The United Kingdom has said the growth in Lagos will be retarded if non-indigenes are not seen as Lagosians, insisting that ethnic profiling should not be accepted in any part of the country.
Non-indigenes especially the Igbos complained about attacks on them by some political thugs suspected to be Yorubas during the last Governorship elections in Lagos.
The attacks were fueled by the belief of some non-indigenes who claim that Lagos is ‘no-man’s land’ .
However, British Deputy High Commissioner in Nigeria, Ben Llewellyn-Jones, in an interview with Nigeria Info FM, said the strength and beauty of Lagos are in its blend of culture and religion and should be recognised as a cosmopolitan city, and condemned the ethnic profiling of a particular ethnic group before and during the just-concluded governorship and state assembly elections.
“If you live in London, you are a Londoner, a British-Pakistan is a Londoner. The British Prime Minister lives in London. My boss, the British foreign secretary is clearly British-Sierra Leonean and lives in London, they are Londoners.
“Why is it that people who pay taxes, who work, who provide teachers, who built businesses, who create jobs, who live in Lagos, who happen to be from a different ethnicity to some other people are not Lagosians?
‘’Of course, they are. The strength of Lagos is its diversity, and if Lagos can’t be that kind of cosmopolitan melting pot of culture and language and all the things it should be, then really how is Lagos going to succeed?
“People chanting anti-Igbo messages and walking on the streets by polling units on elections day are totally unacceptable. Not just in Lagos, but also in Enugu and Rivers where we had our teams as well and many other places.
“It was a very much tougher day for voters which shouldn’t be. But we saw people vote in spite of that, which is truly impressive about the elections.
“I think the right question to people who have been driving this ethnic kind of languages would be, when you go to cities around the world like London, what do you see when you see the success of those places? The success of those places is not built upon division but upon unity.
“I think that people who are still using that kind of language should stop, and the party they represent should be saying to them ‘stop now, this is not in our name and you are wrong’,’’ the Uk Deputy High Commissioner stressed.
