Tinubu’s Both-Sides-Of-The-Mouth Statement on Amotekun- Farooq A. Kperogi on Security and Politics in Nigeria

16 views
Skip to first unread message

Oluwatoyin Vincent Adepoju

unread,
Jan 25, 2020, 12:37:53 PM1/25/20
to usaafricadialogue, nigerianworldforum, Politics Naija, Edo Global
Tinubu’s run-with-the-hare-and-hunt-with-the-hounds statement on Amotekun pretended to be statesmanlike and evenhanded but it actually only cleverly concealed its attempt to please the Aso Rock cabal.

Why didn’t he exercise this sort of even temper when he asked “where are the cows?” after Chief Reuben Fasoranti’s daughter was murdered in cold blood by people alleged to be herders? Tinubu might well have been right that the woman wasn’t murdered by herders, but he couldn’t have known that for sure since no investigation had been carried out. And he said it when emotions were still aflame.

Plus, herders who choose to murder don’t take cows to the murder scene, which made his sarcastic question at once pointless, insensitive, and unstatesmanlike. Incidentally, it's the intensification of senseless, unresolved murders such as the one he taunted that inspired the formation of Amotekun.

Tinubu’s neither-here-nor-there statement mirrors the duplicity and opportunism of his symbolic actions on Amotekun. For example, neither Sanwo-Olu nor his deputy, who are both beholden to him, attended the formal launch of Amotekun, and Lagos was the only Southwest state where an Amotekun solidarity rally was disrupted by the police. These actions clearly typify opposition to the security outfit.

At the same time, Tinubu’s minions in the intelligentsia and his battering rams in the news media have come out strongly against the federal government’s—and some northern politicians’—opposition to Amotekun.

In wanting to opportunistically appease both sides in the service of his illusive 2023 presidential bid, Tinubu will appease none in the long run.

The cold, calculating inner circle in Aso Rock is intensely aware that Tinubu’s fence-sitting is an insincere, self-seeking political maneuver to appease them, and the Southwest people who were compelled to embrace Amotekun by the escalating sense of siege that unceasing mass murders by homicidal thugs have activated would be unimpressed by his ambiguity and lack of moral clarity.

People who are neither here nor there end up being nowhere, and, with time, nowhere becomes somewhere untoward.

Salimonu Kadiri

unread,
Jan 25, 2020, 6:16:25 PM1/25/20
to usaafric...@googlegroups.com
​I have intended to take a pause from the forum for a while when my nostrils were invaded with inhalation of toxic intellectual fume from professor Farooq Kperogi's brain-farting. Too paragraphs in his brain-farting will be enough for consideration here.

​Hear him, "Why didn't he exercise this sort of even temper when he asked 'where are the cows?' after Chief Reuben Fasoranti's daughter was murdered in cold blood by people alleged to be herders? Tinubu might well have been right that the woman wasn't murdered by herders, but he couldn't have known that for sure since no investigation had been carried out. And he said it when emotions were still aflame.

​He wrote further, ''Plus, herders who choose to murder don't take cows to the murder scene, which made his sarcastic question at once pointless, insensitive, and un-statesmanlike."

​To begin with, Tinubu was at Fasoranti's residence on condolence visit over the murder of her daughter while travelling from Lagos to Benin on a highway. Tinubu was confronted with a categorical statement that the murderers were Fulani herdsmen. Tinubu asked intelligently, *Where are the cows?* The implication of Tinubu's remark was that it was senseless and irresponsible to be so categorical about the identity or occupation of the murderers when nobody had been arrested, and off course no cattle were found within or around the scene of the murder. Tinubu was appealing to the reason of the public and not their emotion. He did not ask the question to demean the murder of Fasoranti's daughter, for which he, Tinubu, was on condolence visit.

