Category: Femi Orebe

By Femi Orebe

No Nigerian can claim not to have seen how very pained President Muhammadu Buhari is, concerning insecurity in Nigeria . What with his many condolence messages?

We also have the likes of Bauchi state Governor, Bala Mohammed,  his predecessor, Isa Yuguda and Mohammed Babandede, who believe that guns are  entitlements of Fulani herders; native or  foreign, as they  wander from Khartoum to Calabar. Indeed, not just guns, but the super AK 47.

It is fascinating, however, that we

have others like  Governors Abdullahi Ganduje and Nasir El Rufai, as well as the respected Sheik  Ahmad Gumi, to thank for their seminal efforts towards resolving the insecurity  deluge in our country.

It has  been  absolutely convenient  for Governor Mohammed to rationalise Fulani herders   hugging guns all over the country  under the guise of  using  them to repel cow hustlers. In case he doesn’t know, the average Southerner does not have the skills to control a single cow, talk less of stealing a herd of cows, so how come guns accompanying Fulani hrrdsmen in Southern Nigeria?

This is why  it has become obvious that Fulanis, not just the herders, most probably have a design akin to Sir Ahmadu Bello’s self verbalised intent to dip the Quoran in the Atlantic ocean. It  thus seems that the  murderous herders are the advance  phaåange of that “all conquering army”,  the way they are  surrounding the entire country, crowding  out  all  the forests,l especially down  South, enthroning Serikis everywhere, and with neither President Buhari, His Eminence, the Sultan, nor  even the police, at the  very least, cautioning the Fulani Nationality Movement when they claim they own Nigeria and ready to conquer it . Only this past week, some of them were arrested in Onitsha trying to board a night luxurious bus with concealed guns. We can only imagine what they  would have done to the passengers along the way.

And some people will be talking about ethnic profiling.

Back then to the aforementioned three  gentlemen who, between them,  exist three paradigms that can make insecurity history in Nigeria.

SHEIK GUMI

To this cleric, I give respect.

Sheik Gumi has undertaken  very dangerous trips to forbidden forests, all in search of peace. These are forests poor governance in the North has rendered ungoverned for ages. He has spared no effort in trying to see peace return to the country through dialogue with people who were driven into  criminality through illiteracy and ignorance both of which are no fault of theirs as it is feudalism that let them down.

Today they are completely unemployable, remaining only what

Dr Akinwumi Adesina of the African Development Bank recently described as “the recruitment super market”, of  all manner of criminals.

Of course, many in the South do not buy the idea of a dialogue with bandits, but I wholeheartedly endorse it as a way out of our present miasma.

I recently commented as follows on a piece by Prof Usman Yusuf, one of the Sheik’s team members foraying into the “ forests of seemingly no return”.

“Reading through this piece by a very senior academic, I must, first and foremost, commend the Sheik’s background as a medical doctor and retired military officer. To have gone on to become a Sheik, a highly regarded Muslim cleric  on top of  these, speaks volumes about  his being a well rounded individual; also with a solid pedigree. Therefore, he must  have thoroughly thought this project  through.

Until I read the piece, I was a die- hard opponent of  any kind of dialogue with bandits.

From the piece,  I learnt that he first sought  the buy-in of some very relevant stakeholders in various communities. These must be people who can have considerable influence on that huge population of idle youth  and may thus stanch their recruitment into banditry.

The greatest impact of the Cleric’s effort, however,  comes from the face to face meetings with the bandits as they enabled Nigerians  to have an idea of  the armoury at the disposal of these bandits – big guns, AK 47, RPGs, even anti aircraft guns as narrated in Professor Yusuf’s article and they are said to number in thousands.

These bandits, many of who do not know their families  simply do not mind dying on the battle field. With a ready supply recruitment chain, their commanders can afford, like Boko Haram, to fight Nigeria, whose army is spread thin over many theatres, for decades.

Therefore, given their loyalty to cause, banditry to them being preferable to begging or hawking, and being probably better kitted than our fighting forces, negotiaying  with them cannot be a bad thing, by any means. It is an additional advantage  that it is a Sheik, armed with the Quoran, who is leading this charge. It must be refreshing to hear, for instance, that their  commander, who knows that their staying power is actually drugs, has already stopped  the sale of narcotics to them  consequent upon the Sheik’s preaching to them. Additionally, it is my considered opinion, given the recent massive Boko Haram resurgence in the Northeast, that nothing can be better than what the  Sheik is doing.

Starting out, the Federal government should get the Zamfara bandits to surrender their arms, grant them amnesty and, in collaboration with the state, build large scale ranches for them as well as  give  them  some cows in soft loan. Those of them between ages13 to 20 should now be hurried to schools, some of which can be built afresh for them.

I merely laughed when I read the presidency say this past week that  it  will grant no  amnesty to  any  type of  insurgents constituting a threat to innocent citizens but will be dealt with.

How many times have we heard that concerning Boko Haram and when in April, 2020 chadian troops “killed 1000 Boko Haram fighters” weren’t we told Boko Haram would be annihilated in weeks?

We just shouldnt make Nigeria a laughing stock instead of grabbing this opportunity with our two hands. These bandits can overwhelm Nigeria if they turn to our highways and cities rather than the forests they presently operate from, stealing school children.

I say all these because this teeming army of mostly illiterate youths can cause, not just a civil war, but real ANARCHY which can be ten times worse than  Somalia, Afghanistan or Yemen.

Capt Aliyu Umar (rtd), a respected security analyst, speaking on Channels TV  this past week, does not agree with my prognosis as he wants the bandits defeated before any negotiations. But who tells him our politicians, for both  ethnic and religious reasons, would actually like to have bandits or herders killed in numbers?

GOVERNOR ABDULLAHI GANDUJE

I salute of Governor Abdullahi Ganduje’s foresight, forthrightness and statesmanship.

Months ago, he offered all herdsmen a place in Kano state which offer, had they taken, would have  considerably reduced insecurity in the country. Now he has gone a notch further.

Apart from building a massive RUGA, he has suggested that there should be a law “abolishing  the transportation or trekking of herdsmen from the northern part of Nigeria to the Middle Belt and Southern part of Nigeria”.

This will certainly serve as a silver bullet to our “Cow War’ in Nigeria, to quote my friend, Professor Niyi osundare.

I am waiting to see somebody improve on that “Ganduje-an logic”.

GOVERNOR NASIR EL RUFAI

Both brash and irreverent, you cannot never  divorce brilliance from this governor who would always say his mind, no matter whose ox is gored.

El Rufai has mostly situated his answer to insecurity in Nigeria on a tinkering with the country’s structure. His views are now so well known I need not repeat them here. I actually did that, in some depth, in my article  on Governor Kayode Fayemi’s recent Kaduna lecture.

Like Ganduje, Governor El Rufai has also moved up a notch. He has inspired  ten major actions, only 7 of which space will permit here,  towards modernising pastoralism in Kaduna state  as a way of removing tears, and sweat, from herders’ faces just as he is determined  to move millions of them out of poverty. They will all reduce insecurity too.

