Olusola Oni, a Nigerian man who contested on the platform of the ‘’Yoruba Party in the U.K.” has revealed why he founded the party.
Olusola who took the second to the last spot in the election, garnered 261 votes while the winner of the election, Miatta Nema Fahnbulleh, garnered 22,813 votes.
“April is the beginning of the rainy season when plants spring to life. April 2024, the Yoruba Nation campaign appears visibly to have sprung to life. The Afenifere leadership went to Abuja and met with President Tinubu presumably to demand ‘restructuring’. The Yoruba Self-determination Movement (YSDM) leadership wrote to President Tinubu to demand self-determination. The YSDM letter is similar to the one they wrote to President Buhari on 6 August 2022. Others too have written similar letters, for example, Oodua Action Movement (OAM) on 23 September 2020, Omo Oodua Worldwide (OOW) on 16 March 2021, and Yoruba Descendants Group (YDG) on 23 February 2023. These demands for ‘restructuring’ and for self-determination were predicated on how Nigeria victimised the Yoruba people.
This time around, Yoruba leaders hoped that President Tinubu, as a Yoruba man, would be sympathetic and understanding of the plight of the Yoruba people. There is no indication that President Tinubu would be so persuaded, however. President Tinubu like everyone else knows the plight of the Yoruba very well, he does not need reminding. Indeed, not too long ago President Tinubu himself advocated for the dissolution of Nigeria. In other words, the Yoruba leaders are backing up the wrong tree; it does not matter for how long, the Yoruba leaders are still backing up the wrong tree. The problem is that the Yoruba leaders have no plan other than this appeal to the good nature of the Nigeria government. As far as anyone can tell, the Yoruba leaders have no ‘Plan B’.
Without a miracle, the tactics of the Yoruba leaders are not going to get the Yorubaland out of Nigeria. We the people have to do the job ourselves. We can do it. We can create a Plan B. Britain is the cause of the nightmare in which we Yoruba find ourselves. Britain wrote the first constitution for Nigeria, that is to say, the Amalgamation Constitution of 1 January 1914. Perhaps therefore, it is to Britain that we should aim our Plan B.
Nigel Farage’s UK Independence Party (UKIP) has demonstrated what a small party could achieve without having a parliamentary majority. UKIP showed how a small party could change the course of the British nation. UKIP’s campaign was successful because it was focused solely on restoring Britain’s sovereignty. The UK left the EU to regain its sovereignty. That was it. Brexit was all about sovereignty. European and American support for Israel is all about sovereignty, Israel’s sovereignty. Sovereignty sells. YorubExit, like Brexit, is all about sovereignty. The question is how we Yoruba could play this sovereignty card, and make the people of Britain support Yoruba sovereignty. To achieve this requires that the Yoruba have a direct political voice at Westminster.
On 13 February 2024, I founded the Yoruba Party in the UK (YPUK), and registered it with the Electoral Commission in London. I founded the YPUK to encourage, energise and assist Yoruba people domiciled in the United Kingdom to achieve their full potential as individuals and as a group, and to encourage and assist them to contribute their all to the political and socio-economic life, and the development and growth of the UK.
By active participation in UK life, YPUK means
· standing candidates in local and parliamentary elections in the UK
· changing the negative perception of the UK public of black Britons
· showcasing the Yoruba culture and tradition to the UK public
· advertising ancient and modern Yoruba achievements in the UK
· campaigning for and publicising worldwide the Yoruba cause whatever that might be
The YPUK has created a brand, a known entity, which the community could identify with and relate to. The YPUK shows commitment different from the usual stereotypes that the British have of black people. Best of all, YPUK gives the Yoruba access to electoral power in the UK.
The YPUK wants the British public to know about the Yoruba Nation: that we had our own independent country, which signed a treaty of friendship and trade with Queen Victoria’s Britain in 1888; that we did not cede the Yoruba country to Britain and Britain had no jurisdiction; that Britain stole our sovereignty in the act of Amalgamation of 1914; that we want our sovereignty back, and are entitled to have it back, just like Britain got its sovereignty back from Europe in the act of Brexit.
Our first test is the parliamentary elections that the Prime Minister, Rishi Sunak, is likely to call as early as July 2024. YPUK intends to have candidates for that election. If you are interested in standing for that election, please contact us for an election pack. Those who do not wish to stand for election could support us with donations – paypal.me/YorubaParty; please include with your donation, your name, phone number and/or email address for acknowledgement.”
