Prof Osinbajo’s Irresponsible And Irreverent Assertion –An Open Letter To The Acting President

By Femi Fani-Kayode

“Those that are calling for restructuring are looking for appointment. When they say they want restructuring what they mean is that they want an appointment……. some people told us Nigeria is a “geographical expression” although it was not even original to them”- Acting President Yemi Osinbajo.

 

*Osinbajo

Your Excellency,

I trust that you are well despite the fact that your principal is still at large.

Permit me to take this opportunity to respond to your gratuitous insult and your irresponsible and irreverent assertion about those of us that have been at the forefront of the fight for restructuring our nation for many years.

However before doing so I shall make a few observations and assertions of my own.

You have constantly condemned and warned against what you call “hate speech” in our nation yet you indulge in it more than anyone else.

I say this because you constantly call others, particularly members of the opposition, “looters” and you take pleasure on demonising them before the world even before a court of law has pronounced them guilty of any wrongdoing.

You also call them “plunderers”, “liars”, “clueless” and “destroyers”. If this is not hate speech then I really don’t know what is!

You have stigmatised and criminalised every single leading member of the opposition PDP, including our leader President Goodluck Ebele Jonathan, over the last three years and you have sought to paint us as reprobates and evil souls that are not fit to hold public office and that have destroyed the very foundation of our country.

One of your most prominent and vocal sympathisers, supporters and leaders even called President Jonathan’s wife, our former First Lady, Mrs. Patience Jonathan, an ugly and illiterate hippopotamus! Are these sentiments not motivated by pure hate?

Yet you know very well that all that you and your associates have said about the PDP and our leaders is not only a lie from the pit of hell but also a carefully crafted, purposely contrived and premeditated false narrative.

Worse still you are fully aware of the fact that over sixty percent of your party elders and APC governors, ministers, legislators and public office holders were, up until three or four years ago, all elders, leaders and members of the PDP, including President Olusegun Obasanjo and Vice President Atiku Abubakar.

What’s Prof Osinbajo Not telling Us?

By Bolaji Tunji

The Vice and Acting President, Professor Yemi Osinbajo, during the week paid a short visit to President Muhammadu Buhari. It was a very short visit which lasted less than 24 Hours. The man left the country on Tuesday and was back by Wednesday to preside over the Federal Executive a Council (FEC) meeting.

*Osinbajo

The Vice President’s visit is just one of the many visits to the President in recent time. The president’s wife, Aisha Buhari, had equally paid a visit to her husband including other prominent Nigerians, amidst rumours that the first lady had been shielded from seeing her husband during previous visits.

In all these, the story had been that the president was responding to treatment and would soon come back. This is contrary to information from the opposition figures that the President is on life support machine. Ekiti State Governor, Ayodele Fayose, had said that the president was on life support machine. His statement was further amplified by former Aviation Minister, Femi Fani-Kayode.

Indeed, the Ekiti state governor went further to state that he would release some pictures of the president on life support machine to corroborate his claims.

Nnamdi Kanu, Biafra And The False Premise

By Femi Fani-Kayode

In a short contribution titled "Biafra Without Our Consent?" which appears to have gone viral on social media, a social commentator wrote as follows:

*Nnamdi Kanu

"I think the current generation of 'Biafrans' are the most funny people I have ever seen. How dare you sit in your home or offices and draw your Biafra map and include places like Rivers, Cross River, Akwa Ibom, etc as part of your empire? Did you consult them? Did you seek their opinions? You are forcing people to join a country whose commander in chief you have already anointed- Nnamdi Kanu; whose currency you have already decided- Biafra Pounds; whose official religion you have already adopted- Judaism; whose God you have already chosen- Chukwu Abiama? Do you not realize that you are doing to those people the same thing you accuse the British and Nigeria of doing to you? For carving my state into your 'Biafra' and renaming it without my permission and consultation, I have a moral duty to stand against you with everything I have. I am not standing against you because I do not want your freedom; I stand against you because I love mine too. I don't stand against you because you don't have a right to your country; I stand against you because I have the same right. I stand against you because your map is an insult to me and my freedom to choose were I belong. Be warned!"

This commentator who I shall refer to as Miss X and those that think like her are being disingenious and unduly hostile to Nnamdi Kanu and the concept and spirit of Biafra.

