₦airaland Forum

In Nigeria, there has always been conflict Entrepreneurs and conspiracy theorist who seize the opportunity of our ethno-religious diversities to play with our emotions especially during difficult moments.
When bandits were perpetrating atrocities at Benue, State and some parts of southern Kaduna, Obadia Mailafiya and CAN played a very dangerous religious card by falsely accusing Buhari Govt of having non-existing delusional agenda to wipe out Christians and minority tribes who are mostly Christians from Southern Kaduna and North-Central states in order to grab their lands by chasing them away while simultaneously the bandits atrocities in Zamfara, Katsina, Sokoto and Niger states were deliberately underreported and surreptitiously isolated to make the emotional readers and listeners of the predicament believe in their conspiracy theories.
United State's past President who was also emotionally attached to the persistent report of CAN and some Christian organisations depended completely on the bias reports than U.S consulate, or CIA's intelligence reports on the long age history of ethno-religious conflict nature of Nigeria driven by many factors went ahead and blacklisted Nigeria on countries with no religious right!
Donald Trump's action made many bigots happy despite knowing that U.S action could hurt the poor man only but not the ruling class.

However, the conspiracy theorists, conflict entrepreneurs, religious bigots all went mute when the perpetrators of the crime are pushed to mainly boarder states especially Zamfara and Sokoto and Niger state in North-Central. Recently, there is rise in killings by bandits in Zamfara and Sokoto with little or nor outcry by the advocates groups who always alleged "Islamization" on the events of bandits attacks in hotspot areas that suit their narrations.
Bandits are like arm robbers who doesn't discriminate among tribes and religion; there was report on Ramadan where bandits asked Imam to forcefully break his fasting whom they killed for refusing to do so, on numerous occasions they attacked and killed Muslim worshippers during prayers, they do abduct Islamic school students/children. Most of the victims of cattle rustling which is carried out by the same bandits are Fulani, many villages reported to have been attacked are also Fulani settlement.
What many commentators who don't understand North particularly North-West is, there are two or more different types of Fulani. First, there are Fulani who are herders, some have settled in a particular place doing their business while others are wandering in bushes. Secondly, there are many Fulani who take larger proportion who no longer have cows and are living in villages, towns and cities and embrace normal social, economic and cultural activities of Hausa people; these are the commonly known as Hausa-Fulani, this group have blended almost completely to Hausa in almost all their life activities, the degree of inter-ribal marriages between them and Hausa is second to none in West Africa to the extent that about 80% of North-Western people have either Hausa or Fulani from either paternal or maternal relatives.

Therefore, going by the manner and antecedent that we have conducted ourselves and approach sensitive ethno-religious issues, it is very wrong for some people to publicly fuel conflict on matters that don't have basis for their emotional delusion or born out of perception.
It is very unfortunate how many Northerners believed GEJ was behind Boko Haram attrocities in the North as a result of his failure to tackle their mayhem during his administration, and many Islamic groups and individuals made similar accusations against GEJ that Christian groups are making today. Six years after PMB has taken over, now people from other part of the country are equally made to believe PMB is behind banditry, and the trend of these accusations is likely to continue and people will keep dying due to our failure to understand the bloodshed politicking in Nigeria. Both PMB and GEJ are incompetent, weak and lack idea on how to take Nigeria to the next level. We used to vote base on ethno-religious reasons, deceptive anticipations and lies sold to us by Politicians not only in case of PMB but in almost all our previous voting system. Normally, Politicians use the opportunities of insecurity and corruption created by them to deceive voters.

Nigeria has more than 200m people which make it a market opportunity and dumping ground for developed Nations. Nigeria has a lot of talents and almost all what it takes to grow, we have both human and natural resources for this growth to happen within shortest possible time. The long age destabilisation of Nigeria may not be unconnected to foreign Nations conniving with unpatriotic citizens, because our development is a serious threat to their market opportunities!

We need to ponder well and vote competent, strong, detribalised leaders who have good profile that have what it takes to uplift Nigeria to next level irrespective of their ethno-religious background!