(1) Kaduna State government is setting aside 5,000 square kilometres to build the largest cattle ranch in Africa in Birnin Gwari;

(2) Kaduna State governor has reached an agreement with Al Rayan Islamic Bank to open an animal feed compounder at Birnin Gwari;

(3) Kaduna State government has reached a deal with the New York Giants Leather & Suede Jackets Company to open a manufacturing facility in Kaduna;

(4) Kaduna State government has, like Ekiti and Promasidor, successfully wooed Nestle to open a dairy plant in Zaria;

(5) Kaduna State government shall be opening Africa’s largest abattoir in Kafanchan. It shall be funded with an Islamic Finance loan;

(6) Kaduna State will open at least two technical training colleges in each of its 23 local government areas.

(7) At the Birnin Gwari ranch there shall be a disarmament centre where all armed herdsmen and bandit can hand in their weapons without prosecution.

One hopes that the federal government will buy into these ideas and let Nigeria kiss insecurity bye.

By Femi Orebe

“To eliminate herders’/ farmers clashes, ECOWAS must take drastic steps in curbing foreign herders who are always armed with sophisticated weapons from making incursion into Nigeria just as  the federal government must ban open grazing and block grazing routes from the northern to the southern part of the country” – Statesman Abdullahi Ganduje, a Fulani and Governor of Kano state

In tackling insecurity in Nigeria, the place to start is to tell ourselves the truth. And the truth is that to the President must go the blame for the increasingly intractable problem of  insecurity in the country. This is obvious, primarily,  from his appointments which are deliberately stoked against the South, the same area that  bears the brunt of  the murderous Fulani herdsmen’s mayhem. The headship of nearly all the intelligence services, ministers of Defence,  Police Affairs;  Director – Generals of Customs,  Immigration and the Chairman of EFCC aside the Inspector- General of police, are all from the North, demonstrating nothing  short of an iniquitous system in a multi – ethnic country. Worse is the fact that when it is time for these Northerners to retire, as constitutionally prescribed, President Buhari, almost routinely, extends their appointments as we saw in the cases of Muhammed Babandede, the Comptroller- General of Immigration, and more recently, in the case of the Inspector- General of Police,  Muhammed Adamu. Are these mere coincidences or a deliberate intent to simply dominate, and treat others like slaves? How,  given all these level of unfairness, can Governor El Rufai be hoping for egalitarianism in a country crawling with barefaced injustice?

Don’t these  presidential actions confirm the reckless statement by the Fulani Nationality Movement that “Nigeria is the only inheritance Fulanis have in Africa and  that from Sokoto to the banks of the Atlantic Ocean, they own it all? Did the police or the DSS invite them for questioning when they said: “Our men are waiting. We are eager to fight. We are boiling with the zeal to actualize our dream; enough of double dealing and ambivalence by Fulani political leaders who, unfortunately, think the Fulani can only take back what belongs to us through appeasement and elections”?

(I think this should be a grand opportunity to tell, or remind, these people that: “ in 1840 the Ibadan army, (read as Yoruba army), at Osogbo, routed the Ilorin army, ( read as Fulani army) decisively destroying their dreaded calvary,  killing or capturing most of their horses and capturing many of their commanders, dislodging their forces, and pushing them all the way beyond Offa …” – Professor Banji Akintoye in A History of The Yoruba People, P. 301).

I digress.

What is the meaning of the skewed appointments in NNPC,  whose minister the President is, and where it is alleged that most, if not all the topmost 20 directors, are all Northerners? What of the people under whose feet, crude oil resides and  whose ecosystem have been messed up for decades? Are they lesser Nigerians?

Do all these make for peace or security in a multi – ethnic country?

So what are we expected to believe when herdsmen run riot, spreading mayhem all over the country, without as much as a rebuke  by the presidency but all we hear is that Nigerians  can stay,  and do business, anywhere in the country as if the  intendment of the framers of the constitution includes raping, kidnapping and killings? Aren’t  Nigerians  now seeing action from Abuja only because Fulani herdsmen are beginning to get a taste of what they have been serving others for years?

What did Garba Shehu say when the Bauchi State governor, Bala Mohammed, said Fulani herdsmen are free to carry AK 47 all over the country as if that  wasn’t  enough encouragement to  Fulanis from Chad, Mali, Niger etc, to come to over run Nigeria with guns? If the President didn’t endorse that statement did he instruct that his objection be made known to Nigerians, as Governor Akeredolu recently posited?

Or what manner of culture revels in needless, unrestrained and unprovoked blood letting?

Truth be told, the place to start fighting insecurity in Nigeria is for President Buhari to rule in good conscience, with malice to no  part thereof. He must not only be fair but must, like Caesar’s wife,  be seen to be fair which is obviously not the case today. To expect that insecurity will reduce in a system so heavily weighed against some sections of the country, can only amount to  day dreaming.

These are the reasons some of us who,  in our little corners, campaigned for a General Mohammadu Buhari (rtd) we believed we knew well enough, but whose government, the  First Lady told BBC some people have hijacked, are extremely disappointed.

We remember, with nolstagia,  all that General Buhari did at his first coming and believed him when he promised to come and fight corruption as well as  restore security. We believed him more when unlike before he stretched his hands beyond the River Niger this time around,  believing he will rule for all and be a unifying factor.

All that have been in vain

These are the reasons why insecurity got exacerbated,  and metastasised, as Fulani herdsmen, super spreaders of insecurity, saw themselves as special beings who can do just about anything. Rein them in today, take away their guns, and see considerable  peace return to Nigeria.

If this government truly wants an end to insecurity, justice must be allowed to prevail. Nigeria is a multi- ethnic and  multi- religious country and that fact must be reflected in its governance. Not to do so is to continue to do the same thing, over and over, hoping to get a different result which will be a futile hope.

At a particular time in the 2nd Republic, the recently departed Alhaji L.K Jakande, reacting to NPN’s monumental corruption, suggested that President Shehu Shagari should empty the Central Bank of Nigeria, share all the money among its thieving members, and promptly resign. I am sure that Nigerians would not mind  if, in order to defeat insecurity , President Buhari would spend every penny in the coffers of the CBN to build ranches, and meat processing factories, all in the North, so that  Fulani herdsmen would have no reasons to trek with  cows from Kaura Namoda etc, to far flung places in the south, destroying farms,  kidnapping and killing all the way. In this way, the fortunes of the  North can be dramatically changed by turning it to a massive meat processing zone coupled with the entire industry’s  value chain, to serve not only Nigeria but the entire West coast thus,  further diversify the country’s economy.

President Buhari must not wait until Nigeria unravels as has been severally predicted. For instance, not many Nigerians believe that “this government is working for the unity and stability of the country”,  nor are they convinced that “there is any small number of people with resources and influence constituting a nuisance to the oneness of the country”. What  they see, instead,  is widespread injustice, right from the top.