The greatest brain-farting perpetrated by Professor Farooq Kperogi on this issue is his assertion that ''herders who choose to murder don't take cows to the scene of murder.'' Simple gumption dictates that a person is a herder only, and if only, he is driving a flock of cattle. A herder ceases to be a herder the moment there are no herds of cattle he is driving. Obviously, there is no special way by which one, except perhaps the likes of professor Farooq Kperogi, can recognize or identify herdsmen if they are not in the company of the flocks of their cattle. A herdsman without cattle around him looks like any other (Northern) Nigerian. As long as the murderers of the daughter of Chief Fasoranti are yet to be apprehended it must be stupid for anybody to attribute her murderers to herdsmen. Let us look at an illustrative example. A bank is robbed in Abuja at gunpoint, resulting in the deaths of some people. Professor Farooq Kperogi speculatively claimed that the bank robbers were medical doctors. In order to know why he is so certain that the bank robbers were medical doctors, when nobody has been arrested, someone asked professor Kperogi, "Were the robbers wearing white overall coat with their syringes hanging around the neck or stocked into the ears during the robbery?" Responding to the question, Professor Farooq Kperogi said, "Medical doctors who choose to rob a bank and kill in the process don't wear white overall coat with syringes around the neck or stocked into the ears, to the scene of robbery." How then could professor Kperogi identify the Bank robbers as medical doctors? It is sad when misinformation becomes the basis for reinforcing false opinions. Tinubu may not be my first choice as a presidential candidate in 2023, but on his question, 'where are the cows?' as well as his statement on Amotekun, he has demonstrated that he is beset with very high intelligence.
S. Kadiri       


Från: usaafric...@googlegroups.com <usaafric...@googlegroups.com> för Oluwatoyin Vincent Adepoju <toyin....@gmail.com>
Skickat: den 25 januari 2020 17:35
Till: usaafricadialogue <USAAfric...@googlegroups.com>; nigerianworldforum <NIgerianW...@yahoogroups.com>; Politics Naija <naijap...@yahoogroups.com>; Edo Global <Edo_G...@yahoogroups.com>
Ämne: USA Africa Dialogue Series - Tinubu’s Both-Sides-Of-The-Mouth Statement on Amotekun- Farooq A. Kperogi on Security and Politics in Nigeria
 
--
Listserv moderated by Toyin Falola, University of Texas at Austin
To post to this group, send an email to USAAfric...@googlegroups.com
To subscribe to this group, send an email to USAAfricaDial...@googlegroups.com
Current archives at http://groups.google.com/group/USAAfricaDialogue
Early archives at http://www.utexas.edu/conferences/africa/ads/index.html
---
You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "USA Africa Dialogue Series" group.
To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to usaafricadialo...@googlegroups.com.
To view this discussion on the web visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/usaafricadialogue/CALUsqTRPV92Lbcmsoc3q00o%3Dv_HcQRchv0naY3mt43wU%2B4C%3D3w%40mail.gmail.com.

Oluwatoyin Vincent Adepoju

unread,
Jan 26, 2020, 11:15:20 AM1/26/20
to usaafricadialogue
Beautiful thoughts from Salimonu.

It was wise of Tinubu to forget that terrorist Fulani herdsmen are Nigeria's greatest security threat, possibly at the same level as Boko Haram. 

The various documentations by international terrorist watch agencies of their destruction across Nigeria, the various reports by Nigerians over the years, across Nigeria, of killings and rapes by Fulani herdsmen,  was of course fiction.

Thus, since the cows were not present at the time of the murder, even though the villagers on the route where the killing took place identified Fulani herders who camp their cows and rob as the culprits, brigands who have long been operational on that road and agst whom the police behaved as if their hands were tied,  Tinubu has a right to ignore well documented history and ask where the cows are, thereby absolving the most likely suspects, instead of simply urging that the police be allowed to come out with reports of an investigation.

Have the police  arrived at anything conclusive on this crime?

It is claimed they have not.

Could that have to do with the same reason why some say Tinubu developed amnesia and was eager for evidence of cows?

Some are saying the killers are untouchables, being kinsmen and perhaps agents of someone in Aso Rock, the same someone who makes sure the terrorist coordinators Miyetti Allah Fulani Socio-Cultural Organisation are never questioned talk less punished for their open terrorist campaign nor their foot soldiers  brought to book.

Is that not why Amotekun was created, not bcs there are not enough national security agents  but bcs they are compromised, as ex min of Defence Theophilus Danjuma has been crying out?

Lets keep watching. Who would have thought the SW would reach this point, a region a good no of whose residents were silent or  oppositional as IPOB struggled for what some rightfully understand as the ultimate potential of Amotekun?

thanks

toyin



To view this discussion on the web visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/usaafricadialogue/DM6PR07MB5020693CD17AAA609974B4F2AE090%40DM6PR07MB5020.namprd07.prod.outlook.com.

