One of the leaders of the Nigerian Indigenous Nationalities Alliance (NINAS), Prof. Yusuf Turaki, has said that the rising tempo of crises in Nigeria today, is rooted in politics of dominance and control among the competing dominant groups in the country. He alleged that, from all indices and evidence across the length and breadth of Nigeria, the Fulani warriors are the cause of the crises, noting that they are bent on re-colonising Nigeria.

The Defence Headquarters had recently stated that foreign Fulani herders were responsible for most of the killings in the Benue, Plateau axis, as well as in other parts of the country.

But in this interview with VINCENT KALU, the university don and a prominent Middle Belt leaders, emphasised that Nigerians were fully aware of those who invited the Fulani and also the policies that sustain the invitations. He also condemned the so-called de-radicalisation of terrorists and remarked that the only best way to deal with them is to speak to them in their own language.

In your opinion, why is the security situation in the country escalating?

The use of the word ?insecurity? in Nigeria is a deliberate eclectic socio-political narrative to hide its root causes. From all indices and evidence across the length and breadth of Nigeria, the Fulani warriors are the cause of it all, as they are re-colonising Nigeria, as the defunct Sokoto Caliphate did since the Jihad of Usman Dan Fodio. President Obasanjo told Nigerians that the political agenda of President Buhari was two-fold: Fulanisation and Islamisation, which has grave implications for insecurity. Governor Nasir El Rufai of Kaduna State had to pay-off the Fulani warriors in order to appease them from mass killings of Nigerians, as the Fulani were on a revenge mission on Nigerians.

Governor Bala Mohammed of Bauchi State told Nigerians, that ?they? invited the Fulani from other parts of Africa to come and have their abode in Nigeria, for a Fulani is ?trans-national, and for this reason, they are entitled to Nigerian citizenship.? This factor raises insecurity issues for Nigeria. President Goodluck Jonathan told Nigerians that Boko Haram members have infiltrated his government and institutions, and this statement is well loaded with insecurity issues, in terms of government execution of security matters and compromises. Lt.-Gen. T.Y. Danjuma (retd) has also told Nigerians severally, that the Armed Forces are colluding with the terrorists and that Nigerians should defend themselves, otherwise they would be killed one after the other.

And this assertion confirms the killings across the Nigerian social environment. The DSS director had told Nigerians the need for them to defend themselves because the government security agencies do not have the capacity to defend everywhere in Nigeria. This is the best available solution as self-defence is the order of natural law, in the absence of state protection of its citizens. Currently, some governors are telling Nigerians that due to the porous borders of Nigeria, foreign killers have invaded Nigerian communities. This social fact speaks loudly of the magnitude of how insecure Nigerians are today.

But Nigerians have forgotten about President Buhari?s immigration policies, his invitations to all Fulani in Africa to come and settle in Nigeria. How are they to be settled in Nigeria? Both government action and inaction demonstrates how the Fulani are to be settled and made Nigerian citizens. Of course, it is by invasions, killings, genocide, settlements, and forceful land grabbing. Are Nigerians telling themselves that they do not know what is happening to them? How far can we allow the politics of dominance, deception and hypocrisy to consume us? What is going on in Nigeria today is a modern Fulani re-colonisation of Nigeria, so as to complete the jihad of Usman Dan Fodio, which was halted by British colonialism. Myths, once believed, can become motivating factors for rash actions.

Thus, the rising tempo of crises in Nigeria today is rooted in the politics of dominance and control among the competing dominant groups in Nigeria. This politics of dominance and control is rooted in two dominant historical factors: The Jihad of Usman Dan Fodio and the British colonialism. The Jihads of Usman Dan Fodio, which began in 1804, overthrew the Hausa rulers and replaced them with almost all Fulani rulers. The Hausa Sarauta system was replaced by Muslim Fulani rulers, called the emirs. In the Northern Protectorate, established 1st January 1900, the British established an Anglo-Muslim rule and favoured the Fulani and Kanuri groups in the Colonial Government and kept this dominance and control until independence and post-independence.

