On May 4, 201611:08
“If you
are neutral in situations of injustice, you have chosen the side of the
oppressor.” -Archbishop Desmond Tutu.
“The ultimate tragedy is not the oppression
and cruelty by the bad people but the silence over that by the good people.”
-Martin Luther King, Jr.
VEXED voices have, in exasperation, been
asking where Reverend Father Ejike Camillus Mbaka is. They are absolutely right
who expect the priest to speak up. People should ask where Bola Tinubu is, the
one who covets the feat of unknotting Pandora’s Box. People should be asking
where many other previously vocal Nigerians are. People should conduct an
investigation on the seemingly abrupt dryness of Niyi Osundare’s inkpot, for he
has put an incongruous halt to his fondness for poetizing on national
questions. All those experts on radio and television, all those incisive
analysts on cyberspace and concourses – know you one thing! People have a right
to ask what sneaked in and stole your voices. What crept in and rendered you
incapable of standing up? What stealthily stymied your very humanity?
People also
have another responsibility, which in fact is more fundamental than pointing
accusingly at the supposed guilty. People should be asking themselves where
they stand.
People will, perhaps, temporarily desist from
wondering whether Wole Soyinka had embarked on a journey out of the planet
Earth. The Nobelist’s voice finally crashed against the wall of eviscerating
injustice: “Impunity evolves and becomes integrated in conduct when crime
occurs and no legal, logical and moral response is offered. I have yet to hear
this government articulate a firm policy of non-tolerance for the serial
massacres have become the nation’s identification stamp. “I have not heard an
order given that any cattle herders caught with sophisticated firearms be
instantly disarmed, arrested, placed on trial, and his cattle confiscated. The
nation is treated to an eighteen-month optimistic plan which, to make matters
worse, smacks of abject appeasement and encouragement of violence on innocents.
“Let me repeat, and of course I only ask to be corrected if wrong: I have yet
to encounter a terse, rigorous, soldierly and uncompromising language from this
leadership, one that threatens a response to this unconscionable blood-letting
that would make even Boko Haram repudiate its founding clerics.”
Fantastic! Except that Soyinka’s reaction is
like that of a fowl on virgin territory that stands tentatively on one leg. For
the murderous activities of Fulani herdsmen, he faulted “this leadership”.
Well, “this leadership” has at its head someone with a name. Why is the man’s
name unmentionable? On Soyinka, there will be much more to say as the unfolding
scalping encompasses the variegated swathes of the entity. For now, it requires
to explore and expand his observation.
The
Government of Enugu State received intelligence on the impending carnage by
Fulani herdsmen. Dutifully, Governor Ifeanyi Ugwuanyi summoned a 10pm State
Security Council meeting attended by the following on the state government’s
side: Ugwuanyi, the Deputy Governor, the Secretary to the State Government, the
Governors’ Chief of Staff, the State Attorney-General, and the Chairman of the
State Traditional Rulers Council. President Buhari’s government was represented
by the following: Brigadier General Olufemi Akinjobi, the Commander of the
Enugu Garrison (representing the GOC 82 Division of the Nigerian Army); the
Enugu State Commissioner of Police, Mr. Nwodibo Ekechukwu; the Enugu State
Director of the Department State Security Services (DSS), Mr. M. Abdul Malik;
the State Commandant of the Nigerian Security and Civil Defence Corps, Mr. Lar
Stephen; and the representatives of the Nigerian Air Force, the Federal Road
Safety Corps and the Nigerian Prison Services, who attended as observers.
Yet, the
carnage took place, costing anything between 60 and a hundred precious lives;
leading to widespread destruction. Would this have happened if the threat had
been on Muhammadu Buhari’s hometown of Daura?
The attitude of three politicians in this
dispensation – Buhari, Fayose and Ugwuanyi – best illustrates contemporary
Nigerian antinomies. About Buhari, his inertia and nonchalance hardly surprise.
Hadn’t he told the world that his stance on governance was preferentially tied
to the quantum of votes he amassed from different constituencies during last
year’s presidential ballot?
On Governor Fayose, there is clear evidence of
leading from the front. He has not, since his election, shied away from meeting
the aspirations of his people upfront, doing so fearlessly, clearly conscious
of the fact that he owes his gubernatorial mandate to the good people of Ekiti,
not some potentate in Abuja. But, what has been happening to Fayose? His own
people mostly – not those who elected him, mind – but his own people,
nonetheless, have been vociferous in damning and condemning him at every
juncture, to sustain an untenable patchwork coalition of Masters and Slaves.
Some have hung a label of Afonjaism on the perversity.
And then,
there is Ugwuanyi. This man looks and sounds pathetic. This was how he started
his statewide broadcast: “Four days ago on Monday April 25, 2016 many of our
brothers and sisters in Nimbo in Uzo Uwani Local Government Area of the state
were murdered in cold blood by suspected Fulani herdsmen…” Four whole days
passed before this man deemed it necessary to address his massacred and
traumatised people. What was he doing in the interim, apart from leaving his
handkerchiefs sopping wet with tears? He found time to be “very grateful to the
President and Commander in Chief of the Armed Forces, Muhammadu Buhari, for his
prompt and decisive reaction to the incident in Nimbo.” Someone certainly is
trapped in cloud cuckoo land. The President hadn’t visited the scene of the
massacres. He hadn’t sent a condolence message. He hadn’t ordered an
investigation. When he met with Ugwuanyi, it was at the Governor’s instance.
Still Buhari got effusively appreciated for his “prompt and decisive reaction”.
This beggars belief. This provocative condescension was voiced in a broadcast
that had the following only paragraphs away: “In less than three months,
violent clashes have occurred in Enugu State in Awgu, Nike, Abbi and Nimbo
between suspected Fulani Herdsmen and our people,” with absolutely no reaction
from Abuja.
The
genocide of 1966 happened before me. Colonel Chukwuemeka Odumegwu-Ojukwu, the
then Governor of Eastern Nigeria, did not respond to that anti-Igbo pogrom by
grinning ear-to-ear before the murderers of his people; he didn’t go about
salaaming them. It is inconceivable that Governor Fayose, were he in Ugwuanyi’s
shoes, would have allowed a single night to pass before taking exception,
before acting like a man with his people’s mandate. That recommends itself as
the stuff of commonsense. The bloody trail of mass murders by Fulani Herdsmen
is unfolding in front of all our eyes. Think of the quotes from Archbishop Tutu
and Martin Luther King Jr. above. Think of the dictate of conscience. Think of
the sacredness of life. Think of the impunity of these mass murderers. Consider
that “Impunity evolves and becomes integrated in conduct when crime occurs and
no legal, logical and moral response is offered.” Then ask yourself this
question: Am I sitting on the fence, deadening my senses in silences?
Mr. Chuks
Iloegbunam, an author wrote from Lagos.
Read more at:
http://www.vanguardngr.com/2016/05/buhari-fayose-ugw
Governor
Ugwuanyi expressed gratitude to God that Ukpabi-Nimbo killings were
attracting the attention of the entire country and the world at large,
saying that it means there will be concerted effort to find solution to
the menace.