She has made a point that appears to be valid but that point is based on a false premise. That premise is that the southern minorities would be compelled or obliged to be part of Biafra without their consent. This is false. It is not true.

The truth is that each of the bordering ethnic nationalities, and even the Igbo themselves, must and will have their own referendum before going anywhere. It is entirely up to them what they do and where they go.

They cannot and will not be forced to go with Biafra if they choose not to do so. And neither can they be forced to remain in Nigeria if they choose to leave.

Everything that is done must and will be based on the free and fair expression of the will of the people.

That is the basic point that needs to be grasped and clearly understood. Miss X's fear is therefore baseless.

Yet we cannot leave it there. We must consider the wider issues that her concerns have raised. We must learn to be clear-headed and strategic in our thinking and actions. We must know what we wish to achieve and we must learn from history.

The cost of petty bickering, division, undue rivalry, pettiness and age-old suspicions amongst the southern ethnic minorities and southerners generally is extremely high.

It has cost us virtually everything and it has stripped us naked and bare before our enemies and adversaries.

The Enemy Within And The Cold-Blooded Threat From Arewa (2)

By Femi Fani-Kayode

READ PART ONE HERE

Apart from Afenifere, the OPC and a number of noble and courageous elders and leaders hardly anyone else from the south west has spoken up publicly for the Ifes and the Yoruba in this matter and that is a crying shame. What happened to the voices of the APC Governors in Yorubaland? What happened to the voice of Vice President Yemi Osinbajo? What happened to the voices of the respected Pa Bisi Akande and the great Jagaban of Borgu, Asiwaju Bola Tinubu? We need to hear from all of these distinguished personalities now more than ever before. The celebrated American spy and defector Mr. Edward Snowdon urged public figures and leaders throughout the world to “speak NOT because it is SAFE but because it is RIGHT”. How right he is!

 

*Femi Fani-Kayode

The black American civil rights leader, Dr. Martin Luther King jnr. took it a step further by saying, “in the end we will remember not the words of our enemies but the silence of our friends”. Finally, in his famous poem titled ‘The Inferno”, the great poet and immortal writer Dante Alighieri wrote “the hottest places in hell are reserved for those who in times of moral crisis preserve their neutrality”.

Those who remain silent as their compatriots and kith and kin are butchered have much to learn from the words of these three great and deeply profound men. When faced with the level of orchestrated carnage and the magnitude of pure malevolence and evil that was unleashed on the local indigenous population by the Hausa Fulani in Ile-Ife every single Yoruba leader worth his salt has a solemn duty and obligation before God to condemn it and speak out against it.

Honor and decency demands that much from each and every one of us and, more importantly, we owe it to the dead and to those that were cruelly butchered and cut short in their prime. We can appreciate the fact that the Presidency and the Federal Government will not commiserate with us for those that we lost in the conflict given their rabid pro-Hausa Fulani disposition but we cannot comprehend the devastating and incomprehensible silence that comes from our fellow Yorubas who happen to be leaders, members and supporters of the ruling Hausa Fulani-led APC.

Instead of standing in solidarity with us and publicly condemning those that drew first blood in the carnage, a few identifiable individuals within their ranks who have clearly lost their way and who ought to know better, are talking rubbish, running for cover and exhibiting nothing but good old fashioned trepidation and fear. Worse still they hate those of us that have the courage of our convictions and that are prepared to stand up, pick up the gauntlet and face the challenge.

 One wonders why this is so? Could it be because, as is being speculated, they had assured their hegemonist masters that they had Yorubaland under lock and key and that they could go ahead and kill as many of our people as they pleased? Could it be because they assured them that no-one would challenge them or complain when they did so? Is it possible, as many believe, that things have got that bad and that those from the south west that suffer from this slavish disposition have degenerated to this level? If so then what a tragedy this is! What a shame! What cowardice! What treachery!

The Enemy Within And The Cold-Blooded Threat From Arewa (1)

By Femi Fani-Kayode

On March 28th a hitherto unknown northern group known as the Arewa Youth Consultative Forum, through its spokesman, one Yerima Shetima, had the nerve and effrontery to accuse Afenifere and the Yoruba  nation of a “subtle campaign of ethnic cleansing” and went on to threaten us with what they described as “reprisals against the millions of Yoruba living in the north” if we did not stop complaining about the fact that our people were slaughtered in Ile-Ife and that the police were handling the whole matter in a selective, inappropriate and unjust manner.