The time has also come for the establishment of state police as well as a genuine move towards restructuring the country which, truth be told, many Nigerians now believe is too late in the day to be a panacea to the country’s  many problems.

Readers of this column will know how long, and vigorously,  the columnist has canvassed restructuring. I still  believe it can  help, but time is obviously not on our side.

Former Head of State, Abdulsalami Abubakar, this past week, warned that Nigeria may soon disintegrate. However,  I wonder why, like Col Dangiwa Umar, he could not directly tell the President that the responsibility for rescuing Nigeria lies, first and foremost, with him,  rather than  harranguing  state governors, who he knows, control neither the army nor the police and so,  cannot disarm the herdsmen carrying  AK 47 all over the country.

Banditry is another major problem which should be tackled head on. Thanks to Sheik Gumi, Nigerians now know that the President had, in fact, sent emissaries to the bandits (the Sheik said this in a press interview) thus indicating that government knows their whereabouts. I  agree with governor El Rufai that, rather than go into any manner of negotiation  with them, the military should be asked to simpl flush  them out. I salute the galantry of our fighting forces many of who have made the ultimate sacrifice and verily believe that this is not beyond their capability if there is the political will. After all, these are ragtag ruffians,whose mainstay is drugs. Sheik Gumi committed a grievous error in comparing them to Niger Delta militants who are rebels with a cause, and did deserve the accommodation a proud son of the North – President Umar Yar Adua- extended to them, unlike aimless bandits who are there only because the North permits several ungoverned swathes of forests, as well as have millions of uneducated, idle youth, who are all too ready to be recruited into criminality.These bandits  presently operate in forests, but as we saw this past week in  Niger state, they  could very soon make Northern cities, Abuja inclusive, completely  unliveable.

The time is now for government to act decisively as tomorrow may be too late.

By Femi Orebe

Today, it will be a potpourri.

First, a matter of urgent national interest. What manner of voodoo economics are we practising in Nigeria? Why would Nigerians, citizens of an oil producing country, rather than be happy each time oil prices rise in the international market, be getting prompted, to get ready to pay higher prices for petroleum products?

Okay, if this is because Nigerian public officials have, over a long time, conspired with their business men friends to run down the refineries, why is Petroleum Equalisation Fund still on our books?

Why is everybody not paying economic price for petroleum products such that the consumer in Lagos won’t be paying the same price as the consumer in Abuja or Kaura Namoda,  given that local transportation cost in Lagos is absolutely miniscule compared to what is paid for haulage of the same products to far flung destinations?.

Also why are Nigeria’s  refineries close to  insolvency over debts prompting calls for privatisation? For instance, a June 2020 report showed that  while  it generated NIL revenue in 2018,  the Kaduna Refining (KRPC) incurred an operating loss of N64.5 billion, prompting concerns over the continued operation of refineries by the NNPC.

Is governance robotic science?

To Southwest Governors: Help President Buhari reduce insecurity by eliminating  demand for cows from outside the region.

“Getting serious means seeking with a sense of urgency, ways of terminating mayhem, impunity, and the homicidal culture being imposed on us through some near cultic business minority who just happen to trade in cattle. It means not giving up on peaceful solutions, but also being prepared for the worst. Those of my line of thought have been working on various ways of sensitizing the nation to the very real and imminent danger issuing from this cattle aberration. The menace, I repeat, challenges us as a cohesive entity and as communities of free individuals, committed to the dignity of existence. Cattle imperialism under any guise is an obscenity to humanity”. Nobel Laureate, Prof Wole Soyinka Or are we in these parts even condemned to cow meat?

Preparatory to his campaign for the 2007 Osun governorship election, I met about twice  with Ogbeni, (Engr) Rauf Aregbesola, during which time he took me through some of  his intended programmes, some of which  would later make his administration rank very high with International development agencies. One of  these was his plan  to see the Southwest, and Edo state, supply a huge chunk of the over N2Billion food items consumed daily in Lagos.

Amongst these items are 10,000 cows.

Regarding the supply of cows, Ogbeni and his governor colleagues would not have needed to re-invent the wheel  because some six decades earlier, the Avatar, Chief Obafemi Awolowo, had established ranches in Ibadan, Shaki, Ikun, Agege, Ikare, Akunu, Oke Ako – Ekiti and Imeko, Ogun state.

They were all  stocked with cattle imported from Argentina. Although now in ruins, all they would have done  is refurbish and stock them to the brim with the best species.

They were not just mere ranches, but complete farm settlements with segments for animal husbandry, fishery, poultry, piggery etc.

The ranch at Akunu sits on over 8 hectares with five big dams,

The Oyo ranch covered 16, 000 hectares  with 2, 000 carved out for the Ikere Gorge Dam and 5,000 in Ibarapa. Imeko was on 4, 000 hectares while Oke Ako was on 12, 000 hectares.

As indicated earlier, these facilities are now mostly in ruins.

What we have in Ogun, Oyo and Ondo are mostly talk, except that only this past week, the Ondo state legislature passed a grazing bill.

Governor, Seyi Makinde, says he has begun moves to revive farm settlements in a bid to increase the state’s food production capacity. In Ogun state Governor Dapo Abiodun has disclosed plans to establish a world-class ranch on a Public Private Partnership (PPP) basis through which he hopes to see the state service  the huge Lagos  state  demand. However, things are slightly different in Ekiti where  the Ikun Dairy Farm, a joint venture with Promasidor, is already operational with the first 100 cows already in place and with a plan to add 300 more. This is according to Anders Einarsson, Managing  Director of Promasidor Nigeria Limited. The partnership  will attract an investment of about $5 million. Also a group of  Ekiti diasporans, intent on establishing a ranch recently paid a working visit to the moribund Irele Ekiti Grazing Reserve in Ikole Local Government , preparatory to  taking it over.

While all these are fine, the urgency of now requires a much more aggressive approach towards supplying our own cattle needs in Yoruba land to at least drastically reduce the current mayhen  by  murderous Fulani herdsmen most of who, those who should know, say speak French thus confirming President Buhari’ claim that they are foreigners prompting the question as to  why they should be granted amnesty  rather than be smoked out.  I believe that the fact of these terrorists being  Fulanis hamstrings the Buhari government.

I digress.

To enhance security in this part of the country, it is time our state governments partner with the Odu’a Investment Company Limited which is believed to  have some business plans for integrated cattle ranching for beef production, dairy and other large-scale commercial  ventures. This would involve strategic joint ventures with investors that have  the technical knowhow, as well as the financial capabilities which will, in turn  result in increased employment and overall economic development.

There must also be, in the meantime, and until the local efforts mature and ready to supply our protein needs, a deliberate campaign to significantly reduce our cow meat consumption. For our elderlies, it should actyally be a no, no. Our huge market is the reason even genuine Fulani  herders come to the Southwest, thus providing a cover  for their murderous foreign compatriots who invade  our farms and neighbourhoods. Reduction in the number of genuine herders, occasioned by reduced aggregate demand, will facilitate the tracking down of the killers aming them  by the police and Amotekun.

