RELGION AND THE NEW POLITICS OF COLONIZATION IN NIGERIA: OPTIONS FOR THE AUTOCHHTHONOUS ETHNIC NATIONALITIES AND CHRISTIAN OF NORTHERN NIGERIA. BY Z. K. A. BONAT, CENTRE FOR POPULATION AND DEVELOPMENT, BARNAWA, KADUNA. KEYNOTE ADDRESS DELIVERED TO THE LEADERSHIP CONFERENCE FOR CHRISTIANS IN POLITICS IN NORTHERN NIGERIA, ORGANIZED BY THE KING DAVID GENERATION MOVEMENT, AT THE JOSSY ROYAL HOTEL, BUKURU EXPRESSWAY, JOS, PLATEAU STATE, 4 – 5 APRIL, 2014 PROLOGUE ON VIOLENT COLONIZATION AND THE EXTERMINATION OF THE AUTOCHTHONES Between 1534 and 1603, through a series of military campaigns, England began a policy of what they described as plantation, through which thousands of English and Scottish Protestant settlers, were deliberately and officially encouraged to migrate to Ireland, planted there and assisted to take over the land owned by Irish Catholic landholders. By the time the English abolished the Irish Parliament and announced the formation of the United Kingdom of Britain and Ireland in 1801, the Irish had lost their lands to the English through massacres and forced evictions. Millions of Irish lives were annihilated in order to make room for English cattle, sheep and crops. In America, from the 17th to the 19th centuries, White settlers from Europe invaded and annihilated the Native American populations; and during the same period, the Spanish and Portuguese conquistadores massacred and enslaved the native populations in South America, to the point of extinction for most of their nationalities. By 1900, out of about twenty six million Native Americans, just about 770,000 were left, and by the 2000 census, the original owners of America were 2.5 million. In Lebanon, in 1975, 76% of the population were Christians, but through a deliberate policy of sponsored Muslim immigration, genocidal attacks and terrorism, the natives were either killed or driven out, and today Lebanon is more than 70% Muslim, with the former majority reduced to second class dhimmis in an Islamic State. In Northern Nigeria, the 1952 census showed that Muslims were just 40% of the population, while Christians and traditionalists consisted 60%. Today, there is a terroristic onslaught by Islamists under the banner of Boko Haram, in collaboration with Fulani militias and guerillas both from within and outside Nigeria, to drive the native non-Muslim, non-Hausa/Fulani and non-Kanuri populations from their lands in the area generally known as the geographical and political Middle Belt. As the war by the Islamists and Fulani terrorists has progressed, the purpose and objectives of the terrorists have become clearer, being to physically remove the ethnic and religious minorities from their lands and make it available to owners of cattle and money to establish their commercial farmlands and livestock empires. While this is going on, just as the Irish were busy quarrelling and fighting each other; just as the American native nations were never able to come together to face the settlers wiping them out and taking over their lands; and just as the Lebanese Christians were left to their own devices against the Arab and Muslim immigrants and terrorist organizations, history is repeating itself in Nigeria today. HISTORICAL ANTECENDENTS IN NORTHERN NIGERIA Before the Fulani jihad of 1804, there were several kingdoms in the area that later became known as the Protectorate of Northern Nigeria from 1900. The most notable of these were the kingdoms of Borno, several Hausa kingdoms, the Kwararafa confederation, including Nupe, Igala, Igbirra, and Kwangoma federation in what is today Southern Kaduna (which encompassed the Gbagyi, Adara, Koro, Gwong, Ham and the Kataf Group of nations). Other kingdoms and chiefdoms were found in Southern Borno, the Adamawa plains and Mambilla plateau, the Bauchi and Central Highlands that today make up Plateau, Bauchi and Gombe states. In the south east and south central areas of this vast region were the Tiv, Idoma, Igedde, Doma, Eggon, Alago, Ninzo, Karshi, and the Sanga, Mada, etc, in what is today Benue and Nasarawa states and the southern part of Southern Kaduna. In the south west of this region were the northernmost Yoruba principalities in what is today Kogi State, and the northern area of old Oyo, as far north as Ilorin. North of this area were found the Nupe, Kambari, Gbagyi Nkwa, and the nationalities that are generally referred to as Zuru, but which include several other groups. Slightly to the east of this area were the Kamuku and related ethic nationalities. The Fulani jihadists conquered the Hausa States, from Gobir and Zamfara in the west, to Katsina, Kano and Zazzau in the east. The jihadists extended their rule to Nupe, Ilorin, Bauchi and Adamawa in the southern areas. It must be stated unequivocally, that up till the time of British conquest in 1900 – 1903, the Fulani jihadists did not conquer or rule more than 40% of the area that later became Northern Nigeria. The peoples in the aforementioned kingdoms and federations of kingdoms, chiefdoms, and political communities remained fiercely independent, and ruled themselves as nations and states, with their own territories, governments, judicial and military systems. The British found it convenient to believe the fabrications of “histories” by their emirate collaborators, claiming that they had conquered and subjugated the various nationalities in the Middle Belt region. But the British had to fight almost continuously from 1904 to 1914, to conquer the nationalities that the emirate rulers had claimed were their vassals or subjects. Studies have shown that it was the British that conquered, and subsequently subjugated most of these proud and