“There is a sharp distinction between Indigenes of Lagos and Citizens of Lagos” – Former Lagos AG declares at Roundtable on Land & Power in Lagos
Mr. Olasupo Shasore, SAN
A former Attorney-General of Lagos State, Mr. Olasupo Shasore, SAN, has affirmed the distinctions that exist between indigenous peoples of Lagos and residents of Lagos.
He made the submission at the Roundtable on Land and Power in Lagos, an event organized by the Institute of African and Diaspora Studies, University of Lagos on Tuesday, August 13, 2024 at the Arthur Mbanefo Digital Resource Centre.
The respected Silk delivered the Keynote Address at the blended event and used the opportunity to raise fundamental questions about the rehashed history of the origins of Lagos, which he considered as “negligent and abdicating of the geomorphic and morphological process of its human settlement”.
His words: “Human settlements and habitation are driven by geography and natural resources. In human history, coastal regions have long been choice positions for human migration and settlement. There is a natural human inclination towards water. Several generations have failed to apply the knowledge of the history of Lagos’ geography to its indigeneity and that abdication is what has led to the Lagos Settlers’ Myth.”
He proposed research collaboration between his team and the IADS-UNILAG to embark on archaeological excavations of the Ido and Idumagbo areas of Lagos, submitting that “the Identity of Lagos is far deeper than the First Settler mythology suggests”.
Nigeria’s only cosmopolitan State
According to Mr. Shasore, SAN, “Lagos is the only cosmopolitan State of the 36 States in Nigeria, a host to different ethnicities from across the nation; and it means that Lagos has already accepted its role as a global city.”
He traced the cosmopolitan nature of Lagos back to the years before the turn of the century when the arrival of the Saros (liberated slave-returnees and children from Sierra Leone) and the Agudas (descendants of freed Afro-Brazilian slaves) in Lagos mixed with the indigenous Lagosians and Europeans to give the city its character as a melting pot of cultures and orientations.
“Lagos has remained ever-cosmopolitan and accepting of people who flow into her to advance the cause of their lives; and for long may it remain so”, he said.
The “No-Man’s-Land” Question
The Keynote Speaker minced no words in affirming the indigenous character of Lagos. Though admitting the challenges posed to that reality with examples of notable events like the 1861 Treaty of Cession, the 1901 Privy Council Ruling, and the 1978 Land Use Decree, he declared that “a community of people that is indigenous to a particular area has its own right to express that.”
“Indigeneity is not a rude thing to say. The United Nations Convention on Indigenous Peoples affirms the right of indigenous peoples to express their indigeneity. There is a sharp distinction between Indigenes of Lagos and Citizens of Lagos; and that distinction is irreversible.”
A well-published investigative historian and documentary producer, Mr. Shasore averred that the Citizenship of Lagos is conferred on Nigerian residents of Lagos who work and pay their taxes to the State, and it is a constitutional right.
“We must begin to align the operations of our Constitution to our indigenous realities. Citizenship and Indigeneity can co-exist with their respective rights being acknowledged and accorded. Voting for Governor is not an indigenous right; it is a constitutional right”, he declared.
While he re-affirmed the age-long accommodation and hospitality of Lagos, Mr. Shasore admonished that those admirable qualities must not be taken for granted with hair-raising statements like “Lagos is a No Man’s Land”.
Panels, Postulations, and Prognoses
Three different panels followed Mr. Shasore’s well-received Keynote presentation. Panel 1 focused on Land Contestation and Spatial Displacement, Panel 2 on “Who is Lagos? What is Lagos?” and Panel 3 on “Is Lagos Really a No Man’s Land?”
Appearing on Panel 1 alongside three other eminent personalities, Dr. Esther Thontteh, a Land Administration and Mgt. Specialist, identified the Land Use Decree as the single most significant act which nationalized cultural lands and set the stage for contestations between statutory and customary rights.
On Panel 2, an Elder Statesman, Dr. Patrick Dele Cole, defined a Lagosian as “anyone who has a claim to being a Lagosian”. He averred that “Lagos is big enough to accommodate all its competing claims, but progress should not contaminate us. We should find a way to be ourselves while we are progressing”.
On Panel 3, Prof. Patrick Oloko spoke of a “Spirit of Lagos” which attracts, refines, and infuses its inhabitants, indigene or resident, with the “capacity to grow and “blow”’. According to him, “Lagos defines itself as being somebody’s land, but its culture and energy derives from the overwhelming and simultaneous exhibition of multiple cultures”.
Common threads that ran through postulations on all the panels include the facts that:
☞ Lagos has a provenance and its indigenous character is incontestable.
☞ Access to land does not confer Indigeneity.
☞ Lagos is inherently accommodating of multiple cultures and orientations and should remain so, and
☞ Projection and preservation of heritage should be taken more seriously by the indigenous peoples of Lagos.
An Important Subject of Research
Earlier in his Welcome Address, the Director of IADS-UNILAG, Prof. Muyiwa Falaiye, affirmed the importance of researching Lagos, being a subject of interest to many national and international concerns.
“This workshop is a follow-up on a documentary produced by the Institute two years ago. We discovered, based on the viewership and responses to the video, that there are too many contestations about Lagos and so we decided to extend our search. Here at the IADS, we conduct fair-minded, independent research and that is what we have done with the research on Lagos.”
He commended the duo of Professor Taibat Lawanson and Dr. Abisoye Elesin whose research collaboration, which he fondly described as the “Lawanson-Elesin Consortium”, has continued to win generous grant funding. He also declared the openness of the Institute to receiving funding from non-governmental organisations that would like to commission research studies on any aspect of African Studies.
“Ọmọ Èkó” and “Ará Èkó”
Professor Taibat Lawanson spoke on behalf of the research team. She expressed gratitude to their funders like the African Multiple Cluster of Excellence and the University of Bayreuth, Germany, and doubled down on the significance of Lagos as a subject of research.
“Lagos is a complex city, which is at the centre of many expressions of African epistemologies. It is a melting pot of fusions and hybridities, which has continued to raise the questions of “What is Lagos” and “Who is a Lagosian?” Today’s event is to closely examine some of the factors that are shaping new socio-economic and political trajectories, seeing that Land and Power have become recurrent themes in contestations on Lagos. We are here to look very closely at the distinctions between “Ọmọ Èkó” (Natives of Lagos) and “Ará Èkó” (Residents of Lagos) and how that is daily operationalized in our lived realities”.
An Ongoing Conversation
The blended event was well-attended by a diverse audience of students, scholars, policy makers, indigenes, and residents of Lagos who leveraged the platform to express their respective views on a subject which promises to be an ongoing conversation on national and continental development.
REPORT: Isaiah Kumuyi
PHOTOGRAPHY: Samuel Dosumu
About UNILAG
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UNILAG Communication Unit