BALA Mohammed, Bauchi State governor, has come under criticism over his comments justifying and supporting armed Fulani herdsmen in the country.
Mohammed, who spoke at the closing ceremony of the 2021 Press Week of the Correspondents’ Chapel of the Nigeria Union of Journalists (NUJ), Bauchi State Council, on Thursday, said that Fulani herdsmen had no choice than ply their trade with AK-47 rifles.
“The Fulani man is practising the tradition of trans-human, pastoralism. He has been exposed to the battery of the forests, the animals, and now, the cattle rustlers, who carry guns, kill him and take away his commonwealth – that is his cows. He had no option than to carry Ak-47 because the society and the government are not protecting him,” he said.
“It is not his fault, it is the fault of the government and the people. You don’t criminalise all of them because in every tribe there are criminals. You should be very sensitive. We have to be careful,” Governor Mohammed said.
He also condemned South-West and South-East governors, including Governor Samuel Ortom of Benue State, over the manner in which they were handling farmer-herder clashes.
He faulted the quit notice given to Fulani herders in some southern states, particularly Ondo, pointing out that the “southern governors are wrong.”
“On the herders-farmers clashes, you have seen what our colleagues in the South-West are doing and some of them in South-East. Some of us told them with all modesty and humility – you are wrong.
“But the person that is most wrong is the Governor of Benue State, my brother and my colleague, Governor Ortom. He started all these. If you don’t accommodate other tribes, we are also accommodating your tribes in Bauchi and other places.
“We have so many Tiv people working and farming in Alkaleri, farming in Tafawa Balewa, and farming in Bogoro Local Government Area of Bauchi. Has anyone asked them to go? We have not, because it is their constitutional right to be there.
“We have Yoruba people in Bauchi for over 150 years, even before the birth of Nigeria. Nobody has told them to go. Some of them have risen to become permanent secretaries in Gombe, Bauchi, and Borno,” Governor Mohammed added.
Bala Mohammed is openly defending Fulani herdsmen who carry AK-47. I didn’t hear him condemn killings. He is speaking the minds of a lot of influential decision makers. That exactly is where the problem is and why it doesn’t took like they are ready for a solution any time soon.
Rich men who live in the cities buy cows and gives to herdsmen and also equip them with AK-47 to protect the cows.
Herdsman uses the gun to secure grazing fields for thecows, for his own petty criminal activity and makes the guns available when it is time to push "agenda."
Imagine the Governor of Bauchi justifying why herdsmen carry Ak47. And you expect these guys to protect you from herdsmen? I know for a fact that only the President can license a private individual to bear arms like AK47. Who licensed herdsmen to carry AK47?#BuhariTormentor
The reality is herdsmen act like they r above the law n they definitely r as they carry out their vices with impunity.If a police stop u as an ordinary 🇳🇬 with a pistol in ur bag.They r likely to shot u to death b4 asking abt d gun.Yet,d herdsmen carry AK47 like a walking stick.
THE Nigeria Bar Association (NBA) has charged President Muhammadu Buhari and the Police Service Commission (PSC) to court over the extension of the tenure of Mohammed Adamu, inspector-general of police (IGP).
This was disclosed in a statement signed by Olumide Akpata, chairman of NBA, on Friday, who explained that the case had been filed before the Lagos Division of the Federal High Court in Suit No. FHC/L/CS/214/2021.
“In fidelity to the motto of the Nigerian Bar Association (NBA) which is Promoting the Rule of Law, on Thursday, 11 February 2021, the NBA-Public Interest Litigation Committee (NBA-PILC). on behalf of the NBA, commenced legal action at the Lagos Division of the Federal High Court in Suit No. FHC/L/CS/214/2021 (the ‘Suit against the President, Federal Republic of Nigeria, the Police Service Commission, and Mr Mohammed Abubakar Adamu,” Akpata wrote.
He pointed out that the NBA wanted to understand the constitutionality of the president’s extension of the IGP’s tenure for three months despite attaining 35 years in the Nigeria Police Force.
The NBA noted that its position was that as of February 1st, Adamu had ceased to be a member of the police force according to the constitutional provision.
Akpata further noted that the president’s extension of Adamu’s tenure by three months, in the NBA’s respectful view, was unconstitutional.
“In the grand scheme of things, the NBAis wary that the more government officials casually violate the law, the harder it would become to expect citizens to be compliant Citizens take their cues from their leaders, and public office holders who flout the laws of the country that they are meant to uphold will discover sooner or later that their examples will be followed by those that they purport to govern,” the statement further read in part.
The lawyers’ association noted that ‘acts of impunity’ by those in high public offices posed threats to the survival of Nigeria.
The ICIR had reported that Buhari extended the tenure of the IGP for three months against the provision of the Police Act signed by the president in 2020.
According to the Police Act 2020, Part 111 Section 7 (6) , only a single tenure of four years was provisioned for persons appointed as the IGP subject to the provisions of clause 18 (8), which stipulates that every police officer shall, on recruitment or appointment, serve in the Nigeria Police Force for a period of 35 years or until he attains the age of 60 years, whichever is earlier.