independent peoples under the Fulani and Hausa emirs during the colonial period. Under British colonialism, laws were passed that imposed Hausa and Islamic land tenure laws on the non-Muslim peoples. Hausa and Fulani Mallams were employed as clerks even in areas ruled by non-emirate chiefs in British Northern Nigeria. They were the judges, who dispensed Islamic law under the Native Court system in the Northern Provinces, thereby subjecting non-Muslims to Islamic law. District Heads, and often Village Heads were appointed and posted from the emirate headquarters to rule over people they never ruled before, and whose history, languages, cultures and customs they never understood, and instead viewed with derision and disdain. It was this export of Hausa and Fulani rulers into the Middle Belt as administrators protected by the colonial police and army that began the migratory process that planted Hausa enclaves in most areas of the region. The relatives, clients and partners of the Native colonizers became the traders who controlled commerce, and gained political ascendancy over the people of the Middle Belt. As the colonial period was drawing to a close, the anti-colonial struggles took different dimensions in the Northern Region. Northern Minorities came together under the Middle Zone League, and subsequently the United Middle Belt Congress to resist their subjection to emirate rule under the protection of British overlordship. Others formed the Bornu Youth Congress, the Igala Union, and Igbirra Tribal Union to champion their political aspirations. They demanded for the creation of a Middle Belt Region, and made their case eloquently before the Minorities Commission, and at the Lancaster negotiations before the granting of independence. Records of the colonial state show that the Hausa-Fulani oligarchy staunchly resisted the quest of the minorities for self-determination. While the Yoruba allowed the southern minorities to form the Mid West Region after independence, the Hausa-Fulani and the Igbo tenaciously refused to let the minorities in their regions to go. And while the creation of States by Gowon effectively removed the South South minorities from the control of the Igbos, and while subsequent state creation set the minorities in the southern geopolitical zones on the path of independent develop, the Hausa-Fulani ruling class has continued to use the power of government to extend the frontier of Islam and the emirates, by creating their own subservient clients, with whom they use for their political control in the name of “North”. ISLAMIC SHARIA AND POLITICS IN NORTHRN NIGERIA While under the British, sharia was recognized as “native law and custom”, they nevertheless accepted the application of Maliki law and allowed the Alkalai to apply it to non-Muslims. However, this was gradually changed following opposition from non-Muslims in the anti-colonial struggle and before the Minorities Commission. By 1956 the Native Courts Law stipulated that no native court could impose a punishment in excess of the maximum under the Criminal Code. Struggles by the minorities led to the Settlement of 1960, where it was agreed that the Northern Region would not operate Islamic law, except as it pertained solely to personal and family matters. A Panel of eminent jurists drew up legislation and systems of legal administration that protected non-Muslims from being subjected to Islamic law by restricting its application to personal and family law. The Sharia Court of Appeal set up in 1957 had application only in Northern Nigeria and dealt with issues of personal and family law. During the Gowon administration, the Northern ruling class, realizing that education was liberating the minority ethnic nationalities, took over the mission primary and secondary schools between 1970 and 1972. Obasanjo’s government came to the assistance of the northern ruling class when legal proceedings were instituted against the forceful take over of mission schools, by promulgating a decree that not only banned the legal action, but proscribed payment of any compensation. It was later discovered that Muslim students’ organisations had written memoranda to northern states governments asking for the takeover of the mission schools. The objective was to hold back the development of the non-Muslim communities and stop the spread of Christianity through the school system. It was however noted that in states like Kano, where mission schools catered to the children of the ruling class, they were not taken over. As the pressure mounted for the military to hand over power, religion became central to the politics of the rulers in Northern Nigeria. In August 1977, Muslim intelligentsia held a National Conference on the Freedom of the Press and the Shari’a at Minna, at the end of which they declared that the sharia must be applied to every one in Nigeria, be they Muslims or not. According to Professor James Kantiok’s analysts of that conference: At the end of this conference Muslims unanimously demanded a total application of the Shari`a in all parts of Nigeria irrespective of whether Muslims existed there or not. This was a strategy to press their demand for a Federal Shari`a Court of Appeal which had been provided for in the Draft Constitution. Muslims saw it as an inalienable religious right for them to be governed by their own laws. Nigerians did not seem to have a problem if the Muslims’ demand was only for Muslims. The fact that they wanted the Shari`a extended to non-Muslims was what posed a problem for the peace loving people of Nigeria. Kenny quotes speakers at the conference as saying …“But they repeatedly said that Shari`a in