It is clear that this is not an empty threat because for the last two weeks fake and horrendous videos and graphic pictures of what purport to be the killings of Hausa Fulanis by the Yoruba and the people of Ile-Ife are being circulated all over the internet and social media by those that seek to promote anarchy, violence and carnage and those that are set to kill.

This is not the time to escalate the tension and we must do all we can to exercise restraint and keep the peace but clearly the stage is being set by some in the north for ethnic pogroms and reprisals against the Yoruba.

Yet we are not in the least bit perturbed and someone should advise the Arewa Youth Consultative Forum and those that they represent that pulling the tail of the tiger can be a very dangerous thing indeed.

Like Shakespeare’s King Henry V once said they must “wake not our sleeping sword lightly.”

They and whoever sent them can be rest assured that the Yoruba are not intimidated or deterred by their boastful threats and that we will lose no sleep over their irresponsible and reckless words.

Whether they and their sponsors like it or not we shall continue to complain and to protest and we eagerly await the full manifestation and execution of their cold-blooded and unwarranted threat.

Yesterday evening the Arewa Consultative Forum itself, the body of elders and leaders that speaks for the north, chose to stop hiding behind their youths and waded into the ring.

They issued a formal statement, through one Muhammadu Ibrahim, who is apparantly their spokesman, cautioning Yoruba elders and leaders not to “give ethnic coloration to the Ile-Ife crises” and that if they continued to do so they should be mindful of and ready for what he described as “reprisal consequences”.

President Buhari And The 20-Month Jinx

By Femi Fani Kayode

Permit me to begin this contribution with an interesting and historically accurate observation made by the Vanguard Newspaper on 3rd February 2015.  

*Buhari 

They wrote: "Between 1983 and 1985, Peter Onu of Nigeria was Acting Secretary-General of the OAU. 

“At the 1985 Summit in Addis Ababa, statesmen like Julius Nyerere, President of Tanzania, lobbied for his election as substantive Secretary-General. 

“However, there was a major stumbling block to Peter Onu’s candidature: his Head of State, Muhammadu Buhari, was campaigning against him. 

“Buhari claimed: ‘This generation of Nigerians and indeed future generations have no other country than Nigeria.’ 

“But when the crunch came, his allegiance to Nigeria disappeared. In the election of the OAU Secretary-General in 1985, Buhari voted against Nigeria and for Niger instead. 

“He secured the election of Ide Oumarou, a Fulani man from Niger; as opposed to an Igbo man from Nigeria. 

“By so doing, Buhari became the first and only Head of State in the history of modern international relations to vote against his country in favour of his tribe".

Graphically illustrated and succinctly put, that is the mindset of the quintessential General Muhammadu Buhari for you. Yet even in his triumphs and all his glory he has suffered immense pain and his challenges and travails are legion.

Consider the following. In 1983 he toppled the much-loved democratically-elected civilian President Shehu Shagari in a military coup and became Head of State.

He ruled with an iron fist for exactly 20 months (31st Dec 1983 - 27th August 1985) after which he himself was overthrown in another military coup led by his erstwhile and again much-loved Chief of Army Staff, General Ibrahim Babangida. Thereafter he was detained for three years in Benin City.

Exactly 30 years after he was removed from power in 2015 he was "elected" civilian President on the platform of the APC.

Once again he presided over the affairs of our country for another 20 months (29th May 2015 - 19th January 2017) until he was struck by an undisclosed yet strange and debilitating illness, fell gravely ill, was compelled to formally transmit his presidential powers to the Vice President, was rushed to the United Kingdom where, up until today, he has remained incommunicado and on "indefinite medical leave".

The Misplaced Call To Pray For Tyrant

By Femi Fani-Kayode

Permit me to begin this contribution with an aside. It is only a weak, insecure, paranoid, wicked, heartless, ignorant, lawless and callous government that refuses to identify, apprehend, prosecute and hang the bloodthirsty, psychopathic and murdering Janjaweed Islamist Fulani militants and herdsmen and instead arrests an innocent and accomplished young man like Audu Maikori who simply had the courage to cry out to the world about the barbarous genocide that the people of Southern Kaduna and members of his ethnic group and religious faith are being subjected to all over the north.