Salimonu Kadiri

unread,
Jan 26, 2020, 7:02:53 PM1/26/20
to usaafric...@googlegroups.com
​Oluwatoyin Vincent Adepoju, 

​I wish to refer you to your post of 22 August 2018 on this forum titled, Partial Timeline : Declarations of Responsibility for Justification of Massacres in Nigeria by Right Wing Fulani Groups. In the referenced post you supplied some links where some people who claimed to be Fulani admitted to committing murders and arsons in Nigeria especially at Agatu in Benue, and at Nimbo in Enugu. I read through all the links supplied by you and to my horror, I discovered that you formed your opinion on Fulani herdsmen from the headlines of the links without reading the contents. Wisdom demands that one cannot testify to if a soup is sweet or not by ordinarily looking at it without tasting it. You need to learn not to judge the contents of an article by reading only the headline, just as you must not judge a book only by its cover without reading its contents. Few days after your post referred to above, I responded with detailed analysis of the links supplied by you and proved that neither Miyetti Allah nor any Fulani had admitted committing the atrocities attributed to them by you. Go into the archives of the forum after 22 August 2018, you will find my full response to the balderdash Fulani terror claim.

​You averred, ''..... the villagers on the route where the killing took place identified herders who camp their cows and rob as the culprits, brigands who have long been operational on that road and against whom the police behaved as if their hands were tied.'' What of if the villagers on the route were responsible for all the robberies on the route and just wanted to divert attentions from their own crimes by engaging in speculative false evidence against herdsmen who were nowhere to be seen in the nearby forests where the daughter of Fasoranti was murdered? ​https://punchng.com/chilling-experiences-of-motorists-travellers-on-kidnapper-prone-highways/ ​  
The lady said she witnessed the killing of three females whose body parts were used for ritual purposes. According to her, it was where they kept her to be killed the next day that the woman who ...
As you rightly pointed out, police are yet to discover and arrest the killers of Fasoranti's daughter but then, you must remember that the murderers of the then Attorney General of the Federation and Minister of Justice, Bola Ige, in 2003 is yet to be resolved. Was Bola Ige murdered by Fulani herdsmen?

​Amotekun was not contemplated because of Fulani herdsmen but to combat crimes in general and I think you overstepped the boundary for what is normal when you equated the action of the six Southwest governors on Amotekun with IPOB, an organisation which all the Southeast governors outlawed even before the Federal government did the same.
​S. Kadiri


Skickat: den 26 januari 2020 16:49
Till: usaafricadialogue <usaafric...@googlegroups.com>
Ämne: Re: USA Africa Dialogue Series - Tinubu’s Both-Sides-Of-The-Mouth Statement on Amotekun- Farooq A. Kperogi on Security and Politics in Nigeria
 

OLAYINKA AGBETUYI

unread,
Jan 26, 2020, 7:03:10 PM1/26/20
to usaafric...@googlegroups.com
Fulani herdsmen/ pastoral conflicts occurred during Johnathan's presidency.  How many Miyetti Allah members did he arrest or question to demonstrate he ( Jonathan )was not shielding them?

What of the amnesty Jonathan granted his terrorist  Delta kinsmen?  When did you ever comment on that?  

OAA



Sent from my Samsung Galaxy smartphone.


-------- Original message --------
From: Oluwatoyin Vincent Adepoju <toyin....@gmail.com>
Date: 26/01/2020 16:24 (GMT+00:00)
To: usaafricadialogue <usaafric...@googlegroups.com>
Subject: Re: USA Africa Dialogue Series - Tinubu’s Both-Sides-Of-The-Mouth Statement on Amotekun- Farooq A. Kperogi on Security and Politics in Nigeria

Boxbe This message is eligible for Automatic Cleanup! (toyin....@gmail.com) Add cleanup rule | More info
Beautiful thoughts from Salimonu.

It was wise of Tinubu to forget that terrorist Fulani herdsmen are Nigeria's greatest security threat, possibly at the same level as Boko Haram. 

The various documentations by international terrorist watch agencies of their destruction across Nigeria, the various reports by Nigerians over the years, across Nigeria, of killings and rapes by Fulani herdsmen,  was of course fiction.

Thus, since the cows were not present at the time of the murder, even though the villagers on the route where the killing took place identified Fulani herders who camp their cows and rob as the culprits, brigands who have long been operational on that road and agst whom the police behaved as if their hands were tied,  Tinubu has a right to ignore well documented history and ask where the cows are, thereby absolving the most likely suspects, instead of simply urging that the police be allowed to come out with reports of an investigation.

Have the police  arrived at anything conclusive on this crime?

It is claimed they have not.

Could that have to do with the same reason why some say Tinubu developed amnesia and was eager for evidence of cows?

Some are saying the killers are untouchables, being kinsmen and perhaps agents of someone in Aso Rock, the same someone who makes sure the terrorist coordinators Miyetti Allah Fulani Socio-Cultural Organisation are never questioned talk less punished for their open terrorist campaign nor their foot soldiers  brought to book.