toto was their real goal, and anything else could be a temporary compromise. They argued that the Muslim is subject to no other law than the Shari`a, while any other law (imported English law, based on pagan Roman law) is alien and has no binding force for a Muslim. Accordingly, at the Minna seminar, Mallam Ma’aji Shani suggested that Shari`a should be made the law of the land, while others suggested that Islam should be made the state religion, with Shari`a applied in toto to any citizen who believes an God and the Qur’an” (1996:347). Following acrimonious debate over the draft, the 1979 constitution ended up having provision for Sharia Court of Appeal, which violated the principle of secularity of the State. Muslims have since made efforts to make Islam the official State religion of Nigeria. In 1982 the Maitatsine sect demanded for full implementation of sharia in Nigeria. In 1984/1985 General Muhammadu Buhari made efforts to have sharia legal system fully implemented in Nigeria, and asked the Attorney General Chief Chike Ofodile to draft a constitutional amendment to incorporate sharia into the constitution. When the AG objected, a civil servant in the Federal Ministry of Justice was instructed to do so, by removing reference to “personal” in the relevant section of the constitution referring to application of sharia. In 1986 Babangida surreptitiously took the country into the OIC with the encouragement of Sheikh Mahmud Gumi. By 1999, the governors of Zamfara, Kano, Kebbi, Bauchi, Katsina, Yobe, Borno, Niger etc had passed legislation instituting the sharia system in their states, applicable to all Nigerians irrespective of religious persuasion. The Boko Haram war is for the implementation of sharia in Nigeria, after first violently overthrowing the so-called secular state. Terrorism, as practiced by Boko Haram, Ansarul and the Fulani militia is the continuation of the politics of sharia by other means. They have stated that their religion is their constitution, their political manifesto, their total way of life, and they make no bones about imposing it on other people. To date, none of the Northern Elders, traditional rulers and politicians (except the Governor of Borno State where Kanuri people and villages are now being attacked and their people also becoming refugees) from the core northern states have condemned Boko Haram’s call for an Islamic theocratic state of Nigeria. DISCRIMINATION AND MARGINALIZATION ON THE BASIS OF RELIGION AND ETHNICITY IN NORTHERN NIGERIA In a document to be circulated at this conference, which is being circulated at the on-going National Conference, we have made the following submission: 1. The British imposed the emirate system on non-Muslim kingdoms and communities, thereby subordinating hundreds of minority nationalities to the emirate system, which they had successfully resisted. This system of subordination has continued, with the State governments deliberately subverting the indigenous political structures, thereby denying the ethnic minorities the right to develop and sustain their traditional, cultural and social values. In Northern Nigeria, some political power groups are still bent on maintaining pre-colonial political structures of by-gone empires, and want to perpetuate some skewed and parochial principles of masters-slaves mentality in the 21st century. This is very visible in Borno, Adamawa, Taraba, Gombe and Bauchi States. 2. Constitution making, political leadership and governance in the history of Nigeria have not been able to address adequately by defining, defending and promoting specifically the rights of the Minorities in Northern Nigeria. Rather, the net socio-political and economic result is the wanton entrenchment of the hegemony of the powerful over the weak. 3. The creation of new States, Geo-Political Zones and Local Government Areas has not really solved the problem of marginalization of the Minorities and the taking away of their rights, but has further compounded them. Creation of States, Local Governments and Geo-Political Zones compounded the issues of Minority Rights and the continuity of unjust geo-political imbalances, with the Southern Kebbi and Southern Kaduna ethnic nationalities buried under a heavily discriminating North West Hausa-Fulani geopolitical zone. (i) There are states in which tens of groups of minority ethnic nationalities have been lumped together with powerful hegemonic groups, which monopolise political and economic power. This includes Kaduna, Borno, Gombe, Bauchi, Benue, Niger/Kwara and Kebbi States. There have been consistent demands for creation of additional States in these states. (ii) There are States in which new hegemonic groups have emerged, such as in Kwara, Benue and Kogi States. (iii) Some fairly large ethnic nationality groups have been balkanized into several small units and scattered in several states, such as the Karekare in Yobe, Jigawa and Bauchi states; the Gbagyi in Kaduna, Niger, Nassarawa and FCT; the Nupe in Kwara, Niger and Kogi States, the Adara in four states, the Bura in Borno and Adamawa states etc. (iv) Local Governments are supposed to be the tier of government that will address local and community issues. However, Local Governments have no legislative powers over issues of land rights, control of local resources, appointments of traditional authorities, control over finances etc. At the level of government where ethnic minorities can have a strong voice, the centralization of power by the States has robbed them of their rights of participation in governance. (v) In some States, as in Kaduna, in the predominantly ethnic minority areas, the State Government has taken the