The Fulani Have Enslaved Nigeria – Chief Tola Adeniyi

The Fulani Have Enslaved Nigeria – Chief Tola Adeniyi

 

Veteran journalist, columnist and administrator, Chief Adetola Adeniyi

says that restructuring Nigeria is inevitable as it must be achieved

either intellectually or by the use of force.

 

Chief Adeniyi said in this interview with Business Hallmark’s Teslim

Shitta-Bey and Obinna Ezugwu how the Fulani have over the years used

the military and trickery to bring Nigeria to where it is today, while

also criticising former president Olusegun Obasanjo who he said is the

most anti south leader Nigeria has ever produced.

 

Excerpts:

 

Nigeria is at a critical point in its existence. The call for

restructuring as a way out is growing. What are your thoughts?

 

My thoughts remain the same. I recall that in 1983, I called a press

conference in Ibadan, the theme of which was the national question. I

said that unless the Nigerian national question was addressed, the

(Shehu) Shagari government should not go ahead to conduct the election

for second term. And that if it did, the government would not last for

three months. I noted that the country was sitting on a keg of gun

powder, and the political structure was skewed in favour of the North

as it was then because there is no more North now.

 

I was arrested and detained, and of course they went ahead to have the

election. But the government collapsed in three months by December 31.

For many years, even when I was regional editor of the Daily Times, I

have always felt that (Lord) Lugard was a devil; that bastard born in

India had mischievous agenda for India, Nigeria and Sudan, those three

countries where he featured as a soldier, as a mercenary, an

administrator and as a trader. It was the Royal Niger Company that

really brought him to Nigeria. The British actually didn’t want any of

their colonies to be independent or to ever be able to govern

themselves.

 

What they wanted to do, which France did to a large extent, was to

make their colonies caricatures of Britain or France, so you will

neither be African nor English. With that devilish plan, Lugard and

most Britons of his era believed that pink pigmentation of the skin

was superior to dark pigmentation. That was why they gave government

in the Sudan to the Arab North and suppressed the South of Sudan which

forced them into war for several years. In India, they encouraged the

caste system for a long time and preferred the lighter skinned

Pakistanis and Bangladesh to the darker skinned middle and Southern

Indians.

 

In applying the same thing here, they found out that the Fulani, who

at that time, had not really intermarried as they have done now, so

you had about half a million of them who were “fair” skinned. And they

also found the Southerners to be more progressive, more aggressive and

better exposed than the then colony of the Fulani. Before then, even

before Lugard was born, the Fulani led by Uthman Danfodio…one of the

lies sold to most of us in Nigeria was that Uthman Danfodio came from

Fouta Djallon, hat is not true. He was born in Sokoto and buried in

Sokoto, I visited his grave. What I’m saying is that the so called

North had been conquered when the Fulani killed the king of the Hausas

and took over.

 

But they are so clever politically; they didn’t take away the language

of the Hausa because it would be difficult for them as a minority to

impose their Language on the larger community, so they allowed the

Hausa to retain their language while they also retained their fulfude.

 

So Lugard allowed them to continue, he used what is now called

indirect rule. But for the North at that time to survive

economically, it needed the South which was already exporting timber,

coal, cocoa and so many other things, and had an existing port; the

South was very wealthy, and given that kind of background, they wanted

to make sure, especially when they established the West African

Constabulary – the Frontier force – they ensured that the bulk of the

recruits were from the North because he also foresaw as Ahmadu Bello

later did, the dictum of Chairman Mao that power flows from the barrel

of the gun.

 

They recognised at that point in time that they must get soldiers from

the North, equip them such that if they failed politically, they will

use their military wing to impose whatever they wanted on the rest of

the country. Lugard violated the natural boundaries of North and

South, the River Niger was there; the River Benue was there, so the

boundary ought to have stopped before Niger and Benue which was what

it was before the amalgamation. But by amalgamation and the

unfortunate incident of Afonja betraying the Alaafin during the Awole

reign, Alimi betrayed Afonja and had conquered Ilorin. In fact, they

wanted to push the boundary to Oshogbo, but for the Ijesha army that

drove them back. At the time they were driven back in 1888 or

thereabout, the British were already in Nigeria; Lugard was already

here. So they prevented the South, the Yoruba from pushing the Fulani

further back.

 

The British eventually ended up giving them such a large expanse of

land, and false population figures; the political arrangement was so

designed that whether it was parliamentary or presidential system, the

so called North must have majority in government. Then they went ahead

in 1952 to give them terrible false figures in census to ensure also

that if they base everything on population, they will say the so

called North had more population. They also went ahead to falsify

figures about even religion, giving the impression that the North was

Muslim, that it had larger Muslim population, but it’s not true. I was

a commissioner in National Population Commission in 1988 to 89, and I

know that apart from Bida and Kano, there is hardly any town in the

whole of the so called North that can boast of large population.

