The
Sultan of Sokoto is the father of the Fulani people, the foremost
traditional ruler in northern Nigeria and the spiritual leader of all
northern Muslims.
He is not just a traditional ruler but
an all-powerful potentate who represents a strange and mystical power
and who heads an ancient and dark empire.
Not only is he revered by his subjects
but he is also regarded and treated by some as something akin to a deity
and by others as nothing less than the reincarnation of Sheik Usman Dan
Fodio, the Sufi Muslim who founded the Caliphate empire by conquering
and utterly crushing the Hausa kingdoms in a brutal and bloody jihad in
northern Nigeria in 1804.
Whichever way his subjects choose to
view him, whether as a deity or an all-conquering and all powerful
jihadi war-lord, to the Muslims of the core north his word is law and
absolutely everything revolves around him.
He is the living symbol of Fulani power, strength and glory and the physical manifestation of the quest for Islamist domination.
Yet despite these lofty heights and
undoubtedly rich and impressive heritage his people have slaughtered,
subjugated and terrorised more Nigerians in the last 212 years since
Usman Dan Fodio’s 1804 Jihad than ANY other ethnic group in our nation.
They have butchered more of their fellow
Nigerians in that space of time than the white Boer settlers and
farmers of apartheid South Africa butchered the black African population
in Southern Africa in 363 years of white rule and domination since the
time that the Dutch coloniser and administrator, Jan Van Riebeek, first
put his foot on the South African Cape in 1653.
No African ethnic group has killed as
many of their fellow Africans as the Fulani of northern Nigeria. Not
even the Hutus of Rwanda, who did a whole lot of killing in the genocide
of the early 1990’s, could match them.
From the first Mahdi, Usman Dan Fodio,
to the second, Sir Ahmadu Bello and to the third, General Muhammadu
Buhari, the trail of blood, carnage, terror and religious compulsion and
the inexplicable quest and insatiable desire to dominate, conquer,
subjugate and control others trails them.
This is as unacceptable as it is
provocative. The truth is that there is no place in any civilised
society for any form of compulsion or ethnic and religious domination
and bigotry
I say this because I believe that the
mark of civilisation is the ability to tolerate dissenting views and to
accomodate those that do not share your faith or come from your tribe,
ethnic stock or nationality.
If you are incapable of being tolerant
of others simply because they are different or they come from a
different place and if you cannot indulge in any form of accomodation of
those that do not share your views, your faith or your bloodlines then
you are nothing more than an uncivilised field hand and an intellectual
barbarian.
If you are capable of both tolerance and
accommodation of others, no matter how strange or absurd their views,
their faith or their circumstances may be, then you are the epitome of
civilisation, decency, good breeding and good old fashioned class.
The morale of the tale is as follows: to
be tolerant and kind to ALL those that see things differently from you,
to stand up against the intolerant and to resist the ignorant, the
bigoted, the racist, the ethnic supremacist and the religious extremist.
.
It is in an attempt to keep faith with
this sacred resolution and honor this fundamental principle that I wish
to bare my mind and share my views about the way forward for the Fulani
Republic of Nigeria in this contribution. Those views are as follows.
I am a nationalist. I believe in the
rise and power of the nation state. I believe in the sovereignty of the
will of the people. I believe in the right of independence and
self-determination for all and sundry. This is especially so for the
numerous ethnic nationalities that make up the space called Nigeria.
I believe in the right of the Igbo to have Biafra and the right of the Yoruba to have Oduduwa if that is their wish.
I believe that that right ought to be
extended to the Ijaws and indeed to every other ethnic nationality in
the country if that is what they want.
I believe that to compel a man or a
people, by the force of arms and with the raw power of the state, to
stay in a house or a space that they do not wish to stay is evil.
Such a state of affairs and situation is
an eloquent testimony, graphic example and accurate illustration of
subjugation and bondage.
It is a testimony of the most barbaric
form of wickedness and a total denial of the most basic civil liberties,
fundamental human rights and expression of free will of the victims.
I believe that there are many countries
in the belly of Nigeria but sadly they have all been choked, suffocated,
swallowed up and killed at birth.
I believe that Chief Obafemi Awolowo was right when he said that Nigeria was “not a nation but a mere geographical expression”.
I believe that Sir Ahmadu Bello was
right when he described the amalgamation of the northern and southern
protectorates as a “great mistake”.
I believe that he was also right when he
told the ever-accommodating and over-compensating Owelle Nnamdi Azikiwe
that we needed to “understand our differences” rather than to just
“forget them”.
Again I believe that Awolowo was right
when he said “there are no ‘Nigerians’ in the sense as there are
English, Welsh or French. The word ‘Nigerian’ is merely a distinctive
appellation to distinguish those who live within the boundaries of
Nigeria and those who do not”.
