Most of the nations with ethno-religious and inter-ethnic disagreements and failed to do a Sovereign National Conference, are either in armed conflict (Congo DR) or have since disintegrated – Yugoslavia, Sudan, Eritrea (from Ethiopia), and even Scotland, from the UK, is on the verge of opting out of an unpleasant union.

But long before then was this quote: “Since 1914, the British Government has been trying to make Nigeria into one country, but the Nigerian people themselves are historically different in their backgrounds, in their religious beliefs and customs and do not show themselves any signs of willingness to unite … Nigerian unity is only a British invention” – Alhaji Sir Abubakar Tafawa Balewa who was reported by the TIME MAGAZINE of October 10, 1960 to have said there was no basis for Nigerian unity and it was only a wish of the British.

The word NORTH (AREWA), in Nigeria, is the most echoed in the polity. It must have be echoed a zillion times since January 1914 when allocation of political and economic resources in this vast land with vast opportunities and natural endowments, began.

“The British needed the Railway from the North to the Coast in the interest of British business. Amalgamation of the South (not of the people) became of crucial importance to British business interest. He said the North and the South should be amalgamated“.

“What is critical and important are the reasons Lugard gave in his dispatches. They are as follows: He said the North is poor and they have no resources to run the protectorate of the North. That they have no access to the sea; that the South has resources and have educated people“

“When the amalgamation took effect, the British government sealed off the South from the North. And between 1914 and l960, that’s a period of 46 years, the British allowed minimum contact between the North and South because it was not in the British interest that the North be allowed to be polluted by the educated South.“

Late Harold Smith apologized to Nigerians with this landmark confession:

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“Our agenda was to completely exploit Africa. Nigeria was my duty post. When we assessed Nigeria, this was what we found in the southern region; strength, intelligence, determination to succeed, well established history, complex but focused life style, great hope and aspirations… the East is good in business and technology, the west is good in administration and commerce, law and medicine, but it was a pity we planned our agenda to give power “at all cost” to the northerner. They seemed to be submissive and silly of a kind. Our mission was accomplished by destroying the opposition at all fronts.

The west led in the fight for the independence, and was punished for asking for freedom. They will not rule Nigeria! Harold Smith confessed that the Census results were announced before they were counted. Despite seeing vast land with no human but cattle in the north, we still gave the north 55 million instead of 32 Million. This was to be used to maintain their majority votes and future power bid. He stated that the West without Lagos was the most populous in Nigeria at that time but we ignored that. The north was seriously encouraged to go into the military. According to him, they believe that the south may attend western education, but future leaders will always come from military background. Their traditional rulers were to be made influential and super human. The northerners were given accelerated promotions both in the military and civil service to justify their superiority over the south. Everything was to work against the south. We truncated their good plan for their future.

“I was very sorry for the A.G; it was a great party too much for African standard. We planned to destroy Awolowo and Azikwe well, the west and the east and sowed a seed of discord among them”. We tricked Azikwe into accepting to be president having known that Balewa will be the main man with power. Awolowo has to go to jail to cripple his genius plans for a greater Nigeria. ‘’Looking at the northern leaders now , If they have any agenda in Nigeria at all, sadly it is only for the north, and nothing for Nigeria….’’