Is that not why Amotekun was created, not bcs there are not enough national security agents  but bcs they are compromised, as ex min of Defence Theophilus Danjuma has been crying out?

Lets keep watching. Who would have thought the SW would reach this point, a region a good no of whose residents were silent or  oppositional as IPOB struggled for what some rightfully understand as the ultimate potential of Amotekun?

thanks

toyin



On Sun, 26 Jan 2020 at 00:16, Salimonu Kadiri <ogunl...@hotmail.com> wrote:

--
Listserv moderated by Toyin Falola, University of Texas at Austin
To post to this group, send an email to USAAfric...@googlegroups.com
To subscribe to this group, send an email to USAAfricaDial...@googlegroups.com
Current archives at http://groups.google.com/group/USAAfricaDialogue
Early archives at http://www.utexas.edu/conferences/africa/ads/index.html
---
You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "USA Africa Dialogue Series" group.
To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to usaafricadialo...@googlegroups.com.

Oluwatoyin Vincent Adepoju

unread,
Jan 27, 2020, 12:43:51 PM1/27/20
to usaafricadialogue
Salimonu,

On Terrorism by Right Wing Fulani 

    Using Impunity as a  Weapon

Rather than go in detail into your efforts to distort reality, I wonder, is it not strange that neither Miyetti Allah or any Fulani organisation is making efforts to deny that they  actually commit massacres of Nigerians and justify them?

Why are you working agst their interests?

       Fulani Herdsmen Militia, their Miyetti Allah Coordinators and the SW Struggle for Self Determination in Security Issues

Nigeria faces various security threats, but the most widespread is by terrorism from right wing Fulani, using Fulani herdsmen militia as their foot-soldiers.

Fulani herdsmen terrorism has ravaged a good part of Yorubaland, along with other parts of Nigeria, as attested by victims and traditional leaders across the SW, Nigerians news reports and international terrorist watch agencies documenting their activities in terms of locations and casualties.

So, the idea of Fulani herdsmen terrorists at work in the killing of Fasoranti's daughter is a very likely possibility. It becomes almost a certainty with the accounts of the villagers.

In the face of the open collusion between Miyetti Allah, Fulani herdsmen militia and the fed govt, I dont expect that case to be resolved.

How can it be when Fulani. Miyetti Allah Fulani Socio-Cultural Organisation has openly threatened the Benue state government for enacting an anti-open grazing law targeted at their terrorist members, carried out a massacre in fulfillment of their threat, and the Min.of Defence and the Inspector General of Police rush to their defense, acknowledging the massacre but blaming it on the Benue state govt?

This is not party politics in the context of which Bola Ige was killed. 

This is a larger ethno-centric agenda that has its roots in terrorist culture, not simply one off political assassinations.

The dominance of the PDP at the time of Ige's assassination, of whom his own party was in opposition to, most likely leading to the no progress made on the case, is very different from the greater existential threat of terrorism by right wing Fulani rooted in Aso Rock.

Yoruba traditional rulers have been crying out that their lands are being overrun by Fulani herdsmen and Fulani kidnappers. 

As is evident from a TV interview, central Yoruba cultural and political group Afenifere spokesman Yinka Odumakin is aggrieved that Amotekun does not go far enough to  address a problem rooted in enablement by the Fulani led fed govt, an interview reinforcing various others he has given on the deadly politics emanating from Aso Rock.

In another TV interview, Gboyega Adejumo, the publicity secretary for the Yoruba Summit Group, speaking for the Yoruba organisations that launched Amotekun, declares that the initiative is spurred by Fulani herdsmen invasion in Yorubaland, yet, you, Salimonu, who, most likely not only have no place in the decision making chambers of Yorubaland and possibly dont even live in Nigeria, are able to declare "Amotekun was not contemplated because of Fulani herdsmen but to combat crimes in general". I wish you well as you inhabit your self created reality.

Amotekun and IPOB : The Restructure or Secession Agenda

Am I overstepping my bounds in correlating Amotekun with IPOB? 

IPOB takes to a logical conclusion  the same spirit that drives Amotekun, the same spirit that motivates most people in the SE, even those who dont support IPOB.

The spirit of self reliance away from the debilitating politics of the fed govt and the manipulations of a unitary Nigeria.

As the situation now stands, what is the likelihood that Nigerians will again support the criminalisation of non-violent IPOB and its branding as a terrorist movement?

