No hate speech!

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Toyin Falola

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Jul 7, 2019, 12:10:30 PM7/7/19
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Some postings on the Fulani that I rejected have bothered on hate speech.

Let us all exercise caution and to remember the following:

1. Evil and Good are equally distributed all over the country. All ethnicities have their evil leaders.
2. The victims are the poor
3. Hate speech can trigger genocide
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Anthony Akinola

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Jul 7, 2019, 1:35:50 PM7/7/19
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 Many thanks, Prof. Our highly educated men and women, exposed to a host of other cultures,
should be the apostles of civility in our society. Sadly, some are as crude in their thinking and
expositions as the class of people they assume are messing up our nation.
Regards,
Anthony Akinola

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Oluwatoyin Vincent Adepoju

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Jul 7, 2019, 1:36:57 PM7/7/19
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Thanks, Prof.Falola,

But with all due respect are you not avoiding reality? 

Your No.1 is not true - " 1. Evil and Good are equally distributed all over the country. All ethnicities have their evil leaders."

There us no other ethnicity in the country engaged in nation wide terrorism apart from right wing Fulani.

Even Boko Haram dont have that national spread.

There is no ethnic leadership in today's Nigeria supporting terrorism apart from right wing Fulani ethnic leadership, particularly Miyetti Allah Fulani Socio-Cultural Organisation which has severally owned up to and justified massacres by Fulani herdsmen and gone scot free under the watch of Nigeria's Fulani led govt in which practically all, if not all the security agencies are headed by ethno/religious affiliates of the same right wing characters.

You are a historian. You are well informed of the dangers of appeasement of persistently dangerously belligerent characters.

Neville Chamberlain's efforts to appease Hitler before WW2 are well known.

You are also informed about the use of the janjaweed in Sudan by President Omar Al Bashir, the same line being towed today by Buhari. Miyetti Allah and the Fulani herdsmen militia.

Efforts like yours to claim, in spite of all evidence to the contrary, that all is well, will not dissuade the right wing Fulani warlords, as the rivers of blood they are spilling makes clear, as they persistently struggle to manipulate  govt policy in tandem with the massacres they are committing, trying to force Nigerians to bend to their dominance in order to gain respite from this incessant bloodletting. 

The only way they can be made to pull back is persistent push back from Nigerians, like the recurrent outcries over the various moves to hoist Fulani herdsmen settlements on other Nigerians, the latest being the RUGA plan.

Fora are badly needed for these issues to be aired and debated as is done here.

Its wise to prevent extreme attitudes but your stated stance looks like a flight from reality.

You might have  blocked my post on the possibility of all out war in response to the war already declared on unwitting Nigerians by the right wing Fulani. The imminence of that all out war is already staring us in the face.

Safer to raise issues and debate them than claim that the house that is Nigeria is not already on fire by right wing ethnic supremacists.

SW, SE, Midwest, Southern Kaduna, the entire nation is crying out under the burden of Fulani herdsmen terrorism and you are declaring that "Evil and Good are equally distributed all over the country. All ethnicities have their evil leaders"?

Thanks

Oluwatoyin Vincent Adepoju  







Ibrahim Abdullah

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Jul 7, 2019, 3:24:13 PM7/7/19
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So it’s Fulani herdsmen not Hausa-Fulani herdsmen? Interesting! 

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Victor Okafor

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Jul 7, 2019, 11:06:05 PM7/7/19
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Well, there have always existed good and evil, as well as the potential for good and evil, in all human communities across gender, race, ethnicity and any other construct by which we have tried to classify human beings or by which human existence manifests itself on earth. That’s not necessarily in dispute here. I submit, with all due respect, that that factor is not the issue at stake. From my standpoint, reminding us of this reality of human existence adds nothing constructive to the discourse; instead, it makes us look like a Pontius Pilate—a judge who cannot, for whatever reason, pronoun a verdict of guilt or innocence where one option seems obvious.

By playing a referee that cannot call a spade a spade when it’s warranted in the course of a game, ostensibly because all sides of the game have the potential to commit foul, we come across as if we are trying to sit on the fence, ignore instances of foul play that a fair-minded referee must recognize, and settle for playing the role of an umpire who seems to be unable or unwilling to blow the whistle when foul play manifestly occurs on the side of the game which is populated by the powerful and the mighty. Were this same foul play to occur on the other side, would we have been all too quick to blow the whistle, issue a yellow or even a red card? The fact that stares us in the face is that we have a “national” leader at the helm that, by his publicly known actions and pronouncements, seems bent upon imposing a particular ethnic hegemony upon the rest of us, instead of taking steps to promote national cohesion, national harmony and national peace.    

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Sincerely,

Victor O. Okafor, Ph.D.
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Michael Afolayan

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Jul 7, 2019, 11:07:20 PM7/7/19
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"Efforts like yours to claim, in spite of all evidence to the contrary, that all is well, will not dissuade the right wing Fulani warlords, as the rivers of blood they are spilling makes clear, as they persistently struggle to manipulate  govt policy in tandem with the massacres they are committing, trying to force Nigerians to bend to their dominance in order to gain respite from this incessant bloodletting." (Oluwatoyin Vincent Adepoju)

Dear Toyin Adepoju:

I think you are pushing this issue too far and in the process you seem to be seeing things that are not as if they are and those that are as if they are not. One of such is the claim that Falola is claiming that "all is well." I am a living witness to the fact that we just finished a conference (TOFAC) here in Nigeria (at Babcock U) plus another major gathering at the First Technical University, Ibadan, where Falola gave the first keynote address of the new institution. If anything, he said exactly the opposite of what you just said about him. I think much of what he uttered was that all was not well, and proffering solutions on the way forward.  Even press reports indicated his firm stance on the need for the nation's leadership to address the problem with the "Fulani warlords" (I'm not sure he used that phrase though). Suggesting he is promoting the "all is well" propaganda tends to align him with the disillusioned folks who, like the proverbial ostrich, hide their heads in the sand. I think he is too apolitical to be in that group and is as concerned about this matter as you are, if not more. To subtly align his effort with that of Neville Chamberlain (I can't even believe you said that!!!) is such an unfair characterization for which you need to apologize to him (not that he would care whether you do or not). It's just my own "egbonly" advice to you since I like you personally.

And by the way, we missed you at TOFAC with your most interesting topic!

Stay well . . .

Michael O. Afolayan

===

Moses Ebe Ochonu

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Jul 7, 2019, 11:08:52 PM7/7/19
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Ibrahim,
Stop trying to be clever. Herdsmen refers to the Bororo roving Fulani, who have remained a distinct group, as opposed to the urban, settled Fulani, who commingled with the Hausa to form a new, hybrid identity. There is also the Adamawa-Taraba axis, where settled Fulani, for reasons that scholars have outlined, such as the absence of Hausa people and the presence of many non-Muslim ethnic groups in the area, remained a distinct, or "pure," Fulani group, although even here, some mixing occurred between the Fulani and Chamba, as Richard Fardon and Abubakar Sa'ad have shown in their works, leading to mixed populations in some parts of Adamawa.

Oluwatoyin Vincent Adepoju

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Jul 8, 2019, 11:16:26 PM7/8/19
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Oga Afolayan,

God bless you.

I always enjoy your presence too.

It would have been good to have been at  TOFAC, but I'll try to ameliorate that  through an essay submission to the conference organizers. Not the same thing as a physical presence at the conference but an approximation. 

Unmodified Clarity 

On right wing Fulani terrorism, I was referring to Falola's intervention here which I quoted in my response, not to his comments at TOFAC or in other contexts.

When a historian insists on equalizing the various sides in an unequal conflict, when he chooses to suggest that there is no conclusive evidence of a one sided ethnic centred massacre of other ethnicities by members of one ethnicity, publicly supported by the most high ranking elite of the belligerent ethnicity, suggestions he has made  in the following summation on the current crisis- 

"Evil and Good are equally distributed all over the country. All ethnicities have their evil leaders"

Then we have a problem.  

Clarifying Fact from Fiction

You state:

"I think you are pushing this issue too far and in the process you seem to be seeing things that are not as if they are and those that are as if they are not."

What exactly do you think I am not seeing accurately?

It is now agreed by many Nigerians, as I have been arguing since 2015, that Nigeria is bedevilled by systematic terrorism by Fulani herdsmen militia. 

It is at last recognized by most that this terrorism scourge is being openly supported by Miyetti Allah, whose patrons  are Nigeria's most elite Fulani, most prominent among whom are the Sultan of Sokoto and the Emir of Kano.

People have come to terms with the fact that Nigeria's Fulani President, Muhammadu Buhari, enables this openly sponsored terrorism through security agencies that never challenge, question or arrest the terrorists or their public managers, talk less prosecute them, leading to these characters being able to publicly defy the laws of an entire state, Benue and subsequently  commit  a massacre of hundreds to reinforce their defiance.

These are not incidents imagined by Adepoju.

In the light of these developments, we are being informed here that  this travesty is not localized to an ethnicity and is no different from the reality across Nigeria.

Afenifere, OPC, Agbekoya of earlier years, Middle Belt Elders Forum, Niger Delta Militants, Ohaneze, IPOB, and other regional pressure, ethnic-centred and militant groups across Southern Nigeria and the Middle Belt, are they equatable to Miyetti Allah and Fulani herdsmen militia in this context or even in the entirety of Nigerian history?

Has any group struggled to decimate and scatter entire communities and occupy their lands as is being done in the Middle Belt by Fulani herdsmen militia and their political backers? Efforts occurring in a less systematic but definitively destabilising manner in Delta, Edo and the SE?

At what time have Afenifere or Ohaneze given support to any such as aspirations from OPC ,  IPOB or MASSOB, aspirations that have never existed?

Was MEND ever so brazen, so destructive and so widespread, even at their most active?

What of OPC?

It is vital to caution agst extremism in crisis but is it suicidal to argue agst the existence of an ongoing unilateral war.

Some people claim the incidents I am describing are not real even though attention to news and a simple Google search verifies them.

I have made the following compilation to suggest the heart of the problem- the demonstration of a jihadist mentality by right wing Fulani:


The right wing Fulani are ruthless ethnic supremacists like the Nazi Party. Their private army, the Fulani herdsmen militia, are like the Nazi paramilitary wing, though the herdsmen militia are more deadly.

Buhari is steadily using the Nigerian armed forces and security agencies in enabling the efforts of this militia through a policy of non-engagement and non-challenge of either their foot soldiers or their leadership, the latter being figures prominent in civil society, unlike the Boko Haram sponsors, who remain undisclosed except by inference.

I am open to critique of my compilation and position on this subject.

Existing Danger

As for the Chamberlain reference, even some Jews in Nazi Germany refused to heed the oncoming Holocaust even with all the clear signs. 

