TheCable

Akin Fadeyi, a columnist, says Nigeria is heading for anarchy if President Muhammadu Buhari does not jettison “his bias” and protect all Nigerians.

Speaking on the crisis between herdsmen and their host communities in the south-west, Fadeyi said each ethnic group has its bad eggs but that criminality should not be condoned.

He said the crisis is a pointer to the fact that “Nigeria is already headed in the direction of total chaos and of course, anarchy”.

He said the actions of Sunday Igboho, a youth leader, are “a systemic creation of anger” against the gruesome killings of notable people in the south-west as well as other murders across the country.

“This anarchy and seeming oppression of a people by another set of people within the same nation, in a country already besieged by hunger, unequal distribution of wealth and impoverishment, threw up the symbolism of resistance that Sunday Igboho represents,” Fadeyi said.

“So, how did the crime of kidnapping by herdsmen became a notoriously enduring industry in Nigeria? Each time we hear ransoms have been paid. Shouldn’t we ask ‘paid to who?’. Into whose Bank accounts do these ransoms flow? Is it these same ragtag –looking kidnappers that are paraded that own the Kidnapping empire? Why has it been a challenge for security Agencies to FOLLOW THE MONEY? These are begging questions requiring urgent answers.

“The Governor of Ondo State must have been concerned about a possible attack on Ondo state by Herdsmen hiding in the forests, and as Chief Security Officer of his State, issued a quit order on criminal Herdsmen to vacate Ondo state on the 18th of January.

“Typically, Mallam Garba Shehu, representing the Presidency countered Aketi and rejected the Quit order! Are citizens not curious to ask: Why is Mallam Garba Shehu combining the job of speaking for the President with speaking for Herdsmen?

“When Miyetti Allah leaders rascally issue threats against their host communities, this Presidency plays deaf. But the moment anyone pokes at the Herdsmen, this Presidency abandons everyone that voted it and embarks on vocal hemorrhage.

“Why is the same President now carrying on like a President of the Fulanis instead of President of Nigeria?

“The President must face a fact here today: There has been a sweeping and systematic liquidation of other people’s territories by unhinged suspected Fulani Herdsmen. The President’s own people.

“A good leader will unite this nation and not divide it. President Buhari should jettison his conscious or unconscious bias and demonstrate leadership now, before he goes into history as the last leader to preside over the affairs of a united Nigeria!”

He asked Buhari to rise above ethnic sentiments and protect all Nigerians who voted him into power or ” struggle to shake off an inaudible complicity in the murdering of innocent souls all in a bid to fulfill what is beginning to look like a well-orchestrated expansion agenda scheme”.

Fadeyi also asked south-west leaders, whom he said are reactive in the face of crisis, to step up and speak out against injustice.

He said Nigerians must recognise that they do not owe allegiance to a leader, but to the country and also to justice and humanity.

“In all of these, where are the South west Leaders? Apart from the Governor of Ondo State, Rotimi Akeredolu, SAN, and now, Sunday Igboho who is fast becoming a phenomenon of circumstance, many South West leaders have always been reactive than proactive,” he said.

“They must go to the drawing board and work out a strategy of containment, not against Herdsmen alone but also ensure South west Youths are gainfully and meaningfully employed through creative unlocking of technological opportunities.

“South West leaders must recognize that ambition for office must never consume them to such extent they throw this momentum away, because, if on the altar of ambition, they keep mute while their region burns, by 2023, they would have no nation left to govern.”