 

So, they had the military, they had false population figures, they had

false landmass; everything was tailor-made to ensure that the so

called North will continue to rule Nigeria.

 

Therefore, they didn’t allow either Zik or Awolowo to rule, and

unfortunately, Zik was more pliable – he was a great man, but he was

not a deep thinker. So you had only Awolowo standing against all the

devilish designs of the British. But some people may ask why we

tolerated this for over 100 years. It wasn’t for lack of effort,

people tried, but as Zik said to all of us, you don’t argue with a man

carrying the gun. It has been very difficult to free ourselves through

civil means, and this had prompted the riots in Benue, it prompted

Adaka Boro and all the militants that have tried at one time or the

other. And (Emeka) Ojukwu tried, he really tried with his secessionist

bid to free the Igbo and the rest of the country from this very

manipulative and very power hungry Fulani.

 

Remember that earlier on I said my own word is not restructuring, you

can only restructure a structure, but to me there was never a

structure. There was no structure, you had over 250 nationalities and

somebody just yoked them together, they didn’t create any structure..

So, what we should be doing is actually to go back to pre 1914.

Leaders of this place called Nigeria, must come together and discuss

the terms of coming together as a country. That hasn’t been done. We

Nigerian people… if there is anybody that can be so called because

there are no Nigerian people. We the people living in this expanse of

land were not involved in what they did with the expanse of land.

There is no structure given to that land, it is a landmass with

several nationalities, what we should do is to go to pre 1914 as

Solomon Asemota, one of the greatest thinkers on these issues said.

 

But if that cannot be done, we can at least go back to 1952/54, that

is, going back to the regions using language, culture and all that to

negotiate how to live together. Also, to ensure that the landmass

itself has to be redefined in a way that natural boundaries are agreed

upon. You cannot be taking about Western region, and leave the Jembe

and so on in Kogi or you have emirs in Yoruba land or emirs in Zango

Kataf or in Kafanchan, which are Christian lands.

 

If there is a correct census in this country, I can say that Western

Nigeria has more Muslims than any other part of this country. You have

had Islam here in Lagos since the 11th Century, and in other places

like Iwo, Oyo, Ijebu and so on. That’s why they called it ‘Esimali’

because it came from Mali. We had Muslims before Uthman Danfodio was

born, but they (Fulani) have done so much that not only have they

conquered the most vociferous and most enlightened part of Nigeria

politically and militarily, they have also enslaved us religiously by

calling somebody head of supreme council of Islamic affairs. What is

supreme council of Islamic affairs? Somebody that had never been voted

for! He has only been a Sultan, then using a puppet like late Dr

Lateef Adegbite, and now using another puppet called Ishaq Akintola

who is now the secretary of the so called Islamic affairs; there is

nothing like Islamic affairs.

 

But because of it, the Sultan will dictate to South West when to fast

and when not to fast; when to kill ram and all what not. And they

won’t allow Muslims from the South to lead prayers in the North. They

made it such that the Southern Muslims have submitted themselves to

the superiority of Fulani Muslims. And they have accepted to be second

class even in their religion. That’s why I’m also leading a forum to

free the Yoruba Muslims and ask the Alaafin of Oyo or the Awujale of

Ijebu land to act as the Supreme head of Muslims in the South West. So

that when the Sultan is dictating to the Fulani people, the Awujale or

the Alaafin of Oyo will dictate to us here. The Sultan should never be

arrogated as supreme head of anybody outside his sphere of influence.

 

You have spoken extensively about how the entire South has been

subjugated by the Fulani, but why is it that the South cannot come

together to stop it?

 

There was a strong alliance between Awolowo and Joseph Tarka, meaning

that it’s not just between West and East, but also between West and

Middle Belt. And when Awolowo was incarcerated in 1964, (Michael)

Opara came to the West and they formed UPGA which was a marriage of

East and West. Again, at a point, there was betrayal, or rather the

Fulani played a hand. The Fulani like I said, are still the most

sophisticated politicians in Nigeria, there is no doubt about that.

Because the only industry they have is power, and they have always had

British and American advisers, till tomorrow, and we didn’t have that.

Up till today, the South does not believe they need the British or the

Americans to advise them on politics. But the Fulani have always

submitted themselves to British influence and directives.

 

It is not that they (the South) didn’t try, but we have always had

fifth columnists among the Yoruba and among the Igbo. Once they dangle

some political office in their face, they fall for it. That has been

the bane, but we have all passed that stage. Maybe some governors are

too chicken hearted to talk, maybe some ministers cannot talk, but

they are only negligible minority. We now have a hurricane in the

South, nobody who knows history can stop it. I have argued in some of

my articles that it was the military wing of the Fulani that brought

us into this mess. It was them that followed the part and pattern

decided for them by the British.