*Femi Fani-Kayode

I am convinced that my old friend Governor Nasir El Rufai has lost it. He has literally been driven mad by the power that he now wields. If he wants peace in Kaduna state and in the entire country is this the way to achieve it? Does he really believe that locking up his critics and those that have expressed concern about the mass murder and crimes against humanity that are being perpetuated in his state by his Fulani friends and kinsmen who he publicly admitted that he sends public funds to is the way forward?

Does he not know that the suppression of dissenting voices and intimidation will only lead to more anger, resistance, violence and dissent? Can he not build bridges rather than burn them? Can he not make friends rather than make enemies? Here is my message to him: the people of Southern Kaduna are NOT your slaves and neither are the northern minorities, the people of the south or the Christians of Nigeria.

You can kill and lock up as many of us as you like: our faith will only continue to grow, we shall continue to go from strength to strength and we shall oppose and resist you till the bitter end. At the appointed time the Lord will strike back at you for your power show and sheer wickedness and He shall deliver His people. I will not beg you to free Audu Maikori but instead I will strongly advise you to do so. This brings me to the meat of this intervention.

One of the qualities that a Prince must have is the ability to speak truth to power no matter the price, no matter the consequences and no matter whose ox is gored.

Today I will share a truth which many may not like but which, as a leader and a Prince, I am constrained to share. Some have suggested that every Nigerian is compelled by God to pray for our ailing President. I disagree. I do not wish him ill or wish him dead but at the same time I do not subscribe to the view that I am compelled to pray for him. I would rather save my prayers for the thousands of Audu Maikori’s of this world who are suffering persecution and who are languishing in dingy cells all over our country for doing absolutely nothing wrong. I would rather save my prayers for the souls and families of those that have been cut short by the guns and bullets of government security forces, the bombs of radical Islamic terrorists and the machetes and knives of the Fulani militias and herdsmen.

When the Holy Bible says we must pray for our leaders the author was referring to God-fearing and Godly leaders and not usurpers and tyrants. The Bible says we must ‘resist evil’ and few would dispute the fact that with the economy in shambles, with the naira at its lowest value in its entire history, with the level of impunity and corruption in government and with the amount of brutal persecution, politically-motivated arrests and prosecutions and the massive shedding of innocent blood that goes on in our country today, Buhari and his Federal Government are pure evil.

As a matter of fact they are a cursed government that have come to do nothing but spread death, disease, poverty, tears, hardship, suffering, division, hatred, persecution, injustice, destruction and wickedness. To those that insist that even evil tyrants are worthy of our goodwill and prayers I put the following questions.

Nigeria: A Hell-Hole For Christians!

By Femi Fani-Kayode

“We will defeat radical Islamic terrorism and we will not allow it to take root in our country…we will wipe it off the face of the earth.”            

– President Donald J. Trump.

Now that is a real President talking! Sadly our ailing Head of State does not possess such a mindset and neither does he share such a disposition. Unlike Trump he does not have an aversion to such evil.

Consequently he has refused to apprehend, caution, arrest or prosecute even one member of the radical Islamist Fulani supremacists and terrorists since he came to power just less than two years ago even though they have butchered thousands of innocent Christians, burnt their homes and occupied their land.

A few days ago, in a letter inviting President Goodluck Jonathan to make a presentation about the plight of Christians in Nigeria, the Chairman of the United States Congress’s Sub-Committee on Africa, Global Health, Human Rights and International Organisations, Congressman Christopher Smith, wrote the following: “my subcommittee has broadly investigated the crises facing Christians in Nigeria today. My staff director, Greg Simpkins and I have made several visits to Nigeria, speaking with Christians and Muslim religious leaders across the country and visiting fire-bombed churches, such as in Jos. Unfortunately, Nigeria has been cited as the most dangerous place for Christians in the world and impunity for those responsible for the killing of Christians seem to be widespread.”