They had lived in Germany for generations. The expulsion of Jews from Spain, the anti-Jewish pogroms of earlier centuries Europe,were things of the past, they believed, even as the Nazis proceeded to destroy Jewish establishments,  to segregate and ghettoize Jews, people who used to be among the most illustrious members of German society.

It was when the transportation of Jews to the concentration camps began that the truth became inescapable.

People seem afraid to face the central qs here-

What are the Implications of an Organisation Headed by Nigeria's Most Elite Fulani Openly Supporting and Coordinating a Fulani Terrorist Movement?

Facing such realities squarely is vital for the survival of Southern Nigeria and the Middle Belt as free people.

Public and Semi-Public Contexts

With all due respect to Professor Toyin Falola, making a public speech or other public pronouncement is different from navigating the more intimate contexts of a group such as this.

Falola has close connections with people across Nigeria.

A good number of his scholarly contacts across Nigeria could be on this group.

He was recently in Sokoto and spoke well of his experience there.

Yet, an increasing tide of animosity is rising against a particular  constituency in this demographic on account of the inhuman behavior of their leadership which the majority are doing nothing to deflect, preferring to remain silent or in a few cases to make arguments that strip the murderers of primary responsibility for their actions and generally refusing to address the daylight murder of Nigerians and of the Fulani name by these right wing leaders.

Unlike many, Falola is able to see the faces in the crowd of those being vilified, to invoke J.P. Clarke's poem "Casualties",  on the group demonisations that fueled the Nigerian Civil War.   Falola may then be seen as overreacting  by trying to paper over problems you describe him as publicly acknowledging. 

Fulani Led Fed Govt's Alliance with Various Terrorism Strategies

Such overreaction may be seen as disguising the fact that it is inhuman for Fulani people generally to carry on as if the country is not burning, as if blood is not flowing in rivers on account of their most prominent leadership unleashing a unilateral war on Nigerians, and beating their chests about in public, in addition, with Miyetti Allah and other right wing establishments of the Muslim North practically indistinguishable from Buhari's government. 

Right now, a Northern Muslim coalition has given Southern governors 30 days to accept the national Fulani resettlement plan known as RUGA or have all Southerners evacuate the North.

I understand that days after this threat, Buhari has made no comment on it. An APC representative, from Buhari's party in the SW, has cried out that Buhari should arrest the leadership of this coalition.

My understanding is that this APC man from the SW has done well, demonstrating humanity over party and creating a platform to further open the eyes of Nigerians to the deadly inhumanity of the characters now running Nigeria.

I expect no one will be arrested.

Why?

Because those people are Buhari's mouthpieces. They could not have made an inflammatory threat of such proportions without the tacit or explicit understanding that they are immune from prosecution, just like a similar coalition that threatened Igbos with expulsion from the North if IPOB did not call off its planned boycott of the Anambra gubernatorial elections, an action by IPOB that the figures behind that group knew would lead to the beginning of the unraveling of Nigeria, their fiefdom.

I anticipate the next four years of Buhari's Presidency could be terrible as he pursues his primary goal, total Fulani/Muslim North  hegemony through various terrorist and political manoeuvres.

The only weapon the South has is speaking up as loudly as possible.

Access to the government's armed forces has been secured by Buhari, that being the first thing he did on coming to power through his Muslim North centred appointments of leadership of the security agencies, agencies under which Boko Haram Islamic terrorism thrives and where terrorism by right wing Fulani is openly empowered.

The Question of Collective Responsibility in Combating  Evil

On  28 Dec. 2011, on the thread of a post "Boko Haram and the Silent Majority," on the NaijaPolitics yahoo group, among others, at a time when Boko Haram was entrenching itself in the Muslim North through its initial strategy of presenting itself as a Muslim army fighting an infidel government and Christians as they built on bitterness in that region that the region did not get the Presidency as expected and with Atiku Abubakar earlier threatening  violent change because a Muslim Northerner, himself was not made PDP 2011 Presidential candidate, which would have led him to the Presidency, Pius Adesanmi made the following observation:

"The majority of peace loving Muslims are powerless before this very powerful radical minority, and for the sake of their lives most prefer to keep quiet. But the agenda of Islamisation which is a crucial expected outcome of these radicals will be an outcome welcome by all Muslims whether radical or not." - Reverend Father Bassey

 

Dear Father Bassey:

 

Thanks are due to Oga Ojo for circulating your thoughts widely. I agree with his critique of same. I have also excerpted a curious point you make. I couldn't disagree with you more on what you state above. 


The majority of Nigeria's peace loving Moslems are certainly not powerless before the bloodthirsty cannibals among them.


 The proper thing to say is that the rest of us, Nigerian non-Moslems, have somehow never held the Muslim majority accountable for their silence over these orgies of murder that come complete with the ability to tar-brush all of them and even their religion. 


I am not saying that we don't hear from a few courageous and progressive Muslims but the numbers are not up to the ten fingers of my non-leprous hands. Apologies for the hyperbole. It is for discursive effect. Just look at my constituency: how many Northern Muslim University lecturers have ever come out to denounce these killings? 


How many of them have ever thought of coming together in pressure groups and thinktanks - something like a League of Northern Academics Against Religious Violence - to mount pressure on Northern state governors, religious leaders and elders? How many of them have organized themselves in NGOs and sought funding from local and foreign bodies to mount public campaigns against religious violence in the core north? 


Don't we have colleagues everywhere from Usmanu Dan Fodio University in Sokoto to Bayero University in Kano? How many of them have you ever heard from? They don't have voices or they suddenly become too busy with academic work whenever these orgies of violence require their voices in the public space?


 I think the time has come when we must begin to make it clear to that Moslem majority that we do not believe that they are powerless to rein in the murderers who are giving their religion such a bad name; that, where we stand, their silence means acquiescence or indifference or both; that we are no longer satisfied with a handful of well-meaning Muslims and Muslim organizations coming out to apply medicine after death by issuing statements after every bomb blast and going back to sleep until the next blast - let them be proactive! 


Let them do the right thing with conscientization campaigns and other socially prophylactic initiatives in the warrens of radical Islam in the North, etc. 


We want to see them get their hands dirty in the trenches of the North, involved in very publicized and mediatized campaigns for religious harmony and against religious violence. That Muslim majority must be seen working proactively by the rest of us. 


Otherwise, the Sultan rushing to Aso Rock for a photo-op presented as a security consultation while we are burying our dead is cold comfort.

 

Pius"

 

 The reaction Adesanmi was hoping for eventually emerged, in a more surreptitious but effective manner after two years of steady bombing and machine gunning of churches and worshipers and govt establishments and killing of informants agst them by Boko Haram.


But there was never, to the best of my knowledge,  a public response from the Northern Muslim academic community, a move that, admittedly,  is likely have been dangerous on account of Boko Haram's policy of executing critics and informants, and even without such criticism from academia in the Muslim North  Boko Haram eventually targeted their universities.


Adesanmi also seemed to be referencing however, a culture of anti-Southern violence in the Muslim that has recurrently erupted since the 1950s. 


What has been the response, for example, of other Northern Muslim and Fulani scholars to Umar Labdo's declaration, in the midst of massacres by Miyetti Allah militia in Benue, that Benue belongs to the Fulani by right of conquest?


Silence.


What has been their response to the various acts of owning up to and justification of massacres by Miyetti Allah?


Silence or description of the killers as reacting to injustices or problems beyond their control.


What is their response to the current threat for Southern governors to support RUGA or face expulsion  of Southerners from the North?


Silence.


The Present as Seeds of the Future


If the right wing Fulani succeed in their colonization plans, will such Northern Muslim scholars not help their Southern colleagues adjust to their new circumstances?


Did cooperative learning by various peoples not flourish in Islamic Spain after the conquest by Muslims?


It did, but the Muslim overlords kept a tight grip on the country they had colonized through unprovoked attack until the Spaniards got their country back after long fighting, after which their own culture thrived.

 

#NotoTRF (Terrorism by Right Wing Fulani)

thanks 

Oluwatoyin Vincent Adepoju



OLAYINKA AGBETUYI

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Jul 8, 2019, 11:17:08 PM7/8/19
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Toyin Adepojus prefereed solutiin seem to be that we should arm ourselves for war and wipe out the Fulani.

Ask him where his battalions are stationed since he would not be using the Nigerian Armed Forces commanded by a Fulani President.

OAA



Sent from my Samsung Galaxy smartphone.


-------- Original message --------
From: 'Michael Afolayan' via USA Africa Dialogue Series <usaafric...@googlegroups.com>
Date: 08/07/2019 04:10 (GMT+00:00)
To: usaafricadialogue <usaafric...@googlegroups.com>
Subject: Re: USA Africa Dialogue Series - No hate speech!

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"Efforts like yours to claim, in spite of all evidence to the contrary, that all is well, will not dissuade the right wing Fulani warlords, as the rivers of blood they are spilling makes clear, as they persistently struggle to manipulate  govt policy in tandem with the massacres they are committing, trying to force Nigerians to bend to their dominance in order to gain respite from this incessant bloodletting." (Oluwatoyin Vincent Adepoju)

Dear Toyin Adepoju:

I think you are pushing this issue too far and in the process you seem to be seeing things that are not as if they are and those that are as if they are not. One of such is the claim that Falola is claiming that "all is well." I am a living witness to the fact that we just finished a conference (TOFAC) here in Nigeria (at Babcock U) plus another major gathering at the First Technical University, Ibadan, where Falola gave the first keynote address of the new institution. If anything, he said exactly the opposite of what you just said about him. I think much of what he uttered was that all was not well, and proffering solutions on the way forward.  Even press reports indicated his firm stance on the need for the nation's leadership to address the problem with the "Fulani warlords" (I'm not sure he used that phrase though). Suggesting he is promoting the "all is well" propaganda tends to align him with the disillusioned folks who, like the proverbial ostrich, hide their heads in the sand. I think he is too apolitical to be in that group and is as concerned about this matter as you are, if not more. To subtly align his effort with that of Neville Chamberlain (I can't even believe you said that!!!) is such an unfair characterization for which you need to apologize to him (not that he would care whether you do or not). It's just my own "egbonly" advice to you since I like you personally.

And by the way, we missed you at TOFAC with your most interesting topic!

Stay well . . .

Michael O. Afolayan

===

On Sunday, July 7, 2019, 6:36:57 PM GMT+1, Oluwatoyin Vincent Adepoju <toyin....@gmail.com> wrote:



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OLAYINKA AGBETUYI

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Jul 8, 2019, 11:17:09 PM7/8/19
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This leader will not be there foe ever.  We will see what the next leader will do.  Johnathan did not solve the security problem by the end of his rule.  Lets wait and see. We will not change the rules or abandon the game while still in progress

OAA



Sent from my Samsung Galaxy smartphone.


-------- Original message --------
From: Victor Okafor <vok...@emich.edu>
Date: 08/07/2019 04:10 (GMT+00:00)
Subject: Re: USA Africa Dialogue Series - No hate speech!

