By Former minister of aviation, Femi Fani-Kayode.
Last week I wrote an essay titled “The Road To
Kigali” which was widely published.
The callous response of the Northern governors
to the horrendous events in Enugu state has
compelled me to write this contribution as
something of a follow-up.
These are difficult and troubling times and
these are times that the truth needs to be
spoken. I appreciate those who publish my
contributions in my various columns because, in
a country that hates to hear the truth and
that finds it difficult to comprehend and
grasp reality, that in itself takes courage.
I also appreciate the increasing large number
of Nigerians from all over the world that take
the time to read my contributions because
without them there would be no point in
writing.
On April 30th, 2016 Mr. George Akinola wrote
the following words on Facebook:
“When the Fulani exploded on the geographic
space later christened Nigeria in 1804, they
did not negotiate power with the Hausas, they
seized it from them on the battlefield.
When the same Fulani appeared in Ilorin in
1823, purportedly to assist Afonja, the Are-
Ona-Kakanfo of Oyo and the ruler of Ilorin, in
revolt against his sovereign, Alafin Aole, the
Alafin of Oyo, it was to gain his confidence for
a while and a vantage position to murder him.
Ilorin has been under Fulani rule since then
and up until today.
When the British colonized all these empires,
kingdoms and fiefdoms in the 19th century, it
was not out of love for the black man.
It was an imperialistic push for more land,
more territories to exploit minerals and other
resources from. If you did not agree by subtle
pressure, they simply applied the brute force.
To hell with you and all you cared for!
When the Fulani attacked Yorubaland in 1825,
they gave all our ancestors notice that they
intended to bury the Quran in the sea at the
backyard of the Yoruba empire and kingdoms.
Meaning? They will kill, destroy, maim, trample
on men, women, children and all that we hold
dear to achieve this goal. This was not by
negotiation or a bargaining deal.
Blood was on the cards and red was its colour.
Thank God for the fierce resistance of the
Yoruba, rallying at Ibadan.
If not, maybe we will be doing “ranka dede” to
one clown Emir of Ado-Ekiti or another
comedian Emir of Abeokuta today.
Power does not give way to persuasion. Power
only succumbs to superior power.
Fast forward to 1960. The new nation had just
gained independence. But the drums of
drunken power was already pulsating with
madness in the heart of Ahmadu Bello, the
leader of NPC, the party that won the 1959
elections, and which assumed the reins of
power to lead Nigeria at independence.
Note that this was the great grandson of
Uthman Dan Fodio, the leader of the 1804
Fulani Jihad. He made his intention, and the
intention of the Fulani, clear in this now
infamous statement: Hear Ahmadu Bello in the
Parrotnewspaper of October 12th, 1960:
“The new nation called Nigeria should be an
estate of our great grandfather Uthman Dan
Fodio. We must ruthlessly prevent a change of
power. We use the minorities in the North as
willing tools and the south as a conquered
territory and never allow them to rule over us
and never allow them to have control over
their future.”
I am sure you did not read any entreaties of
love, affection and camaraderie disposition in
that statement. It was harsh, callous, wicked,
sadistic, exploitative, intimidating and
wholesomely damning.
That is drunken power talking with inspiration
from the lunatic fringe.
When he eventually paid for it with his life, his
inheritors found a way to re-invent their
stranglehold on Nigeria.
They came in through the military and
continued, in a more draconian fashion, the
bleeding exploitation of Nigeria. What we
inherited from the British was “self-governing
Regions of the Federal Republic of Nigeria.”
Now we are forcibly united by an unfeeling
centre. What we inherited was a revenue
allocation formula that was largely derivative.
Now it is almost ‘allocative’ . At a point,
Mohammed Buhari reduced the 50 percent
derivation formula to one percent.
These parasites are barracudas and Shylocks of
the highest order.
The only language these savages understand is
the one that brought them there in the first
case: force.
This may be subtle through the use of the
instrumentality of guerrilla journalism,
protests, occupation, civil resistance, civil
disobedience, referendum, United Nations
appeal, international coalition of forces, etc.
On the other hand it may boom through the
barrel of the gun in a violent uprising or
revolt, civil or guerrilla warfare.
Either way, force is force.
The irreducible decimal is that the Yoruba
reject enslavement, the appropriation of their
resources without their approval and illegal
occupation of their God given land with all iota
of their soul and with all the power in their
being.