When one considers the sheer horror that the Christians of northern Nigeria have been subjected to over the last 56 years can anyone dispute Smith’s assertion? Yet it did not stop there. Mr. Douglas Murray, an influential and respected columnist in the United Kingdom’s Spectator Newspaper painted a graphic picture of what has become the norm in northern Nigeria rather well. Last week, in a widely read essay titled ‘Who Will Protect Nigeria’s Northern Christians’ he wrote as follows: “A few days before any attack, a military helicopter is spotted dropping arms and other supplies into the areas inhabited by the Fulani tribes. Then the attack comes. For reasons of Islamic doctrine, the militia often deliver a letter of warning. Then they come, at any time of night or day, not down the dirt tracks, but silently through the foliage. The Christian villagers, who are forbidden to carry arms (everyone is, in theory), have no way to defend themselves. With some exceptions, they also tend to believe what they were taught about turning the other cheek”.

With contributions and interventions like this from our friends in the international community it appears that the world is finally waking up and recognising the fact that northern Nigeria is in the grip of a great, blood-craving and blood-lusting evil. The frightful events that took place in Southern Kaduna over the Christmas holidays are still fresh in our minds and neither will we EVER forget them.

Yet sadly the carnage did not stop there. It continues on a regular and systematic basis. For example 40 more Christians were killed and many of their houses were burnt to the ground by Islamist Fulani militias on February 1st in a town called Mummuye in the Lau Local Government Area of Taraba state. Little girls were raped and chopped up like barbecue spare ribs. Young boys were sodomised and beheaded. Grown men were castrated and hacked to pieces. Old men were gutted and sliced up like spring onions. And women, both young and old, were slowly tortured and violently violated in the presence of their husbands, children and grandchildren after which their throats were slit open and their blood drained into fly-infested gutters and the dark night soil.

This is the work of heartless vampires and demons in human flesh. This is carnage and butchery in its rawest and most primitive form. This is a festival of horror and a frightful testimony of man’s inhumanity to man. This is evil. This is unacceptable. This is barbaric. This is condemnable. And whether anyone likes to admit it or not, this is Nigeria today. The only thing left to say is to pray that the souls of those that were slaughtered in cold blood rest in peace. The Holy Bible says “fear not those that can kill the body but fear the one that can throw the soul into hell”.

A Final Word To The Cabal In Kaduna

By Fani-Kayode
In reaction to the suggestion that the people of Southern Kaduna should defend themselves from mass murder and genocide given the fact that their state government has refused to protect them a political advisor to Governor Nasir El Rufai wrote the following in an essay titled “Kaduna Shall Be Great Again”.

 

*President Buhari and Gov El-Rufai 

He wrote: “The greatest challenge to peace in Kaduna State now is the antics of political jobbers and opportunists who have gone as low as spreading hate speeches, telling communities in Kaduna State to ‘defend themselves.’ This, of course is an unmistakable call on the people of Kaduna State to procure arms and ammunitions and start killing themselves. This is not just very low but extremely dangerous. This call on the citizenry to take the laws into their own hands totally undermines all on-going efforts to achieve lasting peace in Kaduna State.”

Instead of showing remorse for their woeful failures and begging for forgiveness for the sea of innocent blood that has been shed under their watch, the government of Kaduna State is lashing out at all those that have called them out and that are deeply concerned about the carnage that has taken place in Southern Kaduna. The advisor pours scorn on the suggestion that a man should protect his family, loved ones and home from cold-blooded murderers who are attempting to maim and kill them.

He is suggesting that the people of Southern Kaduna should keep quiet, passively fold their arms and happily welcome, with a warm smile, those that have come to rape their wives, slaughter their children, burn their homes, wipe out their faith and take their land. Is that how to make Kaduna great again? Is that how to get back to the glorious days of Abubakar ‘Dangiwa’ Umar, Ahmed Makarfi and Patrick Yakowa when Kaduna had real governors who were balanced, mature, sensitive, caring, gentle, cosmopolitan, inclusive and fair to all regardless of faith, tribe or ethnic nationality?

Is that how to get back to the peaceful days of Kaduna when those of us that play polo used to look forward to going there to play at the annual Kaduna Polo tournament? Is that how to get back to the days when Kaduna was one of the best places to visit in the country? I doubt it very much. The truth is that nothing could be more insensitive, irresponsible, callous and utterly absurd than the Special Advisor’s suggestion.

