‘’Do not call a conspiracy what these people call a
conspiracy, neither fear ye their fear but sanctify the
Lord your God in your heart and let Him be your only
fear”- ISAIAH 8:12

In an essay, titled, ‘’Afenifere: A Syllabus Of Errors’’,
written in 1998 and published in Gamji.com, Emir
Sanusi Lamido Sanusi wrote the following:
‘’Anyone who needs a lesson in how not to be a
politician, and how never to win power in Nigeria
should study Yoruba politicians.


“Unless the Yoruba masses disown Afenifere, this
group of degree-bearing political illiterates will lead
Yoruba land down its own version of a syllabus of
errors, an island unto themselves, allucinating in
their own idiocy and content to remain marginalised
citizens in their own country while blaming the North
for their self – inflicted woes.


“The syllabus of errors remains a black spot on the
history of the Catholic Church. Afenifere will be an
even blacker spot on the political history of the
Yoruba.
Alhaji Umaru Shinkafi’s pedigree speaks mountains
of what his political stance would be ab initio. “He
probably believes, like other Fulani politicians, that
the problems of this country have a lot to do with the
shift in power away from the Fulani to individuals like
Babangida and Abacha, products of lower cultures’.


“The Fulani of the North, proud of the history of the
Caliphate, remain proud of the roles played by Fulani
leaders of the political and military establishment in
Nigeria- Ahmadu Bello, Murtala Muhammed, Aminu
Kano, Shehu Yar’Adua, Shehu Shagari, Jubril Aminu.


“They are sad that other Nigerians do not know the
difference in ethnic background between say,
Murtala Muhammed and Ibrahim Babangida. They
do not understand how a man like Abacha, born to a
cigarette-seller in Fagge quarters of Kano (and this
speaks mountains of him, how he ruled and how he
died), can be taken as the quintessential
representative of the Caliphate whose head he
disgraced and whose culture and values he sought to
erode.


“So, Shinkafi probably believes in the need for a
power-shift: Back to the Fulani. He may not be alone
in this tendency. Politicians like Mahmud Waziri,
Bamanga Tukur, Jubril Aminu, even M. D. Yusufu may
consciously or unconsciously have similar views.


“To the Fulani, there is nothing like ceding the
presidency or power. If you want it, you work for it…
If you lack the stomach to dig in and fight, too bad for
you. Southern politicians have always failed to
understand the complexity of the North and its
politics’’.


These are interesting words from an interesting
Fulani man. The disdain and sheer contempt that
Emir Sanusi harbors for non-Fulanis and southerners
and for Afenifere and the Yoruba people in particular
remains intact till today. His assertion that ‘’southern
politicians have always failed to understand the
complexity of the North’’ is false.


Racist views
Despite the fact that we southerners understand the
nature of core northern politicians and leaders very
well, we have always chosen to hold our peace,
condone their excesses, carry their baggage and
accept their strange ways and complicated
peculiarities in the name of national unity.
The truth is that it is Emir Sanusi and his Fulani
people that have misunderstood southerners all
along. We in the South may be accommodating,
tolerant and generous people, but our kindness and
liberal nature must never be mistaken for stupidity or
weakness. That is the mistake that people like Sanusi
often make with their racist views and condescending
words. He forgets that the culture and history of
most of the southern empires and kingdoms predate
that of the Fulani Caliphate by hundreds of years.
17 years after Sanusi wrote this piece about
southerners, I have decided to respond to him by
sharing my views about the core North and its Fulani
leaders. This is especially so because we have a
hardline Fulani conservative at the helm of affairs in
our country today.


Sanusi wrote his views about the South in 1998 when
his fellow northerner was Head of State, but I choose
to write my views about the North, not when my
fellow southerner is in power, but rather when a
northerner is President. I have not taken offence at
Emir Sanusi’s views about southerners and I
sincerely hope that he and his people will not take
offence at my views about core northerners.


This essay will not only be deemed as being
controversial but its contents will also be keenly
contested and scrutinized. This is because I am going
to express some home truths here which the
majority of our people know to be true but few are
prepared to voice.
Conspiracy of silence
I am making this intervention not out of hate but out
of love and compassion for those who have lost their
lives at the hands of our adversaries over the last 55
years. I am also mindful of the fact that every single
person that is a member of the ruling class or that
has held a position of leadership in this country
between 1960 and today, including yours truly, has to
take partial responsibility for the terrible things that
our people have experienced over the years, for the
criminal negligence that we have all indulged in, for
the shameful conspiracy of silence that we appear to
relish and for the abysmal and pitiable situation that
we have found ourselves in as a people and as a
nation.