Hausa-Fulani enclaves and made them into Chiefdoms independent of the traditional authorities under whose territory they have settled. This goes down to districts, where some districts are reserved exclusively for Hausa-Fulani, and in some cases, some Hausa-Fulani district heads resident in chiefdoms headed by non Hausa Fulani are made subordinate to Hausa Fulani chiefs in other chiefdoms. In some areas, some Hausa Fulani chiefs are appointed to rule over other ethnic nationalities that constitute the overwhelming majority in the entity. (vi) It is the areas where the British imposed culturally different numerically minority groups to rule over indigenous populations have become areas of intense conflicts between indigenes and immigrant settler communities. Immigrant communities have often been assisted to take over local traditional authority structures through appointments of Sarkin Hausawa, or Fulani Ardos. Immigrant groups, which are often economically more powerful than the indigenous populations, use the entrenched system of money politics and corruption to take over councillorships in the indigenous areas. Hence, in 1960 there were only two Hausa families in Potiskum, a Karekare town, but today almost all the councilors in Potiskum LGA are Hausa people. The same is prevalent in the southern area of Kebbi state, in some parts of Plateau and Adamawa States etc. All areas in which immigrant Hausa and Fulani groups are trying to take over the land of the indigenes are now theatres of war and conflict in the Northern States. LAND TENURE LAW AND ITS APPLICATION 1. The 1978 Land Use Act is directly the colonial Land and Native Rights Ordinance of 1916 of the Northern Provinces, which was amended in 1948, and subsequently in 1963 as the Land Tenure Law of Northern Nigeria. The imposition of this Northern Nigerian law on the rest of Nigeria has robbed the autochthonous communities and ethnic nationality groups of a voice on the administration of the single most important non-human resource in their communities, the land. This law is now being invoked to set aside land for grazing reserves for the Fulani and the rich people who now own most of the “Fulani” cattle. 2. Powerful groups, through the agency of Government at the State and Federal levels, have used the Land Use Act of 1978 to take over control of community lands. The governors no longer hold the land in trust for the people. Lands belonging to minority ethnic nationalities are taken and allocated or sold to state officials, associates, foreigners, land speculators and local immigrant groups. Land confiscation in the name of development has been at the expense of the land rights of indigenous and autochthonous communities. 3. To perpetuate alienation of community lands by confiscation of people lands, the Land Use Act has been placed in the Constitution to prevent its being amended. The Minority Ethnic Nationalities and Communities are now compelled, to their total disadvantage, to operate emirate land law in the name of a “Nigerian” Law Use Act. OWNERSHIP AND CONTROL OVER NATURAL RESOURCES 1. Companies, groups and private individuals exploit resources (land, soil-laterite, forests, quarry stones, water, minerals, grasses and pasture, fauna, aquaculture resources etc) without any payment to the communities from whose lands those resources are taken. 2. There is indiscriminate exploitation of such resources without rehabilitating the land, thereby impoverishing the communities on long-term bases through the destruction of the environment. What happened with the tin mining areas of Plateau and Kaduna States, is happening with solid minerals mining areas in Nassarawa, Kogi, Kaduna and Kwara states, etc, where the land is destroyed and left barren and toxic. GRAZING RIGHTS AND PROBLEMS WITH NOMADIC FULANI 1. Today, there is no state in the Middle Belt in which violent conflict between herdsmen and farming communities have not become a daily occurrence. Our people are being massacred enmasse by marauding Fulani herdsmen and mercenaries in order to take the land from them. Instead of addressing the factors that are pushing the Fulani from their natural and traditional habitats, some northern power groups are trying to get the National Assembly to pass a law to enable them to take land belonging to any community anywhere in Nigeria, and give to Fulanis in the name of Grazing Reserves. The Far Northern States have avoided establishing the 417 Grazing Reserves designated by the government of the Northern Regional in 1965. 2. It also appears that the Northern States governments have deliberately failed to address the ecological and environmental problems in the far Northern States. There are numerous dams constructed by the federal government in all states in the North West and North East zones. However, State governments have failed to develop grazing resources in these zones. It is now obvious that this failure is deliberate, in order to facilitate the migration of Fulani pastoralists into the Middle Belt region, where they are laying claim to land belonging to autochthonous communities, including using violent means and genocide against the farming communities. Our communities are being herded into refugee camps to deny them access to their farmlands. 3. Also, the movement of large numbers of migrants from the South East and South West into the Middle Belt, where money and state power are used to take over land and even local governance, must be addressed. Nigeria must face this issue in order not to lay the foundation for future land wars by dispossessed indigenous communities. 