We must educate our people to rate safety over ‘feferity’, and rather than buy 10 cows for a funeral ceremony, simply by 2.

We must do everything in these parts to dissuade people who rape our women, kidnap and kill us, at will, from coming to us.

When the constitution says Nigerians are free to live or do business anywhere in the country, it refers only to lawful business, not the anything goes being canvassed by the Northern Elders Forum.

After all, below is what an observer said:’ “I wonder why Nigerians are making their killers richer by eating  cow meat. Simply organize a movement of #stopeatingcowmeat.

Boycott  Cow meat totally for 5 years. And watch the fulani go out of business”.

And I say, Fulanis are neither our enemies nor do we want them out of business. But until the Federal Government can order the withdrawal of all guns from ALL herdsmen, and expel all foreign killer herdsmen, they should please give these parts a wide berth. The North should feel free to do the same to any persons involved in dangerous and unlawful business like raping, kidnapping and killing.

Must it always be bad news from Nigeria?

In 2016, the Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria  suspended payments to Nigeria’s AIDS agency over evidence that $3.8 million was stolen by its workers and consultants between 2010 and 2014. Fund spokesman, Seth Faison, said Nigeria’s government has promised to repay the money and to prosecute suspects.

And now in 2021, there are reports that some MDAs are unable to account for disbursement of millions in COVID-19 relief funds”.  Was British Prime Minister, David Cameron, correct when he said Nigeria, (read Nigerians) is “ fantastically corrupt?” Or  U. S Gen. Colin Powell (rtd), dubbing Nigerians, “scammers” who “just tend not to be honest”?

So what  do we say now when there are fears that: “ the $3.4 billion  approved for Nigeria  by the  International Monetary Fund  in April 2020, to help tackle the coronavirus pandemic and bring relief to millions of Nigerians have again grown legs?

What manner of people are we Nigerians?

In April 2020, KPMG had warned that there will be an increase in fraud as a result of the pandemic. Auwal Rafsanjani, the highly regarded Executive Director of the Civil Society Legislative and Advocacy Centre CISLAC – and Nigeria’s representative for Transparency International — had  raised an alarm over the massive fraud being perpetrated by government officials and MDAs under the guise of COVID-19 emergency procurement.

According to him,  up till today, no explanation of how the money has been spent and there is no audited report, which goes against  the agreement signed by Nigerian government and IMF”. Budeshi, a web platform that links budget and procurement data to different public services, using the Open Contracting Data Standards, had last year published how several MDAs had accessed the COVID-19 relief funds loaned from the IMF. Many of these agencies, despite a freedom of information request being sent to them, have not been able to furnish answers as to how the millions accessed for the projects were spent.

I think it is time the appropriate anti – corruption agency moves in to unravel what Rafsanjani describes “as a corruption bazaar in which public officials at local, state, and national levels use Covid-19 as a means of siphonining resources meant to deal with issues concerning the grave pandemic” .

This has become really urgent as the impression in town is that “these persons are a reflection of the body language of the present administration.

ICPC should, at least, help to clear that stigma, from the Buhari administration.

By Femi Orebe

We are building many houses, we are constructing a dam; we are establishing a Cattle Artificial ilnsemination Centre; we are establishing veterinary clinic and ready, we have started building houses for herdsmen. “My advocacy is that we should abolish the transportation or trekking of herdsmen from the northern part of Nigeria to the Middle Belt and Southern part of Nigeria.

“There should be a law that will ban open grazing, otherwise we cannot control the conflicts  between herdsmen and farmers  and cannot control the cattle  rustling which is affecting us greatly.” – Governor Abdullahi Ganduje

Twice now, Governor Ganduje has, in a statesmanlike manner, pragmatically weighed in on the Herders/ Farmers’ problem which is threatening to consume Nigeria.

If the Fulani/ Fulani herders’ primary intent is not land grab as was being coyly planned through cattle colony and RUGA, President Buhari should endeavour to build his legacy on the basis so laudably laid out by Governor Ganduje.

He could very well seek the National Assembly’s approval for the Central Bank to arrange soft loans for all the Northern states  for this purpose. That way, he would have permanently extinguished the emerging fires  being ignited by Fulani  and,  thereby cast his name in gold, all sins forgiven, in the annals of Nigerian history.

When I started writing in support 9f contestant Muhammadu  Buhari towards the  APC Presidential primaries in 2014, it was strictly on the basis of Nigerians’ awareness of his personal integrity. I was not unaware then, of his visit to Governor  Lam Adesina of Oyo state to protest the killing of some Fulani herdsmen even when the governor, corroborated by the then state commissioner of Police,  would later let him know that the herdsmen killed  more people than the number of Fulanis killed, just as I have also  heard him described as a religious extremist.

Not any of these mattered to me.

I did not reckon with his love of his Fulani ethnic group or his devotion to  his  religion  because I knew that Nigeria was faced then with such existential challenges that needed a General Buhari to confront and defeat. These were in areas where President Jonathan  had proved spectacularly ineffective, namely: corruption, insecurity and the economy.

These, incidentally, were the very areas he was promising to restore sanity to Nigeria.

I was particularly enthused by his   campain line: “if we dont kill corruption, corruption will kill Nigeria”.

That, coming from an ascetic,  the initiator of War Against Indiscipline  (WAI) at his first coming as Military Head of state, a minister of Petroleum Resources with no allegations of graft hanging around his neck, and a retired general to booth, I needed no persuading to write that “Nigeria needed Buhari more than he needed Nigeria”.

But would I write that today?

I doubt.

I dont know about you, but like the  President’s friend, Pastor Bakare, recently said,  President  Buhari has disappointed lots of people, myself inclusive.

Nothing will attest to this more than the fact that Lai Mohammed, his Information minister, can now be telling Nigerians that insecurity was worse in 2015 than it presently  is. Given the hopes Nigerians had in voting Buhari as president, should that be an argument at all? Should we still have the sceptre of 2015 in our discussionon insecurity at all?

Apart from the fact that his claim is  fallacious, why does he think Nigerians voted out President Jonathan?

If  Lai Muhammed needs any test as to how  far worse than 2015 insecurity has become in Nigeria, I shall not  even suggest he goes  from Abuja to Kaduna by road, as that will tantamount to  certain death,  he should go instead, by road, with only his driver, from the same Abuja to his home town in Kwara state. He should then , if lucky,  come back  to avail Nigerians of  his experience,  travelling through Kogi state.

I cannot even begin to imagine what a rosy picture of Nigeria he must have been painting for the President.

I am not doing any long write up today. All I ask is this: do those around the President allow him to see newspaper, or other media publications, like the one I am concluding with today? Aren’t they too intimidated to let him know the true position of things in Nigeria today?

If no, aren’t  they being unfair  to the country of their birth, and to whatever allegiance they may have taken? And if yes, what does the President think of the massive killings we now have all over Nigeria, with most the handiwork of murderous Fulani herders?