The ICIR has also reported several times the Nigerian President had violated constitutional provisions and agencies’ Acts in the appointment of public officials since his assumption of office in 2015.
Buhari recently extended the tenure of service and defence chiefs before they finally ‘resigned’ a few weeks ago.
Islamic cleric Sheikh Ahmad Gumi is a man with a lot of clout in his neck of the woods. A retired army officer and a medical doctor who decided to be a full-time Islamic preacher, his people put much stock in whatever he says and does.
So, when he embarked on a self-assigned mission of talking to his Fulani kinsmen holding sway in the North West’s ungoverned spaces out of banditry, Nigerians paid attention. So far, he has been to Kaduna, Zamfara and Sokoto States.
Last week, Gumi came out from the forests of Shinkafi, Sububu, Pakai, and Maradun in Zamfara State where he engaged with outlaws who have declared war against the State.
He has since riveted Nigerians with tales of a people who have an axe to grind with their fellow citizens and the government.
He told us the bandits unfurled a catalogue of grievances, threatening there will be no peace until their demands are met by the Nigerian State they claimed abandoned them.
Gumi thinks they have a point, concluding that they are victims of unconscionable state actors’ base conduct. He also came to another conclusion.
Judging from what he saw in the forests, he said, the Nigerian State has no chance of defeating the bandits militarily and, therefore, has no choice but to negotiate for peace on their terms.
Most of these people holding Nigerians to ransom, Gumi added, are stark illiterates with no education whatsoever. Still, he thinks, nevertheless, that since they took up arms because of injustice allegedly done to them, then, “if they should be called upon and talked to, they could be persuaded to embrace peace.”
“They were victims of violence, so they took arms to protect themselves. Wherever they are as cattle herders, they face farmers’ problems; we saw what happened in Oyo, how their homes and cattle were burnt. These people live in huts while those killing them and destroying their homes live a better life,” Gumi said.
He canvassed for amnesty for those who want to lay down their arms as was done for the militants in the Niger Delta – and schools and skills acquisition centres should be built for them.
“Let there be peace; you all have a legitimate concern and grievances, and I believe that since the Niger Delta armed militants were integrated by the Federal Government and are even in the business of pipelines protection, the Federal Government should immediately look into how something like that will be done to the Fulani to provide them with reasonable means of livelihood including jobs, working capitals, entrepreneurship training, building clinic and schooling,” the Islamic cleric told the bandits in their lair.
And to the rest of Nigerians, he said, “We cannot abandon them. I have a picture of some little girls that are drinking water from the same stream with animals. They have no social amenities; no hospitals and we are here talking.”
Sheik Ahmad Gumi
Gumi admitted in an interview with Daily Trust that those he met in Zamfara forests were Fulani herders.
Expectedly, Zamfara State Governor Bello Matawalle is happy and so is the Federal Government that has publicly endorsed the cleric’s efforts.
“When you want to resolve an issue like this, you use lots of back channels,” Minister of Information and Culture Lai Mohammed said. “Again, it is not unusual for a respected cleric to have the confidence of (approaching) outlaws or bandits …. So, it is not unusual for him to act as a bridge between government and the outlaws in an attempt to find a solution.”
Surprisingly, Kaduna State Governor Nasir el-Rufai, who has hitherto been an advocate of Gumi’s appeasement rhetoric of negotiating and paying ransom to bandits, disagrees. This time, rather than amnesty and compensation for them, he calls for their elimination.
Speaking in an interview with the Hausa Service of the British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC) on Monday, el-Rufai declared that any bandit arrested in Kaduna State would be killed, insisting that “the state is at war with bandits.”
He added: “Anybody that thinks a Fulani herdsman that is engaged in kidnapping for ransom and is earning millions of naira would go back to his former life of getting N100,000 after selling a cow in a year, must be deceiving himself.”
El-Rufai may well be right.
Before going into the forests to meet the Fulani bandits, Gumi was told by the chairman of Shinkafi local government that they had paid over N200 million ransom to the bandits.
If a local government has paid that much, imagine how much the bandits are making from the state government and the entire region. And to imagine that there are little or no consequences. No bandit will give up such a lucrative business on a platter of Gumi’s ridiculous platitudes.
His ad-hominem fallacy which has become the battle cry of other Fulani ideologues – such as Prof Usman Yusuf, former Executive Secretary of the National Health Insurance Scheme (NHIS); and Adamu Garba, the CEO of IPI Solutions Nigeria Ltd, and a former presidential aspirant under the All Progressives Congress (APC), in the 2019 elections – is disingenuous and dangerous.
To contend as Gumi and his co-travellers are doing that the Fulani bandits are angry because they have been grossly offended, and their livelihoods taken away, is to play fast and loose with the facts.