 

When (Alani) Akinrinade, Black Scorpion (Benjamin Adekunle) and Alabi

Isiama, who were the war heroes that I know, but for them and the

Christians in the Military who were mostly Yoruba, there was no way

the so called federal military could have defeated the Igbo. That is

now painful, when you read Jimanze Ego-Alowes’ book, ‘How the Yoruba

won and lost the Biafra War’. We fought; allowed ourselves to be used

by the Fulani to kill the Igbo, but the first thing they did for us

was to create 12 states and weaken the federating units. They gave the

Yoruba just one state, and gave the so called North about six at that

time, and gave the East three because they wanted the minorities

separate from the Igbo. Thus, the Yoruba became the first casualty.

 

Then the worst came when someone of very doubtful paternity called

Olusegun Obasanjo, who for reasons best known to him has remained the

greatest anti south southerner in this country. It wasn’t Murtala

Muhammed that took Federal government out of Lagos, it was Obasanjo.

It was Obasanjo who imposed presidential system on Nigerians, it was

him who took over all the achievements of the South: the University of

Nigeria, Nsukka; the Obafemi Awolowo University; the television

stations; Liberty Stadium… it wasn’t Murtala Muhammed that

nationalised them, it was this … Obasanjo..

 

He is a rootless man that believes that he can only “satanically” hang

on to that mirage called Nigeria since he cannot say he is Igbo, even

though we have question marks about his connection with Obi Onyejekwe,

there is a question mark about whether Ashabi his mother was from

Yoruba land or from Nupe, there are question marks on whether the man

his mother married later who was called Obasanjo and who according to

a television broadcast in 2005 in Abeokuta was actually ‘Sango Sonjo’

but who changed his name to Obasanjo when he became a Christian. So

you have all these questions hanging around his name and around his

paternity.. He has done the greatest harm to restructuring Nigeria; to

making Nigeria a truly federal state than any other person in Nigerian

history.

 

Of course, since they knew who he was, even after (MKO) Abiola was

denied the presidency, the Fulani, using some proxies… because among

those who brought Obasanjo back to power, it was only Aliyu Mohammed

Gusau who is Fulani. Babangida is not Fulani, he is Gwari; Danjuma is

Jukun, but the Fulani used them to choose somebody they know will

always dance to their tune to make him president, they have tested him

before. But before then, the military government of Abacha, which was

itself a creation of the Fulani had gone ahead to divide Nigeria into

36 states and created 774 local governments that had no rhythm nor

rhyme. I know a particular place called Chalawa in a Local government

in Kano; there are not up to twelve houses there. And the only house

there that is plastered, not painted, is a 2-bedroom bungalow.

 

You call that a local government headquarters, to compare with

Alimosho Local Government, to compare with Ibadan, to compare with

Obafemi Owode. You have local governments dotted all over the North

that cannot boast of ten thousand or even five thousand people in

population. And yet the sharing formula for Nigeria’s resources is

based largely on landmass, which is false; on population, which is

false and on local governments, all of which are fraudulent. So for

peace and stability to return to this landmass, we have to go

confederate, anything short of it is just window dressing; anything

short of that is still going to collapse. Nigeria must be based on a

confederation.

 

Let us have six republics: the Caliphate Republic; the Elkanemic

Republic, which is Borno; the Igbo Republic; the Niger Delta Republic;

the Yoruba Republic and the Middle Belt Republic. And those six

republics would then come together and have the confederal republic of

Nigeria on agreed terms. Every republic will have its own

constitution, police and military but to be coordinated by the federal

military for national defence against external enemy. Why should the

federal government have the ministry of education, why should it have

ministry of agriculture or ministry of lands and housing? Federal

government does not own land, you cannot be doing agriculture when you

don’t have any land. The land belongs to state and local governments.

So, once we have that, let every region develop at its own pace.

 

There is no point in talking about whether or the North wants that to

happen. We cannot be talking about the North when there is no North.

You can’t be killing people in Benue and say they are Northerners;

they are not. I spoke to some professors in Niger State, they told me

that they are more bitter about this so called Nigeria than we Yoruba

are; that they have been the perpetual slaves of the Fulani that they

cannot even talk. They slaughter Benue people almost on daily basis.

The Zango Kataf people in Southern Kaduna are being killed on daily

basis, and you are calling them Northerners? You only have the

caliphate that has overrun the rest of the so called North, but they

never succeeded in overrunning Kanuri, the Borno people.