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Well, there have always existed good and evil, as well as the potential for good and evil, in all human communities across gender, race, ethnicity and any other construct by which we have tried to classify human beings or by which human existence manifests itself on earth. That’s not necessarily in dispute here. I submit, with all due respect, that that factor is not the issue at stake. From my standpoint, reminding us of this reality of human existence adds nothing constructive to the discourse; instead, it makes us look like a Pontius Pilate—a judge who cannot, for whatever reason, pronoun a verdict of guilt or innocence where one option seems obvious.

By playing a referee that cannot call a spade a spade when it’s warranted in the course of a game, ostensibly because all sides of the game have the potential to commit foul, we come across as if we are trying to sit on the fence, ignore instances of foul play that a fair-minded referee must recognize, and settle for playing the role of an umpire who seems to be unable or unwilling to blow the whistle when foul play manifestly occurs on the side of the game which is populated by the powerful and the mighty. Were this same foul play to occur on the other side, would we have been all too quick to blow the whistle, issue a yellow or even a red card? The fact that stares us in the face is that we have a “national” leader at the helm that, by his publicly known actions and pronouncements, seems bent upon imposing a particular ethnic hegemony upon the rest of us, instead of taking steps to promote national cohesion, national harmony and national peace.    

On Sun, Jul 7, 2019 at 12:10 PM Toyin Falola <toyin...@austin.utexas.edu> wrote:
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Sincerely,

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Eastern Michigan University


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Michael Afolayan

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Jul 9, 2019, 3:46:41 AM7/9/19
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You did well, Oluwatosin Vincent Adepoju, in proffering a lengthy explanation to my brief observation. Seriously, I don't want you to shoot the proverbial fly with a million dollar cannon. You have fiercer battles and bigger enemies in the theater of operation. I sure know you were trying to react to Falola's intervention in his attempt to caution against various reactions bordering on bigotry and hate, which prompted him to state that:

1. Evil and Good are equally distributed all over the country. All ethnicities have their evil leaders.
2. The victims are the poor 
3. Hate speech can trigger genocide 
Moderator

Take out the phrase "equally distributed" and replace it with the word "found" and you will be okay, right? I, too, will. Would it not be universally and empirically true, though, that evil and good are found all over our country (and in all societies)? Don't all ethnic groups have their leaders that are evil? Aren't the victims always the poor, prompting the saying that "when two elephants fight it's the grass that suffers"? Isn't it factual that hate speeches do have the tendency to trigger genocide?

But, really, my position is not on the specificity of Falola in his three positions but the "all is well" claim that you attributed to him and that such claim would not be consistent with his known position not only in the past but even in contemporary circumstances as in the two instances I cited.

And as for the Chamberlain's allusion, I think a man with such poor (or even bad) leadership record in the history of England does not fit the profile of TF that you and I know. Don't you think so?

That's all I was trying to say in a nutshell.

Affectionately,

MOA

===

Cornelius Hamelberg

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Jul 9, 2019, 10:19:29 AM7/9/19
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 Of  some relevance: This interesting piece about Hate Speech:

The Fight for the Future of YouTube | The New Yorker

Toyin Adepoju. Some of us are sick and tired of him. We are all witness to the passion and the hysterical, monomaniac zeal with which Toyin V. Adepoju is and has been conducting his relentless crusade against what he fears is a movement towards “Northern Hegemony!“ With my own background and experience, the relentlessness of his attacks leaves me wondering who he is or could be working for and if anyone - either a conglomerate of disgruntled, power-hungry opposition politicians or indeed a foreign power who would like to see the rapid disintegration and demise of Nigeria along the well-known fault lines of the North-south, Muslim-Christian divide, is paying him to do what he does: Because it seems that when not dabbling in esoterica he is otherwise occupied 24 hours a day – every day – as the archives also bear witness, either bashing Islam as the animus of Fulani Herdsmen protecting their cows, that it’s Islam and not Christianity behind prominent Muslims such as President Buhari, and Nigeria's foremost Islamic leaders such as the Sultan of Sokoto and the Emir of Kano, and members of the various organizations under the umbrella of the Miyetti Allah Cattle Breeders Association of Nigeria – all of Fulani ethnicity and said to be leading the caravan in the so-called drive to the alleged “Northern hegemony” : That it’s power-hungry Islam that’s the driving force behind our beleaguered Fulani Herdsmen’s survival instinct when it comes to warding off potential cattle rustlers; that it’s Islam that’s to blame when the Fulani herdsmen struggle to fend off hostile neighbours through whose territories they have to trek in their long journeys to the abattoirs and hungry stomach forever waiting to be filled by delicious Fulani beef, further South, through the ever-expanding so called “Middle-Belt and much further South, down south, the True South, to their pen-ultimate destination: the hungry stomachs in the South-east and the South-west of the once great, the still undivided and united Federal Republic of Nigeria.

Who is Adepoju working for? No doubt, he will say that he is a Nigerian and that Nigerians don’t work for other people, even if he has some of the characteristics of some people who I know work for other people. No doubt his reply would be about the rivers of pure Nigerian blood beating in his heart and coursing through his arteries and his veins, even if he has previously declared the causes which impel him and some others of his kith and kin to separation, from what is now Nigeria.

A more important question: Isn’t it about time that the Federal government provided armed escorts for the Fulani Herdsmen?

In this his latest response to Michael O. Afolayan’s innocent remonstrations, blow by blow, Adepoju has painstakingly, sometimes with meticulous details situated the whole problem along the North-South axis. The way he sees it, it’s the armed North (which he equates with Nigeria's national army) versus the unarmed and toothless South, so that helplessly wringing his hands Adepoju cries,

The only weapon the South has is speaking up as loudly as possible. “.

This impotent victim’s’ cry from Adepoju is further amplified earlier on by the same Adepoju stopping short of calling for an armed insurrection or Civil disobedience - a call which I thought Oga Falola would have censored


Oluwatoyin Vincent Adepoju

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Jul 9, 2019, 10:19:48 AM7/9/19
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Thanks Oga Afolayan.

What fiercer battles and bigger enemies do I really have?

I am not in an IDP camp like the hordes displaced in the Middle Belt by Fulani herdsmen militia.

Neither myself or anyone close to me has been kidnapped by the proliferation of right wing Fulani kidnapping cells in the SW and perhaps other parts of the country.

My library and computers, my professional tools, are intact. They have not suffered the fate of farming livelihoods destroyed  by Fulani herdsmen terrorizing farmers across the nation.

But, in travelling from Lagos to Benin on  research trips, I have to be wary of these kidnappers.

In exploring forests in Benin, one of my research goals, I have to watch out for dangerous Fulani herdsmen described as camped in such remote locations in Edo state.

If there is an uprising against Buhari's crazy politics, or a conflagration initiated by his incendiary govt style,  I might not have the stable environment to work in anymore.

So, these issues affect each of us personally. The stories of those who have suffered from these ravages make that clear.

Electricity, water and other fundamentals of life are challenging in Nigeria. I cant see any signs that this will change for most Nigerians in the next 50 years, unless by a miracle. In the midst of these deprivations, people  should at least be able to live in peace.

While Falola's observations are generally correct across time and space, they are not factual in the implications actualized by the context in which he used them.

The issue in this crisis is not the general distribution of evil and good across ethnicities and regions in Nigeria.

The issue is about the manifest efforts of the leadership of a particular ethnic group to dominate others through a combination of terrorism and manipulation of govt policy.

Is there any other ethnic leadership in Nigeria pursuing such a strategy? Is there any other ethnic militia in Nigeria of such murderous scope and territorial ambition?

No.

There has never been in Nigerian history until now. 

My critique was directed at "Evil and Good are equally distributed all over the country. All ethnicities have their evil leaders" which is factually accurate in general terms but inaccurate in the way it is used in this context to suggest we dont have an intensification of evil in a particular context in Nigeria at this point in time.

I am not critiquing 

'2. The victims are the poor 
3. Hate speech can trigger genocide  '

Although this scourge has moved from isolated regions in Benue where villagers have been displaced to more sporadic but recurrent destabilizations in the SW and SE, so it affects everyone.

I agree with the third point and I sympathize with what may be seen as Falola's predicament.

The horse of carnage is about to escape from the stable and people like Falola are desperate to hold it back. The people urging the horse on think its in their interests. When the dust of blood settles, they will be in control, they think. 

Other people are insisting on confronting these destruction merchants. People like Falola are afraid that such confrontation could be grievous for the destruction peddlers.

But how do we restrain them from their folly?

Its vital to be consistent in this struggle bcs of the impressions generated by diverse kinds of response. A central aspect of the struggle is what is stated or not stated, and how things are stated, as indicated by Buhari's calculated silences as his death and intimidation merchants get busy.

I dont expect Falola to urge Northern Muslims on take an open humanistic stand on this carnage by their ethnic leadership. I dont see that as his style.

At the same time, making a public statement to  an anonymous public is not the same as a characterization made on a semi-private group such as this one. 

As for 1930s/1940s British PM Neville Chamberlaine, how fair is it to describe him as a poor or bad leader?

He strived heroically to prevent war in Europe by allowing some demands of Hitler's, not realizing the scope of Hitler's ambitions.

With reference to Toyin Falola's comments on this group which I was responding to, I am urging us to keep in mind the ruthless ambitions of the belligerent ethnic leadership in question while we struggle against the demonisation of the general populace associated with this leadership .

thanks

toyin















Oluwatoyin Vincent Adepoju

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Jul 9, 2019, 11:56:34 AM7/9/19
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Thousands of helpless and innocent Nigerians are regularly massacred and displaced  by a terrorist group centred in Fulani herdsmen and the person writing the post immediately below this one buries this profound suggestion into the concoction he has manufactured- 

'A more important question: Isn’t it about time that the Federal government provided armed escorts for the Fulani Herdsmen?'

Nigerians thank you for your care over the preservation of their lives.

As for the rest of what he has written, is it worth responding to?

Just like the other chap called OAA refuses to examine history but makes assertions that have no bearing on what is written by Adepoju.

Oga, examine the issues before us. Scrutinize the facts before you and draw conclusions which others can then analyse. 

Flight into emotional conjurations will not help the rising body count and destabilization generated  across Nigeria by the terrorists in question.

Is it true or not that Fulani herdsmen's terrorism exists in Nigeria?

Is it true that they have open support from Miyetti Allah, led by Nigeria's most eminent Fulani?

Is it true that  Fulani herdsmen's terrorism  is Nigeria's primary security threat, eclipsing Boko Haram, on account of   Fulani herdsmen's terrorism's territorial scope and synergy with Miyetti Allah and the Fulani led fed govt?

While these facts have become incontrovertible across Nigeria on account of the sheer brazenness of these characters, some people on this group argue these assertions are not factual.

