People following cows are carrying guns publicly and no one is doing anything about it —Tola Adeniyi

THE way some concerned leaders have been crisscrossing the country lately amply reinforces the fears of manyt Nigerians about the state of the nation. As a senior citizen, how do you see the way things are in Nigeria today?

The way things are has been frightening. Nobody in their wildest imagination would have expected that Nigeria would come to this depth of villainy; this depth of insecurity, this depth of bloodletting, this depth of apprehension and fear that has enveloped everybody in the country from Sokoto to Port Harcourt; from Maiduguri to Abeokuta. It is all over the country and it is all self-inflicted.

 

How do you mean?

It is self-inflicted because, one, Boko Haram didn’t just emerge in Borno State; it was self-inflicted because Mohammed Yusuf started the group and a former governor of the state was said to have assembled the members as thugs and after winning an election, he didn’t take care of them and they started rioting. Then, when their leader was arrested by the military and handed over to the police, they killed him in cold blood. That was the genesis of the crisis and since then, they didn’t get the kind of support they expected from the local communities and they thought that they should turn their back against the society; they started killing, harassing, bombing and all that. The ugly trend was soon hijacked by international terrorism and that is why we are where we are today, whereas in 2009, all that was needed was just for the authorities to call the leaders of Boko Haram. One, they shouldn’t have killed Mohammed, but even after killing him, the government should have apologised and because it is a psychological thing, their psychology was bruised. So, what got blown into Boko Haram was a vengeance war. They were just avenging the death of their leader and that could have been sorted out in the beginning with apology from the authorities and meeting them at a point that would be mutually agreeable. Now the ingredients for the fighters were people that had been left unattended to for generations. The North, in spite of the fact that the leaders have had power for over 42 years, remains the poorest, the least educated; the least of everything in the country. So, the children that were not taken care of over the years have become materials for all the terrorism and I remember that Chief Obafemi Awolowo warned years ago that ‘if you do not provide education and prepare for the future of these children, they are going to hunt all of us forever’ and that is what is happening from Maiduguri to Sokoto. You just have children, children, children and children and abandon them to all Nigerians and unless you educate those children, provide for their livelihood and give them hope for the future, this problem will never go away and, of course, we know that Nigeria will not remain one. Nigeria is already dead as a country; we are just waiting for the undertakers to bury the place.

 

Why do you think a breakup is the solution to the problems of Nigeria?

It is not a question of being a solution; it is just that the philosophies of the people that are yoked together are not the same. As diverse as Europe is, they still have almost the same culture. As diverse as the people of the United States of America are, they still have the same culture. As diverse as the people living in Canada are, they still have the same culture. But you cannot say that about Nigeria. There is no Nigerian culture; there is no Nigerian identity. To say you are a country or a nation, there must be a national identity; there must be a national culture; there must be world view. We don’t have that.

 

Are you saying that after almost 60 years of independence and more than 100 years after the amalgamation of the northern and Southern protectorates by the British colonial masters, Nigeria still does not have a national identity? 

You all know that when the British were tired and could no longer sustain the system, they had to go. They finished their business, took our money, gold and everything they wanted to take and then asked [Frederick] Lugard to just bring the South and the North together; let them say they have become one country and then give them a name called Nigeria and Nigeria was the same name they gave to the North before and after merging the protectorates, they decided to call the entire land space Nigeria. So, it is not a question of being a solution, it is just that it will happen, whether in my lifetime or in the lifetime of my children or grandchildren. No force on earth can keep this country together forever. I mean, we have seen examples: Yugoslavia and the Union of Soviet Socialist Republic (USSR) could not stay, as well as India that the British left, which broke into three: Pakistan and Bangladesh. So, we are just different people and we recognise that.

 

A school of thought believes the problem of the country has to do with the unitary constitution it operates?

We don’t even have a constitution. We shouldn’t be talking about the kind of constitution. When General Abdulsalami Abubakar was about to leave office in 1999, they had this military paper that they just signed and then used as a constitution. So, it is a military paper. A constitution is a sort of laws made by the people to serve the people. What we have is not a set of laws made by the people; not a set of laws sanctioned by the people, so it not a constitution. We just have a military decree broken down in some pieces and they called it the constitution. The problem predates 1999.

 

Let’s talk briefly on a few burning issues that seem to have placed the country on the cliffhanger. The country is simultaneously confronting insurgency, banditry, kidnapping, abduction and other forms of heinous crimes and the assumption before now was that such tendencies would not spread to the South West in the kind of scale being witnessed in the area. What do you think went wrong?