Whether for one second or for 200 years, the
enemy shall not feel comfortable until they
leave.
With reference to how they will leave,
however, the choice remains theirs: either on
foot, running helter-skelter, on stretchers, in
trailers, buses, straddled on horses or loaded
in coffins.
But, leave, they shall, when superior power
speaks!
These are harsh and frightful words yet Mr.
Akinola’s historical analysis and assessment is
first class. He has spoken nothing but the
truth no matter how bitter that truth may be.
This takes courage and I commend him for it.
I deplore violence and I do not advocate or
condone it in any shape or form. I do not want
anyone to leave our land “loaded in coffins” or
in body bags and neither do I believe that
violence and bloodshed leads to anything but
even more violence and bloodshed. It is nothing
but a vicious cycle.
However the type of rhetoric that is now being
expressed by our southern youth and
intellectuals about the situation in Nigeria, and
particularly about the excesses of the Fulani
cannot be ignored or downplayed.
We ignore the words of people like Mr. George
Akinola, Mr. Babatunde Gbadamosi, Mr.
Grandson Soyemi and so many others at our
own peril.
Clearly there is tension and anger in the land.
The spirit of division is rife and it is getting
stronger by the day. Things are getting hotter
and tempers are flaring. Nigeria is beginning
to unravel at the seams. We must all be very
careful not to set a match to the tinderbox.
Thankfully there are still a number of Fulani
and non-Fulani voices in the North who
represent a moderate and sane disposition and
who have nothing to do with the hegemonist or
religious agenda of the bigots and the
hardliners.
I am talking about men like Colonel Abubakar
‘Dangiwa’ Umar, Mallam Nuhu Ribadu, Alhaji
Kashim Ibrahim Imam, Alhaji Ibrahim Turaki
(SAN) and so many others. I know every single
one of these individuals and I can vouch for
them.
These are the sort of people who are still
holding the country together by giving
southerners hope that the voice of moderation,
reason and restraint still exists in the North,
and that that voice may eventually prevail. Yet
the fire continues to burn on the mountain and
tempers are still rising.
The insulting warning to the South from the 19
Northern governors just the other day made
matters worse. That contribution did not help
to calm the storm but instead it has further
frayed nerves. Simply put the Northern
governors have rubbed raw salt into our
Southern wounds.
They said that Southerners should “not insult
the Fulani again” and that even though they
deplored what their kinsmen, the Fulani
herdsmen, did in Enugu the other day, that
does not mean that “their people” ought to be
insulted.
This is all they had to say after thousands of
southerners have been killed, maimed, raped,
abducted and tortured in the sanctity of their
own homes and land by the Fulani militants and
herdsmen over the last one year alone, and
after over one hundred Igbos were
slaughtered in Enugu state just a few days
ago.
They even went a step further by saying that
they intend to take the cue from Kaduna
state and introduce the licensing of all
churches and preachers in all the states of the
North.
This is a deep insult to every christian worth
his salt, to the clergy and to the church. It is
also a surreptitious attempt to curb the
spreading of the gospel in Northern Nigeria.
If ever the Northern governors had an all-
time low, this is it.
Instead of them burying their heads in shame
and appealing to the rest of Nigeria to
forgive them and their kith and kin for their
collective and historical sins, the Fulani leaders
are still issuing threats to the rest of us
through their surrogates, leaders and
governors.
This is unacceptable. Such reckless arrogance
and callous insensitivity does not serve them
well and neither does it engender peace and
reconciliation in our country. Instead it is
provocative and insulting and can only lead to
a greater degree of alienation and more
misunderstanding.
Sadly the 17 southern governors could not
even muster the resolve to organize their own
meeting and respond to the slur in a virile and
responsible manner. Instead they all ran for
cover and chose to dwell in the safety and
comfort of a cowardly and conspiratorial
silence.
How I wish that men like Chief Obafemi
Awolowo, the Leader of the Yoruba; Dim
Odumegwu-Ojukwu, the Ikenga of Igboland Dr.
Chuba Okadigbo, the former Senate President;
Chief Alfred Rewane, one of the greatest and
most fearless southern elders that ever lived;
and Chief Harold Dappa Biriye, the Leader of
the Ijaw nation were still with us. How I wish
that men like Chukwuemeka Ezeife, Orji Uzor
Kalu and Chimaroke Nnamani were still
governors. How I wish that people like Ojo
Maduweke and Ebenezer Babatope were still
federal ministers.