In any case one wonders just who these “political jobbers and opportunists” are and precisely what these “ongoing efforts to achieve lasting peace in Kaduna” are given the fact that the Kaduna State Government does not appear to give a damn about the fact that thousands of innocent and defenseless people, including women and children, have been butchered during their watch and right under their noses. The Government of Kaduna State is evidently more interested in insulting, undermining, discrediting and threatening with arrest its critics and those that have expressed outrage about what the people of Southern Kaduna are being subjected to than in protecting and saving innocent lives.

Yet since no names were mentioned, for now I will limit myself to responding to Mr. Special Advisor only with the words of Mr. George Makeris of the One Nigeria group who hails from Southern Kaduna himself and whose views reflects the minds and thoughts of many concerned citizens not just in Kaduna but throughout the country.

In a direct response to the Special Advisor he wrote the following: “Picking of arms for self-defense is obviously the last bastion of hope for Southern Kaduna and not its first option since the commencement of these mindless massacres. This last resort became necessary when it becomes glaring that government is not interested in securing and protecting the lives of the people of Southern Kaduna people even though this is against its oath of office. If Government had lived up to it constitutional responsibility and demonstrated unparalleled commitment in curbing the menace, citizens have no business bearing arms. It is the failure of government that makes taking up arms necessary. Even America had to allow its citizens to bear arms when it couldn’t protect them from constant attacks.

Is Nigeria Really One Nation?

By Femi Fani-Kayode

I love this country with every fibre of my being.
For three generations before me, my forefathers, my great-grandfather, my grandfather and my father, have made solid and notable contributions to the developmemt of this country in both the private and public sectors.

My great-grandfather, Rev. Emmanuel Adebiyi Kayode, studied theology at the great Fourah Bay College in Freetown, Sierra Leone, and Durham University in the United Kingdom after which he returned to Nigeria.

He was ordained an Anglican priest, the first Nigerian to take Christianity to our hometown, Ile-Ife, and was the first to build and pastor the first Anglican Church in that ancient town.
My grandfather, Chief Victor Adedapo Kayode, studied law at Cambridge University and was called to the English bar after which he returned to Nigeria.

He played a key role in the development of education in the country, was deeply involved in the fight against the excesses of our British colonial masters, fought for the rights of the so-called “African natives” and “indigenous population” in the old Lagos Colony and was the third Nigerian to be appointed to the Judiciary after a brilliant and rewarding career as a criminal lawyer.

My father, Chief Remi Fani-Kayode, QC, SAN, CON, was born in the United Kingdom, studied law at Cambridge University and was called to the English bar after which he returned to Nigeria.
Like his father, he also excelled as a lawyer and he set up the first and most successful indigenous Nigerian law firm of that time with Chief Rotimi Williams, QC, SAN, CON, and Chief Bode Thomas.

He went into politics, was deeply involved in the struggle for our independence from colonial rule and he successfully moved the motion for Nigeria’s independence in Parliament and went on to become a Minister and Deputy Premier of the old Western Region of Nigeria.
I have fought military rule, been involved in the struggle for democracy and I have participated heavily in partisan politics, political commentary and political discourse in our country for the last 26 years.

I have had the rare honour and distinct privilege of serving her at the highest level of governance first as a presidential spokesman and then as a Federal Minister in two separate Ministries as far back as 10 years ago.

I have suffered persecution, self-imposed exile, illegal and unlawful incarceration and the most vicious forms of insults and misrepresentation for Nigeria over the years and I have also invested my time, resources and energy heavily in the political terrain and development in our country.

Yet, despite all these wonderful opportunities, the monumental sacrifices that my illustrious forefathers and I have made and our love for and commitment to Nigeria it is time to ask some hard questions. Those questions are as follows:

Is Nigeria really one nation or is she many nations forced to remain within an artificial, unworkable and unsustainable entity?
Are our people really “bound in freedom, peace and unity” as our National Anthem proudly proclaims or is that just a deceitful mirage and never-ending illusion?

Is our marriage and amalgamation borne out of consensus and a genuine desire to remain together or borne out of compulsion?
Can a nation prosper, excel or achieve its full potentials when its people are perpetually squabbling and struggling over the distribution of its meagre resources and when they have two distinct and irreconcilable world views?

Can it thrive when one group wishes to live and compete in the new, enlightened and modern free world whilst the other wishes to go back to the bondage of the dark ages?