Who offended the Fulani in Nigeria? In this raging war of attrition across the country, Fulani bandits are the villains and not victims. Gumi cited what happened in Oyo State as an example of how badly the rest treats his country’s people. But he is economical with the truth. The fact that he disingenuously sidestepped is that the Ibarapa crisis was a reaction by a people who have been humiliated for so long in their own land.
Granting amnesty to Fulani bandits is tantamount to rewarding criminality. Acts of crime should be punished and not compensated. Why should people be paid after killing others and destroying their homes?
In the last one week since after Gumi came back from the Zamfara forests, bandits have killed well over 43 Nigerians and wounded many others in Kaduna State alone.
Last Saturday, 23 were killed in an attack on Ungwan Gajere, Kutemeshi ward, Dankyawai, Janbala, Kishisho, Gwagwada-Kasaya, Agwa and Bugai communities in Birnin Gwari, Giwa, Chikun, Igabi and Kauru local government areas.
That attack was launched barely 72 hours after gunmen killed 19 persons in Birnin-Gwari and Kajuru local government areas.
So, what did the victims do to deserve death? And what kind of peace is Gumi talking about here? How can reward and compensation for banditry engender peace? Can there be peace without justice and equity?
Who compensates the victims who have been driven away from their ancestral homes and live in IDP camps all over the country? Who compensates the women that have been made widows and children who have been orphaned?
Most of these herders causing problems for the country are said not to be Nigerian citizens. Even President Muhammadu Buhari has acknowledged that. But even if they are Nigerians, is their claim that they have been abandoned by the Nigerian State enough to levy war against the country, kidnapping, raping, killing and maiming fellow citizens? Does the Nigerian State care for any of her citizens? Gumi talked about little girls drinking water from the same stream with animals, does he know where little girls of Igbo extraction get their drinking water from? Has he bothered to find out where little Ijaw girls get their drinking water? Is the Nigerian State not failing millions of Nigerian youths who graduate every year from the university without jobs? Should they then take up arms and levy war against fellow citizens, who are also collateral damages of a failing state?
To draw a moral equivalency between Fulani bandits and Niger Delta militants or Indigenous Peoples of Biafra (IPOB) activists as Gumi and his ilk are trying to do is a fallacy unbecoming. It is as foolhardy as “comparing apples and oranges.”
The Fulani don’t own every inch of the Nigerian soil as some of them claim. If the goal of this violence is to cow other Nigerians into submission, it will fail.
Why? Because no ethnic nationality has the capacity to impose its will on the rest of the country. If this madness persists, particularly “now that the war is on our doorstep,” as Nobel Laureate, Professor Wole Soyinka, said this week, there will be mobilisation. That is exactly what Sunday Igbogho is doing in the South West.
Nobody wants to be a slave in his own country. That is as intolerable and unacceptable to Soyinka as it is to anyone else.
Whatever will make a man like Soyinka declare that: “Whatever it takes, I stand ready to contribute in any way and I have made my governor understand this, we are here not just to live but to live in dignity. Right now, our dignity is being rubbished,” is a serious matter.
Incidentally, many Nigerians have come to that inescapable conclusion.
If I were Gumi, rather than being an ideological prop to bandits, my message to the Fulani herdsmen would have been: Please don’t provoke a war you have no chance whatsoever of winning.
INVESTIGATIONS by The ICIR have shown that desperation by applicants seeking to obtain the National Identity Number (NIN) was a major factor in the extortion’s case trailing the NIN enrolment exercise. And some rogue enrolment officers of the National Identity Management Commission (NIMC) are capitalising on the situation to enrich themselves.
But the investigations also revealed that some applicants go out of their way to offer ‘bribes’ to enrolment officers to ‘quicken’ the process in their favour.
NIMC had commenced enrolment and issuance of the NIN in 2012, about nine years ago. But many Nigerians did not bother to acquire the NIN until the federal government, in September 2018, approved its mandatory use from January 1, 2019. As a result, the NIN became a mandatory requirement for access to vital government services such as international passport and drivers license issuance. The NIN also became necessary for pension, health insurance, payment of taxes and participation in the Unified Tertiary Matriculation Examination (UTME). Following the development, crowds started converging at NIMC offices, and other registration centres across the country as Nigerians suddenly felt an urgent need for the NIN. The desperation and urgency heightened when the federal government in December 2020 ordered integrating the NIN and subscriber identity module (SIM) cards of all active mobile telephone lines in the country.
Applicants at an enrolment centre in Kubwa, Abuja
Huge crowds gathered at various registration centres, including NIMC offices, in violation of COVID-19 protocols as panicky mobile telephone subscribers who feared that their lines would be blocked made frantic efforts to obtain the NIN.
The situation led to a sharp rise in reports of extortion in the NIN enrolment exercise.
However, NIN applicants and NIMC workers traded blames over which party was responsible for the extortion.
Applicants who spoke with The ICIR said some NIMC enrolment officers demand monetary gratification before attending to persons who want to obtain the NIN.
But NIMC workers, on their part, say ‘desperate’ applicants, who are in urgent need of the NIN, are the ones who go out of their way to influence the enrolment officers by offering cash.
