In
this interesting and thought-provoking article, former presidential
aide, Reno Omokri has critically examined some recent happenings in the
polity as governed by President Muhammadu Buhari.
Reno Omokri
“A young patriotic Nigerian, Mubarak Maishanu…is a Fulani from
Bauchi state and a fan of former President Goodluck Jonathan. He has a
picture of the former President as his screen saver.”
Three weeks ago, Pastor Enoch Adeboye was in Ado-Ekiti, Ekiti state
and while there, he praised Governor Ayo Fayose for defending his
people from foreign Fulani herdsmen. The next day, the All Progressives
Congress insulted Pastor Adeboye in the media and accused him of
commending Fayose for pecuniary reasons, claiming he may have been
bribed (you see, the only weapon the APC has is anti corruption, and
when the only tool you have is a hammer, every problem begins to look
like a nail).
Shortly thereafter, the Financial Reporting Council of Nigeria
forced Pastor Adeboye to retire as General Oversee of the Redeemed
Christian Church of God.
Connect the dots. Let us not be disunited. If Professor Yemi
Osinbajo is afraid to say it, I Reno Omokri, am not afraid to say it. I
love and respect the Muslim Ummah having read and understood Qur’an
(unlike many other Christians) so do not misunderstand me. I stand with
Pastor Adeboye. Now, more than ever, Nigerian Christians and minorities
need unity and leaders like Adeboye and Fayose!
Many Nigerians and the media as a whole regale in insulting Ayo
Fayose, yet he was able to stop Fulani herdsmen killings in Ekiti. Of
what good are our own sophisticated Governors if they cannot protect
your life?
An average Ekiti man knows that Fayose will fight for him. Can we say the same about our own individual Governors?
Fayose will never go to Abuja to cry to President Muhammadu Buhari
if Fulani herdsmen kill Ekiti people unlike a so called Governor who
went crying like a baby to Buhari when foreign Fulani herdsmen raped,
maimed, butchered then savagely and barbarically ended the lives of his
people. If the first responsibility of a government is the protection of
life and property, I challenge any Nigerian to name a Governor who does
this better than Fayose!
And then after the outcry and the big to do raised by the public,
President Muhammadu Buhari dialed back on the move against Pastor
Adeboye and then sacked the secretary of the FRCN, Mr. Jim Obazee and
‘suspended’ (not revoked) the controversial policy of tenure used by the
FRCN to target Pastor Adeboye.
I have been in government and I do not believe that Mr. Obazee
could have acted as he did without being ordered to do so. This is my
opinion and it is not a fact. I have no proof to back this up, however, I
believe that Mr. Obazee was just a fall guy, a patsy, a small fry that
was expendable as collateral damage after the deed had been done.
And for the army of e-agents this administration has on social
media who keep falsely blaming former President Goodluck Jonathan for
the policy used in removing Pastor Adeboye as GO of RCCG, please be
aware that though the FRCN was established under Jonathan, this new
policy was introduced on the 17th of October 2016 by the Muhammadu
Buhari administration. If you care to check on my Twitter or facebook
profiles, you would see photographic proof of this there.
Never before in the history of Nigeria as a United and independent
nation has the church of Jesus Christ the Son of God been under such a
coordinated attack as it is being attacked today.
For weeks, I and other like minds have been screaming to all who
care to listen that the President must do something to stop the carnage
and harvest of death visited on the Christian minorities of Southern
Kaduna. We have all been in deep pain and agony as the pictures of women
with intestines and wombs wrenched out of their body, children in
horrific death poses and men with machete cuts all over their bodies
circulated in the new and traditional media.
It was our expectation that all men of good will would stand up and
be counted in the condemnation of such barbaric acts, but none of us
were prepared for the call by the Council of Imams in Kaduna state on
President Muhammadu Buhari to arrest the President of the Christian
Association of Nigeria, Reverend Samson Ayokunle, over the Southern
Kaduna killings!
My mouth is too heavy for words! Have we all seen what we have used
our own hands to do to ourselves? The other day it was the 77 year old
head of Afenifere, Olu Falae, that was kidnapped, flogged and made to
kneel down and beg by foreign Fulani herdsmen.
Then only last year the king of Ubulu-Ukwu in Delta state, HRM
Akaeze Edward Ofulue III, was kidnapped then killed and his body left to
decompose in the bush without burial by foreign Fulani herdsmen.
Then we had the agatu killings, the Enugu killings and a
multiplicity of killings by foreign Fulani herdsmen leading up to the
Southern Kaduna killings, but rather than sympathize with the people of
Southern Kaduna and other people killed, these Imams want President
Buhari to arrest their sympathizers. Welcome to the new and improved
Nigeria under President Buhari!