Challenged by Salimonu Kadiri and Olayinka Agbetuyi, figures in this camp, I produced the following compilation-

These people, like the person below, keep pretending, agst the unfolding Nigerian reality, that these facts do not exist. They are not interested in the evidence.

This game of deliberate blindness has run its course.

Nigerians are not buying it any more.

toyin




 



Emeagwali, Gloria (History)

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Jul 9, 2019, 3:06:15 PM7/9/19
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I am baffled by Adepoju's consistent refusal to back off from his ethnic -cleansing sentiments. Some Fulanis are herders.  Some are not - diffused over more than five African countries in different contexts.Thomas Sankara, one of our greatest heroes - of Fulani ancestry - must be twisting in his grave.

On a different note, let me say that
The University of Lagos hosted two great events within the last five days.
First there was the Fela Kuti conference, and then, earlier today, Professor Falola shared his illuminating perspective  on endowments, funding and Africanization.I was delighted to attend the two events.

Professor Gloria Emeagwali
Prof. of History/African Studies, CCSU
africahistory.netvimeo.com/ gloriaemeagwali
Recipient of the 2014 Distinguished Research Excellence Award, Univ. of Texas at Austin;
2019 Distinguished  Africanist Award
New York African Studies Association
From: usaafric...@googlegroups.com <usaafric...@googlegroups.com> on behalf of Oluwatoyin Vincent Adepoju <toyin....@gmail.com>
Sent: Tuesday, July 9, 2019 5:50:38 AM
To: usaafricadialogue

Subject: Re: USA Africa Dialogue Series - No hate speech!
 

Please be cautious: **External Email**

Michael Afolayan

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Jul 9, 2019, 3:06:20 PM7/9/19
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"What fiercer battles and bigger enemies do I really have?" (OVA)

You just gave a perfect answer to that question when you said, among other things: 

"But, in travelling from Lagos to Benin on  research trips, I have to be wary of these kidnappers.

In exploring forests in Benin, one of my research goals, I have to watch out for dangerous Fulani herdsmen described as camped in such remote locations in Edo state.

If there is an uprising against Buhari's crazy politics, or a conflagration initiated by his incendiary govt style,  I might not have the stable environment to work in anymore.

So, these issues affect each of us personally. The stories of those who have suffered from these ravages make that clear.

Electricity, water and other fundamentals of life are challenging in Nigeria. I cant see any signs that this will change for most Nigerians in the next 50 years, unless by a miracle. In the midst of these deprivations, people  should at least be able to live in peace."


And that was exactly what I meant, and even more so for what I had in bold. They are the battles and enemies to which I was referring to. 

To answer your question when you noted, "As for 1930s/1940s British PM Neville Chamberlaine, how fair is it to describe him as a poor or bad leader?" I say, it's fair. Judging by my rudimentary knowledge of English history, his leadership was a poor one; trust me, it was.  That explains why he is no household name even in British social and political history as opposed to his successor, Winston Churchill, and both were wartime, single-term leaders. But we'll let all that fly; it's not about them; it's about us. 

I thank you for your commitment to the struggle. Keep fit!

Michael










Cornelius Hamelberg

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Jul 9, 2019, 3:54:58 PM7/9/19
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Dear Toyin Adepoju,

Check this out: Anyone who says the Quran advocates terrorism obviously hasn't read its lessons on violence

Do you remember these words: “Two stereotypes dominate most of what has been written on tolerance and intolerance in the Islamic world.¹ The first depicts a fanatical warrior, an Arab horseman riding out of the desert with a sword in one hand and the Qur’ān in the other, offering his victims the choice between the two. This picture, made famous by Edward Gibbon² in his Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire, is not only false but impossible—unless we are to assume a race of left-handed swordsmen. In Muslim practice, the left hand is reserved for unclean purposes, and no self-respecting Muslim, then or..." 

You request that we “Scrutinize the facts before you and draw conclusions which others can then analyse.”

Well, what are the facts? In the Naija cyber world, how do we reliably distinguish fact from fiction? Propaganda from fake news? Saying that you read about it in the Bible or in one of your favourite Nigerian newspapers replete with photographs of rampaging Fulani herdsmen armed to the teeth with AK 47s doesn’t make it all real or all true. “A terrorist group centred in Fulani herdsmen “?

I am not being “emotional “ or dispassionate about this:

What we do know is that too many people have died and among those majority of those slain are the embattled Fulani Herdsmen, just as we know that according to the Holy Quran (Surat Al-Ma'idah ayat 32), whoever kills a person, it’s as if he has killed all mankind...”

Your advocacy on behalf of the “Thousands of helpless and innocent Nigerians (that) are regularly massacredis admirable and I would nominate you for The Right Livelihood Award if only you could once and for all ascertain beyond any reasonable doubt, who the perpetrators are. As Baba Kadiri alias “Ogunlakaiyehas variously pointed out, the poor beleaguered herdsmen are too busy tending their cows to be running around, killing other people and simultaneously on raping sprees.

It is on that basis that I propose a logical solution: that the Buhari government provide military escorts for Fulani Herdsmen traversing what has now become dangerous terrain so that the Nigerian army protects the Fulani herdsmen, their cows and the civilian population from further harm - because, as you know, Fulani Herdsmen have been coming under heavy fire and whenever and wherever there is carnage - even in the most remote places were no cows or Fulani herdsmen have ever set foot, people blame any crime that occurs on their ever handy scapegoats, namely our dear Fulani Herdsmen - whether it’s some armed bandits in Lagos or Anambra State or Imo or Abia , wherever the usual spate of criminal activities, the kidnappings and extortion continue without abruption, whether it’s a rape or a series of rapes in some remote Southern village, your people blame all such criminal activities on their ever-handy scapegoat, “The Fulani Herdsmen” If we are to believe all these ill-reports, it would seem that all crimes committed within the borders of the Federal Republic of Nigeria are committed by the Fulani Herdsmen.

We view with daily sorrow, the realities of what we once thought the post-Holocaust age ((“never again!”) would be - only to see that it has been succeeded by an age of terrorism and genocide in which the sanctity of life and the ideal of pikuach nefesh ought to be policies perused by all responsible governments in protecting the lives and limbs and property of even those who did not elect them.

Also to your credit, you have mentioned a problem, although you have not highlighted it, namely the politicization of the military – the military's ethnic composition (an old Nigerian problem) - I remember, it was either Abacha or Babangida who retired a few dozen Yoruba Generals when he took over. That long-standing problem has to be addressed…

Lastly, I don’t know exactly what you intend with your call for an International Campaign agst Nigeria's President Buhari- I don’t suppose that you intend the international community to pass sanctions on Nigeria until peace and tranquillity return to the Federal Republic of Nigeria.

Here’s something to make you reconsider.




Oluwatoyin Vincent Adepoju

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Jul 10, 2019, 6:12:35 AM7/10/19
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Edited


To Cornelius.

"What we do know is that too many people have died and among those majority of those slain are the embattled Fulani Herdsmen"  

Really?

 The same people on whose behalf Miyetti Allah justifies massacre upon massacre? People armed with AK47s agat defenseless villagers?  


 "if only you could once and for all ascertain beyond any reasonable doubt, who the perpetrators are."

I have done that long ago-

"As Baba Kadiri alias “Ogunlakaiye” has variously pointed out, the poor beleaguered herdsmen are too busy tending their cows to be running around, killing other people and simultaneously on raping sprees."

Tell that to the communities crying out across Nigeria-


If you claim you cant give credence to the report, reinforced by many across Nigeria, you have to give a robust reason why. Otherwise your response will amount to escapism and an effort at ignoring factual history.

Nigerians remain grateful to you for your efforts at empowering those who mare making their lives hell- 

"It is on that basis that I propose a logical solution: that the Buhari government provide military escorts for Fulani Herdsmen traversing what has now become dangerous terrain so that the Nigerian army protects the Fulani herdsmen, their cows and the civilian population from further harm"

In trying to sell a bad product, you should at least understand the script being peddled by the makers  of the product.

You are stating-  
 wherever there is carnage - even in the most remote places were no cows or Fulani herdsmen have ever set foot, people blame any crime that occurs on their ever handy scapegoats, namely our dear Fulani Herdsmen - whether it’s some armed bandits in Lagos or Anambra State or Imo or Abia , wherever the usual spate of criminal activities, the kidnappings and extortion continue without abruption, whether it’s a rape or a series of rapes in some remote Southern village, your people blame all such criminal activities on their ever-handy scapegoat, “The Fulani Herdsmen” If we are to believe all these ill-reports, it would seem that all crimes committed within the borders of the Federal Republic of Nigeria are committed by the Fulani Herdsmen.  
  
 Yet the Fulani led govt has openly concluded and announced an initiative to give or has already given Miyetti Allah 100B of Nigeria's money ostensibly to stop kidnapping by its members, further empowering what is an all but self declared terrorist group.

On international campaign agst Nigeria's President-

International pressure needs to be brought on Buhari to desist from what ex President Obasanjo has rightly called a Fulanisation agenda, initiatives connected with which are the most consistent developments of his administration.

The entire country is like  dry grass sensitive to a spark. The call from the SW APC member for Buhari to arrest the Northern Muslim spokespeople demanding that Southern governors either accept the national Fulani resettlement  scheme known as RUGA or face expulsion of Southerners from the North is a warning sign-


Also

Ruga: Yorùbá Summit Group Reacts To 30-Day Ultimatum By Northern Coalition  [ for Southern Governors to Accept the national Fulani Resettlement Scheme or Face Expulsion or Southerners from the North ]

SW governors, before those report above, are shown as working at developing a sense of unity with the fed govt 


This insecurity, however, is critical to the unfolding vision of the right wing Fulani, represented by Buhari and Miyetti Allah Fulani Socio-Cultural Organisation.

Its on the basis of this insecurity the fed govt has offered or given 100B to Miyetti Allah ostensibly to end kidnapping and brigandage by its members.

Its on the basis of incessant murders, despoilations, rapes and systematic massacres by  Fulani herdsmen across the Middle Belt, Southern Kaduna and Southern Nigeria that the Buhari govt has recurrently tried to establish settlements for these herdsmen across Nigeria, from which locations, Nigerians are correctly assessing, they will be better positioned to continue their internal colonization scheme.

The nomadic Fulani are at a historic crossroads. The nomadic lifestyle is increasingly becoming impractical. But they are being failed by their leadership composed of both the cattle herders and the sedentary Fulani represented by people like Buhari and the patrons of Miyetti Allah.

The valid solutions are technological- like Israel and her neighbors have done on their own land, developing means of rolling back the desertification claimed to be afflicting parts of the North, logistical- growing grass in the South and transporting to the North,  investing in meat storage systems in the North and transporting beef to the South using trucks.