4.13 DISCRIMINATION ON THE BASES OF RELIGION The constitution of the Federal Republic of Nigeria stipulates that no citizen of the country shall suffer or be subjected to discrimination or disadvantage on grounds of class, ethnicity, religion, gender or disability. However, in the Northern States religious discrimination has become institutionalized by the Federal, State and Local governments. In the Northern States the following situation generally exists: Hate preaching by religious organization, which has now been transformed into a war for the imposition of Islamic theocracy by violent terrorist groups in the Northern States. Confiscation of missionary and community schools by federal and state governments. Promotion and building of almajiri religious schools by the federal government, which constitute official government discrimination against Christians in Northern Nigeria on the basis of religion. d) The use of State resources for the promotion of religious objectives and agenda of some groups should be critically examined. Discrimination in access to employment, education, health, land and other services at the Federal, State and Local Government levels. This is particularly bad for Hausa, Fulani, Kanuri, Karekare and other native Christians in state such as Sokoto, Katsina, Zamfara, Kebbi, Kano, Jigawa, Kaduna, Yobe, Borno, and Gombe. Some people believe that they have the right to build mosques anywhere in Nigeria but prevent the building of churches in certain areas, and burn down or demolish existing churches. Individuals, Churches, and Voluntary Agencies desiring to acquire land are required to undertake never to build or sell or donate such land for the purpose of building churches in several northern states. Denial of Indigene Certificate, and issuance of “Settler Certificate” to indigenous Hausa and Fulani Christians in some Northern States, including Northern Kaduna LGAs. This directly denies them access to employment in Federal, State and Local government services, as well as in the security agencies. BOKO HARAM AS CONTINUATION OF THE NORTHERN RULERS’ INTENT ON IMPLEMENTING SHARIA IN NIGERIA No guerilla movement succeeds without the support either of some sections of the grassroots, or support of the authorities in establishing a safe haven and operational base for them. The Boko Haram terrorism is officially considered to have begun in 2009, after the leader of the sect, Mohammed Yusuf, was killed while in the custody of the Borno State government. Another person killed while in the hands of that government was the former Commissioner for Religious Affairs, who it turned out was the official liaison between the Yusufiyya (as Boko Haram was locally called in Borno) and the Borno State Government, and through whose ministry the sect received official support and cooperation of the state government. What was not known to the rest of Nigeria, due largely to the pecuniary journalism prevalent in Nigeria, where the State and those with means determine what is published and what “facts” are made known, was that since 2003 the ANPP government in Borno State had been in alliance with the Islamists, whom it had used to intimidate and harass the ordinary citizens into submission, in order for that party to be in absolute control of the State. It reached the point that in many predominantly Christian local governments of Southern Borno, Christians could hardly win a councillorship election. One fellow ‘won election” to be Local Government Chairman seven times. The horrors suffered by Christians in Borno State, and the institution of deliberate discrimination and victimization on the basis of religion under the administration of Ali Modu Shareef of the ANPP (now APC), are well documented in a fantastic document titled Christianity in Crisis: Lessons From Borno State, by the Christian Association of Nigeria, 2006. It is within this context that we should understand the feeling of betrayal by the Boko Haram against the Borno State establishment, when the sect leader was summarily executed. The Islamists had been allowed and aided to become so strong that they operated as a state within Borno and Yobe States, with their own government and hierarchy. Boko Haram groups could not survive and operate at the scale they do without support from the political leadership in the states where they have their bases. The current widespread escalation of the Boko haram mayhem and Fulani militia attacks are linked to the political fallouts of the 2011 elections. The top leadership of the Congress for Progressive Change (CPC) had waged a campaign with their supporters by informing them that in the event that their party lost the 2011 election, it would mean that their opponents had “stolen” their mandate; and that their supporters should settle the matter as they deemed fit. Hence, as soon as they saw the trend of the results of the presidential election being announced, the CPC supporters went out into the streets, killing, burning, destroying and generally causing destruction of unprecedented proportions, on the belief that their “mandate” had been “stolen”. This destruction dovetailed with the campaign of terror already begun by the Boko Haram jihadists since 2004, which had been restricted to just Borno and Yobe States, but which now spread to almost all the northern states. At this stage, the aim was to make the country ungovernable because a northern Hausa or Fulani Muslim had not won the presidential election. The northern rulers adopted a crassly opportunistic attitude to Boko Haram, and saw the sect’s attacks on the institutions of the Federal Government, the armed forces, police, state security, customs and immigration, the civil defence and the courts, as