The Odum of Ala Igbo
Hail Biafra!
Sure.
Most African states are multicultural to varying degrees and the regions which are inhabited by various ethnic groups have often been home to these groups for over a 1000 years.
In such society, you cannot have the perception of a fair redistribution of resources from 'the Centre' unless these groups also perceive that they have political, economic and social power in relation to the centre. Especially if that group is a minority within the state or if there's no majority group within that society.
A major way to alleviate those group tensions would be to devolve various powers to groups so they can lessen anxiety between the centre and its constituent parts.
Depending on your state, and the ability of these ethnic areas to manage their powers - there can even be levels to this federalism.
I've been toying with a few ideas on this.
Here's an example:
Nigeria has 250-300 ethnic groups of varying sizes. Some are as large as 35,000,000. Others are as small at 50,000. What to do in that situation? A centre can propose three levels of federalization.
1. Ethnic Region (ex. Igboland could have control over its education system, generation of electricity etc.)
2. Ethnic Autonomous Zone (ex. Ogoniland could have control over natural resource extraction etc.)
3. 'X County' (ex. Dendiland could have control over the construction of municipal/town roads, property tax etc.)
That way, the ability for these ethnic areas to have autonomy over their affairs will be tempered by their ability to have effective government. Dendiland (there's around 200,000 Dendis) would likely not be able to run a viable healthcare system - but it may be able to undertake the administration of small-scale infrastructure projects.
The Chinese have never been keen to engage in such a direct level of provocation.
Too many people on that real-estate to risk any domestic instability.
