The Yoruba Self-Determination Movement (YSDM) has reaffirmed Lagos State’s position as an integral part of Yorubaland, dismissing recurring claims that the state is “No Man’s Land.”
Speaking at a world press conference in Lagos on Friday, YSDM Deputy Leader (Homeland), Arc. Opeoluwa G. Akinola, warned against what the group described as political, economic, and cultural incursions by non-indigenous groups. The declaration comes over two years after the tense 2023 general elections, which reignited debates about Lagos’ ownership.
According to Akinola, Governor Babajide Sanwo-Olu’s re-election on March 18, 2023, was proof of Yoruba unity and an emphatic statement on the state’s heritage. “Lagos remains undeniably Yorubaland. This fact must be etched in stone to discourage revisionists,” he said.
The group linked the controversy to the Labour Party’s surprise win in Lagos during the February 2023 presidential election, alleging that some non-Yoruba political actors—particularly of Igbo origin—sought dominance in state politics as part of broader economic control strategies.
YSDM applauded Lagos State House of Assembly Speaker, Hon. Mudashiru Obasa, for proposing laws to protect indigenous interests. These include holding Assembly sessions in Yoruba alongside English, regulating land leases to non-indigenes, and ensuring no market in the state is dominated by a single ethnic group.
Citing practices in countries like the UAE, Israel, and South Africa, the group insisted that protecting indigenous rights is a legitimate global standard. It dismissed claims of Bini or Igbo rulership in Lagos history, stressing that the Awori, Ijebu, Egun, Egba, and other Yoruba subgroups are the true natives.
The YSDM criticized the renaming of streets after non-Yoruba figures, the sale of strategic lands to non-indigenes, and the alleged exclusion of Yoruba traders from markets such as Ladipo, Alaba International, and the Trade Fair Complex. It called for laws to prevent any ethnic group from controlling more than 40 percent of market ownership.
Beyond Lagos, the movement urged other Yoruba-speaking states to enact similar indigenous protection laws, linking the cause to the broader struggle for Yoruba self-determination and the release of activist Sunday Igboho.
The YSDM clarified that its stance does not amount to an endorsement of the All Progressives Congress (APC) at the federal level, describing itself as “a coalition of all true Yoruba to rout invaders” and preserve Yorubaland’s cultural and territorial integrity.