 People are now much more keenly aware of the character of terrorism by right wing Fulani, enabled by the Fulani led fed govt, and operational through Fulani herdsmen militia openly coordinated by Miyetti Allah Fulani Socio-Cultural Organisation and its affiliates, a network run by Nigeria's most eminent Fulani.

The SW might not have understood before now the fact that all Nigerians, particularly in the South and the Middle Belt, are victims of the same politics of destruction.

 I believe people are becoming better informed.


Olayinka,

The escalation in systematic terrorism by Fulani herdsmen militia with  the support through policy and protection by the Fulani led fed govt since Buhari's ascension to power creates a different level of crisis.

Was Miyetti Allah, led by such pre-eminent Fulani as the Emir of Kano and the Sultan of Sokoto in the business of justifying massacres by Fulani herdsmen before Buhari's ascension in 2015?

I dont think so.

Was the Nigerian govt in the business of rewarding the killers with govt policies in their favour?

 True, these terrorists have reigned even before 2015 on account of the power of right wing Northern Muslim and particularly right wing Fulani elements in Nigerian politics but they escalated their agenda on Buhari's ascension.

Are you genuinely equating Niger Delta militants with Fulani herdsmen terrorists,  described in 2015 by the Global Terrorism Index  as the world's fourth deadliest terror group? I wish you well in that adventure. 

















OLAYINKA AGBETUYI

unread,
Jan 27, 2020, 6:39:44 PM1/27/20
to usaafric...@googlegroups.com
Miyetta Allah asked for compensation only because they saw that Jonathan rewarded Niger Delta terrorists by paying them off while waging war against Boko Haram.thus becoming the President that set the bad precedence.  That may be the context of your oft quoted statement by Buhari that war against Boko Haram is war against the North

The northern friends of Obasanjo complained to him which was why he accused Jonathan of running Nigeria as if it were his private estate.  That ultimately led to the North and the South West backing Buhari against him.

But to you he did no wrong.

OAA



Sent from my Samsung Galaxy smartphone.
-------- Original message --------
From: Oluwatoyin Vincent Adepoju <toyin....@gmail.com>
Date: 27/01/2020 17:56 (GMT+00:00)
To: usaafricadialogue <usaafric...@googlegroups.com>
Subject: Re: USA Africa Dialogue Series - Tinubu’s Both-Sides-Of-The-Mouth Statement on Amotekun- Farooq A. Kperogi on Security and Politics in Nigeria

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

--
Listserv moderated by Toyin Falola, University of Texas at Austin
To post to this group, send an email to USAAfric...@googlegroups.com
To subscribe to this group, send an email to USAAfricaDial...@googlegroups.com
Current archives at http://groups.google.com/group/USAAfricaDialogue
Early archives at http://www.utexas.edu/conferences/africa/ads/index.html
---
You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "USA Africa Dialogue Series" group.
To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to usaafricadialo...@googlegroups.com.

Oluwatoyin Vincent Adepoju

unread,
Jan 28, 2020, 9:31:50 AM1/28/20
to usaafricadialogue
Since you are now equating Niger Delta militants and Boko Haram, I declare that there are some kinds of polemics i am not sure i want to spend my time on.

Oga, please be careful about the depth to which you push yourself just bcs you are looking to for something to say in a debate.

As for negotiating with Boko Haram, the GEJ govt tried practically everything possible, including offering them amnesty. They responded that it is they who should grant amnesty to the President, not the other way round.

toyin



To view this discussion on the web visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/usaafricadialogue/VI1PR04MB449359B7D5485580CA9469AFA60B0%40VI1PR04MB4493.eurprd04.prod.outlook.com.

Salimonu Kadiri

unread,
Jan 28, 2020, 7:29:06 PM1/28/20
to usaafric...@googlegroups.com
​Oluwatoyin,

​You seem to believe, like Joseph Paul Goebbels, Hitlers propaganda minister between 1933 and 1945, that a lie repeated constantly will subsequently be accepted as a truth by the general public. The political crisis in the Middle-belt (particularly in Benue/Plateau) preceded, not only the ascension of Jonathan as President of Nigeria but continued after he left office. ​https://www.vanguardngr.com/2011/12/five-feared-dead-as-fulani-herdsmen-invade-tiv-communities/  


https://www.vanguardngr.com/2012/10/benue-speaker-asks-fg-to-probetivfulani-crisis/ ​ To make a long story short, clashes between the Tiv and Hausa/Fulani  were reported in online vanguard Nigeria, in May, August and December 2013 as well as March 2014, when Goodluck Jonathan was the President.