Those of us that are members of the ruling elite are
all, in varying degrees, guilty and it is to partly
ameliorate that sense of guilt that I feel constrained
to speak out and expose the truth.
I am not a racist or tribalist. I deplore violence and
bloodshed. I have no hate in me for any individual or
ethnic group and I am a firm believer in the view that
all men are equal before God regardless of the
circumstances of their birth, their creed, their tribe,
their nationality or the color of their skin. Whilst I
hold these truths to be self-evident , I also believe
that it is incumbent upon those of us that lay claim to
being leaders to always speak the truth about the
history and unfolding events in our country no
matter how uncomfortable that truth may be.
Despite all the insults, threats, misrepresentation
and, often times, slanderous and utterly bizarre
allegations that I, my family and my loved ones have
been subjected to over the years from ignorant,
venal and hate-filled men, I shall be counted among
those few voices.


If nothing else that is good enough for me and with
that alone I would have made a meaningful
contribution to my nation’s history and done my
forefathers proud. It is with this in mind that I urge
readers to fasten their seat belts and consider the
following contribution.
When Cain killed his brother Abel, the Bible tells us
that God asked him the following question: “Where is
thy brother Abel?”
Cain responded in a defiant manner: “Am I my
brother’s keeper?” God responded by telling Cain that
his brother’s blood was crying to Him from the
ground for vengeance. From that point, Cain was
afflicted with a terrible curse which could not be
lifted because it came from the Living God.
Wherever he went, the curse that goes with shedding
his brother’s innocent blood followed him. This was
made worse by the fact that he refused to repent or
show remorse for what he had done. Everything that
he did failed and everywhere he went he was
despised, rejected, feared, hated and viewed with
suspicion by his compatriots, colleagues and fellow
men.
Tragedy and misfortune stalked him and he ended up
being nothing but a vagabond, a marauder, a
parasite and a wanderer in foreign lands. He became
a byword and a proverb: a herder of goats and cattle
who lived and survived by guile, doublespeak,
stealing, pillaging and intimidating others. He
became the proverbial leech who made a headway in
life only by benefiting from the sweat, labour and
hard work of his hosts and benefactors, by sponging
off whichever community gave him succour and by
resorting to violence and bloodshed at the slightest
opportunity and at the drop of a hat.


He also acquired an obsession with controlling
others and an insatiable lust for power and the
perpetual domination, suppression and conquest of
what he perceived as “lesser tribes and lesser
people”.
Open defiance
Simply put, he was a dangerous predator who sought
to milk others dry and conquer by guile and
assimilation. There are comparisons to be made with
Nigeria here.


Sinister forces and dark elements from the deeply
conservative core North have killed more Middle
Belters and southerners than any other in our
country over the last 55 years. Worse still, those
forces do not just kill but they also establish their
own communities in the land and territory of their
victims and forcefully occupy it. They have refused to
stop doing so and, to all intents and purposes, they
have developed an insatiable blood lust which
compels them to shed innocent blood at the slightest
whim in order to subjugate others and to remain in
power.
The South, whom our British colonial masters once
referred to as the “rich wife”, has effectively become
the Abel of Nigeria whilst the conservative core
North, whom they once called the “poor husband”,
has now become the Cain. For many years, the Lord
has been asking the core North what they have done
to their southern and Middle Belt brothers and why
they keep doing it.
For years, the conservative core North has
responded with defiance and anger and asked God,
“Am I my brother’s keeper?” The result of this open
defiance and lack of remorse is simple and clear: It
has attracted. God’s wrath. Is it any wonder that Boko
Haram now ravages the core North? Is it any wonder
that every single core northern leader that has ever
ruled Nigeria since 1960 has either been killed or
died in mysterious circumstances whilst on the
throne or was removed in a military coup and then
subjected to a number of years in detention?
Is it any wonder that the core North is totally
dependent on the rest of the country for its
sustenance and economic survival? Is it any wonder
that a UNICEF report, released a few years ago,
stated that if Nigeria were to ever break up, that the
core North would be the most impoverished, the
most backward, the most unsustainable and the most
barren area in the whole of the West African sub-
region?
Is it any wonder that they were viewed with so much
suspicion by others that the core northern states
were excised from the country by Major Gideon
Orkar in his 1991 coup broadcast and asked to re-
apply if they wanted to be part of Nigeria again?
Is it any wonder that the leading south-western
politician within the ruling All Peoples Congress (APC)
is secretly complaining and quietly lamenting the fact
that he was used in the 2015 elections by the core
North simply to put one of their own back in power
so that their hegemony could be resurrected and
their agenda of perpetual and everlasting northern
rule could be established forever? Is it any wonder
that, according to a survey carried out this year by
Global.
Terror Index, which was published in the United
Kingdom’s Independent Newspaper, that two of the
four most deadly terrorist organisations in the world
today are based in core northern Nigeria and are
led, funded, peopled and inspired by some core
northern Nigerians?