Book Haram, like I said, was a vengeance adventure. But what you now have is slightly different from the Boko Haram agenda. What you have is Buhari’s agenda to bring the Fulani that have never created a city in their life, that have never created a town in their life; that have never created a settlement in their life; that have always been nomadic, to a space where they can live and dominate. That is the agenda and that is what is causing the problem. So, you find that most of the people that are behind kidnapping and so on are not the Fulani of Nigeria, though they are still together from what they told us, from what [Nasir] el-Rufai admitted. So, these people who were left uncared for and the source of their sustenance didn’t meet their expectations, went wild. That is the  version we heard and that is what is happening and it fits into the agenda of bringing more Fulani  into Nigeria and that is why they are attacking people even in Zamfara and Sokoto and that is why I said the problem we are having is not just localised to western Nigeria. We thought it won’t get to western Nigeria, not because we are stupid but because we felt if they wanted to bring the Fulani to Nigeria, let them stay in the North; I mean the core north; they can’t come to Benue or Plateau. They have taken over some local governments areas in Plateau State already. They can’t come and do that again; they have taken over places in Southern Zaria in Kaduna State. So, we thought we were immune from this. Why should they come here? But they have realised they have been supported by their tacticians that make sure you get political power in western Nigeria. Once you get the political power, then the people you put in power will be your surrogates who will carry out your wish and that is what is happening. And that is why the Yoruba seem helpless in the face of the assault.

 

 Are you saying that the present governors in Yoruba land are surrogates of the establishment at the centre?

I don’t want to start castigating the governors but to tell them that the people are with them. We don’t want to blame them; they are helpless as at this point.

 

Why?

They don’t control the police. That is the kind of military paper they used to rule the country for years. And that is the absence of real democracy, the absence of true federalism that you have the governor of a state that is not in charge of security of the state. Nigeria is the only country on earth where the premier or the governor of a state or a region is not in charge of their own security. In Canada, for instance, you have a province called Ontario, even every city, including Toronto, has its own police that has nothing to do with the prime minister of the country. In some federal and con-federal countries, the federating units even have their own armies. So, if there is a war, your state or province will contribute your own army to that central pool.  I am saying the Yoruba governors, Taraba governor, Zamfara governor and the Sokoto governor should realise that they are in office and in power by the will of their people.  It is the Yoruba people who voted the governors into office; it is not the party, so their loyalty should, first of all, be to the people who put them in office. The Yoruba senators, the Benue State senators and the Ijaw senators should, first and foremost, give loyalty over and above every other thing, to the people who voted them into power. Then, their loyalty is to their political party. But if they find out that the party is not executing its agenda, they have a moral right, because the people put them in power, to side with their people against the party. Thirdly, the president of a country, whether Nigeria or the US, or whatever, is just first among equals. The president of Nigeria should not be seen and should not be treated as an overlord. The governors should realise that they are not appendages to the president. They should not be because they fear that they will not get their federal allocation because of the whims and caprices of the president, which shouldn’t be. It is statutory and so, when former President Olusegun Obasanjo withheld the local government allocation for Lagos State, the state government went to court and won. So, the governors of the Yoruba states in particular should not be afraid of being denied of their statutory allocations. If the Federal Government withholds their allocation, they should just go to court. We are saying that the Yoruba governors in particular are assured that their people are solidly behind them. They must, therefore, give a listening ear to their people. The Yoruba people do not want Ruga or rogue – whatever they call it. The Yoruba people will not give an inch of their land to foreigners to come and dominate them, and the governors know that. So, they must, as a moral obligation, support their people in defending their ancestral lands even though they are not in charge of the police or the army.

However, the question they should ask themselves at all times is: the people carrying AK47, are the AK47 given to them by government? If the Ak47 are not given to them by government, the Yoruba governors must also find out how these people came by guns and do the same for their own people. It is as simple as that. You cannot say people should not carry guns, they should not own guns and yet a section of the country displays guns in the full glare of everybody and nobody is doing anything about it. They see people following cows carrying guns on their shoulders and nobody is doing anything.

They carry all sorts of guns and ammunition, where did they get these guns?  Who bought them for them because the people carrying those guns cannot afford the money to buy them? And I have always said we should make a distinction: the Fulani herdsmen do not own guns. I was a herdsman myself; I was herding cattle from Lagos to Ijebu-Ode. I never carried a gun; we carried sticks. Nobody following cows has money to buy guns. So, it means somebody is buying guns for them and we know that those who are following cows are not even the people killing or kidnapping. Those who are doing that are a militia created by some people for a purpose. And the militia is being empowered and enriched by foreigners who are now joining forces with them to create the Ruga settlement or whatever name they call it in Ondo, Taraba, Benue or even in Zamfara because they want to change the demography of Nigeria. They want to make it such that the Fulani that will now become the largest ethnic group in Nigeria, which has never happened anywhere in the world. Even in Futa Jallon, where they come from, they have no say there; in Mali, they are being chased away and in South Africa, they have been defeated and almost chased out of the place and they cannot do what they are doing in Nigeria in Ghana. The president of Ghana said if you see any Fulani man roaming about with cattle, kill the cattle and get the cattle into the barbecue. And that Ghana is not Nigeria. But we don’t want to do that; we don’t want to be violent. Let Nigeria break up in peace, not in pieces. Let leaders, governors sit down and find a lasting solution the way it was done in Czechoslovakia: the Czechs went their way; Slovak went their way. No bloodshed, no violence. It was in peace.

 

So, what kind of synergy would you recommend between the governors and National Assembly members from the South West?