The ICIR reporter visited several enrolment centres in the Federal Capital Territory, Abuja, particularly those located at the Nigerian Postal Service (NIPOST) office in Kubwa; Public Service Institute (PSI), along Kubwa Expressway; and the Federal Secretariat, in the Central Area.
Enrolment at NIMC headquarters in Abuja was stopped, while 20 centres reactivated within the FCT, from January 18, 2021. The development was largely informed by the large crowd gathered at the commission’s headquarters, in violation of COVID-19 guidelines.
Checks by The ICIR revealed that reports of extortion, which had marred the NIN enrolment in the past, leading to the dismissal of some NIMC officials in 2019, and suspension of another set of workers in January 2020, have continued to dog the exercise even with the introduction of new centres which was meant to make the process easier for both applicants and the enrolment officers.
NIMC says NIN enrolment is free but enrolment forms are for sale at some centres
NMC had, in a notice published on Twitter on December 31, 2020, emphasised that ‘NIN enrolment is free’. The statement urged applicants to report extortion cases, stressing that punishment for the offence is seven years imprisonment upon conviction.
Reports of extortion had forced NIMC to stress that enrolment is free
However, The ICIR noticed that the NIN enrolment form is being sold to applicants at some of the enrolment centres.
NIN enrolment form is for sale at some centres
At the enrolment centre located in the Public Service Institute (PSI), a federal government agency along the Kubwa expressway, the forms would only be made available to an applicant after payment of N50 or N100.
Applicants who asked for the enrolment forms were referred to a woman, who clutched a large envelope which contained the materials. When our correspondent visited the centre, the woman was sitting among a group of tired, weary-looking applicants who were making efforts to enrol for the NIN. Although the woman refused to disclose her identity, our correspondent learnt that she was not a staff of NIMC, and had no official responsibility in the enrolment exercise.
The middle-aged woman, who appeared to be an ‘agent’ of some NIMC enrolment officers, collected the sum of N100 before releasing a copy of the correspondent’s enrolment form.
A lawyer, who introduced himself as Isaac, also paid N100 for a copy of the form.
“I am a lawyer but can you imagine that I had to pay to obtain the form just because I have an urgent need of the NIN for some official matters?” Isaac complained when our correspondent wondered why, as a lawyer, he did not insist that the form was not for sale.
“Whether N50 or N100 the amount might appear to be small but think of the number of people coming every day to collect forms and you see that some people are making good money illegally from all these. But that is not my concern at the moment,” Isaac added.
Some other applicants, who spoke with our correspondent, shared the same view. But it was also obvious that the clear and present need was to obtain the NIN, and as soon as possible for all of them.
Applicants advised to ‘discuss’ with enrolment officers, and do ‘something’, to quicken process
NIMC recently adopted a booking system for the exercise, whereby applicants are assigned a date when they are to come to finalise their enrolment. However, the date is not sacrosanct – some applicants told The ICIR that they reported on the given date only to be assigned a further date. Also, The ICIR learnt that, in some cases, applicants are enrolled without going through the booking procedure.
At the Public Service Institute enrolment centre, on February 11, 2021, an enrolment officer informed applicants, who were yet to be assigned a date for their enrolment, that they should wait until April 5, 2021, which was given as the next available date as all other days before then had been fully booked.
The ICIR correspondent observed as the group of applicants appealed to the enrolment officers for more prompt attention. At that point, the woman who was selling the enrolment forms advised some of the applicants to ‘discuss’ with the enrolment officers. She suggested that they could receive urgent attention if they do ‘something’.
“Calm down, when they (enrolment officers) comes out again, you can discuss with them. If you do something they can help you,” the woman selling enrolment forms told the applicants.
It was the same situation at the enrolment centre at Federal Secretariat, Abuja, where our correspondent saw several applicants engaged in frantic efforts to enrol for the NIN.
Our correspondent gathered that, on an unusual arrangement, the security personnel stationed at the centre could ensure a speedy enrolment for applicants who are willing to cooperate.
Desperate applicants seek ways to influence enrolment officers
At the Federal Secretariat enrolment centre, on February 11, 2021, a woman, who identified herself as Sarah, told our correspondent that she was waiting for an opportunity to ‘discuss business’ with any of the enrolment officers so that she can have her NIN enrolment ‘immediately’.
Sarah, who said she works with a private firm, explained that she was earlier booked for enrollment on a previous date but could not register for the NIN on the assigned day. She disclosed that she has been coming to the enrolment centre all through the week without making any headway in her quest to obtain the NIN.
“I got here today before 7:00 am, I have been coming everyday for the past one week,” Sarah told The ICIR‘s correspondent around 2:00 pm. The woman, who was apparently very hungry, was having a soft drink bottle with some snacks. She explained that she had not had any food since that morning.
“I am ready to pay money to ensure that I do my enrolment today,” Sarah said, with a determined expression on her face. When she realised that she was speaking with a journalist after our correspondent requested a formal interview, Sarah became evasive. Still, she admitted that she had been made to understand that enrolment officers could give her urgent attention if she offers money.
