Bako, The Bandit Historian!

 By Emeka Obasi

Genocide does not happen in one day. It is triggered by individuals with skewed minds raging with hate and spewing evil through their speeches, body language or pen. Ahmed Bako should prepare for summons by the International Criminal Court (ICC).

Bako, who taught History at the Usman Danfodiyo University Sokoto used what should have been his Valedictory Lecture but was tagged the institution’s 50th Inaugural Lecture to descend on the Igbo. He painted them as Diaspora in Kano, killers of Sardauna, and separatists, whose aim from the beginning was to use education to dominate.

I am not interested in all the garbage he wrote. I have duly packaged the trash and thrown it into Bagauda Lake. There is nothing academic about the lecture. Chidi Odinkalu  has looked at it with the eyes of a professor and failed Bako. Ikechukwu Amaechi, literally tore the paper to shreds.

Mine is to teach this quasi-Kano man History. I am a Comparative Historian and earned my degree when an eminent Kano scholar, Prof. Adamu Baikie was Vice-Chancellor. I will tell Bako about another record making scholar from Kano, Prof. Abdalla Uba Adamu.

Bako graduated from Bayero University, Kano. The late Emir Ado Bayero warmly welcomed and dined with the Igbo. The trio of Bayero, Chukwuemeka Ojukwu and Yakubu Gowon were so close that they frequented Samaritan Club in the 1960s.

Bayero was the Nigerian Ambassador to Senegal when he was chosen as Emir, in 1963. The first to brief him were his friends, Mike Agabamuche and John Okoloafor. In 1966, Ojukwu, as Military Governor of Eastern Region, replaced Dr. Nnamdi Azikiwe, as Chancellor of the University of Nigeria Nsukka, with Bayero.

The Igbo came to Kano, like other groups and made their contributions, majorly from Sabon Gari which was allocated to them by the Emir just like Muslim Yoruba were settled in Unguwan Ayagi. The first Deputy Wakilin Waje, an Igbo man named, Egbe, was turbaned by the Emir.

Chief Felix Okonkwo, became a Special Member of the Northern House of Chiefs. There were Northerners who also rose in the Eastern part of the country. Sarkin Hausawa of Onitsha, Umaru Yushau was a member of the Eastern House and the Mayor of Enugu bore the name Umaru Altine.

The first time the Challenge Cup was won by a team from outside Lagos, it had to be Kano, in 1953, led by M. O. Chike. Another Kano team, Dynamos, got as far as the semifinals. The coach was Chike Anionwu. Perhaps, Bako was not born to know that the Igbo were contributing to the development, not domination of Kano.

During the January1966 coup, Kano would have been invaded but for an Igbo officer, Col. Alexander Madiebo, who stopped Maj. Chukwuma Nzeogwu from sending Maj. Timothy Onwuatuegwu to war against 5 Battalion.

Commanding Officer of the Battalion was the same Ojukwu who stood with his friend Bayero, the Emir  and saved Kano from bloodshed after the Premier of the Northern Region and Sardauna of Sokoto, Sir Ahmadu Bello and top military commanders had been killed in Kaduna.

Bako, must be told that of the 30 soldiers who attacked the Sardauna’s official residence, just eight of them were Igbo. The wicked lie of blaming the Igbo for the brutal operation cannot stand because the Premier did not have any issues with them.

Two Igbo lawyers, Mike Agabamuche and Ernest Egbuna, were among the Sardauna’s best friends and one of them even defended him when he was accused by the Caliphate, of mismanaging tax returns in Gusau.

Bako’s lecture was in Sokoto. He should visit the Palace of the Sultan for lectures. Sultan Sa’ad Abubakar will take him to Nsukka. His predecessor, Muhammadu Maccido, was so close to the Igbo that he attended the funeral service of Mr. Egegbara, in a Lagos Roman Catholic Church.

Their father, Sultan Siddiq Abauakar 111, felt so much at home with the Igbo that his driver for donkey years, Dike Okwuosa, was turbaned as Bada Mafarawa. It was under that Sultan that Ogbunuga Afor built Universal Hotel, one of the first, in Sokoto. This benevolence gingered C. D. Jones Okpala to establish Premier Hotel, Kano and Chief George Anyaegbunam, Historic Hotel, Damaturu.

People with Bako’s mindset tried to sequester Ojukwu from the North. The Ikemba’s half sister, Esther Davis, ( nee Bigger) lost her Ghanaian husband in Zaria during the pogrom.

A mob attacked him at Jubilee Hotel, owned by Ojukwu’s mother, Mama Eunice. The hotel stood till the end of the war. Perhaps, Ojukwu willed it to his daughter, Tenny Harriman, whose mother hailed from Kaduna.

There are notable Professors from Kano. Adamu Baikie was Vice Chancellor of the University of Benin. He was so good that he spent eight years at the University of Lesotho as Vice Chancellor and another eight as Pioneer VC of Nasarawa State University. Prof. Uba Adamu is a former VC, National Open University of Nigeria (NOUN).

Adamu, a Daneji brought up, is Nigeria’s First Double Professor, from Science Education, to Media and Cultural Communication. He did National Service at Umu – Okrika, Ahiazu, Mbaise and continues to visit the East where he is an Enugu titled Chief. This Prof. raps better than some hip pop musicians.

Unfortunately, Historians like Dr. Yusufu Bala Usman and his students, Dr. Garba Nadama and Prof. Mahmud Modibbo Tukur are not around to advise Bako. Maybe, I will refer him to Hadiza Bala Usman, for rehabilitation now that Sokoto will soon off-load the pseudo educator.

I understand Bako taught the INEC chairman. Small wonder, we are producing first class electoral failures. The Igbo have been killed enough. This backyard professor must not be allowed to ignite another Genocide.

*Obasi is a commentator on public issues