‘Amalgamation a continua!’ This coinage could as well have been the befitting mantra for Nigeria’s march to nationhood, right from the amalgamation exercise in 1914 under the auspices of Frederick Lugard, who moulded hitherto disparate, autonomous, ethnic nation states into one political entity, to the present. In its basic meaning, the word amalgamation is the action of uniting or combining two or more factors, substances or even entities to create a new form or dispensation. Hence by referring to the convergence of the disparate ethnic entities as amalgamation, the context ostensibly was that a new political creation would emerge that is different from any of its constituents. In that case it would be the uniqueness of the new entity, that offers assurance of safe berthing with it, by any of its legacy constituents.
As Nigeria celebrates its 65th independence anniversary considerations are rife over contemporary developments and whatever linkages they have with history especially in the context of the amalgamation exercise which birthed the nation in 1914. Against the backdrop of contemporary realities in the country it is clear that the country as it stands today is a far cry from what the amalgamation is and laid the foundation for. Nigerians question tendencies like the cleavages in the country’s social fabric and linkages of such with foundations of the nation and invariably the amalgamation.
One of such areas is the raging contention over the unity question. It is of wide spread concern that even after living together for so long, several sections of the country find the present political system suffocating and want out. While the immediate attention on those who want out may rest on the protagonists in the South East, South West and other areas of restiveness, the deepening insurgency in the northern parts of the country amplify the crisis most graphically.
Such tendencies also invariably raise questions on the amalgamation terms and processes. Put succinctly some of the questions include how successive governments have managed the amalgamation dispensation to lead the country to the present state of affairs where unity is severely threatened. Did the amalgamation end in 1914? And if not what has been happening since then as the country moved from one level to another? Has the country attained optimally from the enterprise of generations of leaders courtesy of the amalgamation?
The straight forward answer is that while a major challenge of the country in 2025 remains the question of unity, it points to a failure in driving the vision and mission of the amalgamation, which apparently did not end in 1914, but has been mismanaged along the years. Put in proper context what the British did in the amalgamation was simply to launch a process of nation building, which has largely been construed by many Nigerians including those who should know better, more as an event than the commencement of a process.
Hence the fact that the context of the 1914 amalgamation of the country is seen from different perspectives today – 111 years after its execution, 65 years after the resultant political entity gained independence from its colonial master and 62 years after it became a formal Federal Republic of Nigeria, accentuates the playout of an ontological miasma – a disconnect of leadership from the expectations of the followership which demands deeper interrogation of same.
From the perspective of the colonialist, the amalgamation made great political and business sense as it provided administrative convenience with respect to effective exploitation of the territorial expanse of the new country Nigeria. However, for many Nigerian nationalists, the parochial, colonial context of the amalgamation had served as a basis for them to strip it of whatever merit it offered to the emergent country Nigeria. It is also in that context that some observers still refer to the amalgamation as Frederick Lugard’s ‘1914 mistake’, on the grounds that no input was made by the people of the country Nigeria, as it was purely a colonial government affair.
Yet, like any typical political dispensation, seeing the amalgamation from only one perspective to the exclusion of others, remains a poor reading of the script. Hence while seeing the amalgamation from the parochial interests of the colonialist gives depth to the sense of nostalgia for the country, another perspective also provides consideration for what the erstwhile, disparate constituent ethnic entities have gained with the emergence of a country as Nigeria and its inherent capacity as well as global ranking.
For instance, but for the amalgamation, hardly would any of the constituent, ethnic constituent nationalities have individually achieved as much dividends as they are doing by belonging to a Nigerian nation. According to the imperative of common humanity, once the opportunity of close contact with each other under friendly terms comes up, people naturally blend for mutual benefits, through social interactions, inter-ethnic marriages and even business partnerships. Hence even as successive leadership dispensations may not be toeing the course the vision and mission of the amalgamation, Nigerians in their respective corners are doing so. And the amalgamation was notionally conceived to build a new nation on that premise. This was also why most of the early nationalists saw the amalgamation from the positive side and embraced the vision driving it.
In the context of the foregoing lie a legion of lessons for the current Bola Tinubu administration, especially as it concerns the national unity question. With an ear to the ground, the administration will invariably appreciate that Nigerians are questioning several tendencies that border on the failure of his administration to see beyond the deepening cracks in the country’s fabric and hence its unity. Already the activities of insurgents have redrawn Nigeria’s map by their control of sections of the country as established at amalgamation. Let him pray and work so that during his tenure, Nigeria does not end up formally balkanised. That will be it.