​In your post of Wednesday, 28 August 2018, which I previously referred to on this discourse, you submitted one Fulbeng Facebook link of 19 March 2016, and online Premium Times Nigeria of the same date to prove that Fulani herdsmen had admitted to the massacres that took place in Agatu in February 2016. Headline of the online Nigerian Premium Times of March 19, 2016 was : WHY WE STRUCK IN AGATU -FULANI HERDSMEN. Anybody who read only the headline, just as you exposed yourself to have done, would conclude that Fulani herdsmen had admitted carrying out the massacres in Agatu and had given reason for perpetrating the massacres. According to Fulbeng Facebook and online Nigerian Premium Times, 19 March 2016, the interim National Secretary of Gan Allah Fulani Association, Saleh Bayeri had said that the attacks in Agatu were orchestrated by Fulani herdsmen in revenge of the killing of one of their leaders by Agatu people three years ago. Specifically, Saleh Bayeri said that about 20 Agatu and Tiv militia, on April 20, 2013 invaded the compound of one Shehu Abdullahi, killed him and carted away over 200 cows, while another Fulani man by name, Ardo Madaki was beheaded. The interim Secretary of the Gan Allah Fulani Association did not say his organization planned and executed the massacre in Agatu. There was no evidence that the organization in question was representing Fulani herdsmen and that Saleh Bayeri was speaking on their behalf. At best his statement on why the massacre occurred was speculative. Therefore, no reasonable person can conclude that the statement of the self-proclaimed interim National Secretary of Gan Allah Fulani Association, Saleh Bayeri, represented that of Fulani herdsmen.

​You also submitted three links to Nimbo massacres in Enugu to support your claim that the Fulani herdsmen had admitted carrying out the massacres at Nimbo. The links were online: New Telegraph, News-proof and Leader News. New Telegraph which actually conducted the interview on the subject was no longer accessible. However, the News Proof of 6 May 2016 and the Leader News of 14 May 2016, respectively, culled the New Telegraph's interview. News Proof had this headline : WHY MY PEOPLE MASSACRED UKPABI-NIMBO PEOPLE IN ENUGU - FULANI LEADER REVEALS TOP SECRETS. The news proof introduced the said Fulani leaders thus, "Alhaji Ardo Saidu Baso is the leader of the Fulani Community in the South-East and deputy leader of Miyetti Allah Cattle Breeder's Association, South-East chapter."  The News Proof continued, "In his revelation yesterday to New Telegraph he said the reasons suspected Fulani herders attacked and massacred scores of Ukpabi Nimbo people of Enugu State last week was a reprisal attack for some herders earlier killed by this community." Quoting Alhaji Baso in his own expressed words, the News Proof wrote, "My own is that if you say they are accusing Fulani, I'm not denying that 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. The last two sentences here show clearly that Alhaji Baso was only guessing who the attackers of Nimbo might have been, based on what had happened before to a Fulani man and his two sons there. He did not know the alleged attackers and he would not even be able to identify them if he should meet them. Thus, the headline, WHY MY PEOPLE MASSACRE UKPABI-NIMBO PEOPLE IN ENUGU does not correlate to Alhaji Baso's statement, "I HEARD THAT IT COULD BE THEM THAT CAME FOR THE ATTACK. IF I SEE THE PEOPLE, I DON'T KNOW THEM." The headline is grossly misleading and it misrepresented what Alhaji Baso who claimed to have lived in Enugu State for 34 years actually said.

​Online Leader News of 14 May 2016 had this headline : I TRIED TO STOP MASSACRE - SAYS FULANI LEADER IN SOUTH-EAST. Leader News wrote among other things, ''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." What might have caused the imbroglio between Fulani and Ukpabi-Nimbo people was the same as narrated by Alhaji Baso in News Proof. The only addition now is that when Alhaji Baso heard the rumours of unusual congregations of Fulani and their cattle somewhere at the boundary to Enugu State he travelled there with the aim of averting problems. When he got to the place rumoured as Fulani herdsmen congregation, he found no one and he returned to Enugu. Evidently, Alhaji Baso did not know who massacred people in Ukpabi-Nimbo, he only heard rumour that it could be Fulani herdsmen and if it were true, he guessed it must be because of previous imbroglio that led to the death of a Fulani man and his two sons in the area. 

As for your assertion that Miyetti Allah has never denied the atrocities attributed to Fulani herdsmen, I think you have made up your mind not to see anything good about all Fulani. Therefore, even if they deny, you will refuse to read their denial much less believing them.