 

But of course, for selfish reasons, and for what their stomach will

eat, there are some leaders of Borno, some leaders of Jukun, Benue,

like Paul Unongo, Plateau who they decorate with an empty title of the

chairman of Northern whatever. The person you can say is the leader of

Arewa is (Ibrahim) Coomassie who is a Fulani from Katsina. They

deceived Sunday Awoniyi and made him chairman. Chairman of who? They

deceived Unongo and say he is the head of Arewa, how can Unongo be

chairman of Arewa when they are killing his people every day? I’m

saying therefore, there is no more North and the South must begin to

recognize that fact.

 

We have been so timid because we have been brainwashed to believe that

there is a superior force somewhere. No, we don’t have any Nigerian

army now, what we have is a Fulani army that may still be exploiting

some people in the military. The kind of military that went to

massacre the Igbo does not exist anymore. I’m still asking whether

there are Igbo among the people from 82 Division who went to harass

people in Abia. I doubt if there were any Igbo or any Yoruba there.

They will selectively call on their Fulani and some stupid Hausa who

have still not seen themselves as slaves to join them.

 

What about the political conferences like that of 2014. People have

suggested that we take this document and implement what we can.

 

At that point in time, it probably satisfied some concerns, but now we

have grown beyond that. You cannot be talking about 2014 conference

that recommended that you should create one more state in the South

East, and create more local governments. We have gone beyond that,

state creation is not the business of the federal government, local

government creation is not the business of any federal government. Let

the republics create them. If you want to create one million states in

Yoruba republic, it is your business.

 

What is obvious from your point is that we cannot move forward without

tinkering with the structure of Nigeria, but still you have a

situation where the Hausa/Fulani…?

 

There is no Hausa/Fulani, you cannot be Ibibio/Efik, you cannot be

Annang/Ibibio, or Ijebu/Egba. These are the things they use to confuse

us; the use of language for political effect. You have only the

Fulani, about five million of them.

 

You have this arrangement where the Fulani who like you said are in

control of the military still opposed to restructuring. How do we go

about getting the country you want?

 

Yes, they control the army, the intelligence service, the SSS,

immigration the police and so on, but it is possible through two

approaches; only two. First is brain, second is brawn.. The Fulani

brought us to where we are today using brawn, and a bit of trickery

and deceit. But it was largely through the military. The creation of

states, killing Biafrans, killing Southerners in the North, local

government creation, presidential system… all those were made possible

by the military. In fact, like I said earlier, it was the military

even though they did well in providing infrastructure that was used by

the Fulani to destroy Nigeria politically.

 

And I have argued that as unpalatable as it might sound, it is still

the military that can take us out of this mess. It is either organised

military or armed militia that will come from various parts of the

country, this status quo cannot continue. The 36 states cannot pay

salaries, the federal government cannot pay police salaries. They are

owing the military pensioners three months salary areas. So, it’s

either we wait for the oil to dry up or to be unprofitable, which will

happen in the next few years, then everyone will go away. But what we

are saying is, please come now, let us restructure Nigeria. The

caliphate has more to benefit than any other part of this country.

 

Why do you say that?

 

They have a lot of resources which laziness and over dependence on

people’s wealth which they have been spoon feeding on has stopped them

from exploring. The caliphate, the North East and Middle Belt are so

rich in agriculture that if you have Middle Belt republic and

Caliphate republic, and Elkanemi republic, they can be exporting

agricultural products: cattle, beef, tomatoes and so on to the rest of

the world. They will make more money from exporting agriculture

produce, but they abandoned all that because they are stealing the

resources of the South. Lagos alone contributes more than 67 percent

of VAT than the rest of the country put together. They say they don’t

drink alcohol… which is a lie, but if you don’t drink alcohol and we

consume it in the South, why are you using our VAT money to develop

yourselves?

 

So, to answer your question, we will get out of it using our brains

which is what we are doing now, trying to persuade everybody. If that

fails, it would be brawn. But either of the two must yield to us the

country we want. And it is in the interest of everyone to allow brain

to decide for us. If Nigeria breaks into militia as you have in

Somalia, it will not be palatable for anybody. So, let us go the

Czech-Slovakia model. Let’s decide to stay apart peacefully and come

together in a confederation than to wait for militia to emerge from

every part of the country.

 

The people in Southern Kaduna will not wait indefinitely; people in

Benue will not wait indefinitely. They have been able to conquer

Plateau, but some elements of Plateau are going to wake up and say no,

you cannot put army of occupation in our land. I told some people that

you can say whatever you like about (Nnamdi) Kanu but I believe that

there is no Nigerian today who commands the kind of followership he

commands, so such a person cannot be dismissed. The forces they have

gathered, you can drive them underground, but when they unleash terror

on this country it will not be funny. The military may be the only

organised force, but they don’t have monopoly of violence.