By Charles Okoh
It is not a mere happenstance that the nation has remained bitterly divided along ethnic and religious lines in the past eight years. Perhaps, the event of the past eight years has brought to the fore the urgent need for the nation to begin to think of how best we can begin to address the many schisms that have held us down for so long.
How do we build that nation of our dreams where justice and fairness will prevail? How do we build that egalitarian society of our dreams where all will be treated as equals irrespective of their ethnic or religious leanings when issues of national concern are on the table?
Unfortunately, the nation keeps throwing up people who see
things from those narrow prisms of religion and ethnicity as leaders. The
consequence being that rather than building a nation we would all be proud of
we appear permanently in turmoil and crises. The injustice and evil perpetrated
by the leaders of the past years have continued to debilitate and stunt our
development.
Sadly, it is those who have benefitted more from this nation
that remain the problem. They had the best training and opportunities and have
been immensely rewarded but all they have done in return is to plunder our
commonwealth and left us in ruin. They have played the ethnic and religious
cards so perfectly to perpetuate their stay in power and relevance.
One of such ingrates to this nation remains the erstwhile
governor of Kaduna State, Mallam Nasir El-Rufai. He ranks second only to his
mentor and benefactor and ex-President Muhammadu Buhari in promoting clannish
and religious bigotry over and above national interests, even when it is
without doubt that the nation has benefitted him all his life.
El-Rufai’s eight years in Kaduna as governor was a living
nightmare for the Christians and those who do not share the same political view
with him. Before then, he was Chairman of the Bureau for Public Enterprises and
FCT minister. His reign at those positions were also dogged with controversies,
but his stay as governor was a disaster.
For eight years he was fighting both real, perceived and imaginary
enemies. If he was not dissipating energy persecuting journalists, Christian
clerics, he was threatening opposition politicians.
Like Buhari, El-Rufai as governor, never hid his backing and
support for the bandits who have held Kaduna captive for this long. He admitted
paying bandits in his attempt to pacify the deadly group while he continued to
berate southern Kaduna indigenes who are their victims. He was reported
severally trying to rationalize the killings of Christians in the state.
There could not have been a better way to confirm the fears held
by many that El-Rufai and Buhari supported the killings of Christians in
Southern Kaduna, than with his recent outburst and incendiary comments on the
deliberate Islamic agenda in our polity.
El-Rufai while addressing a group of Muslim clerics in Kaduna after his party, the All Progressives Congress (APC), was declared the winner of the governorship election had said:
“…What we wanted to prove to people, and
thank God in the last four years, we’ve vindicated ourselves and proved that a
government that has a Muslim as governor, a Muslim as deputy governor, a Muslim
as SSG (secretary of state government), a Muslim as chief of staff, a Muslim as
finance commissioner, we’ll not cheat Christians in Kaduna State.
“And everywhere we go we tell them 'Yes, that’s it; the top
government hierarchy in Kaduna State is Muslims but can any Christian in Kaduna
prove that we’ve oppressed them? Is there any district that we didn’t renovate
schools? Is there any district where we didn’t construct a hospital? Is there
anywhere that we didn’t construct roads? Is there anywhere that we didn’t help
farmers whether they voted for us or not? We’ve given everyone their
entitlements.' ”
Meanwhile, speaking in February, 2020 at the government
house, Kaduna, during a programme put together in honour of his 60th birthday,
el-Rufai said his choice of Hadiza Balarabe as his deputy, was made to take
religion and ethnicity off the table in Kaduna.
“If you invite someone to lunch, he would try to add a religious
connotation to it. We are trying to cure our state of that religionisation and
ethnicisation and I thought the best way to do it is to take religion off the
table of Kaduna state politics. That was why we finally settled for Dr. Hadiza
Balarabe.”
Any sane person would have thought the best way to take religion
and ethnicity off the table would have been for him to give Christians and
other tribes more opportunities given that he as governor is a Muslim and a
Fulani. Is there any society where such plurality, multiplicity or diversities
are not taken cognisance of?
If El-Rufai is not out to self-destruct, how can he be talking
about roads and schools in Southern Kaduna as though those are more important
than human life and security to him? The wanton and dastardly killings and mass
murders perpetrated against the people of southern Kaduna for which he did not
do anything only confirms that he did not bother whether they were being killed
or not. Are school buildings and roads more important than human lives in his
warped estimation of priorities?
The same shameless El-Rufai, who said he chose Muslims to take
religion and ethnicity off the table in 2019, is now
saying: “Why did I pick Dr Hadiza Sabuwa Balarabe to be my deputy in
2019? First, I did a thorough calculation that most of those that are not
Muslims don’t vote for our party (The All Progressives Congress). Most of them.
So, why should I give them the deputy (governor) position? I did my calculation
and I knew we could win the election without giving them (position of deputy
governor). That’s first. That’s a purely political issue. It’s politics. You
want to win an election, you’re looking for people that will vote for you. We
have observed that since we started practising democracy, we know places we
used to win elections and those places we don’t. We’ve done that calculation
politically. That’s the political point of it.”
By the way is El-Rufai saying that in those so-called
areas in Southern Kaduna where he did not win, he did not get the mandatory 25
percent of votes cast to become governor? Can he come in the open and tell
the world the kilometres of road constructed in Southern Kaduna and those
constructed in the North. He should tell the world how much he paid as
compensation and the amount spent in rehabilitating the victims of Southern
Kaduna who were victims of unmitigated murders during his ruinous reign.
In also trying to further justify his plot of a perpetual
Muslim-Muslim rule in Kaduna, he also told the Islamic clerics
that: “That’s what we’ve done for four years, myself and my team. And
that’s what we still did and Senator Uba Sani and Dr. Hadiza Sabuwa Balarabe
still won their election (as governor and deputy) even with the religious gang
up against us…That’s the only thing we want to prove and we’ve started but this
is not the end; we’ll have to do it for at least twenty years and that will
make everyone understand.
“So, after Uba (governor) finishes his tenure and gets re-elected
again that’ll be sixteen, right? (El Rufai served two terms of eight years as
governor). Then we’ll have another tenure which will make it 24 years. That is
when everyone will understand and say “Okay, we understand, we know our status”
and “We know the Muslims will not oppress us.” That’s it. And you’ll see that
there will be peace. I swear to God, this has been our plan from the first day
we started APC in the state and God has been helping us with your prayers and
commitment, we’re on the right path. May God bless you all.”
He also ranted that that same insensitivity, illogicality and
rascality were the reasons behind President Bola Tinubu’s choice of a
Muslim-Muslim presidency.
In that El-Rufai moment of madness, he has succeeded in exposing
the fact that he and his likes are dangerous to the wellbeing of the nation.
It’s the same reason under his reign in Kaduna, that Fulani herders and their
bandit cousins took innocent lives at will. It’s the same reason Buhari spent
eight years with unceasing killings by these marauders, yet not one of them was
arrested.
Having been part of the plot to foist the same religion ticket
which President Tinubu, at least El-Rufai admitted as much, now runs it’s
expected El-Rufai will be appointed into Tinubu’s cabinet. However, we are
not God to tell what the future holds, but what we all know as mere mortals is
that God’s ways and plans are not known to man. Only He can tell what the
future holds.
In the meantime, El-Rufai and his likes can enjoy their foolery
while it lasts.
*Okoh, an editor at Daily Independent, is a commentator on public issues
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