By Bashir Adefaka
When I read recently that the five governors of South East of Nigeria held meeting with Nnamdi Kanu over his agitation for Biafra, I felt like for what purpose? Nne, Ndi Igbo, before you start hitting me with your bullets of utterances, let me quickly wear such bulletproof. No need to laugh, i am about to send a very serious message to you all over there.
I am worried when some of the Igbo people of Nigeria now begin to link the excesses of Nnamdi Kanu and IPOB to have been caused by the Arewa Youths Quit Notice. Are we really serious at all with the business of getting ourselves out of our challenges? What has the Arewa Youths Quit Notice to Igbo living in the North got to do with why Kanu started carrying out his security threats against Nigeria?
Bother not that Goodluck Jonathan removed History from our education life but some of us still keep records of some of the events of the past. Please, can somebody remind us what period did Nnamdi Kanu’s hates and threats to Nigerian national security began and what was the distance between that period and the time the Arewa Youths Coalition resorted to issuing that Quit Notice, which to me is merely a smoke that unfortunately many of the people who speak on radio, television, print, online and social media now take more seriously than the real fire that was the creation of Nnamdi Kanu and his IPOB. I do not also forget that MASSOB has always been the father of all the disturbances. But MASSOB appears to be more civilised and so knows when to come out and when to retreat into its shell.
I read some of the Igbo who write in some of the newspapers blaming Nnamdi Kanu’s excesses on the Arewa Youths Quit Notice. I just want to tell this class of people/writers to watch it as their activities will only prolong the problem of the Igbo except some right thinking Igbo leaders begin to rise to the challenge. Talking about Igbo leaders I am particularly challenging Igbo right thinking leaders like of the governors like Owelle Rochas Okorocha, Governor of Imo State, Dr. Ogbonnaya Onu, Minister of Science and Technology, Dr. Chris Ngige, Minister of Labour and Employment and others to take the bull by the horns at this time and checkmate it permanently.
I have not settled down to read what was the content of the meeting of those Igbo governors with Kanu and I don’t want to believe that the statement going viral in the social media to have been made by Prof. Ben Nwabueze is resemblance of the Igbo governors conclusion in their meeting with the IPOB leader. Prof. Nwabueze was reported to have said that he had been delegated by Nnamdi Kanu (a very low not near his last born) to issue what he said and which many Nigerians have seen as further amplification of the Nnamdi Kanu’s threat to national security.
So, my warning to those from Igbo Race (because there are quite many more Igbo sons and daughters who great brains) as a whole as well as the governors and Federal Government officers of Igbo extractions in particular and even the Igbo in the media and legal sectors is to ensure that they don’t form part of those who are mischievously blaming the Kanu’s excesses on Arewa Youths Quit Notice, which has even since been tamed by leaders of the Arewa part of the country themselves. With single pronouncement by President Muhammadu Buhari during his nationwide broadcast upon return from his medical vacation and pronouncement by the Sultan of Sokoto, the traditional and religious leader of the North like he is to the rest of Nigeria that “nobody can ask any Nigeria to go out of any part of Nigeria, the Arewa Youths softpedal and withdrew their Quit Notice.
The simple word is “Kanu has committed treason against Nigeria and even against his own Igbo Land” and not question about that. Okay, if not, what benefit does Igbo Land get from his activities? Can he or any of his believers tell us how Arewa Youths have come to be as criminally posing as he and his IPOB? Those people should stop diversionary tactics and advise Kanu to go and face the consequences of his crimes against the State. Shikena!
Funny enough, instead for IPOB, Kanu and those who believe in him especially from among the Niger Delta militant groups to appreciate the commonsense that occurred in the attitude of the Arewa Youths and their leaders, they continued to give their threats saying the Arewa Youths can’t fool them and all that. I begin therefore to wonder if these guys realise the enormity of the crimes they have committed.
In a nutshell, those who are saying Nnamdi Kanu should be placated like Arewa Youths were “placated” are just being enemies of State that I suggest the Lawal Daora-led Department of State Service (DSS) must identify and round up into its net. That is clear because many of these are those who cannot distinguish between the right to free speech and necessity for constructive speech that the nation at this challenging period (as a result of wicked loots by Jonathan’s PDP government team) need to really get out of its predicaments and progress to development. Such people must not be allowed to exist among the sane members of the society until they retrace themselves back to sanity.
Finally, I want to thank all Nigerians who have chosen to be patriotic in all their approaches as professionals and citizens, generally, and pray that Almighty Allah will make the Nigeria of our dream, which we have already begun to feel, happen in our own time. However, before I stop, let me sound clear here that it is not that Nigeria of our dream would not have occurred, it is because those who do not want corruption be pushed out of our lifestyle and institutional lives are working seriously in the area of economy and commerce to raise cost of living so that Nigerians would never settle down to take stock of their progress. But because I strongly believe that the government in office is installed by Almighty Allah and is assisted by Allah Himself, no matter how powerful those elements think they are and can flex muscle with and against President Muhammadu Buhari, Vice President Yemi Osinbajo and all that are working hard to make Nigeria better, they can never succeed.
Good Morning Nigeria!
*This piece was posted by Prince Bashir Adefaka on his Facebook wall on September 2 ahead of his September 3 45th birthday. He called the piece his birthday message and we picked from there for the reach of our amiable readers who requested we should.
