
For at least two reasons, October 1, 2018 is significant in the life of Nigeria. First, it has been fifty-eight years since the Union Jack, the British flag, was lowered, and the GreenWhite-Green, the Nigerian flag, was flown on Nigerian soil. It has also been fifty-eight years since the British national anthem, God save the Queen, was replaced by the Nigerian national anthem, Nigeria, we hail thee. Secondly, it has been forty years since Arise, O compatriots was decreed into existence as Nigeria’s national anthem, in place of Nigeria, we hail thee, by the Olusegun Obasanjo-led military junta.
The Nigerian flag of GreenWhite-Green vertical bands was designed in 1959 by a 23-year-old Nigerian, Michael Taiwo Akinkunmi, who was a student at Norwich Technical College in London. The original design had a red radiating sun badge on the central white band which was later removed by the judges who selected Akinkunmi’s as the winning entry. That flag remains Nigeria’s flag till today. At independence, the lyrics of the anthem, Nigeria, We Hail Thee, were written by a Briton, Lillian Jean Williams. Its music was written by her compatriot, Frances Berda. That served as our national anthem until it was changed on October 1, 1978.
There were a few Nigerians who felt it was not proper to have a national anthem whose lyrics and music were supplied by two Britons. The military junta led by Obasanjo, having decided to change the anthem, asked Nigerians to compose and propose a new national anthem. Instead of selecting one of the entries, five were chosen, and the words of the anthem we sing today come from each of those five entries. The five were submitted by John Ilechukwu, Eme Etim Akpan, B. A. Ogunaike, Sota Omoigui, and P. O. Aderibigbe. Its music was written by Benedict Odiase who was, at that time, Director of the Nigerian Police Band.
Although the words of the anthem were written by Nigerians, it is a well-known fact that many Nigerians would prefer that Nigeria revert to the old anthem composed by two Britons. It would seem the lyrics, sentiments and music of the old anthem appeal to Nigerians more than those of the current anthem. The story is It’s been fifty-eight years and it’s been forty years told that delegates to the 2014 national conference unanimously agreed that Nigeria revert to the old anthem. Perhaps we have not sang it for the last time. Fifty-eight years after independence, the peace signified by the white band of our flag remains elusive, while Nigeria’s agricultural wealth, signified by the green bands, has since been sadly supplanted by her oil wealth.

The words of the old anthem, “Though tribe and tongue may differ, in brotherhood we stand”, have been repeatedly antithetized in the bouts of ethnic cleansing that took place especially during the January 15, 1966 coup, in the build-up to and during the July 29, 1966 coup, the 1967-70 civil war, the Boko Haram insurgency, and the bloody rampage of killer herdsmen in the states of the middle belt. Forty years after the national anthem was changed, the service to which Nigerians are called by the current anthem, is no longer fashionable. Rather than serve, we seek to dominate one another, and public office is sought as means of enrichment. We are yet to build a nation where justice and peace reign. We have no peace because we have no justice. The 1978 anthem expresses a pious wish when it says, “the labour of our heroes past shall never be in vain.”
But we have found it very difficult, almost impossible, to identify personalities whose heroism is recognized by Nigerians across religious and ethnic boundaries. The hero of one ethnic community is seen as villain by members of another ethnic community. Fifty-eight years after independence, we have not made life better for ourselves: our education sector is in shambles, our airports are in a state of embarrassing disrepair, our roads are death traps, our cars have seen better days, our country is insecure, our religion is hypocrisy, our hospitals are no go areas, our electoral process is a disgrace, our young ones cannot find jobs, the men among them take to armed robbery while the women among them take to prostitution. Yet, Nigeria is blessed with highly competent men and women. Many of them are doing very well in the diaspora. Many who came back, heeding the call to service in the national anthem, have been frustrated by the way we do things.
They regretted coming back home and have since returned to their bases in Europe and North America. They have well-founded reasons to be afraid of becoming victims of the system. I recall that twenty-two years ago, upon completing my doctoral studies in the United States, I received offers of employment in that country. There were many friends, Americans and Nigerians, who tried their best to dissuade me from returning to Nigeria. Walter Carrington, American Ambassador to Nigeria during the dark days of Sani Abacha’s tyranny, made an important observation when he said that while Nigeria is no longer under military rule, she is governed by military rules. There is an urgent need to demilitarize this country, and the demilitarization must begin in our psyche.
The advent of military rule in Nigeria was a final farewell to due process. There is no due process in taking over the reins of government through military coups. Military rule led us to a civil war whose scars are still there for all to see and whose pain has not fully subsided. Military intervention in Nigeria’s history conferred an ill-gotten legitimacy on disregard for due process. Military rule destroyed our institutions and threw up strong men in uniform and agbada. The militarization of Nigeria on January 15 and on July 29, 1966, and on other occasions of military intervention in Nigerian politics did incalculable damage to Nigeria. Militarization remains a stubborn stain on our garment. The current constitution, a deadly recipe for tyranny, instability and kleptocracy, epitomizes that obstinate militarism. The constitution is itself a military decree.
It was imposed by the young military officers who staged those coups. Today, they have become octogenarians dictating the way Nigeria is to be governed. At the core of the constitution they imposed on Nigeria is a disabling unitarism presented as federalism. Smuggled into it were other military decrees like the Land Use Decree illegitimately renamed as the Land Use Act. These military decrees are renamed Acts. But how could there have been Acts of a National Assembly that did not sit? Fifty-eight years after independence, Nigeria urgently needs to undergo a transmutation from a state held together at gun point by warlords and godfathers into a veritable nation, an association of peoples of diverse ethnic and religious communities able to identify shared core values, an association whose members, despite their cultural and linguistic diversity, live and act in solidarity as they seek their personal and collective fulfillment. Our way of thinking and our way of acting will need to change.
Fifty-eight years after independence, four months to another round of general elections, will service be our watchword? Will the campaign season that has just begun be driven by issues or by the ego of those who would want to be in government at all cost? Will injustice give way to justice so that violence can give way to peaceful co-existence? These and related questions need to be given adequate attention as we approach the sixtieth anniversary of Nigeria’s independence. Given our individual and collective potential and endowment, it is never too late to turn Nigeria around. This year’s Independence Day could trigger that turn around that we urgently need.
• Reverend Father Anthony Akinwale, O. P. is the Deputy Vice Chancellor of Augustine University, Ilara-Epe.
• This piece was first published in 2018.