If it appears like our armed forces have been spread too thin, is anything stopping President Buhari from seeking external help as President Jonathan did then to retrieve Borno state Local Governments which were  under the control of Boko Haram?

If he hates the mere mention  of mercenaries, whose contract he allegedly cancelled on his assumpyion of office, can’t he approach our Western Allies for assistance?

Does President Buhari not mind  Nigeria being at par in beastiality with the likes of Afghanistan, Syria, and Yemen at the height of their civil wars?

Why is the President hell bent in not approving state Police which former  President Obasanjo says would make even Amotekun, unnecessary?

Can President Buhari say, with all his heart, that consaingunity  considerations play no role in his handling of insecurity? I ask this question because not even when Miyetti Allah confesses culpability in mass killings is its leadership as much as invited by even the Inspector General of Police; a fact that has made the herder killers much more audacious.

And, finally, going at the present pace, isn’t  the President worried he may very well be the last President of a united Nigeria?

If dying in numbers daily  is what  Lai Mohammed calls security, I urge him to read and internalise the following words of  I.G Wala, a Human Rights Activist: “If the North is helplessly crying and burying their loved ones as a result of the atrocities of some of them, they should not expect same level of docility in other parts of Nigeria.

The North has lost so much, and still loosing, but not all regions will take it lightly with them. The authorities in Nigeria must act fast in taming what is capable of creating a deadly crisis in Nigeria”.

The minister should know that   were the kidnappings and killings daily occurring in the North to be in the South, no Oba, no Obi, nor any so-called leader, would today be sleeping with two eyes closed.

Shame would have since snuffed sleep off  their eyes.

Below is the publication which presidential minders should bring to the attention of the President because of its critical importance to the nation.

Insecurity worsens as over 255 killed and 258 abducted in January, 2021.

No fewer than 255 Nigerians were killed during the first month of this year as insecurity has continued to worsen across the country, according to a tally by the Civic Media Lab, a not-for-profit organisation that champions media innovation for civic engagement.

More than 258 Nigerians were also kidnapped during the  same period while about 47 persons were injured in the series of violence.

Those Nigerians who did not live beyond January were murdered by different armed groups, such as Boko Haram, Fulani killer herdsmen, bandits, kidnappers and others.

Apart from the long-existing notorious armed groups contributing mainly to violent deaths in the country, the Western Nigerian Security Network, better known as Amotekun, has joined the fray. No fewer than eleven persons were killed by

Amotekun in Oyo State last month.

However, bandits were mostly responsible for the deaths and abductions, surpassing the dreaded Boko Haram that has caused so much miseries in the North East in the over a decade-old insurgency to enthrone Islamic governance.

Boko Haram killed about ten persons and abducted 61 others in January, but bandits killed nearly 141, injured 40 and kidnapped 161 persons. The bandits’ atrocities happened mainly in Kaduna, Katsina, Nasarawa, Niger, Taraba and Zamfara states. In Kaduna State, 57 persons were killed while 31 were kidnapped, making the state the most affected in the country.

Zamfara State came close to Kaduna with 57 fatalities and 18 abducted victims. Other states, such as Katsina, Nasarawa and Niger states recorded more than six violent deaths.

Again, 87 persons were kidnapped in Niger while 25  were also abducted in Taraba. Elsewhere, communal clashes caused 14 deaths. About ten persons were killed in Akwa Ibom and four others abducted. In Lagos, Delta, and Abia states, cults and hoodlums caused 23 deaths, with 21 deaths coming from Lagos alone.

Other instances of violent deaths included 12 persons who were killed by unidentified gunmen in Delta, six in Rivers, five in Kaduna, four in Oyo, three in Ebonyi, two in Plateau, and one in each of Nasarawa and Taraba.

Gunmen also abducted 20 persons in Nasarawa, 10 in Abuja, three in Rivers, two in Delta, and one in Edo and Oyo states

All these, and more, is why one Pastor Adewale Giwa of The Awaiting The Second Coming Of Christ Ministry, Adewale Giwa has urged President Muhammadu Buhari to focus on dealing with hunger and the Fulani herdsmen gradually taking over Nigeria, rather than  putting so much attention on COVID-19.

I am sure Pastor Giwa is not alone in that frame of mind as the Fulani herdsmen, raping, kidnapping and killing in the North, East, West and the South south are fast leading  Nigeria, unerringly, into oblivion.

By Femi Orebe

These herders invade farms and houses to kidnap, rape and loot. They collect ransom before releasing their victims. In some cases, they kill their victims even after collecting huge ransoms. The story of Dr Fatai Aborode who was killed on his 300-acre farm, which led to the Igangan crisis and the rise of  Sunday Igboho, is bloodchilling. People are no longer safe in their own homes, farms and lands. All of a sudden, settlers have become the lords of the manor. There is nothing bad in settling in a place, but as a settler one must conform with the socio-cultural values of that environment”  – Lawal Ogienagbon.

Although some Yoruba socio – cultural groups  have raised objections to the Monday,  25th January, ’21 meeting of  the Nigerian Governors’ Forum  and Southwest governors with members of MACBAN in Akure, the Ondo state capital,  I consider it a reasonable, and well intended, move.

After all, it is better to jaw jaw than to war war, as the saying goes.

It is , however,  unfortunate that such a high profile meeting merely skirted round  the  huge problem the Fulani herdsmen have become for our country.

I say this because the meeting failed to touch on what I consider as the primary aim of Fulani herdsmen in Nigeria: land grab.

This is very  fundamental to resolving the issue with any finality. It is no longer news that Bello Abdullahi Bodejo, Leader  of  Miyetti Allah, has never shied away from   proclaiming  everywhere,  that all lands in Nigeria belong to Fulanis,  with neither the I- G  nor the directors  of  other Nigerian security  agencies  – all Northerners –  once inviting him for interrogation, like a  Dr Obadiah Mailafia.

This claim by  Bodejo, and their   eagerness to have it  actualised   is  the reason Fulani herdsmen are carrying  AK 47 all over Nigeria, kidnapping, raping old and young and killing  people in the hope of scaring  them, make them flee their ancestral homes so they can take over as they have successfully done in Southern Kaduna and in some parts of the Middle Belt.

The starting point for that meeting, therefore, especially with  two powerful Northern governors  present, ought to  have been a  resolution, calling on President Muhammadu Buhari to issue an executive order compelling the immediate  seizure of all  guns from  Fulani herdsmen.

This is particularly so because the  NGF has the  legal status, and the requisite profile,  to holistically interrogate  the issue of  Fulani herdsmen, who are ranked the 3rd deadliest terror group in the world, according to the Global terrorism report of 2018. Doing that, the NGF would have been able to  announce, with glee, and to the pleasant surprise of Nigerians,  that it went beyond the immediate problem in Ondo state to resolve this irritating Fulani herdsmen’s conundrum.

They have become such an existential problem in this country to qualify this omission as a grievous, lost opportunity as not even the National Assembly, with its huge numbers and variagated interests, can successfully do the same.