The Fulani leadership, however, prefer to colonise the Middle Belt through terrorism and Southern Nigeria through terrorism allied with manipulation of  govt policy.

The longer it takes them to realize that plan is not gong to work, the more precarious the situation becomes,  the greater the danger of civil war.

Nigeria's Muslim North, unlike the concentration of Muslims in SW Nigeria, is dominated by an extremist ethno-religious carefully policed mindset.

That mindset is represented by Buhari, whose credentials as leader in that region are built on such calculations as inexplicit but obvious support for Boko Haram by describing the war agst Boko Haram as war agst the North, by later describing Boko Haram as the work of the fed govt and by never condemning the group by name until compelled to do so by his adoption as APC Presidential candidate.

The synergy between ethno-religious extremism of the Buhari variety and sociological and ecological challenges are what is unfolding in the current war being waged on Nigeria by Fulani supremacists.

 Thanks

Toyin



On Wed, 10 Jul 2019 at 06:06, Oluwatoyin Vincent Adepoju <toyin....@gmail.com> wrote:
To Cornelius-

"What we do know is that too many people have died and among those majority of those slain are the embattled Fulani Herdsmen"  

Really?

 The same people on whose behalf Miyetti Allah justifies massacre upon massacre? People armed with AK47s agat defenseless villagers?  


 "if only you could once and for all ascertain beyond any reasonable doubt, who the perpetrators are."

I have done that long ago-

"As Baba Kadiri alias “Ogunlakaiye” has variously pointed out, the poor beleaguered herdsmen are too busy tending their cows to be running around, killing other people and simultaneously on raping sprees."

Tell that to the communities crying out across Nigeria-


If you claim you cant give credence to the report, reinforced by many across Nigeria, you have to give a robust reason why. Otherwise your response will amount to escapism and an effort at ignoring factual history.

Nigerians remain grateful to you for your efforts at empowering those who mare making their lives hell- 

"It is on that basis that I propose a logical solution: that the Buhari government provide military escorts for Fulani Herdsmen traversing what has now become dangerous terrain so that the Nigerian army protects the Fulani herdsmen, their cows and the civilian population from further harm"

In trying to sell a bad product, you should at least understand the script being peddled by the makers  of the product.

You are stating-  
 wherever there is carnage - even in the most remote places were no cows or Fulani herdsmen have ever set foot, people blame any crime that occurs on their ever handy scapegoats, namely our dear Fulani Herdsmen - whether it’s some armed bandits in Lagos or Anambra State or Imo or Abia , wherever the usual spate of criminal activities, the kidnappings and extortion continue without abruption, whether it’s a rape or a series of rapes in some remote Southern village, your people blame all such criminal activities on their ever-handy scapegoat, “The Fulani Herdsmen” If we are to believe all these ill-reports, it would seem that all crimes committed within the borders of the Federal Republic of Nigeria are committed by the Fulani Herdsmen.  
  
 Yet the Fulani led govt has openly concluded and announced an initiative to give or has already given Miyetti Allah 100B of Nigeria's money ostensibly to stop kidnapping by its members, further empowering what is an all but self declared terrorist group.

On international campaign agst Nigeria's President-

International pressure needs to be brought on Buhari to desist from what ex President Obasanjo has rightly called a Fulanisation agenda, initiatives connected with which are the most consistent developments of his administration.

The entire country is like  dry grass sensitive to a spark. The call from the SW APC member for Buhari to arrest the Northern Muslim spokespeople demanding that Southern governors either accept the national Fulani resettlement  scheme known as RUGA or face expulsion of Southerners from the North is a warning sign-


SW governors, before that report, are shown as working at developing a sense of unity with the fed govt 


This insecurity, however, is critical to the unfolding vision of the right wing Fulani, represented by Buhari and Miyetti Allah Fulani Socio-Cultural Organisation.

Its on the basis of this insecurity the fed govt has offered or given 100B to Miyetti Allah ostensibly to end kidnapping and brigandage by its members.

Its on the basis of incessant murders, despoilations, rapes and systematic massacres by  Fulani herdsmen across the Middle Belt, Southern Kaduna and Southern Nigeria that the Buhari govt has recurrently tried to establish settlements for these herdsmen across Nigeria, from which locations, Nigerians are correctly assessing, they will be better positioned to continue their internal colonization scheme.

The nomadic Fulani are at a historic crossroads. The nomadic lifestyle is increasingly becoming impractical. But they are being failed by their leadership composed of both the cattle herders and the sedentary Fulani represented by people like Buhari and the patrons of Miyetti Allah.

The valid solutions are technological- like Israel and her neighbors have done on their own land, developing means of rolling back the desertification claimed to be afflicting parts of the North, logistical- growing grass in the South and transporting to the North,  investing in meat storage systems in the North and transporting beef to the South using trucks.

The Fulani leadership, however, prefer to colonise the Middle Belt through terrorism and Southern Nigeria through terrorism allied with manipulation of  govt policy.

The longer it takes them to realize that plan is not gong to work, the more precarious the situation becomes,  the greater the danger of civil war.

Nigeria's Muslim North, unlike the concentration of Muslims in SW Nigeria, is dominated by an extremist ethno-religious carefully policed mindset.

That mindset is represented by Buhari, whose credentials as leader in that region are built on such calculations as inexplicit but obvious support for Boko Haram by describing the war agst Boko Haram as war agst the North, by later describing Boko Haram as the work of the fed govt and by never condemning the group by name until compelled to do so by his adoption as APC Presidential candidate.

The synergy between ethno-religious extremism of the Buhari variety and sociological and ecological challenges are what is unfolding in the current war being waged on Nigeria by Fulani supremacists.

 Thanks

Toyin




Cornelius Hamelberg

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Jul 10, 2019, 9:55:17 AM7/10/19
to usaafric...@googlegroups.com

Oluwatoyin Vincent Adepoju,

Behold it’s the second coming!

But I know that you won’t be smiling from ear to ear when you read this:

The question re-appears:

Yes, and how many deaths will it take till he know that too many people have died?

There’s no reason to confine me in the madhouse

Of those who deny that there was a Holocaust

Or those who are not quite so sure about Jesus

That he died on the cross

And in this case not even Baba Kadiri is denying that anyone died.

The question is, who did all the killing? He replied to your tall claims a long time ago; I phoned him this morning and he has promised that he is going to demolish you once again , so expect some more fireworks ( shock and awe)  from  him shortly. As for me, I am prepared to swear on the so called “Old Testament” or the one Pastor Adeboye says is still “New” or on the Holy Quran, that it was not the endangered Nigerian species known as “The Fulani Herdsmen” Now, I know that you won’t be smiling about this but it’s all I have to give and you can take that to the bank.

Have a heart. How do you expect a ragtag militia of alleged Fulani Herdsmen to invade any of the places in Nigeria that I know very well, to name a few: Port Harcourt, Ahoada, Omoku, Bori, Kpor, Ken Saro-Wiwa’s Ogoniland, Bonny, Buguma, Bakana, Degema, Abonnema, Okrika, Yenagoa, Brass , Nembe , the White House in Owerri, my Aba, my Umuahia and live to see another day?

Do you really believe that a ragtag army of Fulani cowboys could invade any of my former hideouts, kill a few of our men, leave their cows to graze freely while they rape a couple of our women and that they would live to escape safely back to base? When you believe fairy tales like that it only shows that at no time in your life did you do anything like military service…

It’s very interesting, all the nasty things you say about Brother Buhari : I’ll get back to you more fully about such folly. You should count your blessings. If you said such things about Paul Biya , he would probably lock you up, put your tail in prison, as he did Maurice Kamto. It’s interesting what you say about bringing “International Pressure” to bear on Brother Buhari. I’ll re-read what you say and reply to the trash later. In the meantime, let me tell you what you already know: The enemies of Africa and of Nigeria, the sleeping giant, in particular, are well aware of the economic prognosis that Nigeria will be in the G7 in another 25 years from now- and to thwart that they would like to truncate Nigeria – fragment Nigeria into several smaller ethnic entities, each with its own president and chief justice – and so whether you know this or not – at this stage, you are inadvertently a willing accomplice that will unwittingly assist them in realizing their aim by fomenting and orchestrating a religious-ethenic war God forbid, that would devastate the country. Maybe, you think, not all to the bad after all, that you Edo State and Biafra will arise out of the ashes when the dust settles to become an economic success, whether or not they maintain good relations with your Northern Hegemony with which you were once united as one Nigeria.

I’m going to catch some sleep before the kickoff between Benin and Senegal (I suppose Senegal will win) and then in five and a half hours from now it will be Brother Muhammad Buhari’s Super Eagles of Nigeria United against Ramaphosa’s Bafana Bafana. I hope that you know where I stand on that one.

BTW, this was the exchange of messages between me and a friend in Holland about Tunisia and Ghana, yesterday.

Cornelius : ( Before the match): “The chips and the beer on the ready. Ghana about to trash Tunisia, God willing”

John . ( He used to be a missionary in the Congo): “ Why would God trash anyone?”

Cornelius : ( after the natch) "That should be a good question for Christopher Hitchens, wherever he may be at the moment. Also, why should he allow his only dearlý begotten son to be crucified? Anyway, it looks like Tunisia was also praying and managed to thrash dear Ghana, this time




Oluwatoyin Vincent Adepoju

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Jul 10, 2019, 10:32:14 AM7/10/19
to usaafricadialogue
You cant speak for yourself but must invite proxies- 

'And in this case not even Baba Kadiri is denying that anyone died.

The question is, who did all the killing? He replied to your tall claims a long time ago; I phoned him this morning and he has promised that he is going to demolish you once again , so expect some more fireworks ( shock and awe)  from  him shortly. As for me, I am prepared to swear on the so called “Old Testament” or the one Pastor Adeboye says is still “New” or on the Holy Quran, that it was not the endangered Nigerian species known as “The Fulani Herdsmen” Now, I know that you won’t be smiling about this but it’s all I have to give and you can take that to the bank.'

Cornelius.

Waste of time on the part of such history deniers.

Nigerians have been compelled by rivers of their own blood to accept the tragic reality.

As it is, your efforts to overturn reality will help me refine and update my records.

It will also motivate me to PDF and  more widely distribute those records.

I am also likely to seriously consider bringing out a book on my prophetic writings on this subject, writings anticipating by months and years the publicly stated insights and actions of such national figures as Ayodele Fayose as governor of Ekiti as well as ex-min of defense Theophilus Danjuma and ex-head of state Olusegun Obasanjo.

Solid records make it harder to deny history.

toyin








 




OLAYINKA AGBETUYI

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Jul 10, 2019, 1:27:45 PM7/10/19
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To yin.  

I think I have read part if this before and it shows how partial you have been all along.

Are you saying you dont believe the Agatu killed the Fulani Shehu Abdullahi and Ardo Madaki?  What did Johnathan do about it?