​By the way, why should the Fulani people, regardless of their individual profession, be burdened to deny accusation of having committed attrocities when the burden of proof is on the accusers. ​https://www.tori.ng/news/100533/fg-councillor-others-paraded-as-suspects-of benue-killings.html  
The police on Tuesday paraded a serving councilor from Fidi Council Ward in Makurdi, Benue State, and seven others over their alleged involvement in the killings in some parts of the state.
​https://www.premiumtimesng.com/news/headlines/274063-soldiers-parade-suspects-in-plateau-killings.html 

​On an ongoing murder case investigation, you wrote, "So, the idea of Fulani herdsmen terrorists at work in the killing of Fasoranti's daughter is very likely possibility. It becomes almost a certainty with the accounts of the villagers." Assumption is the lowest level of knowledge. If I assume that the murderers of Fasoranti's daughter are Edo men that have been robbing travellers on Ore-Benin road since the days OF Anenih, the armed robber, the probability that my guess would be right is 90% greater than the assumption that her killers are Fulani herdsmen. There are criminals among all ethnic, religious and professional groups in Nigeria. Therefore, the probability that any of the ethno-religious and professional groups in Nigeria murdered Fasoranti's daughter is much more greater among the indigenes living very close to the area of the crime than nomadic pastoralists.​ https://www.premiumtimesng.com/news/more-news/340689-miyetti-allah-condoles-with-fasoranti-over-daughters-death.html   
The Miyetti Allah Cattle Breeders Association of Nigeria (MACBAN) on Saturday extended its condolences to the family of Reuben Fasoranti, a foremost Yoruba leader whose daughter was killed in an ...
​Finally, the elected Governors in all the six Southwest States have published their reasons for instituting Amotekun and have declared that it is not intended to target any group of law abiding citizens of Nigeria. I discountenance all those attention seeking and unelected rascals claiming to be speaking on behalf of the Yoruba people on Amotekun. You find solace in their statements because it adds sugar to your Gari of hatred for Fulani people. Solution to nomadic pastoralism has been found in the National Livestock Transformation Plan (NLTP) approved by all the 36 states in Nigeria in collaboration with the Federal Government. But as usual identification of a problem and proffering solution to it in Nigeria has often turned into a dilemma at the point of applying the solution. Oluwatoyin, hatred addles the mind, and makes people lose all sense of reasoning. Please, stop hating Fulani herdsmen and love them as you love yourself.
S. Kadiri   






Skickat: den 27 januari 2020 13:51
Till: usaafricadialogue <usaafric...@googlegroups.com>
Ämne: Re: USA Africa Dialogue Series - Tinubu’s Both-Sides-Of-The-Mouth Statement on Amotekun- Farooq A. Kperogi on Security and Politics in Nigeria
 

Oluwatoyin Vincent Adepoju

unread,
Jan 29, 2020, 4:31:52 PM1/29/20
to usaafricadialogue

Yinka Odumakin, speaking for Afenifere, the most prominent Yoruba cultural group, is an 'unelected rascal', but you, Salimonu Kadiri, who has no recognition in Yorubaland, and does not even live in Yorubland, is a wise interpreter of politics in the SW.

 Gboyega Adejumo, the publicity secretary for the Yoruba Summit Group, speaking for the Yoruba organisations that launched Amotekun, is an 'attention seeking rascal', but you, Salimonu, whom nobody knows in Yorubaland, is a good interpreter of SW politics.

You are also very wise in discountenancing the testimonies of various victims of Fulani terrorist kidnapping as well as of the villagers along the road where Fasoranti's daughter was killed, who have identified a surge in kidnapping and robbery by Fulani terrorists, and chose to go back more than 40 years into the past to resurrect the name of an Edo robber named Anini, suggesting that Anini's decades past  crime reign suggests Edo people are equally likely to be the robbers, instead of Fulani terrorists. I greet your logic in time travelling.

I am puzzled  that Miyetti Allah does not put your kind of effort into their self positioning in Nigeria.

Instead of struggles to wash their hands off all semblance of terrorism, struggling to demonstrate they mean well for their hosts across the nation, why do they grow more vociferous?

If truly, Amotekun has no relationship to terrorism by Miyetti Allah why have they been the most combative against it?

  Why are they insisting that Yoruba leaders behind Amotekun be arrested?  

Why are they declaring the Yoruba as being primitive for creating Amotekun?

Why have Yoruba leaders had to respond fiercely to Amotekun?

Where is there a difference between the claim you have defended since 2015- the claim of no guilt from Miyetti Allah and Fulani herdsmen-and the scenario playing itself out in Nigeria?

Or....those news reports are fictions. They are manufactured by people who hate Fulani. Miyetti Allah never rose to challenge Amotekun.

