A community affected in the ethnic clashes in Ile-Ife, Osun State in March, 2017 | NAN
You
may read the first part of this article, Femi Fani-Kayode: The Hausa
Fulani, The Yoruba, And The Slaughter In Ile-Ife – Part 1, HERE.
I used to love and respect Governor Aregbesola even though we belong to different political parties.
I knew him to be a proud, strong,
unrepentant and inspiring Yoruba nationalist who knew the history of the
Yoruba inside out and who was ready to stand his ground and fight his
corner with anybody at anytime in defence of the Yoruba cause.
Yet now it appears that all that has
changed. Seven years in public office as Governor has softened him and
made him lose his nerve, his edge and his fighting spirit.
One wonders what really happened to the fire-brand that we knew as “Ogbeni?” The old Ogbeni was strong but the new one is weak.
His love for power and desperation to
foster and maintain questionable and futile political alliances at any
cost and price has impaired his vision and beclouded his better
judgement.
The old Ogbeni would never have
compromised with the aggressors and purveyers of violence in this way
and he would have called a spade a spade and been fair to all.
He would not have bent over backwards to appease the Hausa Fulani community and abandon his own people.
The truth is that though I still love
Aregbesola I find it difficult to forgive him for refusing to rise up to
the occasion and for not defending and protecting the people of Ile Ife
and Osun state from the reckless adventurers that have humiliated,
assaulted and afflicted them in the last few days.
He has refused to shelter and protect
them from the evil scourge that seeks to subjugate them and turn them
into village idiots and second class citizens in their own land.
We needed to be consoled and comforted
for the outrage and wickedness that was visited on our people by the
Hausa Fulani settlers but instead Aregbesola betrayed his own people,
went on his knees and begged the aggressors and those that beat, raped
and slaughtered them.
I despise anyone that bows and trembles
before tyranny and those that take pleasure in killing the innocent in
the name of faith, cows, cattle or some strange and misguided notion of
ethnic supremacy.
Chief Obafemi Awolowo, the Leader of the
Yoruba, once said, “Kaka ka dobale fun Gambari ka kuku roju Ku” which
means “instead of a Yorubaman prostrating for a Hausa Fulani it is
better to take courage and die”.
Have our leaders in the south west forgotten these heroic words so soon? Has Aregbesola lost his memory?
Since when have we had cowards as
leaders in Yorubaland? Since when did we start fearing our own shadows
and since when did we start speaking in hushed and muffled tones? Is
political correctness more important than the lives of our people?
The truth is that Rauf Aregbesola has
forfeited the right to lead Osun state and I pray that the Lord forgives
him for dancing on the blood of the people of Ile Ife and wining and
dining with the enemy.
Yet sadly the stinking mess does not
stop there. I have been reliably informed by the spokesman of Afenifere,
Oloye Yinka Odumakin, that up until the time of writing this piece only
the sons and daughters of Ile-Ife, including notable traditional
rulers, community leaders and other prominent men and women, have been
arrested by the police and put in police cells in Osogbo, Ibadan and
Abuja.
Not ONE person from the Hausa Fulani community in Ile ife has been detained by the police or security agencies up until now.
Given this, one wonders whether the 30
sons and daughters of Ile-Ife that lost their lives in the conflict
committed suicide? One wonders whether they committed what the Japanese
call “hari-kari”.
One wonders whether they slit open their
own stomachs with a long sharp sword and spilled their own bowels all
over the battlefield.
I say this because no-one seems to be
interested in bringing those that butchered them in the sanctity of
their own homes and their own land to heel.
Such a selective application of justice
can hardly be described as being reasonable or fair and surely that is
not the way to foster better relations between the Hausa Fulani and the
Yoruba in Ile Ife or elsewhere.
