These are strange times in Nigeria. Change is in the air and I do not just mean the transformation agenda of the present administration.

A case in point is the decision of the just concluded National Conference that 18 additional states should be carved out of Nigeria. That such a fundamental decision could be arrived at so easily within the three months life span of an ad-hoc conference is astonishing.

This matter of state creation predates the independence of Nigeria from colonial rule; indeed the agitation for more regions /states was seen as the only means by which minorities could escape from oppression by the majority sub-nationalities in the then three regions of Nigeria.

So convincing were the agitators that the British colonial authorities felt obliged to set up what was called the Willinks Commission whose mandate was to gather evidence and consider all the groups ,receive suggestions and make recommendations ,all these with a view to addressing the fears of the minorities before independence.

It is interesting to note that the Willinks Commission rejected any suggestion that the minorities should be granted the status of states within Nigeria.

The country then proceeded with the preparations for independence in October 1960 with the minority problems unresolved. That, of course, only left room for the minorities to remain with their dissatisfaction and continued agitation for reform.

Such suggested reform invariably became agitation for the creation of new states/regions. Of course in the atmosphere of unresolved discontent, it was no surprise that the problem of the minorities remained unresolved by the concept of federalism .

With the benefit of hindsight the idea that federalism could assuage the fears of the minority is confounded by the type of party politics that accompanied independence. Political parties dominated by the major ethnic groups in the region could not have been expected to do anything other than protect the interest of their majority sponsors.

At this junction, the reader would allow me to cite as a case study the agitation of the people of what now constitutes Delta North Senatorial District for self- determination /recognition as a distinct political element in Nigeria to be known as Anioma. The Anioma area right from the outset was a dissatisfied minority.

It attained self awareness as part of what was called Benin Province which meant that from day one it was an oppressed minority .Its leaders almost from day one coined the name Anioma even before independence of Nigeria in a bid to begin to forge a sense of identity.

Regrettably, their representatives did not play a very prominent role before the Willinks Commission hearings as I pointed out in my contribution to the seminar work NIGERIA: A CENTURY OF CONSTITUTIONAL EVOLUTION 1914-2014 edited by Professor Epiphany Azinge, SAN in chapter 7 -“MINORITY RIGHTS IN FIRST REPUBLIC NIGERIA”.

To a large measure the Willinks Commissions proceedings and hearing were dominated by minorities within the Niger /Delta regions, in particular the Ijaw.

Interestingly the Igbo of the then Eastern Region played no significant role in the affairs of the Willinks Commission even as they dominated the political party (NCNC) that controlled the Eastern Region and the then Mid-West area occupied by the Anioma.

This may not have been unconnected with the fact that the NCNC being controlled by the dominant Igbo of the Eastern Region saw no reason to support or participate in anything that may have ended with the reduction of their sphere of influence.

The end of the civil war did not mean an end to state agitation. As a matter of historical fact, the Gowon administration at that time, before the shooting started, sought to out-maneuver and in fact succeeded in out-maneuvering the Igbo by creating new states, including states for the riverine sub- nationalities and the Ibibio/Efik groups.

Not surprisingly, the beneficiaries of the new states saw no reason to support the idea of Biafra. Indeed ,the master stroke of giving them states satisfied their age-long resentments of Igbo domination of the then Eastern Region.

So deep was this resentments that up till date the Igbo language, the lingua franca of the then Eastern Region, is deliberately not spoken by the leading riverine politicians and people who were of age by1966 even when it is common knowledge that they all speak and understand Igbo.

The creation of 12 states by Gowon and the apparent benefits for the beneficiaries only fuelled the desire of other state agitators but significantly such states creation only succeeded during military regimes.

The Mid West Region exception to this rule remained singular and its success is pointedly located in the politics of that era during which there was a universal gang-up by the Federal Government and its allies to undermine and deal with the main opposition party who dominated the then Western Region.

It is against this background that my reader is invited to consider what I called the astonishingly speedy decision of the National Conference to create 18 new states.

Unless these states are going to be created by an executive fiat which is only possible in a military regime, it must mean that the confab delegates expect their proposal to go through all the rigors and obstacles put in place in the Constitution regarding state creation or even local government creation.

That means that the reason that has made state creation difficult in any dispensation other than military government will apply to this suggestion of the National Conference since President Goodluck Jonathan has no power to create any new state by executive fiat.

The Mid-west Region experience is necessarily instructive. I urge my readers to read the seminal work of Dr Nowamagbe A. Omoigui, Benin and The Mid-West Referendum, easily found on the internet.

The work reveals that much more effort must be put into the quest for a new state by its protagonists than appears to have been done by present day agitations for new states.

The success of the proposal to excise the Mid-west Region from the old Western Region was dependent firstly on the mutual desire of all the sub-nationalities in the area concerned to be part of the new Mid-west region, thus escaping what they conveniently saw as Yoruba domination.

With such an enabling atmosphere, it was no surprise that the constitutional requirement that a referendum of all the people that constituted the proposed new region was easily satisfied.

My reader would note that despite conflicting political affiliations of the leading politicians in that region, nobody dared to speak against what amounted to the wishes of the people.

One can easily see the same scenario repeating itself today with regards to any of the areas from where 18 new states are now proposed to be created easily.

In fact, any proposed state from one area of Nigeria in which the opposition dominates should forget the matter.

The biggest surprise of all is that our main rivals in the present day Delta state, the Urhobo, are fully in support of the creation of Anioma state not because of any new found love for Anioma but because they reason that when Anioma go, they will be left with the remaining ethnic sub nationalities to dominate easily.

I can only say in that regard that just as it is wise to dine with the devil with a long spoon, so it is that in sharing a glass of wine in celebration of this opportunity for emancipation supported by our main detractor, we will sip the wine of brotherhood with caution.

M.A.Agbamuche