Bala Usman, radical change agent in warm embrace of history

EMEKA IBEMERE

If you call him an enemy of capitalism, you are not far from the truth. Also, if you call him a radical, socialist, Marxist, conservative, revisionist, intellectual, academic, teacher and progressive, you are absolutely right. Welcome to the world of Balaism; the philosophy of Bala Usman.

The late scholar believed in the fusion of radicalism and conservatism in an individual self as a vehicle of change.

 Bala was a paragon of socialist movement against revolutionary Marxist theory that believes in the peaceful achievement of social progress through reforms.

 At every opportunity, including lectures, seminars and even classrooms, he never hid his penchant for Nigerian history. In all gatherings, he always advocated the radical change of the political status quo in Nigeria.

While he was a lecturer at the Ahmadu Bello University, he was seen as a progressive and democrat in the image of the late Alhaji Aminu Kano- the Talakawa master and a scion of the royal family of Kastina, whose writings showed radical flares.
He was a well-known historian, whose vision focused on the emancipation of the oppressed masses of Nigerians, especially his northern people.
His scholarly works are not limited only to academic masterpieces. His doctoral thesis on The Transformation of Kastina 1400 – 1883 was a seminal work in Nigerian history. He edited numerous books, including Studies in the History of the Sokoto Caliphate (with Abdullahi Augie), Cities of the Savannah as well as Studies in the History of Bornu (with Professor Nur-Alkali). Apart from this, one of his other books is The Liberation of Nigeria.
 He devoted all his life time to scholarship and struggles to make Nigeria better; and he never faltered.
The respected scholar will be remembered as someone who said no to oppression of the masses and Western imperialism. He will also be missed as a person of great personality who spoke out always towards the progress and the development of the entire country.

He shone like a star with his activism in Nigerian and African affairs from the 70s until he passed on. For instance, he was a member of the committee for the review of the Nigerian foreign policy, constitution drafting committee and Nigerian delegation to the People’s Republic of Angola. He was also Special adviser to the Nigerian delegation to the 31^st session of the UN General Assembly and a trustee of the Nigerian Labour Congress.

In a piece, a permanent secretary writing about Bala Usman, was quoted to have said that “Like most scholars of his time, Bala Usman came to scholarship from a Marxian perspective. He strongly held on to Marx’s retort that philosophers have hitherto interpreted the world, whereas the point is to change it. Transforming the world ranges from aligning scholarship to the amelioration of the human condition, subordinating knowledge to human progress and making theories socially responsible to human needs.

“The dynamics of Marxism was, in his case, confronted with the rampant injustice of his society. The justice, which Dr Usman pursues, is not only that which, in Anatole France’s words “forbids the rich and poor alike to sleep under bridges, to beg in the streets and to steal bread,” but also an egalitarianism that is yoked to the necessity of national and democratic unity. Injustice and inequality represent for him two issues that uniquely define the incapacitation of national development in Nigeria. “National injustice,” Bala Usman would agree with William Gladstone, the British statesman “is the surest road to national downfall.” It would have been easy for the “north” in Bala Usman to twist the course of justice into an ethnic template. However, it is part of the genius of this historian to forge a unique political and scholarly identity that defines his progressive orientation in terms of a broad national ideology that holds both the northern and southern political elite responsible for the degeneration of the polity. He was motivated by the vision that Nigeria could be rescued from the mercantilist political class which constantly sought to benchmark its material prosperity against the existential austerity of the ordinary masses. What is needed is an alternative governance space that affords intellectuals the possibility of exposing not only enormity of elite crimes but also the recipe that could bring about national transformation.

“Being a progressive, therefore, does not translate into merely lifting the radical cudgel of criticism against power without also applying the balm of recommendations that could point at the right direction that resolves the identified problems. Bala Usman was, therefore, not only functional as an intellectual who speaks truth to power, but also one who insinuates himself into social and national responsibilities. He was not only a seasoned administrator at the Ahmadu Bello University, Zaria, he also accepted to participate in the national Constitution Drafting Committee which was set-up by the Federal Government in 1975. However, his radical thought on the preconditions for national unity could only be aired through a minority report he wrote with other progressives like Dr. Segun Osoba.    