What is beyond any rational disputation in Nigeria today  is the fact that Fulani herdsmen , especially the foreign ones, (the Chinua Achebe Foundation research  on Fulani herdsmen has revealed that only about 10% of the killer herders are native to Nigeria) are in every part of Nigeria daily committing all manner  of criminalities.  For anybody to validly  challenge this claim, he/she will have to tell Nigerians the date, time and place, where representatives of Nigerian ethnic groups met and agreed that they would always point accusing fingers  at Fulani herdsmen whenever these  crimes are committed. Or how come, to quote a trending Whatsapp chat, “ that they  are the only ethnic group in Nigeria that is at war with the  Eggons in Nassarawa, the Tivs in Benue, the Idomas of Agatu, the Beroms of Plateau, the Adaras of Southern Kaduna, the Mumuyes & June 4 District on the Mambilla, the Hausas of Zamfara, the Igbos of the South East, and the Yorubas of the Southwest, all of who Bodejo continues to boast will be put to the sword by a Fulani army made up of contigents from all over West Africa?

The Failure of the Buhari government to resolve this problem reminds one of what President Obasanjo did in a somewhat similar situation.

When over the weekend of  Sunday, 23 October 2011,    Hausas and OPC militants battled each other in Lagos, Obasanjo, forgetting he is Yoruba roared: ”The police have instructions that any criminal should be shot on sight. Anyone who calls himself OPC should be arrested and if he doesn’t agree he should be shot on sight.” ”We cannot allow this country to be overtaken by hoodlums and criminals.” “When people decide to behave like animals then they must be treated like animals.”

Only this past week, Ambassador (Dr)

Hakeem Baba – Akeem of the NEF, was saying on Channels television that the President should invite all state governors to discuss the Fulani herdsmen’s problem but I dont know how many Nigerians now believe that President Buhari can be a honest broker in the matter. Although he once told Nigerians that these murderous herdsmen are foreigners, he is yet to read the riot act to his  security chiefs to deal with the predators that have turned Nigeria to worse than a living hell.

What Nigerians saw, instead,  was a presidential executive order revoking  licences for firearms and  short guns nationwide; an order which so  initially embarrassed the Nigerian police they had to  deny  its existence as it said nothing about the millions of unlicensed AK 47 Fulani herdsmen are  hugging all around Nigeria. That order must surely have encouraged the minders of the killer herdsmen as it  froze  all meaningful opposition to their ‘army’s’ bestialities.

No genuine members of MAC BAN, in my view, can be involved in kidnapping. I invite the reader to please note the distinction between MACBAN and Miyetti Allah, whose primary concern is Fulani expansionism.

The main concern of the Akure meeting, besides emphasising the orders of the Ondo state government

should thus have been a decision to recommend the seizure  of all the guns of these killers because all that the meeting achieved could very soon turn a pyrrhic as long as they have not been separated from the guns which intoxicate them into committing serial crimes. It is only  when that is done that peace can return to this beleaguered country.

Research has shown that it is not the genuine Fulani herdsmen who are committing these crimes  but those who were  imported into Nigeria as cattle security men by  Fulani herd owners who are all very influential persons.

Below is how the Chinua Achebe Foundation report captures it:

“Most Nigerian Fulanis are no longer migratory herdsmen, but top men in all facets of the Nigerian economy who,  keen to maintain their cultural ownership of cattle, choose to  increase their wealth, astronomically, through the cattle business by  importing  Fulanis from outside Nigeria to rear their cattle. Instead of investing in ranches, they chose the cheaper alternative of having them take these cattle from the north to  the south; using the entire Nigerian space as their “grass kingdom”. These cattle, in turn, destroy most farms in their path thus rendering farmers in other parts of the country economically ruinéd. They also import the muscle men  whose job description, says the report, ”is just to kill”. “These ones  do not own cattle but are employed by cattle owners as “security men” whose job is strictly to protect the cattle”.

What the Akure meeting achieved, compared to the problem was, therefore, at best, tokenistic. The President must now graciously order the  seizure of  all the guns without which (guns), the murderous elements would become as powerless as those they now terrorise all over Nigeria. And once that is done, substantial peace would return to Nigeria. But

until the President gives that order, I shall hold that this government is not serious about ending insecurity in Nigeria.

A word then about the very careless manner in which the Oyo state governor has been handling  security matters in the state. Listening to his Security Adviser on Channels television the other day,  saying that the police in the state should have been  celebrating arrests, and not for once  saying that those kidnappings and killings should never have happened, I was convinced  as to where the lacuna comes from. It is a question of gabbage in gabbage out. Many people have been killed in Igangan, some kidnapped, and not a few raped, with about N50M allegedly paid in ransom, and what  titillates the Security Adviser is the   arrest of some Fulani herdsnen whose full prosecution may, any time, be stopped from above.

In the meantime,  the governor is being called out  in a WhatsApp chat,  to react to the following:

“Where was the governor when Dr Aborode was assasinated?

Where was he when Alh. Amubieya was kidnapped?

Where was the governor when Alh Olusegun Olosunde was kidnapped?

Where was he when OYSCATECH staffs were kidnapped?

Where was the governor when my uncle’s wife was butalised?

Where was he when Alh Subawah was assassinated?

Where was  he when Alh Monsuru was kidnapped?

Where was he when Baba Aso’s wife and Temitope Esther were kidnapped?

What of the killing of Oko Oloyun on Igboora-Eruwa road?

With the governor’s obvious lackadaisical approach to security, and with all these happening in only a part of the state when his primary responsibility is to ensure the  security of life and property of the state’s citizens, why,   exactly, would Oyo state not birth 100 Igboho’s?

By Femi Orebe

Lost the White House

Lost the Senate

Lost the House

Lost the popular vote

Lost Electoral College

Lost 60 suits in an attempted coup

The end of a pathetic Trumpian era.

Watching the Trump mob took over the United States capitol  complex evening of Wednesday, 6 January ’21, will go into the history books as a spectacle, one which film makers must do everything to permanently etch in our minds, forever. And should they need a title , any of these should do: As an Infantile Trump Goes Gaga, The Day Mobocracy Took Over America, The End Of Trumpism, or The Day Of The Jackal 2.

And know what: the event reminded me of a Dr Charles Arnade, my immaculately dressed, fast talking, Visiting  American Professor of History,  teaching  our American History class in the late ‘60’s  at the then University of Ife, Ile – Ife,  trying so hard to impress it on our young minds that Americans were a master class – a people who quit religious persecution in Europe, thought nothing of traversing thousands of kilometres, just to begin a new life in the New World, regardless of whatever the danger.

How a rabid, unthinking President Trump rubbished that brand?

This mobocracy was long in coming, especially since the coming of that big man with little hands into 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue, 4 November, 2016.

Asked in a Presidential television debate ahead of  the  2016 Presidential election if he would accept the result of an election in which he was defeated, he had replied: ”I will look at it at the time. I will keep you in suspense”.