In spite of what social scientists are saying about insecurity in Nigeria, there is a very strong historical and geographical correlation between the Old Sokoto Caliphate jihadists and the present Fulani warriors in the Middle Belt areas today. Similarly, there is also a very strong historical and geographical correlation between Old Sultanate of Kanem-Bornu jihadists and what Boko Haram is doing in the North East of Nigeria. The invariance of the historical and cultural memories is by far much stronger than the current sociological dynamics.

The Defence Headquarters said the violence attacks on communities and the killings of farmers in Plateau, Benue and other states are mostly perpetrated by foreign herders. What?s your take on this?

What have they to say about the war of genocide between the Fulani and the Hausa in Hausa land ? Zamfara, Katsina, Sokoto and Kebbi? Are they also foreigners?

With this, what message do you think Nigeria is sending to the world?

Are Nigerians inviting foreigners to come and re-colonise them? Nigerians are fully aware of those who invited them and also the policies that sustain the invitations. Nigerians are not bereft of security intelligence, not to know of any these things.

Instead of negotiating with the bandits, or de-radicalising the insurgence group, don?t you think that a fully military option will end it, as it happened with the Maitatsine Islamic sect in the 80s?

Political diplomats have always been faced with the choice of negotiation or de-radicalisation. If it is a matter of political self-determination or freedom from dominance, a path of peace is better. The governors of Kaduna, Zamfara and Katsina have already made such fruitless efforts. De-radicalisation of the Boko Haram members with such costly efforts, at the expense of their victims! The current governor of Borno State is lamenting the resurgence of Boko Haram, in spite of such practice being condemned on moral and ethical grounds. It is evident that the sponsors of negotiations or de-radicalisation, invariably, are usually the funders of such evil activities, not to have them tried or killed. President Obama once remarked that the only best way to deal with the terrorists is to speak to them in their own language.

There was a video showing Boko Haram elements overrunning a military formation in Yobe State. What does this suggest?

This is a recurrent countless phenomena, since the Nigerian security agencies have chosen to practise an ineffective method of combating terrorism. Military science has multitude of effective methods of combating terrorism, but Nigeria has chosen to live with what we have since the uprising of the Maitatsine since 1980.

What do you make of Tinubu?s message to bandits and terrorists to quit Nigeria during his state visit to Katsina?

What if the majority of the bandits and terrorists are Nigerians, as so many of them could have been naturalised, at the invitation of some Nigerian leaders? Katsina is part of Hausaland. Have we forgotten of the festering state of warfare between the Fulani and the Hausa in Hausaland? The long-term consequences of Usman Dan Fodio?s overthrow of the Hausa rulers and jihad are now raging between the two ethnic groups that once used to be an assimilated Hausa-Fulani? The feud between the two has bearings on two things: In the first place, the question of ethnicity: Hausa and Fulani; and secondly, the interpretations of Islam and the jihad of Usman Dan Fodio between the Fulani Islamic scholars and the Hausa Islamic scholars. This has cast a dark shadow over the state of Islam in Hausaland. Peace may return to Hausaland if these two issues are amicably resolved, as the rift is beginning to emerge, and has a great potential for conflict between the two groups in Hausaland. This is a show of the power of historical and cultural memory that seeks to correct the distorted historical and ethnic identity, and the variant interpretations of Islam and the jihad of Usman Dan Fodio.

Some analysts argue that there?s political colouration in the escalation of insecurity especially in the North. According to them, two years to the 2015 general elections, when President Jonathan was to be pushed out, Boko Haram was at its peak. Two years to the 2027 general elections, when opposition against Tinubu is mounting, the killings in North are escalating. What is your reaction to this?

This interpretation is not the cause. I have already alluded to the primary and root causes. Boko Haram has been consisted in telling Nigerians that she is a Jihadic organisation that seeks to establish an Islamic State in Nigeria. I do not think that Nigerians have accepted their own self-definition and mission.

You talked about the opposition against President Tinubu as rooted in the dynamics of Nigerian politics of elections. This is far from it. The general killings in Nigeria cover all the geo-political zones of Nigeria. The killings are widespread with concentration in some areas. Don?t forget the already existing agenda of Fulanisation and Islamisation. This requires a deeper understanding, which an average Nigeria does not seem to know.

