I have been saddened since President Muhammadu Buhari made his Democracy Day speech last Sunday, the 29th of May. I had felt that I was the only one who noticed that he made no mention of Fulani Herdsmen amongst groups he declared security threats to the nation, despite the fact that the group, his kinsmen may have killed more people, who hadn't the opportunity to fight back, than the official enemy of the state with whom his government now seem set to dialogue, the fundamentalist Islamic group, Boko Haram.
Interestingly, the next day security forces clashed with unarmed pro-Biafra activists during a peaceful protest in Asaba, Onitsha and Nkpor, amongst several locations in the southeast, where according to the latest report forty of the protesters are said to have died, while two policemen lost their lives, in what seems to have become a recurring decimal each time protests like this takes place in the East of Nigeria. In fact, during an interview, which President Buhari granted Al-Jazeera months back, he refused to watch footage of security operatives swooping in on unarmed pro-Biafra activists during a prayer session, in an open field and shooting some of them in cold blood.
It pained me to note that a President of a multiethnic nation like Nigeria could be so sectional to ignore in that speech, the genocidal activity of his Fulani kinsmen, to focus on groups especially in the South by whose hands no life has yet been lost, and who after much criticisms for his silence over the continued menace of his kinsmen on the lives and livelihood of other Nigerians, simply claimed that the marauding Fulani were none other than strangers from Libya, despite mounting evidence in text and video that these were armed Fulani militia from Nigeria, ranked fourth on the global index of terrorist groups, whose activities aren't even covert but carried out with impunity, sometimes with the security agencies conveniently staying out of their way when and while they strike.
It is therefore with much sadness that I heard the Inspector General of Police, instructing his men to disarm unarmed pro-Biafra activists and protesters while he has never said anything close to that concerning Fulani Herdsmen who have replaced bows and arrows and sticks with AK-47's. The only group besides security forces, armed robbers and terrorists who travel with such light weapons, discharging bullets with reckless abandon, when simple citizens could spend the night or more (to be bailed only after parting with huge sums of money, and physical and mental torture) in the police cell for having a pen knife in their person during the usual illegal police "stop and search".
To compound my sadness, is the deafening silence amongst so called Igbo leaders, political or not, who haven't deemed it fit to confront the government for the wanton killings of their own for engaging in what is seen to be very legal in democracies worldwide, even going to the extent of calling their own hoodlums, at a time accused terrorists are been released in droves on the instance or prodding of the northern political, traditional and religious oligarchy. Even a former governor and now senator Kwankwaso from Kano came to Lagos to bail out Hausa youths arrested for complicity in the recent clashes between the Yoruba and Hausa in the Mile 12 Area of Lagos. It had to take an Ekiti governor, Ayo Fayose from the Southwest to stand with the Igbo youth for daring to mark the anniversary of the day in 1967 when the Late Dim Odumegwu Chukwuemeka Ojukwu, then a colonel, declared the Sovereign State of Biafra, separate from Nigeria, to which Nigeria responded with a war of attrition for three years, after the Igbo safety couldn't be guaranteed any longer within the geographical space called Nigeria, a situation that seems not to have changed much, not just in the North where many of them reside, but now even in their own land.
Nigeria may have survived the prophecy that it was doomed for disintegration in 2015, but it doesn't mean that it can't still happen in the immediate or remote future, especially with a sectional president who feels that the so called oneness of Nigeria is non-negotiable, and would die rather than see the day, than submit like former Vice President Abubakar Atiku did at a book launch recently on the subject of Biafra, that Nigeria needs to be restructured such that the constituent parts can have a sense of belonging. Unfortunately, President Buhari has chosen to waste this golden opportunity to become a statesman, even stating that the document from what is viewed by some, as a flawed National Conference held while former President Goodluck Jonathan was in power isn't worth even as much as a skimming through for some of its merits. Of course, with that attitude, it isn't surprising that vistas of hotspots are opening up in different places all over Nigeria with each passing day, chief of which is the Niger Delta Avengers who have managed to half Nigeria's crude oil production capacity with their precision attacks on oil drilling platforms and pipelines, while the economy seems to be trying to drill into the earth's core at the rate at which it's falling, just months after he came into power, and Nigeria's economy was adjudged the biggest and fastest growing in Africa, and third in the world. He forgets easily, that the trouble we brew today, we drink tomorrow!
