During the recent Ile Ife massacre, many peace loving Nigerians appealed for calm especially in northern Nigeria, and I humbly wrote an article calling for same because both the state and the federal government were doing everything possible to contain the crisis and the sin of some thoughtless miscreants shouldn’t be visited on innocent Nigerians living in the north. It will be undoubtedly a good move to once again join other well-meaning Nigerians to call for peace and restrain from reprisals especially in Northern Nigeria at this moment that the IPOB are killing northerners in a cowardly manner, in retaliation for a fight they started which is beyond what they ignorantly expected.
However, I call on all Nigerians, especially those from the Igbo extraction, to have a rethink and live beyond the fear of Kanu and selfish interest to replace the direct and indirect support and sympathy they are showing for Kanu and his terrorist ideas with open condemnations because, that single act will go a long way in addressing the situation on ground.
It will be unreasonable to think that youth in Northern Nigeria will continue to heed to our call for peace while their brothers are singled out, burnt and butchered before their watchful eyes. Of course, it would have been easy for Christ (peace be upon him) to put forward the other side of his blessed face for every slap, but it may not be that easy for fallible 21st century humans, as we recently saw on the Northern youth, quit notice that has sent vibration to the nerves of not just, Nigerians, but the UN, EU, ECOWAS, UK and others.
War is beyond what Kanu and his ragtag army are showing to the Igbos, and it’s definitely beyond what you and I may think. It’s beyond that! I pray that this ugly experience will teach all of us a lesson to reject this madness while we can. The consequences of hate and violence are beyond coming to write or comment on the media.
Some discussants are putting the argument that this Neobiafran agitation has been in Nigeria since 1999, but successive governments of Nigeria had ignored them except the current administration of President Buhari. This is not true because even Ralph Uwazurike who was adjudged by many to be less violent, abusive and confrontational than Kanu had been arrested and put to trial with others by Obasanjo, Yar’adua and Jonathan administrations in the case of Ralph Uwazurike v. AG Federation and other sister cases. How do you expect this government to allow Kanu to continue flaunting his army and secrete services; and threatening Nigerians without consequences? No reasonable government will allow a group of miscreants to unleash fear and terror among its citizens without taking any step to stop them. If the Operation Python Dance II was solely to re-arrest Kanu without proper court order, which the army said and showed that it is not, I would have seen it as legally faulty,
On a final note, I want to bring to the notice of the few Igbos who think that the so-called struggle that is executed in a terrorist manner by Kanu will at least produce an Igbo President that they are wrong. Violence will never force Nigerians to vote for an Igbo President in our democratic setting any time soon. If they based this shallow alleged thought on the almost unopposed 1999 victory of Obasanjo, they are with all due humility wrong! Obasanjo was a product of the military class who handed over Nigeria to him in order to cover their tracks and not the product of OPC or any violent organization. Therefore, the more the Igbos visit violence and hate on other Nigerians in the name of the “Biafran” wild goose chase, the more they distance themselves from any elective office that requires the consent of other Nigerians.
This is 21st Century. Nobody can force anybody to vote somebody in a democratic setting like ours.
Hussaini Hussaini, Abuja