Are you saying the Nimbo to your knowledge did not kill any Fulani?  What was done about it before the Fulani ILLEGALLY took the law into their hands to protect their own?

Are the lives of Fulani killed not equally precious as their own reprisal victims are?

Are these not jointly community unrests?

What has all these got to do with colonisation?


OAA



Sent from my Samsung Galaxy smartphone.


-------- Original message --------
From: Oluwatoyin Vincent Adepoju <toyin....@gmail.com>
Date: 09/07/2019 16:59 (GMT+00:00)
To: usaafricadialogue <usaafric...@googlegroups.com>
Subject: Re: USA Africa Dialogue Series - No hate speech!

Boxbe This message is eligible for Automatic Cleanup! (toyin....@gmail.com) Add cleanup rule | More info
Thousands of helpless and innocent Nigerians are regularly massacred and displaced  by a terrorist group centred in Fulani herdsmen and the person writing the post immediately below this one buries this profound suggestion into the concoction he has manufactured- 

'A more important question: Isn’t it about time that the Federal government provided armed escorts for the Fulani Herdsmen?'

Nigerians thank you for your care over the preservation of their lives.

As for the rest of what he has written, is it worth responding to?

Just like the other chap called OAA refuses to examine history but makes assertions that have no bearing on what is written by Adepoju.

Oga, examine the issues before us. Scrutinize the facts before you and draw conclusions which others can then analyse. 

Flight into emotional conjurations will not help the rising body count and destabilization generated  across Nigeria by the terrorists in question.

Is it true or not that Fulani herdsmen's terrorism exists in Nigeria?

Is it true that they have open support from Miyetti Allah, led by Nigeria's most eminent Fulani?

Is it true that  Fulani herdsmen's terrorism  is Nigeria's primary security threat, eclipsing Boko Haram, on account of   Fulani herdsmen's terrorism's territorial scope and synergy with Miyetti Allah and the Fulani led fed govt?

While these facts have become incontrovertible across Nigeria on account of the sheer brazenness of these characters, some people on this group argue these assertions are not factual.

Challenged by Salimonu Kadiri and Olayinka Agbetuyi, figures in this camp, I produced the following compilation-


These people, like the person below, keep pretending, agst the unfolding Nigerian reality, that these facts do not exist. They are not interested in the evidence.

This game of deliberate blindness has run its course.

Nigerians are not buying it any more.

toyin




 



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OLAYINKA AGBETUYI

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Jul 10, 2019, 1:28:04 PM7/10/19
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I agree with you that Toyin Adepoju,s call is tresonable!


OAA



Sent from my Samsung Galaxy smartphone.


-------- Original message --------
From: Cornelius Hamelberg <hamelberg...@gmail.com>
Date: 09/07/2019 15:28 (GMT+00:00)
Subject: Re: USA Africa Dialogue Series - No hate speech!

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 Of  some relevance: This interesting piece about Hate Speech:

The Fight for the Future of YouTube | The New Yorker

Toyin Adepoju. Some of us are sick and tired of him. We are all witness to the passion and the hysterical, monomaniac zeal with which Toyin V. Adepoju is and has been conducting his relentless crusade against what he fears is a movement towards “Northern Hegemony!“ With my own background and experience, the relentlessness of his attacks leaves me wondering who he is or could be working for and if anyone - either a conglomerate of disgruntled, power-hungry opposition politicians or indeed a foreign power who would like to see the rapid disintegration and demise of Nigeria along the well-known fault lines of the North-south, Muslim-Christian divide, is paying him to do what he does: Because it seems that when not dabbling in esoterica he is otherwise occupied 24 hours a day – every day – as the archives also bear witness, either bashing Islam as the animus of Fulani Herdsmen protecting their cows, that it’s Islam and not Christianity behind prominent Muslims such as President Buhari, and Nigeria's foremost Islamic leaders such as the Sultan of Sokoto and the Emir of Kano, and members of the various organizations under the umbrella of the Miyetti Allah Cattle Breeders Association of Nigeria – all of Fulani ethnicity and said to be leading the caravan in the so-called drive to the alleged “Northern hegemony” : That it’s power-hungry Islam that’s the driving force behind our beleaguered Fulani Herdsmen’s survival instinct when it comes to warding off potential cattle rustlers; that it’s Islam that’s to blame when the Fulani herdsmen struggle to fend off hostile neighbours through whose territories they have to trek in their long journeys to the abattoirs and hungry stomach forever waiting to be filled by delicious Fulani beef, further South, through the ever-expanding so called “Middle-Belt and much further South, down south, the True South, to their pen-ultimate destination: the hungry stomachs in the South-east and the South-west of the once great, the still undivided and united Federal Republic of Nigeria.

Who is Adepoju working for? No doubt, he will say that he is a Nigerian and that Nigerians don’t work for other people, even if he has some of the characteristics of some people who I know work for other people. No doubt his reply would be about the rivers of pure Nigerian blood beating in his heart and coursing through his arteries and his veins, even if he has previously declared the causes which impel him and some others of his kith and kin to separation, from what is now Nigeria.

A more important question: Isn’t it about time that the Federal government provided armed escorts for the Fulani Herdsmen?

In this his latest response to Michael O. Afolayan’s innocent remonstrations, blow by blow, Adepoju has painstakingly, sometimes with meticulous details situated the whole problem along the North-South axis. The way he sees it, it’s the armed North (which he equates with Nigeria's national army) versus the unarmed and toothless South, so that helplessly wringing his hands Adepoju cries,

The only weapon the South has is speaking up as loudly as possible. “.

This impotent victim’s’ cry from Adepoju is further amplified earlier on by the same Adepoju stopping short of calling for an armed insurrection or Civil disobedience - a call which I thought Oga Falola would have censored


On Tue, 9 Jul 2019 at 05:17, OLAYINKA AGBETUYI <yagb...@hotmail.com> wrote:

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OLAYINKA AGBETUYI

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Jul 10, 2019, 1:52:58 PM7/10/19
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Iga Corneliys:

I also once made that proposal of total disarming the populace so only law enforcement agents possess arms and these be used to protect the herdsmen in view of their vital trade.

In the US (unlike London) where there is no Sunday trading armed police patrol empty malls in small towns because of their economic importance

OAA



Sent from my Samsung Galaxy smartphone.


-------- Original message --------
From: Cornelius Hamelberg <hamelberg...@gmail.com>
Date: 09/07/2019 20:55 (GMT+00:00)
Subject: Re: USA Africa Dialogue Series - No hate speech!

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Dear Toyin Adepoju,

Check this out: Anyone who says the Quran advocates terrorism obviously hasn't read its lessons on violence

Do you remember these words: “Two stereotypes dominate most of what has been written on tolerance and intolerance in the Islamic world.¹ The first depicts a fanatical warrior, an Arab horseman riding out of the desert with a sword in one hand and the Qur’ān in the other, offering his victims the choice between the two. This picture, made famous by Edward Gibbon² in his Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire, is not only false but impossible—unless we are to assume a race of left-handed swordsmen. In Muslim practice, the left hand is reserved for unclean purposes, and no self-respecting Muslim, then or..." 

You request that we “Scrutinize the facts before you and draw conclusions which others can then analyse.”

Well, what are the facts? In the Naija cyber world, how do we reliably distinguish fact from fiction? Propaganda from fake news? Saying that you read about it in the Bible or in one of your favourite Nigerian newspapers replete with photographs of rampaging Fulani herdsmen armed to the teeth with AK 47s doesn’t make it all real or all true. “A terrorist group centred in Fulani herdsmen “?

I am not being “emotional “ or dispassionate about this:

What we do know is that too many people have died and among those majority of those slain are the embattled Fulani Herdsmen, just as we know that according to the Holy Quran (Surat Al-Ma'idah ayat 32), whoever kills a person, it’s as if he has killed all mankind...”

Your advocacy on behalf of the “Thousands of helpless and innocent Nigerians (that) are regularly massacredis admirable and I would nominate you for The Right Livelihood Award if only you could once and for all ascertain beyond any reasonable doubt, who the perpetrators are. As Baba Kadiri alias “Ogunlakaiyehas variously pointed out, the poor beleaguered herdsmen are too busy tending their cows to be running around, killing other people and simultaneously on raping sprees.

It is on that basis that I propose a logical solution: that the Buhari government provide military escorts for Fulani Herdsmen traversing what has now become dangerous terrain so that the Nigerian army protects the Fulani herdsmen, their cows and the civilian population from further harm - because, as you know, Fulani Herdsmen have been coming under heavy fire and whenever and wherever there is carnage - even in the most remote places were no cows or Fulani herdsmen have ever set foot, people blame any crime that occurs on their ever handy scapegoats, namely our dear Fulani Herdsmen - whether it’s some armed bandits in Lagos or Anambra State or Imo or Abia , wherever the usual spate of criminal activities, the kidnappings and extortion continue without abruption, whether it’s a rape or a series of rapes in some remote Southern village, your people blame all such criminal activities on their ever-handy scapegoat, “The Fulani Herdsmen” If we are to believe all these ill-reports, it would seem that all crimes committed within the borders of the Federal Republic of Nigeria are committed by the Fulani Herdsmen.

We view with daily sorrow, the realities of what we once thought the post-Holocaust age ((“never again!”) would be - only to see that it has been succeeded by an age of terrorism and genocide in which the sanctity of life and the ideal of pikuach nefesh ought to be policies perused by all responsible governments in protecting the lives and limbs and property of even those who did not elect them.

Also to your credit, you have mentioned a problem, although you have not highlighted it, namely the politicization of the military – the military's ethnic composition (an old Nigerian problem) - I remember, it was either Abacha or Babangida who retired a few dozen Yoruba Generals when he took over. That long-standing problem has to be addressed…

Lastly, I don’t know exactly what you intend with your call for an International Campaign agst Nigeria's President Buhari- I don’t suppose that you intend the international community to pass sanctions on Nigeria until peace and tranquillity return to the Federal Republic of Nigeria.

Here’s something to make you reconsider.





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Oluwatoyin Vincent Adepoju

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Jul 10, 2019, 6:42:17 PM7/10/19
to usaafricadialogue
Olayinka,

Thanks for making your stance clearer.

Your earlier demand was "Show evidence that Miyetti Allah owned up to and justified massacres anywhere."

You demanded for information that is part of public information.

It has been provided and your attention repeatedly drawn to it.

Your new argument can be so presented-

Fulani herdsmen massacre hundreds in Agatu.

There is an outcry.

Miyetti Allah justifies this massacre as revenge for the killing of a Fulani man.

Olayinka asks- 

"Are you saying you dont believe the Agatu killed the Fulani Shehu Abdullahi and Ardo Madaki?"

implying that this unverified claim  about the death of one person as justification for the massacre of hundreds suggests that the principle of justice, even if self help justice, has been served.

