Indigenous people of Lagos State have said they will never be part of the Western Region or Province, should a purported Bill seeking Nigeria’s return to the regional government system turn out to be true.
The natives, under the aegis of the De Renaissance Patriots Foundation, said this in a statement released by Prince Adelani Adeniji-Adele.
The statement was reacting to a proposed Bill seeking approval of the National Assembly to return Nigeria to an already defunct regional system, which it said is set to be considered by the House of Representatives.
Although the National Assembly has distanced itself from such a Bill, the group insisted that Lagos State people will not go with the Western Region.
The purported Bill which went viral on social media was titled: “A bill for an act to substitute the annexure to Decree 24 of 1999 with a new governance model for the Federal Republic of Nigeria.”
According to the group, the purported Bill was said to have been drafted by an individual, who is reportedly not a federal lawmaker and from whose mouth it slipped that “if Nigeria could return to the old national anthem, why should it not also return to the regional state system of government?”
But De Renaissance Patriots Foundation, unconvinced by the denial, insisted on its position informed by the experience of its leaders in the character of South West people who are now finding it difficult to own up to their plans after they were exposed and what they planned to do with the bill, for reasons best known to them, has been revealed before the plan is hatched.
The group said, “This bill that is being proposed or suggested spells an ominous sign to us from Lagos State. It is a further attempt to subsume our aspiration into a larger group that is antithetical to whatever we believe in as indigenes of the state. The first and most important is that vast consultations were not held on the matter to find out if being submerged into another subgroup is a thing we desire. It cannot be generally assumed. Generally, and since Lagos and its environs became a colony, we have always maintained that we prefer a stand-alone status and not be part of any Western Region or Province.”