Hilary Clinton, her opponent and candidate of the Democratic Party, had observed, fulsomely, as follows:

“Well, Chris, ( the host) let me respond to that because that’s horrifying.

You know, every time Donald thinks things are not going his direction,

He claims that whatever it is , is rigged against him.

He lost the Iowa caucus. He lost the Wisconsin primary and said the Republican primary was rigged against him.

Then his Trump University gets sued for fraud and racketeering. He claims the court system and the federal judge are rigged against him. There was even a time when he  didn’t get an Emmy for his  TV programme three years in a row, and he started tweeting that the Emmy was rigged against him”.Then the bombshell: “this is a mindset. This is how Donald thinks. And it’s funny. But it is also troubling because that isn’t how our democracy works”.

That, however, was only the beginning.

In 2018, Anonymous – author of  a White House tell-all book,  later revealed  by himself  to be Miles Taylor who had served as Homeland Security chief of staff in the Trump administration, and would later launch a group called the Republican Political Alliance for Integrity and Reform (or REPAIR for short) made up of “former U.S. officials, advisors, and conservatives under the Trump administration,  had organized  themselves silently working towards a leadership change in the White House and seeking to repair the Republican Party. They tried to lay bare, all the happenings in the Trump White House  which showed that the President was totally unqualified for high office.  He it was, who revealed, in a withering 2018 New York Times op-ed, that there was such a “resistance” within the Trump administration. After the op-ed was published, an irascible  President Donald Trump had blasted it as “gutless,” tweeting, “TREASON?” and writing that “If the GUTLESS, anonymous person does indeed exist, the Times must, for National Security purposes, turn him/her over to government at once”.

While outing himself in 2020, Taylor wrote: “Why I’m no longer ‘Anonymous, is that my book was “a character study of the current Commander in Chief, and a caution to voters that it wasn’t as bad as it looked inside the Trump Administration — it is worse.”  He wrote further: “Much has been made of the fact that these writings were published anonymously. The decision wasn’t easy, I wrestled with it, and I understand why some people consider it questionable to levy such serious charges against a sitting President under the cover of anonymity. But my reasoning was straightforward, and I stand by it. Issuing my critiques without attribution forced the President to answer them directly on their merits or not at all, rather than creating distractions through petty insults and name-calling. I wanted the attention to be on the arguments themselves.”

By the events of Wednesday, 6 January, ’21 during which the U.S Congress was completely shut down by insurrectionists who Trump had personally  promised to walk down to the capitol;  with four Americans dead, congress effectively shut down, and the office of the House Speaker turned completely upside down, President Trump has shown, conclusively, that a pig will always remain a pig, no matter how dressed up.

But Annonymous was not the last, either, as it has been followed up by several other books, among them: ‘UNHINGED’, by Omarosa Newman and both ‘FEAR’ and  ’RAGE’, by the incomparable Bob Woodward, a two time winner of the Pulitzer Prize. All the books had been critical of Trump but hardly would anything match what  his own mother was  alleged to have said of  him.

Though of a rather dubious source, it claims  that his mother, Mary Anne Trump, once said of the future President: “Yes, he’s an idiot with zero common sense, and no social skills, but he is my son. I just hope he never goes into politics. He’d be a disaster”. Even if the mother never said  any of those words, whoever ascribed them to her must have been truly prophetic. He would, indeed, be lucky to end his only term.

President Trump, like his father, who wont let apartments to blacks, is a narcissistic racist bigot, and God being ever so good, has ensured that he will be shamed out of office. I wonder if you, the reader, has seen the video of President Trump and his family watching that attempted ‘Nazi’ takeover of congress on TV, with his equally racist son so happy,  his girlfriend was  dancing  and Ivanka  doing a high five.

When the President  talks about making America great again, he is thinking only of  a return to a  slave owning America, when he says stop the steal, or that the  country or the election was being stolen, he was only mouthing shorthands for the  votes of Blacks and  other non white Americans who  he believes are illegal because,  for him, and his ilk, who  predominate non college graduate white Americans, these people are less than human.

Recall that in his absolutely shameless telephone calll to the  Republican Georgian secretary of state, he was hammering on votes from mostly Black populated areas of the state like Fulton.

However,  if anything shows how dark Trump’s inner mind is , it must be the shambolic manner in which Omarosa Newman was shoved off  from the White House.

Always on the lookout for a fall guy, Trump got Kelly, his then Chief of Staff, to do the dirty job of separating the black woman from him ,  her friend of 15 years, going back to the APPRENTICE, the TV programme that shot him  literally to the strastophere.

A normally brusque man who had never shown he even saw Omorosa who was Trump’s  Director of Communications for the office of Public lisison, Kelly had sent for her to meet him at The Situation Room, normally reserved for talks with world leaders. Without as much as any courtesies, he  brusquely told her: “We’re going to talk to you about leaving the White House. Its come to my attention there have been significant integrity issues related to you. They are very serious. If this were the military, it would deserve a court martial. I’d like to see this be a friendly departure. But it’s very important that you understand there are serious legal issues that have been violated…”.

Completely taken aback, she asked if the President  was aware of this? The brash man, like his boss who he is now vigorously badmouthing unlike those days when he played sissy, though a retired general, Kelly would only tell her: “the staff works for me, not for the President. So when you are gone, I’ll tell him”

It took a brilliant Omorosa, a former professor,  to put two and two together even though she had played no role in what led to it.  Like the infamous ACCESS HOLYWOOD TAPE which showed Trump at his most lurid, sexually perverted, another tape was about being outed, dating back to APPRENTICE days. Called the N-word Tape, it has shown Trump’s utter depravity when it comes to race. Bill Pruitt, a former Apprentice producer, had tweeted that there were tapes far worse than the Access Holywood Tape,  telling the NPR it contained “unfathomably despicable words about African Anericans, Jewish people and, of course, his whipping boys, the Mexicans.

Though Omarosa says she  hadnt heard Trump use those words or would have promptly resigned, she was now getting pissef off especially with Trump’s silly phone call to the wife of a killed soldier as well as what she described as Trump’s and Kelly’s racially charged attack on Representative Fredrica Wilson, who heard the call and told the press about it. To be sure she wasn’t playing the fool, being ‘herself a Black, she decided to try lay her hands on the tape to hear what it contained. She told a friend, who most probably told another, who must have told Kelly. Knowing how neck deep in racist bigotry Trump is, Omorosa had to go but it was cleverly presented  like Trump knew nothing about it, and with a coterie of lying Trump staff  linking her offence to a so- called mis- use  of  her official car.

I am sure President Trump’s travails have only just begun.

 

 

By Femi Orebe

So much is wrong with Nigeria that I personally no longer  know  what to think or believe. Indeed, I no longer know what to write, having severally repeated myself on issues which, not only I, but even well known  friends, and sympathisers, of President Buhari, the likes of the Emir of Katsina and His Eminence, the Sultan, have had cause to  say of recent concerning where the President  has landed  Nigeria.