The thousands killed in various massacres in Agatu, the Middle Belt and across Nigeria by Fulani herdsmen thank you for your understanding of justice.

They also thank you for your efforts to help the murderers manufacture a similar excuse when they never presented such in connection with the Nimbo massacre- 
     
"Are you saying the Nimbo to your knowledge did not kill any Fulani?"

The Fulani herdsmen ideologues, for their part, thank you for your celebration, not only of the right to massacre as many as one can, and thereafter claim as justification for the orgy of blood that one of one's own was killed but to justify that in a country with a functional legal system-

  What was done about it before the Fulani ILLEGALLY took the law into their hands to protect their own? Are the lives of Fulani killed not equally precious as their own reprisal victims are?


These same ideologues will thank you for your determination to occlude the central part of the narrative-     
 
Are these not jointly community unrests?

What has all these got to do with colonisation?

The occupation of Middle Belt lands by Fulani herdsmen after massacring and displacing their inhabitants, the struggle of Miyetti Allah, in alliance with the Hausa-Fulani led fed govt, to make ineffectual, through reprisal massacre, the Benue anti-open grazing law, a law that Benue was emboldened to enact only after fiery Ekiti state governor Ayodele Fayose had done it, in spite of attacks from fellow SW Westerners who myopically thought then that they were witnessing Fayose's trademark anti APC strategies , only now, years later,  coming to realize he was firing an early shot in a national struggle for survival agst merciless imperialists. 

The Fulani herdsmen ideologues will also thank you for trying to conceal the fact that the various Hausa-Fulani led govt's initiatives on behalf of Fulani herdsmen, from trying to grant them cattle colonies and Fulani RUGA settlements across the nation to offering to or granting them 100B of the nation's money is based on the terror they have unleashed on the nation, claiming that these initiatives of planting a self declared terrorist group as settlers across Nigeria is meant to stem their terrorism and the money is meant to help their managers stop their brigandage.

 They will also thank you for your efforts to protect them as they settle in their territories gained by blood through the disarming of everyone, the non-prosecution of the terrorists and the non-return of the land gained by blood.

Well done, sir. 

As long as people like you remain active,Nigeria's journey to the precipice continues unabated.

Because people like you represent the mindset driving the people feeding on Nigerians' blood, it is imperative to put international pressure on the man at the centre of this orchestration of folly, Muhammadu Buhari.

People like ex head of state Olusegun Obasanjo, ex-min of defense Theophilus Danjuma and Cardinal  Okogie, the most prominent Nigerians speaking up agst the hyper-ethnocentricism of this man, need to take the case for the survival or peaceful dissolution of Nigeria to the international community and seek help.

Buhari and his right wing Hausa-Fulani allies must be stopped.

Meanwhile, as Fayose created an armed group to protect Ekiti, as T.Y Danjuma has urged for the Middle Belt, as SE youth are declaring they are able to do for the SE, as OPC is described as being able to do for the SW, every group has to actively work at protecting themselves, in the same self conscious military empowerment the right wing Fulani have done in creating and training the Fulani herdsmen militia, since the fed govt will not protect anyone but rather enable their elimination and occupation by Fulani herdsmen terrorism.

Justice for all, but justice reached through the power of deterrence. If you insist on attacking me, I will fight you. As long as you dont attack me, I leave you alone. 

thanks

toyin





OLAYINKA AGBETUYI

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Jul 10, 2019, 7:43:13 PM7/10/19
to usaafric...@googlegroups.com
Why did you not say international pressure should have been put on Johnathan in 2013?  Because he was not a Fulani leader?  He allowed this vendetta to develop and perhaps paved the way for his rejection by the North and emergence of Buhari

You are not an objective and reliable umpire and analyst.

You do not quantify loss of human lives by average of atrocities or casualties on either side. Each life life is equally precious.

OAA.



Sent from my Samsung Galaxy smartphone.


-------- Original message --------
From: Oluwatoyin Vincent Adepoju <toyin....@gmail.com>
Date: 10/07/2019 23:55 (GMT+00:00)
To: usaafricadialogue <usaafric...@googlegroups.com>
Subject: Re: USA Africa Dialogue Series - No hate speech!

Boxbe This message is eligible for Automatic Cleanup! (toyin....@gmail.com) Add cleanup rule | More info
Olayinka,

Thanks for making your stance clearer.

Your earlier demand was "Show evidence that Miyetti Allah owned up to and justified massacres anywhere."

You demanded for information that is part of public information.

It has been provided and your attention repeatedly drawn to it.

Your new argument can be so presented-

Fulani herdsmen massacre hundreds in Agatu.

There is an outcry.

Miyetti Allah justifies this massacre as revenge for the killing of a Fulani man.

Olayinka asks- 
"Are you saying you dont believe the Agatu killed the Fulani Shehu Abdullahi and Ardo Madaki?"

implying that this unverified claim  about the death of one person as justification for the massacre of hundreds suggests that the principle of justice, even if self help justice, has been served.

The thousands killed in various massacres in Agatu, the Middle Belt and across Nigeria by Fulani herdsmen thank you for your understanding of justice.

They also thank you for your efforts to help the murderers manufacture a similar excuse when they never presented such in connection with the Nimbo massacre- 
     
"Are you saying the Nimbo to your knowledge did not kill any Fulani?"

The Fulani herdsmen ideologues, for their part, thank you for your celebration, not only of the right to massacre as many as one can, and thereafter claim as justification for the orgy of blood that one of one's own was killed but to justify that in a country with a functional legal system-

  What was done about it before the Fulani ILLEGALLY took the law into their hands to protect their own? Are the lives of Fulani killed not equally precious as their own reprisal victims are?


These same ideologues will thank you for your determination to occlude the central part of the narrative-     
 
Are these not jointly community unrests?

What has all these got to do with colonisation?
The occupation of Middle Belt lands by Fulani herdsmen after massacring and displacing their inhabitants, the struggle of Miyetti Allah, in alliance with the Hausa-Fulani led fed govt, to make ineffectual, through reprisal massacre, the Benue anti-open grazing law, a law that Benue was emboldened to enact only after fiery Ekiti state governor Ayodele Fayose had done it, in spite of attacks from fellow SW Westerners who myopically thought then that they were witnessing Fayose's trademark anti APC strategies , only now, years later,  coming to realize he was firing an early shot in a national struggle for survival agst merciless imperialists. 

The Fulani herdsmen ideologues will also thank you for trying to conceal the fact that the various Hausa-Fulani led govt's initiatives on behalf of Fulani herdsmen, from trying to grant them cattle colonies and Fulani RUGA settlements across the nation to offering to or granting them 100B of the nation's money is based on the terror they have unleashed on the nation, claiming that these initiatives of planting a self declared terrorist group as settlers across Nigeria is meant to stem their terrorism and the money is meant to help their managers stop their brigandage.

 They will also thank you for your efforts to protect them as they settle in their territories gained by blood through the disarming of everyone, the non-prosecution of the terrorists and the non-return of the land gained by blood.

Well done, sir. 

As long as people like you remain active,Nigeria's journey to the precipice continues unabated.

Because people like you represent the mindset driving the people feeding on Nigerians' blood, it is imperative to put international pressure on the man at the centre of this orchestration of folly, Muhammadu Buhari.

People like ex head of state Olusegun Obasanjo, ex-min of defense Theophilus Danjuma and Cardinal  Okogie, the most prominent Nigerians speaking up agst the hyper-ethnocentricism of this man, need to take the case for the survival or peaceful dissolution of Nigeria to the international community and seek help.

Buhari and his right wing Hausa-Fulani allies must be stopped.

Meanwhile, as Fayose created an armed group to protect Ekiti, as T.Y Danjuma has urged for the Middle Belt, as SE youth are declaring they are able to do for the SE, as OPC is described as being able to do for the SW, every group has to actively work at protecting themselves, in the same self conscious military empowerment the right wing Fulani have done in creating and training the Fulani herdsmen militia, since the fed govt will not protect anyone but rather enable their elimination and occupation by Fulani herdsmen terrorism.

Justice for all, but justice reached through the power of deterrence. If you insist on attacking me, I will fight you. As long as you dont attack me, I leave you alone. 

thanks

toyin




On Wed, 10 Jul 2019 at 18:27, OLAYINKA AGBETUYI <yagb...@hotmail.com> wrote:

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Cornelius Hamelberg

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Jul 10, 2019, 7:43:13 PM7/10/19
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 As the saying goes, “He who feels it knows” and that’s why those of us who are less emotional about the matter must be more cautious with our rebuttals, since Toyin is in Nigeria – in Lagos at the moment, whilst we are not. He can feel the temperature there, maybe better than any of us, and that includes Baba Kadiri who was probably cheering the Super Eagles in full flight, cruising to victory over Bafana Bafana this evening, cheering maybe even occasionally shouting some words of advice/ encouragement from the comfort of his armchair, in his villa here in Stockholm. Baba K might want to argue that the only thing that Toyin A can feel is the temperature in air-conditioned suburbia Ikoyi, almost as cold as Stockholm and almost as far from the scene of the crimes in the places being mentioned, “Benue, Plateau, Taraba and the entire Middle-Belt of Nigeria.

We question some of his certainties and true, just as with some of the Gospels, he has not yet given us any eye-witness accounts. Last summer, one of my friends here in Stockholm, from Edo, just back from holidays there told me that he saw a Fulani Herdsman on his farm. Have the Fulani herdsmen moved that far south?, I asked him. What are you asking? I say the Fulani herdsman was carrying an AK 47. No, the Fulani herdsman did not shoot him down, thank God, that’s why he’s still alive, and no, unfortunately, he did not take a photo of the herdsman. Blessed are those who have not seen yet believe.

As Bobby D asked,

You ever seen a ghost?

No But you have heard of them

https://vimeo.com/326101058

There’s no denying Toyin Adepoju’s best of intentions. I learned this the hard way: In the run-up to the 1996 Israeli elections I attended a seminar/ course conducted by Rabbi David Rose about the lay of the land and almost got into a fight with a co-delegate, a freshly arrived Jewish guy from Kazakhstan who at some point was complaining bitterly about his years of being deprived of a Jewish education there and I had told him that he should try to get over it now that he had finally arrived in Stockholm where the air is free. To my great surprise, after the session was over, he accosted me in the corridor, nose to nose it was and trembling with rage he hissed into my face, (his exact words): “Don’t you ever raise your voice above mine, when we are in the same room!”. He almost added the word, “Nigger!”. You see how it is for someone who has lived all his life, repressed, suppressed and oppressed by a totalitarian regime and was not used to other people exercising their freedom of speech? At another time, I was praising the Islamic Revolution in Iran when my friend took his shirt off to show me the scars from a few lashed that he received in a house of detention. Lesson learned. He who feels it knows..