Sarah, taking a snack while waiting for enrolment
But when asked if she and other applicants who go out of their way to offer cash for the enrolment are not the ones corrupting the process, Sarah was quick to claim that NIMC workers intentionally make things difficult for applicants to make money from them.
NIMC workers union leader exonerates colleagues, says going by dictionary definition, there is no extortion
Lucky Asekokhai, leader of the NIMC staff union, told The ICIR that his colleagues were not to blame for cases of extortion being recorded in the enrolment exercise.
Asekokhai not only insisted there was nothing like extortion going on, but he also suggested that applicants are the ones offering cash inducement to enrolment officers.
“Somebody will come and tell you I want to enrol, and there is no electricity and no fuel to power the generator and the person that wants to enrol need the NIN urgently. If the staff tell the applicant, there is no fuel and says he wants to buy fuel, the enrolment officer will not say no. Still, by the time that applicant gets the NIN, he will go out there and tell everybody that he paid for it and that is how you will now hear people accusing NIMC staff of extortion,” the union leader observed.
Lucky Asekhohai, NIMC workers union leader
Noting that applicants are not being compelled to bring money for the NIN enrolment, Asekokhai added, “I am still not seeing any extortion – when I use my dictionary to define extortion, it means the money you collected from somebody with force. That is the dictionary definition, including the Oxford dictionary and Webster dictionary. But when you come to the enrolment centres, what is happening is different. If there is no electricity, NIMC is not the one that produces electricity. Now you come to enrol, and you need the NIN urgently to link with your SIM, how do we go about it? Won’t we look for fuel? By the time we buy fuel and say ‘use this one to support the fuel’, will you call it extortion? To me, it is not extortion. I keep telling people it is not by force, anybody telling you to bring money report the person. In fact, in December, we sacked three people who collected money from applicants. They were sacked.
“The people that are extorting money are not NIMC staff. In Kano, a group of people came together, and they were collecting money from applicants and giving out fake NIN. When the information got to us, we made investigations, and those people were arrested, but anybody who does not know the difference between those people and us will say NIMC staff were extorting.”
“NIMC staff are not extorting. The people that are offering money are not being compelled to bring money and secondly, they need the service urgently; that is why you hear about money. To avoid these stories, I have educated my people that anybody that comes and there is no electricity you tell the person to go home. We are not AEDC that generates power but whenever you come, and there is the electricity. I can tell you that the NIMC staff are not extorting. Those that are extorting are not NIMC staff, they are miscreants,” Asekokhai insisted.
* NIMC management opened account to receive money donated by individuals, organisations, states and local governments to support NIN enrolment
The ICIR investigation also revealed that, officially, funding of the enrolment exercise is supported by donations, monetary contributions and grants from individuals and public institutions, including states and local governments.
The NIMC management, in an internal memo dated March 19, 2019, provided an account number for the collection of the money. According to the internal memo, the CBN account – National Identity Management Commission, 0020451061028, signed by Abdulhamid Umar, general manager, operations, is where all monetary support for the enrollment should be paid into.
Internal memo on NIMC account for donations
So far, about 46 million Nigerians have enrolled for the NIN. But many more Nigerians are still struggling to register for the NIN before April 6, 2021, the new deadline given by the federal government for the NIN-SIM integration.
The Western Nigeria Security Network (WNSN), popularly known as Amotekun, has alleged that two of its operatives were killed by herdsmen in an ambush at Ago Sanusi, along Ute Road, Owo Local Government Area of Ondo state.
The ICIRlearnt that the ambush against the Amotekun men took place in the forest.
A source disclosed that the attack took place at about 2:00 am on Wednesday, with the suspects fully armed with dangerous weapons, including AK 47 riffles.
Adetunji Adeleye, commander of Amotekun Corps in the state, who confirmed the development, said a farmer whose name was given as Lanre, who had earlier been abducted in the area, was also found dead in the forest.
He also stated that a member of the Vigilante Group of Nigeria was equally shot dead.
He said it was the villagers that alerted the Amotekun men of the attacks, adding that the suspects burnt down an Amotekun vehicle parked in the village and scared the villagers away.
Adeleye, however, debunked the news making the rounds that the head of operations of the corps in Owo Local Government, Oluwasesan Adebayo, was missing.
This is coming barely 48 hours after Amotekun claimed it arrested two armed herdsmen and about two hundred cows following the ban on under-aged grazing, night grazing, movement of cattle along highways and open grazing by the state government two weeks ago.
Although the presidency has charged security operatives to arrest any herdsmen found with an unauthorised weapon, criminality attributed to armed herdsmen has become a growing concern in the South-Western part of the country.
Wole Soyinka, Nigerian Nobel laureate, has predicted that if the situation is not urgently and decisively addressed by President Muhammadu Buhari, it could degenerate into a civil war in the country.
On Thursday, the Nigeria Governors Forum (NGF) announced an outlaw of open grazing in all the 36 states of the country.