part of the “revolt” to make Nigeria ungovernable after Dr. Goodluck Jonathan was declared winner of the 2011 presidential election. They saw it as an opportunity to show their support for Islam by not condemning Boko Haram even when they declared that they want to overthrow the Nigerian State and replace it with an Islamic theocracy. Boko Haram stated repeatedly that they were at war with the Nigerian State, while northern new generation “radicals” and “comrades” became their unofficial intermediaries and spokespersons. The most prominent of these Comrades is now campaigning to be a senator on the platform of the successor party to the CPC. In 2012 some northern elders paid President Jonathan a visit, and followed it up with a furious media campaign blaming the Federal Government for the insecurity in the country. Some of them even gave press conferences, at which they brazenly stated that the Boko Haram was located at the Presidential Villa. When the Federal Government responded to accusations of incompetence in handling the Boko Haram “insurgency”, the northern elders began to complain that the security forces were killing more innocent people than the terrorists. Boko Haram issued press statements taunting the Federal Government, that no power could stop them in their terror campaign in Nigeria. As the response from the security forces began to rout the terrorists, the Boko Haram groups decided to put pressure on the northern leaders by attacking the Shehu of Borno and the Emir of Kano, and killed a high profile war hero like General Muhammadu Shuwa. After these attacks, ordinary citizens in Kano, Borno and Yobe began to cooperate further with the security forces, leading to the exposure of terrorist hideouts. The war against the terrorists in Mali, the apparent training ground of the Nigerian terrorists, and Nigeria’s involvement in it, was roundly condemned by sections of the northern leaders and their press. It was apparent to discerning eyes that the northern rulers were beginning to realize that they had wagged the tail of the tiger, which was now turning to bite them, at a time when the head of the tiger was out of their control due to its linkages with international terrorist networks. They saw the call for amnesty as their last chance of taking control of the religious politics of the northern states, which was clearly getting out of their grips. Northern leaders and elders declared that government’s use of force against the terrorists had failed, and they urged government to grant amnesty to the Boko Haram terrorists. The newspapers, radio and television media were awash with calls by the Sultan of Sokoto, Northern Elders, and even one or two Christian clergy who are known to be class consorts of the northern ruling class (in their misguided quest for some dubious “recognition” by the northern rulers), for amnesty to Boko Haram on the unsubstantiated claim that the campaign against the terrorists had failed. The terrorists themselves, in a show of defiance, have extended their field of operations to the Middle Belt states, with the Fulani militia doing most of the fighting in the central Nigerian states. Fundamental issues have been raised by the Boko Haram terrorism in Nigeria. There are claims being made that members of Boko Haram are unemployed; but millions of other Nigerians are unemployed, but have not taken up arms against their fellow citizens. Are the Fulani militias also unemployed? How many northern Muslims have ruled Nigeria since 1960, compared to Christians, if marginalization is the issue? Who is being marginalized; is it the ordinary northern peasant farmer, worker, artisan or herdsman, or the elites who hate being out of power? What did the northern rulers do with the power they held for about 40 out of 53 years of self-rule? Did they develop the agricultural wealth of the north? Have they not individually partaken in the exploitation of the solid minerals wealth of the northern states, mostly located in the Middle Belt region, which is conservatively estimated to yield over $25 billion annually in exports? Before the 13% derivation for oil producing states came into effect about seven years ago, were the northern states not receiving the same, and often more statutory allocation from the federation account than the southern states? Since that is the case, how has it come about that the North East and North West zones have the highest levels of illiteracy, maternal ill health and deaths, child ill health and deaths, poverty and destitution in the country? How is it that the areas with the poorest hospital services, worse schools, and worse water supply systems are the northern states? Is the Federal Government of Dr. Goodluck Jonathan of just a few years responsible for the more than 40 years of misrule, neglect and impoverishment in the north? Whenever the northern rulers want to hide their culpability for the endemic corruption and poverty in the country, they resort to chanting “Sharia! Sharia!!” Is the Boko Haram phenomenon not the logical outcome of their “Sharia Approach” to the problems of their states? If the leaders of the north can use sharia to mobilize, capture and retain power, why can’t the terrorists use the same strategy? Under whose government did corruption become the normal way of doing government business? Boko Haram and associated groups have decided to set up an Islamic state, in pursuit of which they began by attacking and massacring Christians in the northern states. If they had restricted their attacks to the members of the security forces, the mainstay of the State they hate, then their case would have been more credible. They have