. I knew because I researched and wrote books on some parts of the north.
Note that even within a Fulani emirate there were people of other tribes. They were ever in the majority in a situation where the ruling class, the Fulani, were in the minority. Within an emirate or outside, there were situations in which these tribes were content that a Fulani District Head would be fairer to them than any of their own people. In fact, these tribes spoke in favour of the Fulani, who mostly dealt fairly and in justice with them. This was part of the success of the Fulani in native administration in the pre-colonial and colonial periods, not just the story of subjugation. I mean the Fulani who rule over you in such a manner that makes you feel that they deserve to be thanked for it—when compared to other rulers, that is. It’s a norm in the teaching of the religion and in their culture. They don’t brag. They aren’t garrulous, and they don’t put things in your face. Humility and simplicity make them win people over to their side. You find the same virtues in many of them who’re highly educated. Compared to them, I’ve listened to some other tribes, and the difference comes to me in very sharp relief.

As it happened, the Fulani had lived within the boundaries of the Oyo Empire when it was one of the most dominant in this part. Their traces as cattle herders are still in many Yoruba-speaking areas, from present-day Oyo to the upper parts of the Niger River. Many have become assimilated into the Yoruba culture, and in Kwara State you hear their descendants say, “I’m Yoruba-Fulani.” It isn’t only the Fulani; many other tribes have assimilated as well. As a matter of fact, the Oyo Empire was made up of different ethnic groups all the way from Nigeria to parts of Ghana and the lower edges of Burkina Faso, as depicted in a BBC documentary researched and narrated by the highly respected journalist, Zainab Badawi. Persons of non-Yoruba origin were in the Oyo armies just as they were in the Ibadan army. Many of them were slaves owned by Yoruba warlords. Many such slaves were trusted, and they married into the families of their lords. Through conquest and intermarriages, the Oyo Empire had such an admixture of people with roots in different ethnic groups that I wonder if any Oyo Yoruba can disregard other tribes without disregarding a certain percentage of their own roots.