In a communique issued at the end of its 25th virtual meeting and signed by Forum chairman, Kayode Fayemi, the governors were encouraged “to put in place systems to accelerate the grazing initiative of the National Livestock Transformation Plan and ranching in the country.”
The consensus was reached to address the rising insecurity in the country, which had been linked to armed herdsmen operating as bandits.
Meanwhile, the Forum condemned the ethnic profiling of crime in the country and resolved to “convene an emergency meeting of all Governors” on the matter.
“The Forum respects the right of abode of all Nigerians and strongly condemns criminality and the ethnic profiling of crime in the country in an effort to frame the widespread banditry and the herders- farmers crisis,” the communique said.
On Thursday, Emirates airline announced the suspension of flights from Lagos and Abuja into Dubai, the United Arab Emirates’ capital.
Emirates announced in a statement posted on its official website the suspension of flights from Murtala Muhammed and Nnamdi Azikwe International airports to Dubai on Thursday
“In line with the government directives, passenger services from Nigeria (Lagos and Abuja) to Dubai are temporarily suspended until February 28, 2021.”
The airline further said that passengers who had been to Nigeria in the past 14 days would not be allowed entry into UAE until the stipulated date.
However, it noted that its flights from Dubai to Lagos and Abuja airports would continue to operate according to the normal schedule. The ICIR can confirm that the suspension of Emirates flights is in connection with a ban earlier placed on the airline a few days ago by the Nigerian government.
The Nigerian government had suspended outbound flights from Nigeria to Dubai through Emirates airline over failure to comply with government directives.
According to the suspension notice, the Nigerian government said Emirates airline was demanding RDT test conducted in unapproved laboratories from Nigerians after the PCR had been done. This was against the Nigerian government’s directive.
The Presidential Task Force on COVID-19 (PTF) had warned the Emirates airline to either accept passengers with PCR test only or suspend its flights pending the time the Nigerian government would come up with an approved infrastructure for RDT test.
Sam Adurogboye, spokesperson for the NCAA, during a telephone interview, told The ICIR that the suspension of flights by the Emirates airline could have something to do with compliance with government’s earlier directive.
He noted that although the NCAA did not suspend the flight, the airline took the initiative to suspend part of its operation following the government’s directive.
“At first instance, we suspended their operation for violating the PTF protocol on air travels and the protocol is that they cannot be asking for extra test for Covid. They have to abide by what we have. Maybe alluding to the issue of fake results, they introduced an additional measure on their own and, of course, they are making the passengers pay,” Adurogboye said.
He added that the NCAA noticed the violation and placed a ban on them following which the airline promised to comply with the government’s directive.
“When we saw the violation, we placed a ban and they wrote us again, pledging to abide by our own position. Now, we gave them two conditions: It’s either you bring in passengers and don’t take out or suspend your operations. They chose to opt for one of the conditions until a certain period,” Adurogboye further stated.
UAE government ban Nigerians
Apart from Emirates airline, Air Peace announced Thursday that the UAE government had suspended the airlifting of Nigerians to Dubai until February 28. According to Air peace, the directive was in connection with UAE’s ‘measure’ on COVID-19.
“The Management of Air Peace wishes to notify the flying public that the UAE Government has stopped the airlifting of Nigerians from Nigeria to UAE as part of its COVID-19 measures.
“However, flights bringing Nigerians back from UAE are not affected. To this end, Air Peace flight from UAE(Sharjah-Dubai) to Lagos is not affected. Normal flights shall resume when the restriction is lifted from February 28, 2021,” said Air Peace.
The refusal of the UAE government to allow Nigerians into the country at this period is said to be in connection with reports of fake COVID-19 test in Nigeria. There are reports that some Nigerian passengers have been travelling to other countries with fake COVID-19 tests.
Adurogboye had also suggested that ‘maybe’ the reason for the request for the RDT test was due to the issue of fake COVID-19 tests in Nigeria.
The alleged issue of fake COVID-19 result is not peculiar to Nigeria or Africa as some European countries have also been found to either possess fake COVID-19 test results or to be travelling with them.
SOBOMABO Jackrich, the Convener, Network for Defence of Democracy and Good Governance (NDDGG) claimed that Rivers State has the highest number of unemployed people.
Nyesom Wike, governor of Rivers State, in January of 2021, donated 500 million Naira to Sokoto State to support the rebuilding of the state’s central market which was gutted by fire.
This gesture has generated reactions from many people.
The pensioners in his state said the 500 million Naira could have been used to meet some of the demands of retired civil servants.
Jackrich, reacting to the 500 million Naira donation, said, Wike is unbothered that his state ranks number one on the unemployment index. He said:
The action of the governor clearly proves that he does not seem to have a protected future at stake or vision for our dear [Rivers] state.
He is not bothered that the state ranks number one on the unemployment index having the highest unemployed population as published by the National Bureau of Statistics and other institutions.
THE CLAIM
Rivers State ranks number one on the unemployment index having the highest unemployed population.
THE FINDINGS
Findings by the FactCheckHub show that the claim is TRUE.
