The
real reasons why the President Muhamamdu Buhari-led federal government
did not designate marauding Fulani herdsmen as terrorists have been
revealed by the Minister of Information live on BBC programme.
File photo
While speaking in an exclusive interview with BBC’s Focus on
Africa, the Minister of Information and Culture, Lai Mohammed said the
federal government did not proscribe Fulani herdsmen as terrorists
despite being responsible for hundreds of death and destruction of
properties, because their activities were criminal and not
terror-related.
According to The Guardian,
Lai who spoke on Wednesday, said that the criticism of Nigeria’s
designation of the Indigenous People of Biafra (IPOB) as a terrorist
organisation was flawed, noting that both the separatist group and the
deadly herdsmen have different agendas.
The minister insisted that the herdsmen’s “acts of criminality should not be confused with terrorism acts” even though they were named the fourth deadliest group in the world, according to the 2014 Global Terrorism Index.
But President General of the Ohaneze Ndigbo, John Nwodo, who was
earlier interviewed on the programme, said that the labelling of IPOB as
a terrorist group was “extremely unfair and lopsided.”
Nwodo argued that Fulani herdsmen deserved the terrorist label, not IPOB.
“In Nigeria, we have Fulani herdsmen…and terrorism tracking
organisations have ranked them as the third or fourth deadliest
terrorist organisation, that kind of organisation which has ravaged
farmlands in Nigeria, killed quite a number of people, has not been
classified as a terrorist organisation,” he said.
SB Morgen Intelligence in its report on security in the country in
2016 said pastoral conflicts were the deadliest threats Nigeria faced in
2016 – cattle rustlers and Fulani herdsmen accounted for 470 and 1,425
fatalities respectively. Cattle rustlers were responsible for 7 per cent
of the attacks and Fulani herdsmen 29 per cent. However, an average of
39 victims were recorded in each cattle rustling attack while Fulani
herdsmen attacks have an average of 30.
The targets and victims of cattle rustlers and Fulani herdsmen were usually farmers and residents of attacked communities.
But unlike the herdsmen, IPOB is demanding an independence for the
Igbo people in Nigeria’s southeast. Its push for an independent Biafra
became heightened since 2015, especially after the arrest and release of
its leader Nnamdi Kanu by the government.
Kanu said his group was non-violent and would only use peaceful means to achieve its goal. “We
have chosen the track of peaceful agitation, non-violence, persuasion,
logic, reason, argument. We are going to deploy all of that to make sure
we get Biafra,”he told AFP in an interview in May.
Mohammed, said IPOB’s non-violent claims were just a facade to cover up its terrorist intentions. “For instance, Nnamdi Kanu, the IPOB leader was caught on tape, saying that they want Biafra and not peacefully, but by force.
“He declared that if they do not get Biafra, Somalia will be a
paradise with the kind of mayhem they will unleash on Nigeria. The group
openly embraced arms and ammunition and the leader set up Biafra
National Guard, Biafra Secret Service and openly attacked army
formations.
“When an organisation decides to not just attack the Army but
set up its own parallel government; when an organisation openly solicits
for arms all over the world; when an organisation starts issuing out
its own passports and currency and does not recognise the democratically
elected government, then it becomes a different thing.”
No comments:
Post a Comment