attacked and killed thousands of Christians in their churches, houses, and communities. They have ordered indigenous northern Christians to leave northern Nigeria, and have shown their disdain for the lives of Christians by bombing and gunning them down while they are praying to God in their places of worship. Boko Haram has only attacked some isolated Muslim clerics who opposed their theology and strategy of violence. Today the generalized war by the terrorists affects Muslims as much as Christians because some people thought that the war would never come to them. What of the Fulani from Niger, Mali, Chad, the Futa Djallon in Guinea and Senegal that have been drafted into Nigeria by Fulani groups and organizations to fight our people over their land in the Middle Belt? We are being told that Nigerian “Fulani”, who had for decades lived in relative peace with their host communities, to the extent of being given land to settle, are not those who are attacking and driving out the original land owning communities. However, the few Fulani killed or captured during their attacks on communities have been local Fulanis. The Fulani marauders have been attacking and massacring village communities, with apparent impunity. Miyetti Allah Cattle Breeders Association has been justifying the attacks and massacres of women and children by claiming that their cattle have been stolen. Yet they turn round and say that the gunmen are “unknown”. They say that the attackers are mercenaries from outside Nigeria; how do they know that they are mercenaries, and who is paying them? The Attakar and Moroa of Kaduna State have been attacked by the Fulani for purchasing and rearing cattle on their own land. All the cattle owned by the Agatu people of Benue and Nassarawa state have been stolen by the attackers. It should not be forgotten that the current war spread from Bauchi to Plateau `State from 2008, and escalated there to the point where, by 2013, it was a general war in the entire state Plateau. They militias set up shop in Niger State and started attacking churches in Suleja, until their camps in the bush were cleared and relative peace returned to that state. They have attacked areas of Igbirra in Kogi, and taken their cattle into Igala land, where the people drove out the cattle. In Nasarawa State, Fulani terrorists have burnt down villages and massacred defenceless women and children in many villages and made the land of the Alago ethnic nationality desolate. Fulani marauders have invaded Tiv land and burnt and killed and despoiled the land and the people, and they claimed that their cattle have been killed. Obviously, people are less valuable than cattle. WHAT HAVE THE POLITICIANS OF THE MIDDLE BELT BEEN DOING ABOUT THE GENOCIDE AGAINST THEIR PEOPLE? Those whose communities are being attacked are helpless, because there does not appear to be any leadership to organize them. Politicians continue to pursue their personal political and business affairs by relocating to Abuja, and go to “see” the carnage against their communities after they had been killed and their houses, crops, livestock and property destroyed. What is amazing is that some people believe that they can continue to be politicians after their communities have been decimated and their land occupied by other people. We can see some trends emerging from this war of colonization by those looking for land for their cattle: Apart from Senator David Mark and Governors Jang and Suswam, how many other politicians have cried out publicly against the massacres of their people? Have all the politicians of the Middle belt come out solidly and declared a united stand against those destroying their constituencies? Those who have gone out of their way to broker peace and settlement with the Fulani, like the late Senator Dantong, were killed by those with whom they made “peace”. Why is it that the victims of the genocide are those that are being urged to keep the peace and to live in “harmony” with their killers? Why is it that no one is arresting the killers, and even those arrested are set free? Have the politicians of the Middle Belt bothered to notice that even in the north, for the past two decades, whenever Fulani cattle destroy crops and farmlands, some traditional rulers and powerful politicians ensure that they are set free? What does it say about those who actually own the cattle herded by the Fulani, including in the urban metropolises like Kaduna? How is it that the politicians are not speaking about the withdrawal of the military just before attacks are launched against the communities? Recently, Governor Murtala Nyako was asking the same question. Some civil society groups put the same question to Governor Mukhtar Yero after the Moroa massacre, and His Excellency says he has asked the security forces the same question. Why have the Middle Belt politicians not demanded to know the sponsors of the terrorist armies and militia, whom President Jonathan says are in the Government, the civil service and the security forces? Is it not strange that the Minister of Defence, the National Security Adviser, the Inspector General of Police, the Minister of Police Affairs, the Principal Private Secretary to the President, are all Fulani? What informed the peculiar colouration of these appointments? Why have the politicians of the Middle Belt NOT challenged members of the opposition political party that has promised to end the terrorism within 100 days of taking over power, to come out and tell Nigerians what their connections are with the terrorists as to be able to persuade them to stop the war immediately they win political power? What is the political agenda