According to the report, Nigeria’s Boko Haram is now
officially the world’s most deadly terrorist
organisation whilst what they have described as ‘’the
Fulani militants’’ (aka Nigeria’s Fulani herdsmen) are
number four. Is it any wonder that, according to the
same Global Terror Index report, Nigeria is now the
“third most terrorised nation in the world” whilst Iraq
and Afghanistan remain the first and second and
Syria and Pakistan remain the fourth and fifth
respectively? Given this, is it any wonder that there
are loud and increasingly persistent calls for self-
determination in southern Nigeria?
Child brides
Is it any wonder that the core North is ravaged by
poverty, disease, violence, strife, conflict, stagnation
and bareness more than anywhere else in our
country? Is it any wonder that, according to a 2015
UNICEF report, Nigeria has the ‘’highest number of
child brides on the African continent’’ with no less
than 23 million child brides in the North?
Is it any wonder that, according to the World Health
Organisation, northern Nigeria has the ‘’highest
number of young girls in the world suffering from
vagina vesicovaginal fistula (VVF)’’, a disease which
comes as a consequence of sexual intercourse with
young under age girls?


Is it any wonder that many core North is afflicted
with a self-serving and calculating ultra-conservative
ruling elite who keep their own people in perpetual
subjugation, darkness and bondage and who come
from a distant foreign land called Fouta Jallon in
modern-day Guinea?
Is it any wonder that most core northerners name
themselves after the towns and villages that they
were born and raised in rather than after their
families and forefathers? Is it any wonder that we
have a core northern President who finds it difficult
to stay at home?
Is it any wonder that an influential leader from one of
the core northern states, who later became a
traditional ruler, was an Islamic fundamentalist in his
youth, and was one of those that inspired and
orchestrated the murder of Gideon Akaluka for
“desecrating the Koran?”
Is it any wonder that a core northern Nigerian by the
name of Omar Farouk Abdul Mutallab, the
‘’underwear bomber’’ who tried to blow up an
American airliner that was filled with passengers in
Detroit, told the FBI that his ‘’most trusted mentor’’
and ‘’favorite uncle’’ was a well-known and leading
core northern leader? Is it any wonder that Bishop
Matthew Hassan Kukah, one of the most respected
northern voices in the country, recently, said ‘’the
northern Muslim elite laid the foundation for Boko
Haram?”

www.vanguardngr.com/2015/12/the-caliphate-the-emir-and-nigerias-master-race/

Typing...

Op u just uploaded a handout .......

All FFK and Fayose do is whip up religious and ethnic sentiment to galvanize popular movement against the establishment.

Here he comes, starting with a bible verse in the opening paragraph in order to pervert the mind of the christian reader from the very beginning- and those who'd fall for those old tricks of his would care less what else in contained in the body of the article. For such people, as long he's quoted a bible verse, "he's one of us, and regardless of his righteousness or the propriety of whatever he says or does, he is right!!"

It is intended to create the same effect Jonathan created when his handlers flooded the internet with images of him kneeling and genuflecting before the General Overseers of the biggest churches in Nigeria, and those of him on pilgrimage in Jerusalem.

Such people as FFK would be seen for who they are, nonentities with a flare for writing, when Nigerians are eventually cured of their religious and ethnic prejudices.

Karl Marx couldn't have been "righter" about his assertion about religion.

it is quite clear to even the blind, deaf & dumb that we do not love each other in this country.
The hausa man does not like the igbo man, the igbo man does not like the yoruba man and vice versa, despite how hard we try to pretend about it. Yet keep deceiving ourselves chanting one Nigeria, no kingdom, country divided against itself will ever stand. Nigeria is built and still standing on faulsehood, it's just a matter of time before it crumbles. we keep making same mistake and then expecting a different outcome, there is no unity anywhere in this country

Words on Marble

Well, FFK may be an attention seeker but he's not far from the truth this time around. And before u quote me, I'm a Muslim too.

I don't like ffk for one cuz he is an opportunist.. Considering d vile he spew about Goodluck and later work for him. But the truth be told.. This article said it all about the north

Iroh88:
All FFK and Fayose do is whip up religious and ethnic sentiment to galvanize popular movement against the establishment.

Here he comes, starting with a bible verse in the opening paragraph in order to pervert the mind of the christian reader from the very beginning- and those who'd fall for those old tricks of his would care less what else in contained in the body of the article. For such people, as long he's quoted a bible verse, "he's one of us, and regardless of his righteousness or the propriety of whatever he says or does, he is right!!"

