Guinness World record holder and Chess In Slum convener, Tunde Onakoya, has taken to X to address the accusation that he is a tribalist for choosing to only support his tribesmen.
A social media user had taken to X to raise the allegation, he wrote, “I’ve never seen this guy help anyone outside the Yoruba tribe.”
Responding to the allegation levelled against him, Tunde Onakoya used the ‘ants in a jar’ metaphorical analogy.
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“If you put a 100 black ants and a 100 red ants in a jar, nothing happens. But if you shake the jar, the ants start killing each other… The real enemy is the one who shook the jar.”
Onakoya did not stop there, he went on to mention that some trolls further attacked his root.
He followed up the tweet, “Someone tagged me ‘ewedu excellence’ this morning… The tribalism and bigotry here really sadden me. It never used to be like this,” he wrote. “I hope you someday see that I am not your enemy. It is those who shake the jar we must fight (sic).”
Read his tweets below:
Tunde Onakoya: Supporting Other Tribes, Culture In Nigeria
In addition to the tweets, Tunde Onakoya shared how he has been supporting various tribes from different states in Nigeria.
Read his statement below:
“I have nothing to prove to anyone, but for the sake of posterity, I feel compelled to say this.
I’ve always tried to “stick to chess” on Twitter, not out of fear, but out of reverence for the sacred work we do. This work is about children and giving them a fighting chance to belong in a world that too often forgets them. It would be terribly selfish to let my personal opinions or politics smear the integrity of this important mission.”
He went forward to say, “But I worry now. I worry that we’re becoming so divided as a people, so consumed by suspicion and tribal lines, that we’re losing sight of what truly matters. And if we continue on this trajectory of hate, the ones who will suffer most are the very ones we claim to love, our children.
It is simply untrue and deeply unfair to suggest that I favor any tribe or ethnicity. In all my years of living, the thought has never even crossed my mind. I have stood in IDP camps in Maiduguri and Yola. I’ve held hands with children in Bayelsa, Cross River, and Delta etc. We have supported education projects across every region in Nigeria, and now in over 20 countries across Africa.”
In all my travels, what I have seen is not tribe or religion, but talent, possibility, pain, and deep suffering.
In conclusion, wrote, “I have made it my life’s work to stand in the gap for these children and be a voice that compels the world to be less indifferent to their plight. That should be our shared mission: to stand in the gap, together. Not as Igbo, Yoruba, Hausa, or Ijaw. But as Nigerians. As humans.
If we allow those who shake the jar to pit us against one another,we will fail the children and leave behind a legacy of hate. And that would be a tragedy too great to bear.
I am proudly Nigerian. And my life will always remain committed to helping every child, no matter where they’re from, find their place in this world.
Because in the end, the true measure of a nation is how fiercely it fights for the children it did not birth, but chose to love anyway.”