What general Nigerian politicians need to know and understand is the dynamics of politics exclusively in Hausaland, Kanuriland and the Middle Belt. Next, one needs to identify the ethnic and religious identities and the geography of the key frontrunners of the opposition. This is within the realm of investigative journalism. Political practitioners, elites and rulers have track records of their political policies, administrative practices and attitudes towards the various ethnic groups, religions and regions.

For Nigerians to have clean and transparent politicians, each politician has to be subjected to investigative journalism, so as to ascertain what the politician stands for. There are too many dominant, deceptive and hypocritical politicians around, who have sectarian, exclusivist and parochial ideologies that are based on ethnic, religious and regional bigotry. They come in the name of democracy, but are inherently domineering, despotic, demagogical and hardcore exclusivists. They only use democratic institutions to gain political dominance.

Tinubu has created development commissions for the six zones. What?s your position on this?

This is a plus for President Tinubu, since every geo-political zone was clamouring to have such.

Buhari was accused of nepotism and Tinubu too is accused of the same. What do you make of such accusations?

Nigeria has Federal Character Commission. In 1980, National Institute for Policy and Strategic Studies (NIPSS) held a Conference of Federal Character, and some of its resolutions were incorporated into the Nigerian constitution, thereafter. From the general criticisms of both presidents, it seems that the commission is no longer being effective in moderating between merit and ethnic, religious and regional preferences.

What is your view on the planned coalition of political parties to oust Tinubu? Can it succeed?

Politicians are in the business of political propaganda and deception, which are not based upon sociological dynamics of socio-political factors, but blatant unscientific evidences of weird personal opinions. They tend to believe that the more they dish out propaganda and deception, people would believe them. Political choices and preferences are with the electorate and not personal permutations and opinions.

I am waiting to see, if the coalition of political parties would ever be formed. If my observation is correct, I see that the political frontrunners are running out of steam and gas.

The North is always crying that Tinubu is giving them the short end of the stick. How can the president appease the North?

The Political North died 15th January 1966. What we now have is only the Geographical North consisting of 19 states and the Federal Capital Territory. There are those who are still dreaming of ?North?, or ?Arewa.? The old political North can best be described as: Hausaland, Kanuriland and the Middle Belt. Middle Belt is nothing but Southern Nigeria, Hausaland and Kanuriland. From the current sociological political dynamics, the Middlebelters have never given up on their quest for a region, which was denied them by the British Colonialists. The politicians, from mainly Hausaland, have turned the ?Phantom North? into North-ism, which is both an ideology and idolatry. From historical evidences of the treatment of the people, not that they like or love the Middlebelters, but they want only two socio-political factors from them ? land mass and population mass with which to bargain with the Southern politicians. ?North? or ?Arewa? in Nigerian political equation, simply means ? Middle Belt land mass and Middle Belt population mass. The Fulani warriors and the many Jihadic groups in the Middle Belt that are invading, killing and occupying the ancestral lands of the Middlebelters are there to subdue them and make them submissive to the ?North? and Arewa.?

Should power return to the North in 2027? If yes, why?

Should political power be returned to the politicians of Hausa land or Kanuri land, the historical forms of slave-raiding, slave trade and slavery of the Middle belters would even become worse than ever. The atrocities of the Fulani warriors in the Middle Belt would be a child?s play. We have all the historical facts and memories of how the historical and current Fulani jihadists have dealt with the Middle belters.

Most members of the opposition parties are defecting to the ruling APC. What is your view on this? Are you not afraid of Nigeria becoming a one-party state?

If the one-party state will still be under President Tinubu, the Middlebelters would prefer such, than from any politicians who would not want to emancipate them from the shackles of neglect and slavery.

Boko Haram ravaging the Northeast, herdsmen militia groups tormenting the North Central and the bandits and Lakuruwa are causing havoc in the North West. Why always the North?

It is not necessary to keep on reminding Nigerians over these issues. Don?t we see that the peoples of Hausaland and Kanuriland have created many warfronts, out of these non-state actors, as means of taming and subjugating the entire Middle Belt? (Saturday Sun)

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