“Dr. Bala Usman came to his nuanced critique of the trajectory of mal-development in Nigeria from a radical understanding of the methodology and role of historiography in national development. Understanding the nature of the national question requires a deep understanding of history and how it ought to be done. Bala Usman, together with his teacher, Professor Abdullahi Smith, pioneered a rethinking of postcolonial historiography and the teaching of history in Nigeria. This effort followed in the step of the Ibadan School of History masterminded by Prof. Kenneth Dike in the 60s and 70s. After its decline, the Ahmadu Bello University School of History took up the challenge of rethinking African history that had hitherto been circumscribed by colonial methodology and its emphasis on written sources as the only objective means for writing history. This methodology automatically leads to the disparagement of oral tradition and other sources as a veritable useful means of historical reconstruction.

The implication of this historical methodology for the reconstruction of African and Nigerian history becomes immediately obvious: the largely oral basis of African history would ensure that we would never be liberated from the “victor’s history” written by the West. The colonial historical methodology essentially distils a conqueror’s worldview that is inimical to a true understanding of the achievements, values and possibilities inherent in a people’s history.”

In an article entitled The Misrepresentation of Nigeria: The Facts and Figures, under the auspices of CEDDERT, Usman made it known that it is not an aberration to see a spontaneous fusion of radicalism and conservatism in the same individual.
“Bala Usman craftily wrought a new geo-historical alchemy for Nigeria. This alchemy was forged in order to lend validity to his thesis of absolute control by the Nigerian state over petroleum resources. To further buttress this new thesis, Bala discarded the pre-colonial histories of the various ethnic nationalities in Nigeria. All current developments, Bala insisted, should be viewed through the colonial history handed over to us by the British.
“Balaism was seen as acting the script of the 'grandiose' history of the Fulani churned out by the British following their conquest of Northern Nigeria. For in Balaism, major Nigerian nationalities, except the Hausa-Fulani, have no pre-colonial history. Balaism went further to inform that the name 'Yoruba' was given by a Hausa-Fulani scholar. Of course, as for the Igbos, Bala carefully side-stepped, and the Niger Deltans (Urhobos) never inhabited the current terrain until the British brought them from only God knows where to partake of the protectorate of Southern Nigeria.
Professor Peter Ekeh's article, "Mischief of History" did a good job at exposing the historical fallacies inherent in Bala Usman's cut and paste historiography.
According to him, “Balaism engaged in pseudo-science by calculatingly contriving new physical processes involved in geological formations of fossil fuels. In Balaism, the transportation of faeces and organic matter along the Rivers Niger and Benue through the ages were the potpourri that gave birth to the crude oil found along the Delta and the Atlantic seaboard of Nigeria. What a queer geological description of fuel formation by a democratic historian? God must have indeed positioned the Hausa-Fulani for the exploitation of this geologic wonder of the 21st century, to the exclusion of the citizens of Guinea, Burkina Faso and Niger! This 'excrement and organic matter' thesis by Bala is not new, for another die-hard northerner of Fulani pedigree sometime in late 1999 had posited the 'excrement theory' of fuel formation in the Niger-Delta. This Fulani is no one else than 'Professor' Jubril Aminu.”
The intellectual community in Nigeria received with great shock the news of the death of Bala Usman on September 24, 2005. Indeed, the shock went beyond the intellectual community or the Nigerian nation because he was not only a Nigerian intellectual but one recognized across the world. He was not just an intellectual but also a democrat, a freedom fighter, and a lover of peace and justice. Thus his house at Hanwa in Zaria (Kaduna State), witnessed a large crowd of people who came from villages, states and countries within and outside Nigeria. Those who trooped to offer condolences to the family included Heads of state, governors, ministers, commissioners, businessmen, intellectuals, bankers, labour leaders, technocrats, students, market women peasant farmers, spare-parts sellers, factory workers, mechanics, labourers, messengers, politicians, serving and retired military men. For over one month after his death, the Department of History, Ahmadu Bello University, where he taught until his death, received letters of condolence from within and outside.

In a condolence letter, a man had written thus: “Bala Usman challenged northerners who also talked about Sardauna’s virtue and greatness, arguing that ‘You Northerners, every time Sardauna, Sardauna, why can’t you be like Sardauna?’ His words penetrated my mind, and at that time, I hadn’t started my university education. Before then, if I were to be admitted to read history, I would have preferred Political Science.  But seeing how Dr. Bala was speaking with authority without fear or favour in differentiating between the truth and the falsehood, I was won by History. I began to like History. So, when my elder brother (Dr. Yusuf Adamu) said to me, “Yasir, I am not sure if you can get Pol. Science, if you don’t mind I will try History for you”, I just jumped at the opportunity without hesitation. He is ‘mad’ about history even though he is a Geographer. Today, History is my field of study in the university. That was how much a person of Dr Bala’s calibre can influence people. I know I am not the only one inspired by him. May Allah reward him abundantly for that.”