I believe that Nigeria’s first Prime
Minister, Sir Abubakar Tafawa Balewa accurately reflected the mind of
his core northern people when he said,
“the Southern people who are swamping
into this region daily in such large numbers are really intruders. We
don’t want them and they are not welcome here in the North. Since 1914,
the British Government has been trying to make Nigeria into one country
but the people are different in every way, including religion, custom,
language and aspirations. We in the north take it that Nigerian unity is
only a British intention for the country they created. IT IS NOT FOR
US.”
I believe that Lord Frederick Lugard,
the architect of the 1914 amalgamation, was right when he said “the
North and the South are like oil and water. They will never mix”.
Again I believe that Awolowo was right
when he said “Nigeria is only a geographical expression to which life
was given by the diabolical amalgamation of 1914. That amalgamation will
EVER remain the most painful injury a British government inflicted on
Southern Nigeria”.
I believe that the hero of Biafra,
Colonel Chukwuemeka Odumegwu-Ojukwu (the one and only Eze Igbo
Gburugburu), was right when he said “it is better we move slightly apart
and survive than move together and perish in our collision”.
I believe that Sir Ahmadu Bello spoke the minds of his northern people when he said,
“the new nation called Nigeria should be
an estate from our great grandfather, Othman Dan Fodio. We must
ruthlessly prevent a change of power. We must use the minorities in the
North as willing tools and the south as conquered territories and never
allow them to have control of their future.”
I believe that General Yakubu Gowon was right when he said,
“suffice it to say that putting all
considerations to the test, political, economic as well as social, the
basis of unity is not there.”
I believe that Dr. Nnamdi Benjamin Azikiwe was right when he said,
“if this embryo republic of ours must disintegrate, then in the name of God, let the operation be a short and painless one.”
Finally I believe that Colonel Chukwuemeka Odumegwu-Ojukwu was right when he said,
“Nigeria is a stooge of Europe. Her
independence was and is a lie. Nigeria committed many crimes against her
nationals which in the end made complete nonsense of her claim to
unity. Nigeria persecuted and slaughtered her minorities; Nigerian
justice was a farce; her elections, her census, her politics – her
everything – was corrupt. Qualification, merit and experience were
discounted in public service. In one area of Nigeria, for instance, they
preferred to turn a nurse who had worked for five years into a doctor
rather than employ a qualified doctor from another part of Nigeria;
barely literate clerks were made Permanent Secretaries; a university
Vice-Chancellor was sacked because he belonged to the wrong tribe.”
These words are as truthful, accurate and appropriate today as they were when Ojukwu spoke them many years ago.
If there is still anyone left that
believes that all is well in our forced union I urge them to consider
the words of Chief John Nwodo who is a former Minister of Information
and the newly-elected President-General of Ohaneze, the leading Igbo
political and socio-cultural group which comprises of all the elders and
traditional rulers of Ndi Igbo. He said,
“Our young men and women can no longer
tolerate a second class status in their own country. They can no longer
forgive the President for arguing before he came into office that Niger
Delta militants were meekly treated and tolerated by President Yar’Adua
while Boko Haram was harshly treated by President Jonathan when his law
enforcement agents literally opened fire and maimed and killed unarmed
MASSOB and IPOB members. They see how returnee Boko Haram members are
absolved and rehabilitated while leaders of MASSOB and IPOB are
incarcerated or mercilessly murdered. In their rage, they are becoming
uncontrollable as they pass a vote of no confidence on us, their
parents, describing us as cowards and compromised”.
Could anyone have put it any better than
this? Has Nwodo not hit the nail on the head? Has he not spoken the
bitter truth? Is this not an aberrant and unacceptable state of affairs?
Has our so-called country not been
turned into the theater of the absurd where anything can happen in the
last two years? Did some of us not warn that this would happen if a
Fulani supremacist and Muslim fundamentalist with delusions of grandeur
like Buhari was elected President? Are the Nigerian people not reaping
what they sowed in 2015?
Have the southerners and Middle Belters
in Nigeria not all been turned into slaves today? Have their leaders and
elders not all been turned into quislings and cowards who shiver under
their beds at night and who dare not speak truth to power?
Christians are slaughtered, nobody
talks. Southern youths are butchered, nobody talks. Shiite Muslims are
massacred, nobody talks. Christian refugees are bombed at IDP camps,
nobody cares. Fulani militants murder hundreds in cold blood on a weekly
basis all over the country and nobody is arrested or apprehended.
Was this not Awolowo and Ojukwu’s greatest fear? Are we not living that nightmare today?
Whether they wish to admit it openly or
not EVERY southerner and Middle Belter in this country feels like a
second class citizen today. (TO BE CONTINUED).
Femi
Fani-Kayode is a lawyer, a Nigerian politician, an evangelical
christian, an essayist, a poet and he was the Special Assistant (Public
Affairs) to President Olusegun Obasanjo from July 2003 until June 2006.
He was the minister of culture and tourism of the Federal Republic of
Nigeria from June 22nd to Nov 7th 2006 and as the minister of Aviation
from Nov 7th 2006 to May 29th 2007. He tweets from@realFFK.
The opinions expressed in this article are solely those of the author.
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