Meanwhile the people of the South are still
grieving and suffering immeasurable pain as a
consequence of the gratuitous violence and evil
that we have been subjected to at the hands
of these murderous Fulani herdsmen over the
last ten months.
We are still mourning our dead and indeed all
the innocent and defenseless souls, including
women and children, who were murdered in
cold blood in Enugu state just a few days ago.
The truth is that as long as those that
represent the Fulani militants and herdsmen
continue to try to justify or rationalise their
beastly behaviour and threaten the south
there will be people like Mr. George Akinola
who will respond with the sort of rhetoric that
he has expressed in this contribution.
There would also be far more than mere
rhetoric and this, more than anything else,
saddens me because I am a man of peace and I
deplore violence.
Yet you cannot expect people to sit by silently
and watch their loved ones and kith and kin
being slaughtered like Christmas turkeys and
Sallah rams on a daily basis by a bunch of
uncouth, vulgar and unlettered barbaric beasts
who are suffering from some kind of vampiric
blood lust, and who are plagued and afflicted
with a cult-like Janjaweed syndrome.
It would be most unwise for the Fulani leaders
and indeed the leaders of the north to ignore
such sentiments and dismiss them with the
usual contempt.
It is important that the Fulani militants and
herdsmen are reigned in and that they stop
killing southerners and occupying our land.
It is important that the Buhari administration
stops encouraging and covertly supporting
them in their mass murder and savage
butchery.
It is important that the greater and wider
agenda to conquer the south, to take our
lands, to dominate and Islamise our people and
to discredit, destroy, jail and kill all vocal and
credible Southern leaders that have opted to
stand up against them be brought to a halt.
It is important that the master plan to
subjugate the people of the south to perpetual
bondage and slavery at the hands of the
Fulani be stopped.
It is only when that happens that we can
guarantee lasting peace in our nation. It is
only when this is done that people like Mr.
George Akinola and all the other young rising
Southern stars will stop saying the sort of
things that they are saying.
It is only when that happens that they will stop
speaking and reflecting the minds of millions
of Southerners who are fed up with what is
going on in our country and who are prepared
to stand up, challenge the powers that be,
break the yoke of bondage and slavery and
fight for their freedom.
Permit me to end this contribution with the
reaction of Afenifere, the leading Yoruba
socio-cultural organisation, to the insults of
the 19 northern governors.
On May 1, 2016, the Sunday Vanguard
newspaper reported as follows:
The Yoruba group, which spoke through their
national publicity secretary, Mr. Yinka
Odumakin, told Sunday Vanguard:
“It (the northern governors’ position) is a sign
of unfeeling, uncaring for any group today to
come out and say that those who have been
causing problems and killing people in the
Middle Belt and the South are not Fulani
herdsmen. They have killed in Agatu land,
Enugu; a traditional ruler was killed in Delta
state; they killed Chief Olu Falae’s guard and
also kidnapped chief Falae himself. For some
people to gather and call themselves northern
governors, and have no sympathy for lives
than to be defending the Fulani herdsmen,
shows clearly that it is a tragedy of
monumental proportion to be in the same
country with these elements. You also begin to
wonder if the blood of human beings runs in
their veins because anybody that has human
blood running in his veins will not come and say
that Fulani herdsmen are not responsible. What
nonsense.”
The Afenifere spokesperson went on: “I think
the northern governors should bury their
heads in shame. I do not think they are fit to
be in the comity of civilized human beings. If
the attackers are not Fulani herdsmen, where
have they struck in the North-West? Why are
their activities only in the Middle Belt and in
the South? That is the question these
northern governors should answer. When
militants were blowing up pipelines in the
South-South, were they not called Niger Delta
militants? Do they want us to call them
Yoruba herdsmen?”
As always, Afenifere has done the Yoruba, and
by extension the entire South, proud with their
courageous and timely intervention. They have
spoken for every single one of us that still has
his dignity and self-respect intact.
Let us hope that the Northern governors and
the murderers that they seek to defend get
the message.
Let us hope that they can purge themselves of
the unwholesome and denigrating contempt
that they clearly have for the people of the
South before it is too late and before the
whole damn nation explodes and breaks into a
thousand pieces.
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