According to Yoruba history, by the time the British came to colonize and subjugate Yorubaland first to itself and later to the Fulani of Northern Nigeria, the Yoruba were getting ready to recover from what is popularly known as the Yoruba Civil War

Isokan Yoruba Magazine, Fall 1996/Winter 1997 , Volume III No. I, Page 7.
Editorial

According to Yoruba history, by the time the British came to colonize and subjugate Yorubaland first to itself and later to the Fulani of Northern Nigeria, the Yoruba were getting ready to recover from what is popularly known as the Yoruba Civil War. One of the lessons of the internecine Yoruba wars was the opening of Yorubaland to Fulani hegemony whose major interest was the imposition of sultanistic despotism on Old Oyo Ile and present-day Ilorin. The most visible consequence of this was the adding of almost one-fifth of Yorubaland from Offa to Old Oyo to Kabba to the then Northern Nigeria of Lord Frederick Lugard and the subsequent subjugation of this portion of Yorubaland under the control of Fulani feudalism.

Almost two hundred years later, the Yoruba people - especially those living in the comfort of Europe and America - have not forgotten the culture of international wars of self-destruction that allows external predators to wax stronger by the day. Recently, in the United States, many Yoruba people have been looking for reasons to replay the civil-war syndrome by fomenting troubles that can divide the Yoruba people into rival organizations for reasons that include pleasing agents of the military junta in Nigeria despite the junta's illegal detention of Chief Moshood Abiola for winning a free and fair election in 1993; Chief Gani Fawehinmi, Mr. Femi Falana, Mr. Kunle Ajibade, Dr. Beko Ransome-Kuti, and others for openly identifying with the call for the restoration of democracy in Nigeria.

Given the traditional attachment of the Yoruba to democratic principles and values - most graphically illustrated by the tradition of unseating and exiling Obas who have lost the confidence of the people - it is not unusual for Yoruba people to be found on all sides of an issue, but it is a false justification for people to argue, as some highly educated Yoruba men in the United States have done recently at a meeting in Washington, that Yoruba organizations should be demonized for discussing the political problems facing Yoruba men and women in today's Nigeria.

Many Yoruba men and women in the Washington area and other metropolitan areas surprisingly believe that Yoruba associations should be strictly cultural or limited to picnic groups that must place a taboo on the discussion of the political well-being of the Yoruba within the framework of today's Nigeria. Several of such people expect to be taken with seriousness for what can only be an excuse for the endorsement of a system that has brutalized the psyche of millions of Yoruba people since the annulment of the June 12, 1993 election. Nationality groups or so-called ethnic associations, such as YORUBA GROUPS, IGBO ASSOCIATIONS, MOSOP, IBIBIO UNIONS, TIV ASSOCIATION, ZUMUNTA GROUP OF NORTHERN NIGERIA, BACHAMA UNIONS, etc., are capable of providing a proper space for the discussion of the problems facing the Nigerian federation today. Pretending that the Yoruba people have no problems in Nigeria or that the annulment and the subsequent incarceration of several Yoruba leaders do not require special considerations at Yoruba meetings is to play the Ostrich that hides its head in the sand to avoid confronting its reality.

Afterall, Yoruba sycophants at home who are paid for assisting the dictatorship in the repression of their people are honest enough to be seen in the open with tyrants. Yoruba people who are making a living in the free political and economic space made possible by Americans and Europeans should not "call a dog a monkey" for their fellow countrymen and women. Those who want to serve as overseas operatives for laundering the image of the dictatorship in Nigeria should desist from forming Yoruba organizations to do so. The junta at present needs lick-spittles from all Nigerian nationalities more desperately than before to make the current process of civilianizing military rule possible. Those of us who want to be so employed should go as individuals without dragging the name of Yoruba people into the mud with them. If Nigeria is to pull out of its current stalemate as a unified nation, it is the responsibility of right-thinking people all over the world to encourage each Nigerian cultural or ethnic organization to start serious discussions of its place in the scheme of things in today's Nigeria. This position is more rational and more honest than to engage in subterranean campaigns that Yoruba associations or any other national associations should not discuss politics.

As Yoruba people in Nigeria and other parts of West Africa are still hurting from the last Yoruba civil war, this is no time for any group in Washington or London to commence intragroup verbal warfare within the rank of Yoruba people who believe that it is a democratic right of any national group in Nigeria to engage in searching for solutions to the problems foisted on the nation by Abacha's junta since 1993. Those Yoruba who find fulfillment in serving as cheerleaders for corruption and tyranny in Nigeria must remember that other Yoruba people have a right to imagine a better future for their children and grandchildren. Aabo oro la n so f'omoluwabi; bo ba d'enu re, a d'odiidi.