MURTALA NYAKO, BOKO HARAM AND PATRIOTISM

It may be necessary to delve into a little bit of history to know the kind of patriot that former Navy general, Murtala Nyako is. Remember that he was the former Deputy Chief of Defence Staff under President Ibrahim Babangida. Until he took that office and after he left, there is no record that anyone ever held that office. The only person who can answer why that office was created is Babangida himself; but some in the military then suggested because the Minna strongman did not want to contend with the less than normal behavior of the Adamawa man, he gave him the office to keep him in check.

Many also seem to forget that he is one of the lab rats former President Olusegun Obasanjo foisted on the Adamawa people as part of his experiment to see how men who had been successful outside government could do within government. And, anyway, Obasanjo needed someone to checkmate the large image of his then-but-now-forgiven-political foe, Atiku Abubakar. As fate would have it, Atiku and Nyako are now in the same party, the All Progressives Congress (APC), the contraption of motley of characters, worse than what is now in the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP).

The discernible in the APC must now be wondering whether what they now have on their hands is what they bargained for: there are too many liabilities to contend with. The moves now being made by some of these characters are definitely going to cost precious votes, not only here in the north, but definitely in the south. Take that letter written by Nyako, which was only a shade different from the outburst of our dear Fulani leader, Lamidon Adamawa.

This is what a party like the APC suffers when it calls itself a progressive group and absorbs men, who, out of bitterness of soul, flock to its midst; and now has to contend with the same bitterness that drove them out of where they previously belonged.

In his bile-filled memo to the Northern Governors' Forum, titled: 'Genocide In Northern Nigeria,' this man who, more often than not, behaves like a drunken sailor on the high seas, unaware of the reality on ground, wrote that it was very clear that the protection of life and property of innocent citizens in Northern Nigeria and recognizing their Human rights and Voting right in the forthcoming general elections is no longer a cardinal principle of the (present) administration.'

This is fresh information coming from the soldier-turned farmer, who, whether we like it or not, was a successful farmer, until Obasanjo plucked him out of the fiefdom he was running, to superintendent over collective property. Many in his State have complained how land is being appropriated by the drunken sailor in the china ware shop without any consideration for the rights of owners. But now, the governor, without addressing these human rights abuses in the State, is seeking to turn logic on its head.

He knows that insurgency predates this administration; and when the administration sought to deal with it, some men who have more money than common sense, in tandem with desperate power seekers of their genre, had poured in fuel and money. Now that the misadventure is backfiring, they are inciting others through private and public letters to join in. If we must tell ourselves the truth in the north, we have sown the wind and we are reaping the whirlwind, and until we backtrack, we will be miserably left behind.

This suddenly brilliant security analyst, who could not bring his years of military training to bear in his State after nearly seven years in the saddle, is now telling us that the victims of the (present) administration's evil-mindedness are substantially Northern Nigerians, adding that the administration was bent on bringing wars in the North between Muslim and Christians and within them and between one ethnic group and another or others in various communities in the region. Without knowing it, this governor is telling us the blueprint of those behind the on-going carnage, either because somebody knows what is at play or has been adequately briefed by the blue printers, and now that the noose is tightening, hands are being thrown up to show innocence before the noose asphyxiates.

Nyako says, 'cases of mass murders by the administration's bloody minded killers and cut-throats are well known, but it attributes the killings to so-called Boko-Haram.' Is that so? So, why does Boko Haram take the credit for these mindless killings? He adds: 'thousands of our young girls and boys have been kidnapped by clearly organised militia in the last few years and kidnapping is now a random affair all over the far North. These organized kidnappers must have the backing of the federal administration for them to move about freely with abducted children just as those who convey ammunitions and explosives from the ports to the safe-houses of so-called Boko-Haram in the North. Hurrah we are no longer being deceived!'

Is this governor normal at all; and where did he get the information that arms move from the ports to safe houses? Are Goodluck Jonathan and his security chiefs reading these between the lines? This exposition is either a function of a brilliant security analyst or someone in the know, but we know that brilliance in matters like this is not one of the attributes of the man who allowed his signature to be appended to this letter.

All that jibe about being targeted by a militia, along with other prominent Nigerians, does not sell with Nigerians, even when it has been proven that some of the would-be killers were of the same ethnic stock as this governor, some coming from as far as the landmass that the Lamidon Adamawa told us that his kingdom stretches as far as. Many have said if this is an attempt to further the ideals of Uthman Dan Fodio, it would fail, but it is necessary to tell the ones who take this position that the present children of the sage are incapable of doing what he did because they simply do not have it in them. But if it is true that is what is happening, they are merely trying to prosecute in the complex 21st century, what might have worked for their great forebear in his time.

In his veiled attempt to protect his Fulani brothers who have been slaughtering with impunity for decades, until the table turned against them, the Adamawa governor wrote: 'Fulani communities in parts of the North who have been in their locations for over 100 years are now being raided and uprooted by paid killers within the Nigerian Army for the satisfaction of the Federal administration instead of being protected as citizens with their rights and dignity safe-guarded.'

It is time that Nyako realized that all the decades of unbridled shedding of blood by his Fulani brothers in the far north, now extending to the middle-belt, on its way to the south is clearly going to lead to the ethnic cleansing of his race, or to use his own word, genocide. The earlier he advises them to stop in their tracks, the better. If not, the Fulani race may be wiped out of Nigeria, not by government, but by other ethnic groups tired of the marauding nature of his people.

Written By Hamisu Abubakar