of Christian politicians for the survival of the people of the Middle Belt? When they meet their northern counterparts at the Arewa Consultative Forum, do they discuss the issues that we have been discussing above? If they do, why are our people still being killed and their lives destroyed with impunity? WHAT ARE THE OPTIONS FOR THE MARGINALISED AUTOCHTHONOUS ETHNIC NATIONALITIES, AND THE RELIGIOUS AND CULTURAL MINORITIES IN NORTHERN NIGERIA? This question is the purpose for this conference. This question is to be answered by all participants attending this conference. We cannot answer this question without proper analysis of the issues. We can only answer this question by pooling together our facts from our research, observations and experiences, upon which we draw scenarios and make prognoses of our situation. We have to share our experiences and information, as the basis for taking on the challenges facing our people. In doing this we should look at the Biblical King David and Diplomat and Court Official Daniel, and their implications for Christians in Northern Nigeria. We should look at the Bible to see what God’s people have done when faced with security challenges. What are the correct interpretations of the scriptures over issues of politics and economics; over issues of oppression and injustice? Have we as Christians stood up for each other when facing oppression, marginalization and discrimination in this our region called Northern Nigeria? What have been the consequences for our people for failing to stand up and fight for justice as if we were Christian Soldiers marching on to confront injustice? What of our own people that have at every turn led us astray, or betrayed us and sold out our interests? If, as the saying goes, that poor leadership has been at the root of Nigeria’s problems, what kind of leadership have Christian politicians provided to their people? When we answer these questions, we should begin to find ways to address the logical conclusions that flow from honest analysis of the situation confronting us. At the end of this conference we should come up with a vision and mission, that will inform the direction that we must take in order to survive in Nigeria, and then participate fully as free citizens in the political, economic, social and cultural affairs of this country. This means that we should formulate a development agenda for our people around these issues: Immediate, short, medium and long term Political Agenda, with clear goals and how to achieve them. Economic Vision, for the empowerment of our people, immediately, and in the not distant future, and the strategies for attaining such a vision. Cultural Vision, for the preservation of our identities as ethnic nationalities, our languages, our cultures and traditions that promote equitable development and progress. Knowledge and skills drive development today. What educational system should we develop to be able to uplift our people from ignorance, poverty and powerlessness? How do we transform the educational system to make it serve our developmental needs? This generation is characterized by the contests of ideas, ideologies, philosophies, faiths and world views. The media is the most powerful propaganda tool in the world. How are we going to develop media resources and use them for the task of properly educating, informing and entertaining our people? Or are we going to depend on others for news and information that they tailor to achieve their own objectives? Security of our lives and property, including intellectual property, is the most fundamental issue today. You cannot go to church without being alive. We have a situation where soldiers and police have to stand guard over us before we can congregate in worship to our Lord Jehovah. We cannot be Christians unless we have freedom of worship and dissemination of our faith. How are we going to secure our lives, our children’s lives, our communities and nationalities in this very hostile Northern Nigeria? In a situation where we are being bombed, shot, slaughtered and burnt alive because of our faith, what are we going to do? In this situation where the security forces only show up after our people have been massacred, and the perpetuators are not apprehended, or even set free after being caught, what are we going to do to ensure our own safety? Or are we going to lie down and be killed by those intent on wiping us out from our land? Our women in various church denominations, have no common forum. Can our women experience full incorporation into politics and economic life without being organized and standing for themselves? How are we going to organize and educate our Christian women into one organization, or a network of coordinated organizations, where they can have a powerful voice? Civil society is becoming a crucial player in the affairs of Nigeria. How are we going to position our people to fully engage with the rest of civil society, as means of promoting our freedom and right of participation in the development process? These, and other issues, are the crux of our being gathered at this conference. Our success will not be measured by the brilliance of paper presentations, but by what we learn and the use we put that knowledge to in facing the challenges encapsulated in the above questions. If we do not want to end up as the Irish in their own country, or the Aborigines in Australia, or the Native Americans in the Americas, then we have to wake up, stand up and take action. If we do not want to end up as the Lebanese, we must stand up and take action.
Posted on: Sun, 06 Apr 2014 07:55:42 +0000
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