Does President Buhari Have A Conscience?

By Femi Fani-Kayode 

“Aside the 105 soldiers killed by Boko Haram, additional 34 soldiers were killed two days ago but it wasn’t in the news”– Deji Adeyanju.

I concur with Mr. Deji Adeyanju. The most heartless and reprehensible thing that our government could have done is to cover-up the fact that 105 of our soldiers were killed by Boko Haram a few days ago. To do such a thing is simply evil.

A soldier ought to be honoured in death and this is especially so if he died in the course of doing his duty and fighting for his nation.

The government has not only dishonoured them by not acknowledging their sacrifice but they have also buried them in the wilderness like rabid dogs.

This is wickedness of the highest order and President Buhari, his Chief of Army Staff and his Minister of Defence should bury their heads in shame.

Anyone that buys the lie and propaganda that the 105 soldiers never died and that they are still alive is a compound fool or a village idiot.

Will the military also deny the fact that a few days ago 34 of our soldiers were killed by Boko Haram? These boys died for their country. Why deny them?

I am outraged by the fact that a soldier will sacrifice his life for his country yet the citizens and authorities of that country don’t even appreciate it.

Pictures of the dead bodies were posted on social media. Everyone in the military knows that those soldiers are dead. It is an open secret. Yet because government denies it so many people just choose to believe them.

The truth is that Boko Haram must have used chemical weapons in the attack. When you look at the pictures of the dead bodies this is obvious. It was probably mustard gas.

All we want from the military is the truth. If 105 soldiers were not killed then how many actually were?

The whole episode happened last week in Borno State and the military authorities are denying it. I am sickened by that.

If others cannot appreciate the importance of honouring our dead soldiers, I can. I will not be intimidated and I will not remain silent.

Tell us where our boys are buried and if you refuse to do so we will keep asking. There must beaccountability and respect for those who have made the supreme sacrifice just to keep the rest of us safe. Our soldiers deserve that much.

Finally, let it be said loud and clear that since President Buhari came to power he has not bought one bullet for the military. Considering the fact that we are in the middle of a protracted and very bloody war I believe that this is utterly shameful. If you say you want to fight and defeat Boko Haram then why are you not buying arms for your troops?

This brings me to other matters and raises other questions about our President’s sincerity of purpose and commitment.

You say that you are fighting Boko Haram yet you are travelling the world drinking tea with world leaders whilst your soldiers are secretly being slaughtered.

You say you are fighting Boko Haram yet you were nominated as their spokesman and chief negotiator two years ago in a proposed peace talks with the Federal Government.

You say you are fighting Boko Haram but the man you appointed as your National Security Adviser was retired from the army a few years ago for ordering the release of Boko Haram terrorists under suspicious circumstances.

You say you are fighting Boko Haram but the first thing you did when you came to power was to remove military checkpoints. This guaranteed Boko Haram free movement and access to the entire country.

You say you are fighting Boko Haram yet last year you told the world that an attack on Boko Haram is an attack on the North.

You say you are fighting terror yet since you came to power Boko Haram has grown in strength, has regained lost territory and has been declared the “worlds number one most deadly terror group” by the Global Terror Index.

Between Buhari and Jonathan

By Ebere Wabara

I have a strong conviction that President Muhammadu Buhari is overwhelmed by the challenges he met on assumption of office and the novelty of fresh missteps by his administration. The country is just faltering and floundering like a ship without a compass. Its analogical equivalence is driving a vehicle with the driver’s eyes blindfolded. One thing is certain, if the veil is not swiftly removed, there is a very high certitude that the vehicle will crash and its occupants involved in ghastliness and fatalism!

*Jonathan and Buhari 

Issuing from the above and other deteriorations which I will explicate shortly, it would be justifiably correct to declare that President Buhari is irrefutably more clueless than his predecessor, Dr. Goodluck Ebele Jonathan (GEJ)!

This government is spending precious time battling people who are not our immediate problems at all. If it is not Dasuki, the leadership of the National Assembly comes to the fore in a serial spectacle that offers comical relief. The vogue of course is Femi Fani-Kayode, the former Aviation Minister and media campaign arrowhead of GEJ in the last presidential election, and lately Dr. Reuben Abati, spokesman for ex-President GEJ. In all of their cases and other tangential ones, the stream had been obviously witch-hunt. All the justificatory rationalizations are like a mirage that you cannot behold in what is plainly a circus show that may serially run for the next two years.

