Amid the rising ethnic tension and scares in Lagos state ahead of the March 11 governorship election, the State Governor, Mr. Babajide Sanwo-Olu has called for calm.
The governor called on residents of the state to embrace the spirit of excellence and shun any ethnic discrimination and slurs that will further escalate the tension in the state.
The New Diplomat reports that Lagos state has been witnessing varying degrees of discords between the Yoruba and Igbo communities online and offline, including alleged physical attacks.
This was fuelled by the outcome of the February 25 presidential poll in Lagos and the upcoming governorship election as President-elect Bola Tinubu’s Lagos fell into the hands of opposition’s Peter Obi’s Labour Party.
Some parties’ supporters have continued to direct ethnic vitriol at LP governorship candidate in Lagos, Gbadebo Rhodes-Vivour over his mixed Yoruba Igbo heritage, reving up ethnic sentiments among particularly supporters of both the All Progressives Congress and the Labour Party.
Addressing this concern, Sanwo-Olu, who is seeking a re-election this Saturday, described the crisis as condemnable and unacceptable.
According to him, all residents of Lagos state are the same in the eyes of the law and are Nigerians first irrespective of their origin.
The governor stated this during an interview with the Arise TV, monitored by The New Diplomat, Wednesday.
In his words, “If indeed we’re excellent, there are some things that we need to be able to be globally competitive with, you know, the resilience and our ability to make sure Lagos continue to create opportunity for everyone.
“So, but in terms of specifics, you know, to the extent that we do all of these, identify training and bring these skills out, we also don’t have rules over who come into Lagos, at this point we don’t have a border posts at Ojota or any way coming into Lagos. So we usually have a challenge to know where are all of these people are coming from, because for us, a Lagos that is a centre of excellence, must continue to speak to that excellence in every sense of it.
“It’s a place where people come in, do business do well, and they can create wealth for themselves, and their family and the ecosystem.. in which really, that is primary, you know, driver, right. Any other thing that comes up will be a distraction for us. So to answer your question very well, it’s condemnable, and we’re totally condemning it as it not acceptable. It’s not something that any forward looking government will not want to be condemned.
“The first thing is we’re human beings. That’s the first thing and the next very thing is that we’re Nigerians. The moment we can put that into inclusion, then the next question we should ask is okay, so a pregnant woman needs to go to an hospital at the point she’s going to deliver would she said that she needs a Yoruba doctor, or she needs an Igbo doctor for her for her baby to be delivered? Or you’re going to bakery, are you going to ask that you want a Yoruba bread that is manufactured as against an Igbo bread? For as long as those don’t divide us, for as long as those are not the parameters which we judge ourselves, these other lines that politics has brought is supposed to be a little dot or things we move away very quickly. We should not even ventilate it, we should not give it anything to hold the space in us,” Governor Sanwo-Olu added.