In anticipation of his book of prophecy, and with pikuach nefesh in our hearts I think that we should be working pre-emptively to abolish the death penalty in Nigeria, so that just in case he goes too far with the zeal, a treasonous Brother Toyin Adepoju will still (miraculously) escape the hangman’s noose or the firing squad..

We could be taking a good look at his last response and his sixteen paragraphs and links under the title “On international campaign agst Nigeria's President”, and be responding to that – seriously...






Salimonu Kadiri

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Jul 11, 2019, 4:21:07 PM7/11/19
to usaafric...@googlegroups.com
​A major problem with mythologists is that they always mistake fiction/fable for reality and story for history. While I was busy perusing Oluwatoyin Vincent Adepoju's Facebook product titled Partial Timeline : Declarations of Responsibility for Justification of Massacres in Nigeria by Right Wing and Fulani Groups, he posted the same to me personally in response to my request to Femi Segun to provide me with the name of Miyetti Allah's leader that admitted to Fulani herdsmen's murders around Nigeria and where and when such murders took place. On accessing Adepoju's Facebook page I was confronted with a picture of a brand new AK-47 and my immediate reflection was that the weapon had been recovered from a Right Wing Fulani herdsman who had deployed it massacring non-Fulani Nigerians. Alas, there was no correlation between the picture of AK-47 on Adepoju's Facebook and any Fulani herdsman. In the Western World, Journalists are courteous to inform readers whenever the picture they use in an article deviates from the contents of the article. Mr. Adepoju discourteously (419) induced his readers to believe that the AK-47 in his Facebook project belonged to a Right Wing Fulani herdsman. Not being discouraged by the deceptive AK-47 picture, I took time to read through all the compiled links he supplied.

​A purported Facebook of Gan Allah Fulani Association, Fulbeng Facebook, of 19 March 2016, had reproduced a summary of interview conducted by Premium Times Nigeria with one Saleh Bayeri who claimed to be the interim National Secretary of Gan Allah Fulani Association of Nigeria. The association ought to have been newly formed since it had only an Interim Secretary and its other officers were unknown. Mr. Adepoju knows quiet well that Fulbeng Facebook had copied its article from Premium Times Nigeria, yet he included it in his Partial Timeline as well as the original from Premium Times of 19 March 2016. The title of the interview conducted with Saleh Bayeri in the Premium Times was : Why we struck in Agatu - Fulani herdsmen. With that title one is made to believe that the interviewee was among the planners and executors of Agatu massacres. Premium Times stated, "In February, 10 Agatu communities were razed and hundreds, including women, children and the elderly, were reportedly massacred by suspected herdsmen." Premium Times continued, "A leader of the Fulani ethnic group has provided a detailed insight into why his people attacked the Agatu people of Benue and killing hundreds sacking several communities and killing hundreds. Saleh Bayeri, the Interim National Secretary of Gan Allah Fulani Association, rose in defence of his kinsmen, saying the February bloody conflict in Benue was a reprisal attack by his people against the Agatus who he accused of killing in 2013, a prominent Fulani man." From the aforesaid, the attackers in Agatu were, in legal term, only suspected herdsmen because no one had really seen or witnessed herdsmen attack Agatu. At best, Saleh Bayeri only rose in defence of his suspected kinsmen by speculating that they had reason to carry out such attack in view of what happened three years earlier. Premium Times continued, "Although the Nigerian Senate last Wednesday blamed Boko Haram insurgents for the mass killings in Agatu, Mr. Bayeri said the attacks were orchestrated by Fulani herdsmen in revenge of the killing of one of their leaders by Agatu people three years ago." On the detailed insight into why Saleh Bayeri's kinsmen attacked Agatu people, Premium Times wrote, "The Fulani leader said about 20 Agatu and Tiv militia, on April 20, 2013, invaded the compound of one Shehu Abdullahi, killing him and carting away over 200 cows. Another prominent Fulani, Ardo Madaki, who tried to mediate for peace was beheaded." All that we know about Agatu killings in February 2016, had its origin in unresolved conflicts between Tiv militias and Fulani herdsmen that had resulted not only in the deaths of Fulani but theft of their cows. For the mere fact that the publication of the interview was not accompanied with a personal photo picture of Saleh Bayeri, made the interview look invented by the journalist. A Fulani man claiming to be an interim national sectary of an organisation should either be addressed as Alhaji Saleh Bayeri, and if he had never been to Mecka, or Malam Saleh Bayeri. Why we Struck in Agatu, was a personal opinion of the fictitious Mr. Saleh Bayeri whose relation or connection with Fulani herdsmen has never been proved or established.

​Concerning a reported case of violence at Ukpabi-Nimbo in the Southeast of Nigeria, Oluwatoyin Vincent Adepoju supplied three links on the matter. These are News proof, New Telegraph and the Leader News online. The online News Proof of 6 May 2016 carried the headline : Why My People Massacre Ukpabi-Nimbo People In Enugu - Fulani Herdsmen Leader Reveals Top Secrets. News Proof attributed the source of the report to New Telegram. Since I am unable to access the report in the New Telegraph, I searched in the Leader News online and found that it culled the entire report from the New Telegraph. The headline of the online Leader News of 14 May 2016 reads : I Tried to Stop Nimbo Massacre-Says Fulani Leader in South-East. Thereafter, readers are informed : The leader of Fulani Community in South-East, Alhaji Ardo Saidu Baso, in this interview with Sunday Telegraph, gives an insight into what may have caused the invasion and massacre of Ukpabi-Nimbo residents by suspected herdsmen recently and his efforts to avert the ugly incident. He narrated how he had the rumour that Fulani were planning to avenge the murder of two Fulani boys and their Father who came from Nasarawa to find out his sons were murdered in Ukpabi-Nimbo. He said that in recent years, several Fulani had been killed in that area. When he had the rumour of the impending attack in Nimbo, he informed the community leaders and the police but the authority neglected him. The Leader News quoted him as saying, "My own is that if you say they are accusing Fulani, I'm not denying it is Fulani because of those two boys and their father (Fulani) killed in that place. I heard that it could be them that came for the attack, if I see the people I don't know them." In view of the above statements, the headline of News Proof, Why My People Massacre Ukpabi-Nimbo people In Enugu is misleading and untrue. Alhaji Ardo Saidu Baso said that he did not know who carried out the attack in Nimbo but guessed that if they were Fulani, it could have been in retaliation for murdered Fulani in that community. When asked about the cause of fighting between farmers and Fulani herdsmen, Alhaji Ardo Saidu Baso denied that there had been any fighting between farmers and Fulani herders in the Southeast. The youths in the Southeast, he said, had learnt to trail the movement of herders in the bush and hunt cows as if they are hunting wild animals. Operating in groups, the youths kill cows and share the meat for sales. Is that not stealing, he queried? He explained further that Fulani herders always obtain the permission of the Igwe, the head of the community in which they reside, to graze their cattle in specific wild bushes around. But the Southeast youths always come behind to collect grazing fees, ranging between N100,000 and N300,000 in the past, the authority of the Igwe could not be flouted, but now the youths have overgrown the power of Igwe, Alhaji Ardo Saidu Baso lamented.

​Oluwatoyin Vincent Adepoju also supplied a link to online Daily Post of 27 March 2017, to justify his claim on Fulani herdsmen atrocities in Nigeria. The headline reads : EXPECT BLOODY REPRISAL - HERDSMEN GIVE KWARA GOVT ULTIMATUM. Contrary to the headline, a part of the content reads, "The warning followed a recent fracas between a vigilante group and some herdsmen in Gwanara, Baruten Local Government area of the State where some herdsmen were murdered." There is nothing wrong in warning that if you don't stop slapping me I will chop off your hand. Vigilante groups in the course of rustling cows and killing herders should not be allowed to go scot-free.

There is nowhere in the links supplied in the Partial Timeline, where any Fulani had claimed responsibility for massacres in Nigeria. At no time in the Partial Timeline compilation did Saleh Bayeri admit or produce evidence that Fulani herdsmen committed the massacres in Agatu, Benue State. Saleh Bayeri only speculated that if Fulani herdsmen were behind the massacre, it must have been in retaliation for previously slaughtered herdsmen by Agatu people. In Nimbo, Alhaji Ardo Saidu Bado stated clearly that he only heard rumours about impending Fulani herdsmen reprisal in Nimbo, but he never saw or knew who carried out the attack. Both in Agatu and Nimbo there had been internecine wars between Fulani herdsmen and local cattle thieves and not between herdsmen and local farmers as it had been touted in the media. We must remember too, that when Olu Falae was kidnapped in Ondo State, Fulani herdsmen were suspected as his abductors. The speculation was premised on the fact that herdsmen had been made to pay damages to Olu Falae when their cattle trespassed into his farm and destroyed plants. But when the abductors were finally arrested, it turned out that they were ordinary criminals who were neither Fulani nor herdsmen. As a human being, I am moved to tears when I read what Alhaji Ardo Saidu Baso, the leader of the Fulani Community in the Southeast and deputy leader of Miyetti Allah Cattle Breeder's Association, Southeast chapter told New Telegram. Hear him, "I have stayed 34 years now in Enugu State, even though I'm from Katsina State. Anybody who fights Enugu State people is fighting me. I don't have any other place to go; it's Enugu State that I have my family, my children, everything, how will I like the people fighting Enugu people." Nigeria is so ethnically diluted that if it were to be broken into pieces as being canvassed by right-wing Edo fascists, it will cause sufferings for millions of Nigerians. Alhaji Baso, as well as others like him in all states of Nigeria, has the right to government subsidized ranch establishment in Nigeria for livestock farming if we are to join the community of civilized nations. I beg those who are talking about their ancestral land to review their objectionable claim against nature. If there is no ancestral rain, sun, or air there cannot be ancestral land to individuals. No one has created Nigerian land just like the rain, sun and air within her geographical space and as such it is criminal to lay claim to a piece of land that belongs to all Nigerians. Since the Land Use Act placed land ownership in the hands of the government of each state, the best appropriate thing to do is for every citizen who so wishes to lease land from the government.

Elsewhere, in your dialogue with Professor Michael Afolayan, you averred, "Electricity, water and other fundamentals of life are challenging in Nigeria. I can't see any signs that this will change for most Nigerians in the next 50 years, unless by miracle. In the midst of this deprivations, people should, at least, be able to live in peace." Justice brings peace and peace triggers progress. The Nigerian right wing fascists can never live in peace because, as deprivers and impoverishers, they have produced Boko Haram, armed robbers, kidnappers, cattle thieves (rustlers), hungry, starving and thirsty Nigerians.
S. Kadiri        



Från: usaafric...@googlegroups.com <usaafric...@googlegroups.com> för Oluwatoyin Vincent Adepoju <toyin....@gmail.com>
Skickat: den 9 juli 2019 17:38
Till: usaafricadialogue
Ämne: Re: USA Africa Dialogue Series - No hate speech!
 
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