ON a fateful night in the course of courting, I had my closest, non-crash, non-ailment shave with death, right in my place of birth; Ilesa. Gani Adams’ inspired militant wing of OPC had wrestled domestic security from the organized security system known to the constitution of Nigeria, raining terror on both the real and imagined enemies of Ijesaland under the guise of routing the booming fraud community known as 419 then and now Yahoo Pro Max. The ragtag Adams’ army began the anti-corruption war to rapturous applause. The famed osomalo gboo mi (will crouch continually until debt is paid me) land of commerce and industry had almost become South West capital of fraudsters and it got to this in-your-face situation when the outlaws almost became the law governing fatherland. At that point in the history of Ilesa in particular, a cleansing was needed, necessary, expedient and any anyhowness would be deemed needful and welcoming. And that was what we got and even more, unfortunately, the more was unpalatable.
After ridding the town of the undesirable akin to the flushing police got during the endsars mobbing, the crime fighters, led mostly by unlettered garage touts and NURTW goons, transmogrified into a band of lawlessness, combining and executing the constitutional roles of various bodies in the justice sector. They arrest, detain, try, condemn and execute their targets at will. They almost extrajudicially executed me the night I mentioned above. Scorned girlfriends and wives run to them for “justice”. You have instant death wish, dating their babes. The land was in their awe.
The night I encountered them, I left her place a little late, though I was confident Ilesa should not frighten me. My umbilical cord was and is still buried there. As Yoruba would say, I walked there with my head, not legs. But a few meters away from her house, something happened. Though I had been hearing about OPC executioners, it never came that close home. Someone just called out a name strange to me and I was about to keep walking since it didn’t sound like my name, when multiple cocked guns were suddenly pointed at different parts of my body, head and heart inclusive. Then began uncordinated, mostly irrational questioning, with a persistent question if I wasn’t the mentioned name. Then, I motioned to them I was on a love jaunt, which ultimately saved my life.
I was led to the house at gunpoint amid ceaseless threats that I should consider heaven’s pap seller hawking for me if my claim of love-delay wasn’t established. Well, by God’s mercy, ladies of then had not become so woke to deny the obvious in the name of girls’ power. Her friends were already soaked in fear for Uncle Lanre’s life. I was chorus-like identified as their “Uncle” and the killer gang ordered me to spend the night there. Space was found for me to sleep alone, though I barely winked all night. It was that close.
I searched the dictionary for meanings of terrorism. The commonest is “unlawful use of violence and intimidation especially against civilians in the pursuit of political aims”. While it is debatable if activities of OPC then could be said to have political aims, the group was obviously deploying “unlawful use of violence and intimidation against civilians”, in many Yoruba cities and towns, including Lagos. If its agenda of Yoruba emancipation could be considered political because it was indeed one, then OPC of that era was a terror group. Then Olusegun Okikiola Obasanjo became president and handled the Yoruba “terrorism”.
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Before IPOB and Nnamdi Kanu’s lawyer, Aloy Ejimakor began sparring with DSS boss, Tosin Ajayi over the latter’s “defend yourself” advice to Nigerians and communities under varying terrorism, I had listened to the message and obviously didn’t make much of it, because it has become some kind of comfort and empathy cliche from the elite to traumatised Nigerians especially those under the deathly vice grip of Fulani herdsmen terrorism. Of course, the political aim of the Fulani elite arming the herders is too glaring and in plain sight to require dissection. Fulani elite want political power and its perks endlessly and the herdsmen have become utility foot soldiers. They now carry guns more expensive than the total worth of the animals in their care. Even the few monkeys left in Idanre (the land of no foolish monkeys) know that when a morsel is lifted up, the mouth is the final destination.
But I return to the IPOB lawyer’s venting that his famous client Kanu and the DSS boss were sharing the same tongue on self-defense but while the government official is being lauded and lionized for his candour to join a chorus that is not popular in government circles, his client was hounded into prison and his Igbo race blacklisted as terror-prone.
Well, I have always had a dual sympathy for the Igbo race; one, over the denial of its sixth state while the greedy North West has seven, and two, the refusal of the rest of Nigeria’s political establishment to let go of the civil war memories and open the Nigerian presidency to the race. Anytime a viable Igbo is on the ballot, I am more likely to go in his/her direction even if a Yoruba is running. My Father in heaven hates injustice and let no one tell me any nonsense about power not served a la carte. Those who snatched it the last time to run with it, have landed the nation in a ditch. Digging the country out is a task that no one can predict the timeline if it is ever done.
That no Igbo person has been either president or vice since 1999 cannot be excused anywhere aside those who see politics as a game and not service to God and humanity. This sentiment of mine won’t also excuse the deliberate trade wickedness of an average Ibo. We see it everyday, everywhere, even in the remotest part of everywhere outside Igboland where Ibos are allowed to trade. You have to listen to Yoruba artisans dealing with Igbo traders in Lagos to understand what is playing out. The artisans curse them and still return to the Shylocks in Alaba et al. It is akin to “you Tarka us in politics, we Daboh you in business. Nobody wins in such eye-for-eye, tit-for-tat.
Freedom fighting can be tricky. The line between emancipation agitation and abuse of communal acceptance can be very blurry. Even the history-defining Nelson Mandela became a textbook-definition terrorist at a point in his guerrilla odyssey when he established a paramilitary wing of ANC known as uMkhonto we Sizwe, conducting the Resistance agenda in nefarious and subversive manners and not even sparing fellow blacks singled as saboteurs. When he was jointly awarded the Nobel Peace Prize in 1993 with F.W. De Clerk, the MK (means spear) page was a blot on his glittering emancipation journey.
IPOB leader, the 57-year-old Nnamdi Okwu Kanu is writing his emancipation story and he has every right like Mandela and Gani Adams to demand a better deal for his people, only that the activities of his group, just like MK and then-OPC fit perfectly into the globally acceptable definition of terrorism. That makes IPOB a terror group, blighting Kanu’s justice-for-all agenda, as claimed by his lawyer.
Last week, I called on the Tinubu administration to embrace the reality that only a lawfully empowered populace can be the first line of defence the DSS DG is advocating. Then, I had not even known the secret police boss shares my sentiment. I called the central government’s attention to how America is managing its gun right facilitated into the constitution over 200 years ago by the founding fathers. I was specifically talking about Fulani terrorism and the hopelessness of its victims particularly farmers in the South, North Central and minority communities of North East, especially those who are predominantly Christian.
No, I am not saying that some kind of 2nd Amendment in Nigeria’s Constitution would magically restore peace in communities frayed by Fulanis. But knowing the farmers could also lawfully kill at the sight of danger would be some deterrence and the truth is whether arms are legalized into open market in Nigeria or not, those who feel compelling need to have them, would get them, one way or the other, albeit crookedly. At least, politicians regularly purchase elections guns in their hundreds. Recently, guns yet to be claimed by anyone, were exhumed from a legislative building; in their numbers and no one is saying anything about them again, because it is part of the “political” process. When a governor was transiting from office, loads of guns were also discovered in government house in a South West state and after a little noise, nobody is talking about them again. Politics swallows truth up. But hapless farmers and communities without godfathers to facilitate dark market dane guns, must continue to bear the brunt of political agendas coloured in race and religion. They are the ones to die like chicken without marked graves. They are the sacrificial lambs for politics of election and re-election. Jesus said there is nothing hidden that won’t be revealed. Someday, Nigerians would get to know to which end the endless blood-shedding is serving our politicians. If some people are somewhere sacrificing blood to appease altars supporting their aspirations, God of heaven will asphyxiate them and their desires. Amen in Jesus’s Name.
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