'kovich
PICTURE CREDIT:
- http://www.nigerianeye.com
Interestingly, the next day security forces clashed with unarmed pro-Biafra activists during a peaceful protest in Asaba, Onitsha and Nkpor, amongst several locations in the southeast, where according to the latest report forty of the protesters are said to have died, while two policemen lost their lives, in what seems to have become a recurring decimal each time protests like this takes place in the East of Nigeria. In fact, during an interview, which President Buhari granted Al-Jazeera months back, he refused to watch footage of security operatives swooping in on unarmed pro-Biafra activists during a prayer session, in an open field and shooting some of them in cold blood.
UNARMED PRO-BIAFRA ACTIVISTS HOLDING A PEACEFUL PROTEST BEFORE THINGS WENT AWRY
It pained me to note that a President of a multiethnic nation like Nigeria could be so sectional to ignore in that speech, the genocidal activity of his Fulani kinsmen, to focus on groups especially in the South by whose hands no life has yet been lost, and who after much criticisms for his silence over the continued menace of his kinsmen on the lives and livelihood of other Nigerians, simply claimed that the marauding Fulani were none other than strangers from Libya, despite mounting evidence in text and video that these were armed Fulani militia from Nigeria, ranked fourth on the global index of terrorist groups, whose activities aren't even covert but carried out with impunity, sometimes with the security agencies conveniently staying out of their way when and while they strike.
It is therefore with much sadness that I heard the Inspector General of Police, instructing his men to disarm unarmed pro-Biafra activists and protesters while he has never said anything close to that concerning Fulani Herdsmen who have replaced bows and arrows and sticks with AK-47's. The only group besides security forces, armed robbers and terrorists who travel with such light weapons, discharging bullets with reckless abandon, when simple citizens could spend the night or more (to be bailed only after parting with huge sums of money, and physical and mental torture) in the police cell for having a pen knife in their person during the usual illegal police "stop and search".
To compound my sadness, is the deafening silence amongst so called Igbo leaders, political or not, who haven't deemed it fit to confront the government for the wanton killings of their own for engaging in what is seen to be very legal in democracies worldwide, even going to the extent of calling their own hoodlums, at a time accused terrorists are been released in droves on the instance or prodding of the northern political, traditional and religious oligarchy. Even a former governor and now senator Kwankwaso from Kano came to Lagos to bail out Hausa youths arrested for complicity in the recent clashes between the Yoruba and Hausa in the Mile 12 Area of Lagos. It had to take an Ekiti governor, Ayo Fayose from the Southwest to stand with the Igbo youth for daring to mark the anniversary of the day in 1967 when the Late Dim Odumegwu Chukwuemeka Ojukwu, then a colonel, declared the Sovereign State of Biafra, separate from Nigeria, to which Nigeria responded with a war of attrition for three years, after the Igbo safety couldn't be guaranteed any longer within the geographical space called Nigeria, a situation that seems not to have changed much, not just in the North where many of them reside, but now even in their own land.
Nigeria may have survived the prophecy that it was doomed for disintegration in 2015, but it doesn't mean that it can't still happen in the immediate or remote future, especially with a sectional president who feels that the so called oneness of Nigeria is non-negotiable, and would die rather than see the day, than submit like former Vice President Abubakar Atiku did at a book launch recently on the subject of Biafra, that Nigeria needs to be restructured such that the constituent parts can have a sense of belonging. Unfortunately, President Buhari has chosen to waste this golden opportunity to become a statesman, even stating that the document from what is viewed by some, as a flawed National Conference held while former President Goodluck Jonathan was in power isn't worth even as much as a skimming through for some of its merits. Of course, with that attitude, it isn't surprising that vistas of hotspots are opening up in different places all over Nigeria with each passing day, chief of which is the Niger Delta Avengers who have managed to half Nigeria's crude oil production capacity with their precision attacks on oil drilling platforms and pipelines, while the economy seems to be trying to drill into the earth's core at the rate at which it's falling, just months after he came into power, and Nigeria's economy was adjudged the biggest and fastest growing in Africa, and third in the world. He forgets easily, that the trouble we brew today, we drink tomorrow!
'kovich
PICTURE CREDIT:
- http://www.nigerianeye.com
So well analysed. PMB has shown very clearly that he's sympathetic with his nefarious siblings. Now, the media deceives the world by calling these gun-wielding men as Fulani Herdsmen. They’re Fulani Terrorists! And the president being a Fulani patron is actually complicit in the genocide. We must get the narrative right soon enough.
ReplyDeleteI couldn't agree more with you, it's even more unfortunate when people you expect to know better can't see beyond their noses.
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