Even as every organisation that has the flimsiest link to the North – Coalition of Northern Groups, the Arewa Youth Consultative Forum, NEF, ACF etc,  now equates the minutest criticism  of the Buhari government to regime change,  it cannot but be heartwarming  that  the usually forthright  NEF spokesperson,  Dr.  Hakeem Baba-Ahmed, could still permit hinself to say the  following before lunging into his withering criticism of Bishop Kukak: “There are many grounds to question the competence and sensitivity of President Buhari’s administration. Even his most ardent supporters, if he has any, that is, will wish he has shown greater respect for inclusion and accountability of those he chooses to trust with power. “The nation is paying a heavy price for mediocrity and ineffectiveness in key areas of decision-making under President Buhari”.

With truisms like this, one would not mind  putting  up with the obsequiousness of Presidential spokespersons, and those other hangers on, who are now so dim- witted they cannot offer the President some honest viewpoints even as Nigeria regresses daily under his watch. Even some so- called honourable  members were so unthinking they not only withdrew their invitation to him  on a matter as  critical as insecurity, but had to do so on bended knees. Where exactly is honour left amongst  those Nigerians who feed from the national treasury?

I am presently so completely tanked out having written  a whole year too early, on the topic: Annus

Horribilis on 29 December, 2019 which would have been most appropriate today, pandemic aside.

Readers will, therefore, please forgive me as I go back all the way to my archives to fetch an article that not only encapsulates the times, but generated as much heat, and trended on social media for well over two weeks, as now does the Bishop Kukah speech, when you take away his deliberately misinterpreted so – called call for army takeover.

Published, 15 Decenber, 2019, ‘What Is Happening Mr President?, was also deliberately misterpreted by those who either are mischief makers or who simply do not understand the English language, to be lured into thinking that I was on an errand for a particular politician who they say had an axe to grind with the President.  I had  no alternative than to urge them to go read my column from inception which, incidentally, went back to COMET, and so debuted long before The Nation itself. That incidentally is the way of busybodies.

That article will now be edited for space constraint.

Happy reading.

For those who may not know, I have more than established my bona fides as a supporter of President Muhammadu Buhari. When he was not even sure he would emerge the APC Presidential candidate for 2015, I  had written concerning  him, saying: “Nigeria, in its current dire straits, needs Buhari more than he needs Nigeria”.

This was repeated in a book by the late prof Tam David West when he wrote: “Buhari: The Politics of Age   October 14, 2014:

“Nigeria, in its current dire straits needs Buhari more than he needs Nigeria.” -Femi Orebe.

“The Nation on Sunday” September 28, 2014 Page 18″.

I write  that to show  not just  where I stand on the Nigerian political spectrum, but to let President Buhari  himself know that in asking what are bound to be thoroughly uncomfortable questions, they are not coming from enemy territory, but from the tortured  soul of a supporter of his, who has been at the receiving end of  those Nigerians who say I was one of those who sold them ‘a pig in a poke’, and  the most tribalistic  Nigerian President ever. In fairness to the critics, I have  often personally wondered  as to how the President still manages to sleep, that is, if he is able to, when he takes a hard look at how the North has come to so completely dominate the Nigerian public space under his watch  to the extent that one would be right to say Nigeria  is under a Northern stranglehold.

Worse really, is the fact that this seeming internal colonialism shows no signs of remission as various stratagems are still ongoing; examples being the Water Bill as well as  the case of the Federal Commission on Nomadic Education, which though has failed, maximally,  in its core function, given the number of out- of -school children in the North, but is now trying, coyly,  to insinuate itself into  the contentious grazing reserves matter which is aimed at sexing up Nigeria’s demographics in favour of the Fulani.

As I said earlier, these views of your government are now being shared by core Northerners. Like  one time House of Reps member, Dr Junaid Mohammed,  U S- based, Farooq A. Kperogi, has in fact gone to the extent of describing your government as ‘Government Of Buhari’s Family, By His Family, And For His Family’.

He wrote further:  Before he was sworn in as President in May 2015, Muhammadu Buhari, without prompting from anybody, publicly told his immediate and extended family members to stand back from his incoming government. He even warned that any family member who used his name to peddle influence would face dire consequences”. “I was so impressed by this declaration that in my May 16, 2015 column titled “6 Reasons Why Incoming Buhari Government Fills Me with Hope,” I isolated it as one of the six reasons I thought Buhari’s administration would “represent a qualitative departure from the legalised banditry that has passed for governance in Nigeria for so long.” Specifically, he continued : “Buhari’s symbolic but nonetheless significant gestures like telling family members to steer clear of his government and telling aides to obey traffic laws inspire me.”

I remember the President saying all that and I was beside myself with joy. You would, indeed, have ridden a horse in my belly.

But all those soon  dramatically  changed that the First Lady had to cry out, protesting what she called a hijack of  your government. I thought that was impossible.

If His Excellency  would kindly overlook the impertinence, could you please get the Presidency – no, not you in person Mr President, to  provide answers to the following  posers from  a younger friend of mine,  a retired Ambassador of the Federal Republic of Nigeria.

He taunted me as follows concerning ‘our government’:

“Finance, Customs, Immigration, FIRS, NPA, NNPC, AMCON, NDIC, Federal Mortgage Bank, are now firmly in the hands of Northerners.

Executive, Legislature, the Judiciary, Police, DSS, Armed Forces, minus the CDS, Oil, Airports and Seaports, are  all in the hands of Northerners.

Chief of Army Staff tenure is over. He is still in office

Chief of Air Staff tenure is over. He is still in office.

The EFCC  acting Chairman is from the North.

The terms of office of both the FIRS Chairman and DG NIMASA, both southerners’, are over and they were both replaced with Northerners”.

The rout is complete.

As I indicated above, I know that the First Lady  had once observed that you do not know many of  those working in your government,  but that notwithstanding, I think it is necessary  I remind  your Excellency, that Nigeria presently has no less than 250 ethnic groups’, divided into  6 geo – political zones . Under no circumstances should these things happen as they are  totally unconscionable, and a matter of great discomfort  for those of us still  supporting you in this part of the country. It is extremely nauseating  that a part can so  horribly dominate the rest when those others are no slaves.

No genuine supporter of yours in the South can be happy, or roll out the drums for this state of affairs  as they are  not only unthinkable, but totally ungodly. It is  even worse, given Nigeria’s current realities of mass poverty and unremitting insecurity.

Unfortunately, Nigerians are not hearing a word from APC leaders in other parts of the country who toiled with you in forming the party on which  you rode to power, thus heedlessly, and selfishly, disappointing those they led to  the party.

Whatever you can do to correct these ungodly acts will be of great  help not only to your party, but will  molify the people somewhat ,  and most probably, secure a positive legacy for you. Otherwise all  your  contributions to Nigeria, at this extremely difficult times, may come to naught, which I pray, God forbid”

Concluding, Nigerians are in your hands O Lord.