Nyako, Your Stance is Dangerous

The condemnation handed down to Governor Murtala Nyako by an expanded meeting of the National Security Council which held in Abuja last Thursday was richly deserved. The governor had in the last 10 days made some very serious allegations against the Federal Government and President Goodluck Jonathan that crossed the boundaries of normal political brick batting and threatened the peace of the country.

Nyako has been on this path for some time, beginning with a paper he delivered at a seminar in Washington, D.C. last month. He insinuated there that the Federal Government was not only unable to contain the Boko Haram insurgency but could be the force behind it. This was a very grave charge but Nyako did not adduce any concrete proof to support his assertion, only poorlyconnected circumstantial evidence.

Speaking in Gusau, Zamfara State during an APC rally last week, the Adamawa State governor said “bombing syndicates and gunmen were from nowhere other than those assigned from Abuja to destroy the northern part of the country under various names.” Two days later, the media published the contents of a letter that Nyako wrote to eighteen other Northern state governors. In summary, he accused the federal government of carrying out genocide against the Northern states. He urged the Northern governors to sue the federal government for loss of lives and property due to insurgency. The letter dated April 16 2014 was titled “Ongoing full scale genocide in Northern Nigeria.” In it, Nyako told the people of Eastern Nigeria that “this Federal administration under your son is giving you a very bad name. He takes wrong decisions and seems to be heading us to the abyss.”

Governor Nyako also said in his letter that Nigeria should be saved “from the Hitler-like evilmindedness of a few.” He said since Jonathan did not declare an amnesty for Boko Haram insurgents, a “Northern Nigerian Amnesty” should be declared. He said various ethnic groups in Nigeria “including the aristocratic Kanuri/Shuwa who are presently under siege need the vocal amongst us to save them from further destruction by deliberately recruited murderers embedded in our traditional Defence and Security forces.” He also said “the present Federal administration has now become a government of impunity run by an evil-minded leadership for the advancement of corruption.”

Nyako further said, “Clearly the victims of the Administration’s evil-mindedness are substantially Northern Nigerians. The administration is bent on bringing wars in the North between Muslims and Christians and within them and between one ethnic group and another or others in various communities in the region.” He added, “Cases of mass murders by its bloody minded killers and cut-throats are well known, but it attributes the killings to so-called Boko-Haram...These organised kidnappers must have the backing of the Federal administration for them to move about freely with abducted children just as those who convey ammunitions and explosives from the Ports to the safe-houses of so called Boko-Haram in the North.” He also blamed the Federal Government for the murder of prominent clerics in the North as well as the attempts on the lives of the Senate President, Governor of Benue State, Emir of Kano, Shehu of Borno and himself, even though these events occurred at different times and under very different circumstances.

Nyako’s letter elicited heated and equally ill-advised response from the Presidency. The president’s special adviser for public affairs Doyin Okupe described Nyako as a sponsor of insurgents, saying the governor recently imported some Fulani fighters into the country. Okupe said Nyako is not fit to be a governor. He said, “We also wish to remind Nigerians that this same Governor Nyako was recently quoted as having boasted openly that now that the Fulani herdsman can assemble the AK47 gun, ‘the security equilibrium in the country is now balanced.’ The same man was reported to have imported some Fulanis from outside the country and spent millions of Naira in rehabilitating, feeding, housing and catering for their welfare.” The ruling Peoples Democratic Party’s (PDP) spokesman Olisah Metuh also attacked Nyako, saying “Governor Nyako must desist from such and learn from other APC leaders who are now comporting themselves better as a response to PDP statements which succeeded in exposing the link between their unguarded utterances and escalation of violence and insurgency in our nation.” The weightiest rebuke for Nyako however came at the end of the expanded Security Council meeting, when it transpired that his memo was unanimously condemned. Abia State Governor Theodore Orji said, “The memo that was written by one of our colleagues, Governor Nyako of Adamawa State, was discussed and there was a unanimous condemnation of that memo. All officers and people in positions of authority were advised to be cautious on what they say.” Niger State Governor Mu’azu Babangida Aliyu also said, “I am sure many of you will be curious about the letter written by our colleague, the governor of Adamawa state. We looked at it all; in fact, he was allowed to read the memo to all of us. We concluded that for many of us, we need to be very careful with the kind of statements we make. And we need to be very careful that whatever we say is either evidence based or something that can be authenticated. Otherwise there is no need to be giving terrorists the opportunity of thinking that they are succeeding.”

Governor Murtala Nyako must take serious note of the fact that 15 fellow APC governors did not stand by him when this decision was taken to condemn his unguarded, illadvised and dangerous utterances. He should henceforth desist from making grave allegations against persons and authorities when he has not assembled concrete proof to back up his allegation. The Presidency too is well advised that, even in the face of provocation such as this, it should comport itself well and seek the intervention of statesmen and elders, rather than descend into the gutter with its attackers.

Governor Murtala Nyako must take serious note of the fact that 15 fellow APC governors did not stand by him

when this decision was taken to condemn his unguarded, ill-advised and

dangerous utterances

HAPPENING