I wrote an article a week ago challenging the National Assembly members on why they have lost their voices. They are killing people in Benue, Taraba; don’t they have people in the Senate?  Don’t they have people in the House of Representatives? Can they talk? Can they shout? Don’t the Ijaw people have people in the National Assembly; don’t they have in the state Houses of Assembly? Why should they allow cows to be disturbing students in their classrooms in the secondary school? Those people in Ogun State where such an ugly situation existed, what are they doing?  What are the people in Saki doing, they have representatives in the legislative arm of government at the federal and state levels? Who has put a padlock in their mouths? Then, we have the National Council of State (NCS) comprising former heads of state. What do they do when they go to their meetings? Why did they become dumb and deaf there? Don’t they see what is going on? Why are they quiet? Have they all been compromised? They are rendering a terrible disservice to the country because as they say, evil people can always have their way when the good ones (people) keep quiet.

India is going to the moon, other countries are developing electrical cars all over the world and the United Arab Emirates is doing wonders. We are still debating about cows in the street; cows on the runways at our airports; cows on the overhead bridges and highways. I have lived in Canada for 25 years and I have never seen a single live cow in that country. I never saw one in the United Kingdom, where I went to school for my Master’s degree, where I taught in the university, where I worked at the newspapers there; I never saw a live cow. I never saw a live cow in the US, when I was working at the Atlanta Enquirer in the State of Georgia. Why should we be talking about cow always in 2019 in Nigeria when you know that in Sokoto, you can do what is called fodder: have a large expanse of land covered and you plant some grass that will grow to eight feet in less than 24 hours? And you feed your cow there? Or at worst, let the southern part of Nigeria and the Eastern part of Nigeria grow grasses, export to the North and feed your cattle. Why should we subject any human being to trekking from Sokoto to Port Harcourt? Why should we subject any cow to trek from Sokoto to Kano and to Port Harcourt? Why should Nigeria be debating a Stone Age phenomenon in 2019? That is what I was telling you that our world view is different.

I should always make this point: the issue at hand is not religion.  It is about land. It is about expansionism, it is about some people wanting to come and take over your ancestral land and dominate you. All the people that took over other people’s land in Plateau State are not all Muslims, they are not all farmers; they are not all herdsmen; just come and dominate people. The Federal Government gave them land, took land from other people and settled them there and the owners of the land cannot go back to their land; they cannot go back to their local government. That is the issue. When people kidnap on the street, they don’t ask you whether you are Muslim or a Christian. Those who ravaged a village near Isara Remo in Ogun State, they burnt down school and mosques. Even the Boko Haram people, I can tell you from statistics that they have killed more Muslims than Christians. They have destroyed more mosques than churches. So, it has nothing to do with religion at all. And it has nothing to do with Islamisation. Nobody can Islamise Nigeria. Nobody can force any religion on people. It is not possible.

 

Then, what is the agenda?

The agenda is to bring the Fulani from all over the world – Central Africa, West Africa – to come and be domiciled in Nigeria, change the demographics of Nigeria so that they would have a country they can call their own and control the indigenous people of Nigeria and drive them into exile, let some of them live in refugee camps forever. People driven away from their land in Palestine, some of them have been living in refugee camps since 1949, 70 years ago. That is what they want to replicate in Nigeria. But it cannot happen because by the time they come out with this agenda and it becomes full blown, the country would have gone into splinters. Some people may think that they are going to overrun the place in 10 seconds, no! They should go and read history. They should go and ask what happened to them in Osogbo. The powers of our people that they used in Osogbo are still there. So, let nobody be deceived. And the military that fought the Biafra war is not the same military that we have now. There can never be another Benjamin Adekunle or another Shotomi, or another Akinrinade, or another Alabi, you don’t have such characters in the military anymore.  So, we are saying that those who are still living in this geographical space, we should all address their brains, hearts and minds and quickly find a peaceful solution to all the problems we have. It is not about Islamisation. When they talk about Islamisation, it is just a ruse; it is diversionary. They want you to be talking about Muslims in Yorubaland fighting one another.

It is not about cows. It is not about looking for food for their cows; they are coming to the South; it is all about getting peoples’ land. In Ago Iwoye, you have more than a thousand [Fulani] okada riders. I interviewed a lot of them. The motorcycles they have are the same brand and they told me that the motorcycles are usually bought for them by those who sponsor them to come to South. I mean, why should people come to be okada riders in a terrain that they are not familiar with it? They don’t even know the address of anybody. So, when you ask them to take you somewhere, they will only take you if you know where you are going because they don’t know anywhere. This means that these are people with a different agenda.

 

The government says it is ready to deploy the military on the highways, as part of the crackdown on criminals terrorising the land. Do you see the efforts going a long way in achieving the said objective?

They said those people are in the forests, they should move the military there to locate and arrest them. We don’t need them on the streets because by being on the roads, they can also prevent our people from going home. If you have fierce-looking soldiers, you don’t know who they are and we don’t know what their assignment is and they start harassing commuters; it will be counter-productive. It could even be a ploy to bring in an army of occupation to Yoruba land. The people who are terrorising us are not on the streets, they are not on the highways; they are in the forests. So, if it is because they have fire power that is superior to the police’s, they should just go to the forests, not on the road checking traffic. These terrorists don’t even come in vehicles.