The FactCheckHub checked the National Bureau of Statistics (NBS) website for the data on Nigeria’s labour statistics to determine the total number of the unemployed population in the country per state.
According to the statistics on Nigeria’s labour force released by the NBS for 2nd quarter (Q2) of 2020, Rivers State has a total number of 1.7 million (1,714,188) unemployed people.
This makes it the state with the highest number of unemployed people in Nigeria.
Kano State follows with 1.4 million (1,424,685), and then Kaduna State with 1.3 million (1,339,952).
The Q2 data is the current unemployment data released by the NBS as at the time of this report.
It is essential to note that the total unemployed population is different from unemployment rate.
The former is the total number of people who are unemployed within a state while the latter is the percentage of the labour force that is unemployed within a state.
THE VERDICT
Based on the statistics on Nigeria’s labour force released by the NBS for the 2nd quarter (Q2) of 2020, the claim that Rivers State has the highest number of unemployed people is TRUE.
CITING security concerns, Lagos State government and state police command say they will not allow any protest to hold at Lekki tollgate this Saturday.
At a press conference held in Lagos on Thursday, Moyosore Onigbanjo, Lagos State attorney general, and Gbenga Omotoso, commissioner for information, said it was not an auspicious moment to hold protests in Nigeria’s commercial capital.
While calling on the organisers of the protest to shelve their plans, Onigbanjo said the government would not allow any group to push the state, once again, to the edge of carnage.
“The attention of the state government has been drawn to the planned protest scheduled for Saturday, February 13, 2021 at the Lekki Toll Gate for and against the opening of the Admiralty Toll Gate. The state is aware of Sections 39 and 40 of the 1999 Constitution (as amended), which guarantees the rights to freedom of expression and peaceful assembly. However, such right does not permit the violation of the rights of other citizens in the state,” he said,
“While the state recognises the importance of exercising the rights to peaceful protests, the same cannot extend to blockage of roads or actions preventing other members of the public from enjoying their fundamental rights to move freely within the state. Any individual or corporate body that incites or condones any act leading to the destruction of public and private properties shall be prosecuted under the extant laws and in addition to any penalty the court might pronounce. Such person or body will be liable to compensate for any damage, which may arise as a result of the action or inaction of such person or body.”
On the hand, Omotoso called for peace, urging the organisers of the planned protests to allow the Lagos Judicial Panel of Inquiry to conclude its investigation on what transpired between the military and #EndSARS protesters.
“We believe this kind of tension and anxiety being brought forward by the planned protest will not allow the panel to do a thorough job,” he said.
“If the authorities allow the protest and counter rallies to go on, there would be a breakdown of order, and Lagos is not ripe for such action. It is on this premise that the State Government is appealing to all parties to tread with caution. Both sides have the right to express their feelings, but the time is wrong.”
In a similar vein, Hakeem Odumosu, state commissioner of police, added that the security intelligence gathered by his command indicated that the #OccupyLekkiTollGate protest and planned counter rally would degenerate into a breakdown of law and order.
“The Police Command has gathered credible intelligence that some hidden agents of destruction and shadow parties that orchestrated the last #EndSARS violence have concluded plans to cause another mayhem in Lagos and spread the same to other parts of the country, tactically and spontaneously, like the recent violence,” he said.
“Premised on the available intelligence and due threat analyses carried out on the planned protest, the Police Command perceives such proposed protest as a calculated attempt to cause pandemonium and massive destruction of lives and properties under whatever guide. Such will not be allowed to hold in Lagos.”
The warnings are coming barely hours after the federal government had given a similar stern warning to the protesters.
Lai Mohammed, Nigerian minister of information, had earlier on Thursday, warned that law enforcement agents would be on the ground to prevent any eventuality.
On Monday, The ICIR reported how the plan to #OccupyLekkiTollGate came on the backdrop of the controversial ruling of the Lagos Judicial Panel of Inquiry to reopen the Lekki tollgate.
The Doris Okwubi-led panel ruled in favour of the Lekki Concession Company (LCC) to repossess the toll plaza for repairs and insurance claims at its last sitting on Saturday.
The ruling was supported by five members out of the nine-man panel, with four other members, including Ebun-Olu Adegboruwa, a senior advocate of Nigeria (SAN), and the youth representatives, opposing it.
Some youths have also planned the #DefendLagos rally to counter the protest which is scheduled for Saturday 13th, February, 2021.
The Lekki tollgate has been shut by the panel since last October 20, 2020, when armed soldiers opened fire on unarmed protesters, allegedly killing some and injuring several others.
WOLE Soyinka, Nobel Laurette, has said that President Muhammadu Buhari is not in charge of Nigeria, considering the response of his government to Fulani herders’ crisis.
Soyinka said this on Thursday when he virtually featured on Arise TV over the invasion of his property by cows and the state of the nation due to Fulani crisis.
“I have said this before and I wish to repeat this, Buhari does not appreciate the situation, he doesn’t understand. I see no evidence that he understands how grave the situation is and I have said again and again that I don’t believe he’s in charge,” Soyinka said.
