Someone posted: “There are so many similarities between the Igbo and Yoruba language and it’s interesting to see. Do we come from the same language tree?”
Let us shut this down immediately.
The answer is a resounding NO. Yoruba and Igbo are not the same. They have never been the same. They will never be the same. Anyone who claims otherwise is either dangerously ignorant or deliberately pushing a revisionist agenda to erase Yoruba identity.
Yoruba is a Volta-Niger language. Igbo is Igboid. They are as different as English and Mandarin. The fact that both are spoken in Nigeria does not make them similar. That is like saying French and German are the same because both are spoken in Europe. It is nonsense.
This is not a matter of opinion. This is a matter of linguistic science. The grammatical structures are completely different. The vocabularies are completely different. The tonal systems are completely different. If you speak Yoruba, you cannot understand Igbo. If you speak Igbo, you cannot understand Yoruba. Period.
Those making these videos comparing our languages are not curious students of linguistics. They are sponsored revisionists, agents of cultural erasure whose mission is to bastardise Yoruba language and make it appear as a derivative of Igbo. They want to strip us of our identity and claim our heritage as their own.
First, it was Yoruba food. Then it was Yoruba spirituality. Now it is Yoruba language. They want to take everything that belongs to us and claim it as their own. This is not scholarship. This is theft.
There is nothing similar between the two languages. There never has been. There never will be.
Yoruba is Yoruba. Igbo is Igbo. They are not the same. They will never be the same. And anyone who claims otherwise is either a fool or an enemy of Yoruba identity.
We will not allow our language, our culture, or our heritage to be bastardised. The Yoruba people have a proud history, a distinct identity, and a language that stands on its own.