By Yochuku Ofoka Yobolisa, Editor in Chief
Tin-Kom, tin-Kom, tin-kom; the time is ticking, and the country, swept by fast-flowing rapids of gangland killings and vandalism, is headed to the brinks of catastrophe. Explaining the motives and operations of gangsters and killer herdsmen in a country that has a legitimate government duly elected by the people to protect them can be both quixotic and unnecessary.
Thenewspaperman.com.ng went to town and felt the pulse of the nation over the present state of insecurity in the land, and found out that the continuing presence of Boko Haram – an organization that aims to purify Islam – in the northeast and its splinter groups in other parts of the north, has become an enormous stimulus for the proliferation of other daredevil criminal gangs operating in similar circumstances everywhere in the country today. While the military and government are concentrating efforts in trying to contain the revolutionists in the north, a coalition of hardline, notorious, AK-47-carrying groups are exporting the Islamic revolution to the southern region; with their automatic rifles, they are pushing south, trying to wipe the people of the erstwhile peaceful south out of the map, or at least to subdue them and subjugate them and bring them under their control through mindless acts of terrorism and hate killings.
Southern attempts to resist the encroaching herder militias by setting up vigilante committees and equipping them with similar automatic rifles have been interpreted by the authorities as rebellious. Southern groupings like Amotekun and the Eastern Security Network are non-hostile forces operating only within their individual tribal and geographical areas; their mandates are to police their areas against possible invasions by the AK-47-wielding revolutionist from the north masquerading as herdsmen. In a recent announcement, the administration ordered security agencies to shoot at sight any unauthorized person wielding automatic rifles such as AK-47.
That presidential order gave the security agencies the right to fight revolutions in any form. But the federal operatives have been skewed in their mission and the true meaning of the presidential command looks blurry to the ordinary citizens.
Commenting on the escalating cases of violence in the south in recent time, Nigerians in all corners are reviewing what the outcome of the order would be. Will the order to shoot at sight anyone found carrying automatic rifles include the hitherto untouchable Fulani herdsmen from the northern parts of the country who sneak into remote and marginal places in the south and open fire on unsuspecting inhabitants?
Observers and policy analysts are interpreting the presidential injunctions as an order that does not extend to disarming the herdsmen. Speaking on a recent herdsmen attack in the Egedegede community of Ebonyi state where 25 inhabitants were killed, Charley Nwokolo said, “I think that order is only meant to mop up the automatic rifles that ESN and Amotekun and other vigilantes are using to guard their people. That order is not for Fulani herdsmen who are still using their weapons to attack easygoing people of the south, because those herdsmen are still wreaking havoc and causing vast destruction of human lives down south.
Experts are asking how it is that in early March this year, security forces invaded forests in the southeast forcing ESN out of their sentry positions and making them relinquish their weapons and go into hiding.
Although the ESN and other vigilante committees in the south still claim to maintain their self-assigned security duties, herdsmen with automatic rifles have since then invaded many towns and villages in the southern states and killed dozens of innocent citizens. The question is, ‘Is the government giving advantage and priority to the Fulani gunslinger-herdsmen?’ How many of the herdsmen have the federal security agents arrested so far and prosecuted? Are there not powerful individuals and, perhaps organizations behind these so-called herdsmen for government to fish out?
Governor Bello Matawalle of Zamfara state, in his recent abjuration concerning the evils of kidnapping, banditry, and mass killings, challenged important individuals in the whole of the north to swear they do not have a hand in what is happening, and even trying to export it down south.
Supporting Matawalle’s conspiracy theory, a commentator on national issues, Kunle Ogunlesi said, “In February, herdsmen attacks in the southwest caused the deaths of hundreds of law-abiding people in that zone, thus sparking off a series of agitations that forced Fulani Herdsmen out of the zone.”
A prominent northern politician from Ilorin, the Kwara state capital, once revealed that the so-called herdsmen are foreign Fulani who has a grudge against the administration. Whatever that revelation may be, these so-called herdsmen have inflicted enough punishment on the otherwise, innocent people who have no idea what grudge they have against the state. But across the length and breadth of the north and south regions, these masquerading revolutionists operating under the guise of herdsmen should review their operation with a view to venting their anger on the real person or persons that invited them.