He suggested that due to the grave situation of the herders’ crisis and low response from the government, there was something ‘critically’ wrong within the leadership of Nigeria.
“It’s not possible, in my view, that in a country that has a head of state, commander-in-chief of the armed forces that says he is presiding over a nation, and things get to this level. Something is critically wrong in and within the leadership of this nation,” he further said.
He urged the Nigerian government to make leaders, who had claimed responsibility to criminal offences at different times, take back their words, apologise to the nation and even carry out restitution.
Speaking on the controversy surrounding the invasion of his home in Abeokuta, Ogun State capital, Soyinka said he thought the police needed to be educated.
According to the Nobel Laurette, the police needed to be educated on the meaning of invasion of someone’s home.
“When people talk about the invasion of home, they are not just talking about the physical building, they are talking about the home which includes the ground,” Soyinka said.
He refuted claims that cattle or herders attacked him, but insisted that his home was invaded.
“No cattle people attacked me, that is a fact, that never happened… But my home was invaded by cattle. Why should the police go to such length to suggest that I had nothing better to do than to go accosting cattle on the road,” Soyinka said.
He stated that it was after he and his groundsmen had driven the cows out of his property that he called the police to come to take over as against suggestions that the cows were never on his property.
“I led the cattle to the roadside and called the police to come and take over. Why should the police find it necessary to suggest that the cattle were never in my property,” he added.
Soyinka stated that he wanted the people to understand that what happened to him was typical of what was happening to millions of people in the country.
For many years, Fulani herders-farmers crisis has continued to create several debates on open grazing. Many farmers have decried the destruction of their crops by cattle while some residents in the Southern part of the country have said they are being killed, raped and kidnapped by Fulani herders.
The Fulani crisis again created a national crisis following the order of Rotimi Akeredolu, governor of Ondo State, on Fulani herders to vacate the state’s forest reserve due to several reported cases of kidnappings allegedly perpetrated by some them.
After his order, a series of violence ensued in Ondo and Ogun states in a bid to ‘drive out’ Fulani herders from some communities.
THE most distressful aspect of my recent interaction with cows and herders is that it has created a most unwanted distraction from the ongoing life and death Nigerian narrative. One has to take time off to deal with distortions and Fake versions, while students are being reportedly waylaid and killed and/or kidnapped in Ondo and farmers are being slaughtered in my own state. In short, the killings continue even as panels are being launched to enquire into immediate past human violations. For those who truly seek details of the Ijegba incident, I hereby affirm that I was never physically attacked, neither did I attack any cows. The cows and herders did however attack my property – and not for the first time.
The police need to be very, very careful, learn to be straightforward with public information. Failure to adhere to that obvious, basic form of conduct means that the public will lose total confidence in security agencies and constantly bypass them in times of civic unrest, no matter how trivial or deadly. How on earth could the police claim that my property was not invaded by cattle? It was. My groundsmen knew the drill and commenced the process of expelling them. Fortunately, I was then driving out and was able to lend a hand by vehicle maneuvering. Both cattle and herdsmen were flushed out of my property.
Once they were outside the gates, I came down from the vehicle and beckoned the herdsmen to come over. At first, they pretended not to understand, then, as I approached, fled into the bush. We thereupon “arrested” the cows, confining them to the roadside, while I sent my groundsman, Taiye, to the police to come and take over. Since they took rather long in responding, I summoned a replacement and proceeded to the police station. On the way, we met a detachment, turned round, and together we returned to the scene of crime. The police wanted to commence combing the bush for the fugitives but I stopped them – what was the point? Keep the cows, I advised, and the owner will show up. Of course, that owner eventually did.
I thoroughly resent the police version which suggests that the cows never invaded my home: home is not just a building; it includes its grounds. And it was not a stray cow, or two or three. It was a herd – we have photos, so why the lie? It is so unnecessary, unprofessional and suspiciously compromised. The police suggest that I have nothing better to do than to go accosting cows on the public road – to what end? If the police demand proof, the next time such an invasion takes place, I warn that there will be no lack for cadaver affirmation and the police will be officially invited to join in the ensuing suya feast. So please, let us get serious!
Getting serious means seeking with a sense of urgency, ways of terminating mayhem, impunity, and the homicidal culture being imposed on us through some near cultic business minority who just happen to trade in cattle. It means not giving up on peaceful solutions, but also being prepared for the worst. Those of my line of thought have been working on various ways of sensitizing the nation to the very real and imminent danger issuing from this cattle aberration. The menace, I repeat, challenges us as a cohesive entity and as communities of free individuals, committed to the dignity of existence. Cattle imperialism under any guise is an obscenity to humanity. So let me serve notice that we are about to commence a process of public sensitization; we hope even the police will join hands with the agenda as it progresses.
A special practical plea: now that the railways are being resurrected, let us make cattle wagons a priority. I grew up with the regular sight of those practical conveyances. It is time to bring them back.