It is intended to create the same effect Jonathan created when his handlers flooded the internet with images of him kneeling and genuflecting before the General Overseers of the biggest churches in Nigeria, and those of him on pilgrimage in Jerusalem.

Such people as FFK would be seen for who they are, nonentities with a flare for writing, when Nigerians are eventually cured of their religious and ethnic prejudices.

Karl Marx couldn't have been "righter" about his assertion about religion.

Dispute him with facts and figures and not name calling. I wonder why you people resort to name calling whenever it's time for an intellectual discourse.

Hmmmm

Lalasticla..

This man went to Cambridge but this article just shows that no matter what school you go, you can still suffer from poverty of the mind

Full of generalisations, xenophobic, half truths and an obvious disdain for so called core northerners. For every allegation against northerners in his baseless article, there are equivalent examples of southerners doing the same or worse

For every Muttalahab there is an Adebowale whose terrorist crime was more vicious than the former. In terms of corruption, there is no North or South . They become partners irrespective of their tribe. Dasuki a core northerner became the chief navigator for the misallocation of funds under the leadership of a southerner - Jonathan.

Ffk is seeking relevance and wants to turn to a social critic just because his principal lost an election. As if we have forgotten the level of impunity and corruption under Obasanjo another Southerner. Should we blame that on core northerners too?

Lalasticlala

FFK seems not to be far the truth but what I don't like about this write up is him using the biblical theory of Cain and Abel to support is theory. Write up coming from such angle will promote religion intolerance, even if Nigeria should break up today, FFK should know that their are lots of Yoruba that are Muslims.

Love his courage anyway.

Hmmm

Hehehehehe....

FFK, sometimes useful, most times useless.


Hahahahaha...amala and ewedu has finished this guy's brain. But he is courageous sha, unlike his folks.

Lalasticlala how far nah

Lol

Bigprozzie:
This man went to Cambridge but this article just shows that no matter what school you go, you can still suffer from poverty of the mind

Full of generalisations, xenophobic, half truths and an obvious disdain for so called core northerners. For every allegation against northerners in his baseless article, there are equivalent examples of southerners doing the same or worse

For every Muttalahab there is an Adebowale whose terrorist crime was more vicious than the latter. In terms of corruption, there is no North or South . They become partners irrespective of their tribe. Dasuki a core northerner became the chief navigator for the misallocation of funds under the leadership of a southerner - Jonathan.

Ffk is seeking relevance and wants to turn to a social critic just because his principal lost an election. As if we have forgotten the level of impunity and corruption under Obasanjo another Southerner. Should we blame that on core northerners too?

Lalasticlala

From the article, I don't think FFK exonerate himself as he share the blame so as also other high level citizens but you have to understand that this article is a response to Sanusi Lamido Sanusi article of 1998 title Afenifere: Syllabus of Error

Bigprozzie:
This man went to Cambridge but this article just shows that no matter what school you go, you can still suffer from poverty of the mind

Full of generalisations, xenophobic, half truths and an obvious disdain for so called core northerners. For every allegation against northerners in his baseless article, there are equivalent examples of southerners doing the same or worse

For every Muttalahab there is an Adebowale whose terrorist crime was more vicious than the latter. In terms of corruption, there is no North or South . They become partners irrespective of their tribe. Dasuki a core northerner became the chief navigator for the misallocation of funds under the leadership of a southerner - Jonathan.

Ffk is seeking relevance and wants to turn to a social critic just because his principal lost an election. As if we have forgotten the level of impunity and corruption under Obasanjo another Southerner. Should we blame that on core northerners too?

Lalasticlala

When you accuse someone of generalisations and half-truths, doesn't commonsense tell you the onus is on you to dispute with superior facts?

If you open your eyes and if you had the ability to read and comprehend then you would realise that I provided examples of why he is talking a lot of rubbish.

Or do you want me to just agree with him like you have done because it suits your agenda?

Bekwarra:

When you accuse someone of generalisations and half-truths, doesn't commonsense tell you the onus is on you to dispute with superior facts?

na real wa for Naija..
@OP you mean you read all that or just copied and paste?
I doubt say you read am

Call him names but read the article. The man stated the obvious. And the fact that he didn't exonerate himself, hmmmm. Good one , FFK

flokii:
na real wa for Naija..

@OP you mean you read all that or just copied and paste?

I doubt say you read am

I'm not intellectually lazy. When I see articles of this nature, I don't let it slide even if it's from my enemies. I have an insatiable appetite for learning and a voracious appetite for reading. Well just saying.

I will read it later