A detribalized Nigerian does not exist; he never did, By Chidi Anselm Odinkalu

In reality, the phrase "detribalized" is worse than condescending colonial nonsense. It starts from a conceptual error that "tribal" identity is expendable like a piece of traditional equipment. It is not.

In 1989, scholars Bill Ashcroft, Gareth Griffiths, and Helen Tiffin published, to great acclaim, their study of the evolution of the various dialects of the English language from different colonies of the Empire. Their title was The Empire Writes Back. The book shows how various outposts of the Empire appropriated the language and adapted its grammar and usage.

Few outposts of the Empire have been as prolific in this endeavor as Nigeria. Conceived as an illegitimate offspring in the menage threesome between Sir George Taubman Goldie; his mistress, Flora Shaw; and his near successor, Frederick Lugard, Nigeria became a colonial experiment in the Tower of Babel.

A national anthem composed in 1959, a year before Independence in 1960, recognized this reality in the third line of its first stanza, reminding the world of the aspiration to create a country, even "if the tribe and the language may differ.” The anthem itself invited citizens to "greet" the country in an antique, biblical third person, symbolizing a relationship with the country fractured from the start. from a foreign country.

Without compulsory access to basic education, which could have created a common vocabulary in the imported language, the Nigerian imagination invented its own grammar of mutual intelligibility. This language is called "Pidgin English", which doesn't quite do it justice. It is characterized by an open grammar in which meaning is always available to reveal itself to anyone interested in exercising the imagination.

But this is not the only function of Nigerian English. The French colonial policy of assimilation also offered their way of life the pinnacle of civilization, promising the natives (as the colonists everywhere called Africans) the opportunity to "evolve" to the highest level of civilization, whether they claimed to be French citizenship. For those of us in Nigeria, access to Nigerian English is our license to civilization.

Here, we call those who have reached this level of civilization "detribalized". This is arguably the greatest compliment a Nigerian can give to another. On the contrary, for the possessors of the language, to detribalize someone is to uproot him.

When his former minister, Jubril Martins-Kuye, died last year, President Olusegun Obasanjo called him "detribalized".

Sokoto State Governor Aminu Tambuwal says only a ‘detribalized’ Nigerian is fit to rule the country.

So supporters of Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) presidential candidate Atiku Abubakar are rushing to claim the torch, describing him as the only "detribalized" in the race to succeed Muhammadu Buhari, who is mostly accused of to be the opposite.

Supporters of Labor Party candidate Peter Obi counter that he too is 'detribalised'.

Academic, Jideofor Adibe explains that "when we talk about being 'detribalized' I...