By Femi Orebe
Many reactions trailed my last week article: ‘Periscoping The New Chief Of Staff To The President’, but let me take just two that actually zero-ed in on the same section of the article. Two readers, one a respected Yoruba elder, and the other, a University Professor, called to vigorously disagree with my opinion that Health Minister, Professor Isaac Adewole, should have resigned when Abba Kyari, the late Chief of Staff to the President, turned his ministry to an appendage of the ministry of Agriculture. Their reason was simple: that as we saw when Mrs Kemi Adeosun was replaced by Zainab Ahmed as Minister of Finance, and knowing what we now do about the Buhari government, a Fulani, most probably the man Adewole suspended, may very well have been appointed as his replacement. I honestly couldn’t agree less.
Congratulations to Professor Agboola Gambari, a highly regarded scholar – diplomat, on his appointment as the new Chief of Staff to the President. His appointment can only come as a surprise to those who do not know him as a keen Arewa ideologue. I expect him to use this opportunity to achieve at least two things, nationally, and personally. Given his advanced age and extensive experience at the world level, especially, having served in places like Myanmar and Iraq, two thoroughly atrocious countries, representing the U.N Secretary – General, he should be able to assist the President in mending a divided and painfully agonising Nigeria. Now with the new massive resurgence of banditry in Katsina, Kaduna and Zamfara portraying the government as weak, he should be able to dig deep into both the Boko Haram and banditry conundrum with a view to reaching an agreement which, apart from stanching the ferocious blood-letting on both sides , will also put a stop to these North-induced burning of billions and billions of naira which the country could have put to much better use especially in that part of the country which accounts for more than 70 percent of its national poverty level. He should also please devote some quality time to seriously interrogate the nuisance the Fulani Nationality Movement, (FUNAM) is fast turning to.
Only on May 02, 2020, that atavistic body issued a statement, saying, inter alia, to Northerners now being furiously rushed southwards: “We your leaders held meetings across the key Northern States of Sokoto, Bornu, Katsina, Kano, Yobe, Kebi, Bauchi and Kaduna. Our resolve is that Northern youths should move enmasse to Southern States. Relaunch the mass movement in ways they have never seen … If the towns and cities are hostile, hang out on the street corners, in uncompleted buildings, occupy the forests, pitch tents, make any where available as your abode, your rest places, your home.We urge you to be armed. The infidels may want to attack you”. Were this statement made by another group, the Nigerian police would have become unnessarily hyperactive but a whole two weeks after, mum has been it from both the police and presidential spokespersons.
On the personal level, if Professor Gambari would be a little humble, he should be able to apologise for those unreflected positions he took on critical national issues that saw him asserting, for instance, that ”Nigerians don’t need democracy because democracy is not food. It is not their priority.” Equally, he should be able to make up for his many acts of repaying acts of goodness done him with unkind cuts. I need not delay my readers with examples some of which are already in the public space.
We wish Professor Gambari success.
Then to the issue for the day, a grievous matter of great national interest, given the way Northerners, but certainly NOT Almajiris, given their big, muscular frames, have been rushing to the South in waves, after waves, even after President Buhari had expressly banned interstate travel. In my view, this indicates that torrid days are ahead with regard to overall security in the country as these people could very well be killer herdsmen, elements of Boko Haram/ISWA soldiers or outright bandits. They are being moved like consignments of commodities, hidden behind cows or cement, and covered with very heavy tapaulen. All these in a country where even the President is preaching social distancing as a means of checking the spread of Covid-19. It is in that way, reminiscent of the Atlantic slave trade, that some evil minded characters are transporting these unfortunate Nigerians from the extremities of Northern Nigeria, in blazing sun and inclement weather, over hundreds of kilometers.
The hurried manner in which they are being moved point to the fact that the people behind this scheme are up to no good. The minders are either preparing for a massive uprising in the South, which will first see a re-enactment of their now well-known raping, killing and kidnapping or, alternatively, trying to plant an advance party for RUGA which the South rejected, to the last man, and will continue to reject even with the last drop of their blood. Initially coyly presented by the Federal Government as a silver bullet for herders/farmers clashes, RUGA was to have seen Fulani herdsmen, respledently settled in well provisioned new towns, carved out of other peoples’ ancestral lands, while the owners of the land would have been left eke-ing out life in their old, decrepit ways.
Such equity!
This exodus of biblical proportions, with the characters packed, it can bear repetition, like sardine, hidden amongst cows or being haulaged in several trucks like cement, and being presented to vigilante groups in the South as commodity consignments, is certainly ill- intentioned and the fact that the Inspector General of Police has not deemed it fit to say a word about it, says a lot. God bless the eagled eyed vigilantes, they were not deceived as many of these uninvited guests were immediately turned back where they came from even though it is obvious that many of our forests down South may now be crawling with thousands of killer herdsmen, elements of Boko Haram, ISWA fighters and bandits.The last bit – their being in our forests, though conjectural, is a very reasonable supposition given their battle order from FUNAM, and whoever wants to dispute it must first explain to Nigerians how, with the President’s express ban on interstate travel still subsisting , these people are able to come down, all the way, from the furtherest corners of the North without being stopped by security agents who ought to have felt duty bound to, at least, respect the President’s directive on interstate travels. Nigerians are no longer deceived. A study by the Chinua Achebe Foundation has long shown that when herdsmen are to attack in a given area, directives are usually given from the top, to security agencies around the target area not to intervene in any manner. They usually show up long after the killings.
It is obvious that this exodus, hidden under the Covid-19 lockdown, must be a much bigger project than the well known herdsmen’s murdering escapades but whatever the motive or motives, those behind this project should know that things have since changed in the South. The people have taken their security into their own hands and would respect no orders not to respond in kind if attacked and their ancestral lands come under any threat. They should know that in no way would they over run the South like they did Benue and Plateau states. Nobody in these parts would live to see total strangers take an inch of their ancestral lands, talk less of raping their daughters and killing their wives.
God bless Dr Junaid Mohammed who has honestly called on his Northern brothers who might be behind all these shenanigans to think again. He has suggested that security operatives who collude in this matter should be investigated and those found guilty be brought to book but we know that is where it ends because those behind this macabre dance are executing an ethnic agenda to sex up the Nigerian population and make Nigeria the Fulani homeland as FUNAM has severally asserted. Thanks to them, we have long been told that Nigeria is the only country Allah has given to Fulanis as their homeland.To justify that joke , a people who arrived Nigeria for the first time ever in the 1800’s are claiming a one thousand year ownership of Nigeria. Prof Gambari should be able to let them know, in case they have forgotten their history, that of all Nigerian ethnic groups Fulanis arrived last and were tenants of the Hausas. This is contemporary, not ancient history.
Unfortunately, senior state officials being paid to ensure security of life and property of Nigerians are themselves, compromised and so continue to turn deaf ears to all these criminalities , in the process disrespecting the President and toying with the fate of Nigeria. One thing they should know though, is that recent experienves in Africa has shown that nobody is too important, or powerful, to find him or herself in a refugee camp, especially in a foreign land. That will ring truer in a post Covid-19 world when the West would no longer be ready to welcome our overly exposed politicians.
A stitch in time can still save nine if only some people would just be less prideful.
Leave a Reply