In fact, Miyetti Allah has only declared that Amotekun is a good development but should be law abiding.

The Yoruba leaders responding combatively to Miyetti Allah are illusionists, who read more into Miyeti Allah's response to Amotekun than there is to see.

In fact, they are no better than those people in the Middle Belt, displaced from their homes in a campaign ongoing in escalation since 2015, who keep blaming Fulani herdsmen for the work of unidentified  bandits. Same goes for the Benue governor who keeps blaming Fulani herdsmen instead of blaming bandits with no identity.

Those news reports about threats to Benue by Miyetti Allah over the Benue anti- open grazing bill either never occurred, being inventions by the press, or were misrepresented, being simply humble requests by Miyetti Allah that Benue accommodate the peaceful herdsmen.

The subsequent massacre in Benue  was likely the work of unidentified bandits. The Min of Defence and the IGP in a move seen by many as demonstrating the unity btw the Buhari govt and Fulani herdsmen terrorists by blaming the anti-open grazing law for the massacre, blaming the victims for trying to protect themselves from the terrorists,  were correct bcs the law inadvertently invited unidentified bandits who took advantage of the situation to massacre people, leaving the blame on innocent Fulani herdsmen.

The occupation of the lands of Benue people by Fulani herdsmen after series of  massacres and dispersal of those people as reported by the Benue governor either did not happen, being a fiction created by a politician desperate to divert attention from his misrule or is the outcome of Fulani herdsmen wandering upon unoccupied spaces where they camped.

 The Global Terrorism Index declaring Fulani militia  the world's fourth deadliest terrorist group is run by people who want to destabilize Nigeria through inciting ethnic warfare.

My brother, let us ride along with you, debunking the sad recurrence of the names of Fulani herdsmen and their militia across Nigeria in a coordinated terrorist campaign carried out by unidentified people, from the Middle Belt to the SE, to Edo and the SW and yet all blamed on the innocent herdsmen as Miyetti Allah works hard to project the peaceful nature of these nomadic figures.

Do we need to go into your painstaking efforts to prove Adepoju bigoted in his misdirected efforts to map a pattern of  impunity and intimidation through recurrent massacre of Nigerians and open justification of same  by Fulani herdsmen and their Miyetti Allah coordinators?

Why bother?

Is it not clear that a conspiracy agst the Fulani runs from Southern Kaduna where we were given the news that gov El Rufai paid off Fulani terrorists to the  Middle Belt to Edo to the SE and SW?

Fake news everywhere.

Imagine Adepoju presenting a self declared representative of a Fulani group justifying the Agatu massacre by supposed Fulani. 

Did this supposed representative provide evidence he knows what he is talking about? Did he present his information sources? Even if no Fulani talk less Miyetti Allah debunked his claims, and so what?

You are right to post Miyetti Allah's efforts from 2018  debunking claims it justified massacres of Nigerians. Mischievous people like Adepoju will argue such efforts began to be employed by them when it became clear their strategy of intimidation of Nigerians by massacres of Nigerians and justification of those massacres since 2015 had developed a very negative feedback from Nigerians.

But then, what is the difference btw the group's efforts to distance itself from such justification in 2018 as different from 2015-2017? Is it not the same group. Retroactive denials can be manufactured for them in a spirit of recognizing the goodwill. 

We dont need to go over the long list of claims Adepoju made  which he grandly described as a "Partial Timeline of Self Declarations of Responsibility for and Justification of Massacres in Nigeria by Right Wing Fulani Groups Including Miyetti Allah From 2016-2018".

You have responded to one or two on this thread. Even though you did not respond to most of them in your first debunking of his efforts, it is clear that Fulani herdsmen are largely peaceful people who are being unjustly maligned across Nigeria.

Only God know why Buhari's ascension should suddenly spark this anti-Fulani furor, after all he won convincingly across most of Nigeria in 2015 when this problem escalated. 

People like senator Abaribe calling on Buhari to resign bcs of the worsening security situation, with Boko Haram going strong in the North East and terrorism in action across Nigeria, need to be questioned to know if they are among those sponsoring the unidentified bandits terrorizing Nigeria only for the largely, if not wholly  peaceful Fulani herdsmen to take the blame.

Oluwatoyin Vincent Adepoju





To view this discussion on the web visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/usaafricadialogue/DM6PR07MB5020F171DBB444A6517FDF3AAE0A0%40DM6PR07MB5020.namprd07.prod.outlook.com.
Reply all
Reply to author
Forward
0 new messages