Concerned Nigerians have also consistently expressed worry why the anti-corruption crusade should primarily, preferably exclusively, be targeted at only members of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP). Again, the usual perfunctory elucidation by government functionaries is that it will soon get to the turn of the ruling party, the all Progressives Congress (APC). The whole thing looks like a charade.

Amid all these, the cost of living is not just spiraling but has gone out of description even by lexicographers and etymologists. It has never been so bad for my fellow countrymen. Not even in the choking days of the Structural Adjustment Programme and other belt-tightening measures of the past. What is going on now is like official strangulation of citizens! And because we are so timid, docile and indifferent to our environment and all matters that get thrown up in this part of the world, our so-called leaders (better still, rulers) capitalize on this citizenship weakness and drive roughshod with us. All of us keep hands akimbo and hope that there would be divine intervention soonest—even without helping ourselves!

The festering hardship and obnoxious cost of living are such that prices of basic items change virtually by the hour these days. You buy an essential product in the morning at a price that would have changed by noon and it goes on like that interminably. There are no official explanations, management of the bursting prices, cushioning programmes or anticipatory interventionist initiatives. Everyone is just carrying on as if we were in the time of King Pharoah a la to your tents oh Nigerians.

Buhari: Hater Of Women, President From The Dark Ages!

By Femi Fani-Kayode

"Yea though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death I fear no evil for thou art with me. Thy rod and thy staff they comfort me"- Psalm 23. 

I recited this scripture three times and waited on the Lord quietly and calmly when I heard that my wife and son had been unlawfully apprehended and detained in a bank in far away Ado Ekiti on the orders of the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) whilst I was in Lagos. 

 Somebody should tell President Muhammadu Buhari to stop sending his goons to abduct other peoples’ wives and eight month old infant babies and to stop trying to traumatise them, lock them up and destroy their lives simply because they are married to or fathered by opposition politicians and those he hates. 

He should leave my wife Precious Chikwendu, my eight month old son, Aragorn, and other members of my family alone, face me directly and be a man. Even in war the wives and children of the enemy are out of bounds. 

The truth is that Buhari is nothing more than a coward and a bully and he will suffer the consequences of his actions because God will punish him. 

I give thanks to the Living God, the fearless lion that is known as Governor Ayo Fayose and the good people of Ado Ekiti for saving the lives of my loved ones and protecting them from the barbaric and illegal actions and tyranny of the fascists of the EFCC. 

I have nothing but contempt for these people. They are the scum of the earth and by the time this is all over they will know that I serve a mighty God.

Despite the threats, persecution, violence and intimidation that my family and I have been subjected to over the last one year my opposition to the Buhari government remains implacable and unrelenting and I refuse to be silenced.

I said that Buhari was an evil man right from the outset and that he would prove to be an incompetent and disastrous President if elected into office and I have been proved right. 

If he and his security forces are not killing Shiite Muslims, marginalising Christians, silencing and intimidating critics, locking up members of the opposition, storming the homes of judges or threatening bloggers and journalists they are sponsoring Fulani militants and herdsmen to commit acts of barbarity and terror against their fellow Nigerians. 

If they are not impoverishing Nigerians, decimating the economy or freezing the bank accounts of innocent men and women and their family members they are tormenting, abducting and locking up the wives, infants and babies of opposition figures. 

If they are not intimidating and charging leaders of the Senate and other senior legislators to court on trumped up charges, murdering IPOB youths, butchering Niger Deltans, humiliating and cheating their own party leaders or discrediting and jailing dissenters they are denigrating women and confining them to the kitchen and bedroom. 

Buhari has divided our country along ethnic, religious and regional lines as never before and he has subjected the Nigerian people to levels of starvation, deprivation, poverty and suffering that were hitherto unknown. 

And it is not just southerners and Christians that are feeling the pinch and suffering the pain and affliction. Millions of northern Muslims are feeling it as well. If anyone doubts that I challenge Buhari to walk the streets of Kano today and see what happens.

One wonders how things got so bad? One wonders what engendered this terrible affliction and what attracted this deep-rooted curse of a government?