Do these Imams think they are the only ones who have read the Quran or the Hadiths of the prophet? I have read them too.
In one of the Hadiths the prophet said ‘- “None of you [truly]
believes until he loves for his brother what he loves for himself’. Are
these imams living by this adage? Or do they not know that Christians
are ‘people of the Book’ in Islam.
What does this council of Imam want to achieve by this highly provocative and insensitive call?
Cry my beloved country! It seems the beautiful ones are not yet born!
But going back to President Buhari and his actions and inactions,
my question is this-How come President Buhari can investigate and fire
Mr. Jim Obaze of the FRC very quickly yet he is still awaiting ‘further
investigation’ before acting on Babachir Lawal? The way the President
drags his foot when those around him are accused of corruption puts a
question mark on his anti corruption crusade. What about the
investigation of the Supreme Court Justice visiting Rotimi Amaechi, the
grass cutting Secretary to the Government of the Federation and the
budget padding civil servants?
And President Buhari is beginning to export his double standards
beyond Nigeria’s borders. With all due regards, President Buhari is
acting hypocritically in The Gambia! He refuses to confirm Justice
Walter Onoghen as Chief Justice of Nigeria yet asks Jammeh to confirm
Barrow as President! Since 1987, the most senior Justice of the Supreme
Court automatically became Chief Justice of Nigeria. After 30 years of
Northern Chief Justices of Nigeria, it became the turn of a minority
Southerner and all of a sudden President Buhari refuses to nominate him
as substantive CJN. Is that any different from what Jammeh is up to in
The Gambia?
What moral right does a President who refuses to obey the judgment
of an Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS) court ordering
him to release Col. Sambo Dasuki (rtd) have to tell Jammeh to obey
ECOWAS?
Both President Buhari and the new Ghanaian President, Nana
Akufo-Addo plagiarized speeches by American Presidents but the
similarities between them ends there.
The same day it was revealed that Ghanaian President Akufo-Addo’s
speech was plagiarized is the same day he fired the man behind the
speech. Fired mind you, not ‘redeployed’. In President Buhari’s own case
of stealing President Obama’s speech it took two weeks before he
‘redeployed’ (not sack) the director involved. And this is a man who
claims to have zero tolerance for corruption. I think the President
mistakes zero tolerance for opposition for zero tolerance for
corruption.
To show the value Nigeria places on human life, we sacked Obazee
for embarrassing government over the Adeboye resignation but sacked no
one because of the Southern Kaduna killings. We acquitted the suspected
murderers of the beheaded Christian evangelist, Bridget Agbahime, but
are diligently prosecuting Joe Chinakwe, who named his dog after his
hero, President Buhari. We wait for public outcry before belatedly
sending troops to help victims of foreign Fulani herdsmen but send out
troops to catch and display alleged cattle rustlers on TV. What has
happened to our humanity over the past 18 months? What have we used our
hands to do to ourselves?
This past week we saw four Israelis killed in a terror attack in
Jerusalem and the Israeli Prime Minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, was at the
ground zero of the attacks within an hour. An untold number of
Nigerians were killed in Southern Kaduna and neither President Buhari or
his vice has thought it wise to visit the area for an on the spot
analysis or even to personally commiserate with the victims.
President Buhari has forgotten that on October 13, 2000 after some
Fulanis were killed during clashes with local farmers in Shaki, Oyo
State, that he physically went to the Ibadan office of the then Governor
of Oyo state, Lam Adesina, and passionately protested against the
killings and insisted that Governor Lam Adesina put an end to them.
Why is it that sixteen years after he did that, he has not been
able to find the time to do for the people of Southern Kaduna what he
did for the Fulani people in 2000?
But it is not all bad news though. There is hope for Nigeria. A
young patriotic Nigerian, Mubarak Maishanu, recognized me at Istanbul
airport. He is a Fulani from Bauchi state and a fan of former President
Goodluck Jonathan. He has a picture of the former President as his
screen saver.
I made sure he spoke to the former President on phone and made his
day. We need people like this to complete the handshake across the
Niger! My prayer is that someday we will have more Mubaraks who want to
shake hands over the Niger than those whose intentions across the Niger
have more to do with hegemony than with harmony.
About the Author:
Reno Omokri is the founder of the Mind of Christ Christian Center
in California, author of Shunpiking: No Shortcuts to God and Why Jesus
Wept and the host of Transformation with Reno Omokri.
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