A note that was sent to me captured the mood rather well when the author said the following:
“There is no Yoruba person who has
incited anything beyond putting our case across. We cannot keep quiet
when our people are being harassed and intimidated. Barrister Gbenga
Awosode,an Ife indigene has just been summoned to Abuja yesterday. As we
speak no member of the Arewa community has been summoned. Our people
have been killed on our land and on Arewa land over the years with no
arrest made in history. We will not look for anybody’s trouble but if
anyone look for ours he will get it double. Yoruba will not die on our
knees. Any death that will kill us will meet us on our feet. But before
we die……”.
The concern is clearly building-up and the anger is mounting.
Yet despite that the impunity continues.
I say this because in the last seven days alone the Hausa Fulani have
slaughtered scores of innocent people in Ile-Ife (Osun state), Buruku
(Benue state), Arochukwu (Abia state), Malagum (Southern Kaduna) and
Igbeti (Oyo State). Must we continue like this?
Our faith, identity and ethnic
nationalities are under attack and are threatened with annihilation and
you want me to accept it in the name of one Nigeria?
The fundamental question that we must
all answer either now or later is as follows: if we cannot live together
in peace and unity as one nation must we stay together by force?
Is the unity of Nigeria truly
sacrosanct? And if the older generation believes that this is so must
the younger generation believe so as well?
Never in the history of our country,
other than during the civil war, has there been so much ethnic and
sectarian bloodletting as there is today?
And it is the usual suspects and those
that the late and great Chief Bola Ige called “the Tutsis of Nigeria”
that always spark it off and attack others either in the name of their
faith or in their quest to take over and forcefully seize the land of
others or in the name of herding cattle and grazing cows.
When one considers this one is
constrained to ask the following question: is it a crime to demand for
the restructuring of our nation or for the peaceful and equitable
dissolution of our very unhappy union?
Can we not at least attempt to be
civilised and start learning from others? Must we continue to ignore the
voices of our fathers, elders and revered heroes like the great Pa Ayo
Adebanjo and the gallant General Alani Akinrinade who saw all this
coming many years ago and who urged us all to sit up and prepare for the
worst?
Must everything here be by compulsion
and by force? Must some of us be regarded and classified as field hands
and slaves whilst others are described as being “born to rule?”
Is this not insulting to the majority?
Is it not unacceptable? Is it wrong for people to exercise their
God-given right of self-determination? Is that not the basis and the
very essence of freedom and democracy?
The wave of ethnic nationalism rising
throughout the world, including countries like Holland, the United
Kingdom, France, the United States of America, the Russian Federation,
Israel, Germany, Turkey, Austria and, increasingly, Nigeria cannot be
resisted or played down.
And in Nigeria the more of our people that our collective ethnic oppressors kill, the more that wave will rise.
The right to take pride in our ethnicity and invoke the principle of self-determination cannot be denied.
We reject the concept of globalisation
and the enthronement of a new world order. We reject the concept of an
artificial, man-made, multi-cultural, multi-religious, mongrel
mega-nation that is made up of ethnic and religious incompatibles.
We reject the notion that we must bury
our ethnicity, forget our differences, arrest our development, discard
our values and enthrone the idea of a strange and complicated hybrid
nation where we are expected to live with and accommodate those that
hate our faith, despise our people, scorn our values and that rape, maim
and kill our loved ones and compatriots in the name of religion,
conquest, land, cows and cattle.
The truth is that no force in hell or on
earth can stop the rise and establishment of the sovereign state of
Biafra, Oduduwa or any other ethnic nation that will one day be carved
out of what is presently known as Nigeria.
This is what the German Nazi leader
Adolf Hitler once described as “Mein Kampf”, meaning “my struggle”.
This is my hope. This is my desire. This is my dream.
In conclusion I call for restraint from
both sides in the Hausa Fulani and Yoruba conflict in Ile-Ife. I call
for the restoration of peace and I pray that the souls of all those that
were slaughtered rest in perfect peace.
God bless and be with the people of Ile-Ife and the Yoruba nation now and forever. (CONCLUDED).
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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