Kaduna Will Be Great Again - 362 By - George Makeri

On Thursday 6 October 2016, the State Executive Council sat down and banned the Islamic Movement of Nigeria with effect from Friday 7 October 2016. The SEC claims its action was taken to preserve peace and security in the state, and to ensure that all persons and organisations are guided by lawful conduct and with due allegiance to the Nigerian state and its constitution.


It is ironic to talk about preserving what were never in existence in the state - peace and security. I can not comprehend the peace and security the government was claiming to want to preserve when Kaduna is a safe haven for kidnappers and serial killers ever since this government took over except if the Shiites were the kidnappers and serial killers. From the army colonel to the three pastors to Doctor Abdullamalik Durunguwa to Mrs Mallam and Hubby as well as several others I can not mention here, Kaduna has remained a sanctuary for crooks and criminals, so what security are these people claiming to want to preserve with the ban on IMN? We have seen how many boys were killed all around Kaduna metropolis with not a single person caught in connection with their murder. One was stabbed during the Muslim Ramadan and even blamed for being stabbed because nobody was arrested to that effect too. This is the kind of security the great governor wants to preserve. Ironically, none of the governor's family, friend or crony was ever a victim of these kidnappers or killers.

Most puzzling is the fact that the fulanis that massacre people in Kaduna state were never seen as a threat to peace and security, no no. It is the Shiites that simply block roads and occupy public buildings that are seen as a threat to peace and security and had to be massacred, with its leaders locked up and now the movement banned, yet government will cite peace and security as its reasons. I have never heard that the shiites murder or massacre any person or group of persons, but I have heard multiple times about the fulani herdsmen. Infact, I and my team were just returning from a humanitarian service as a result of fulani activities Friday 7 October 2016; when I heard of the ban on shiites. I nearly throw up when reasons for the ban were given as the need to preserve peace and security with these lines: "...The Order noted that “these acts, if allowed to go unchecked will constitute danger to the peace, tranquillity, harmonious coexistence and good governance of Kaduna State”. Aha! What peace when we have to bury people almost every day from Fulani atrocities as a result of the governor's loan repayment 'misphilosophy'? What tranquillity when people worry about being kidnapped or killed couple with high taxes amidst intense deprivation? What harmonious co-existence when Hausa fulani traditional rulers in Saminaka of Lere local government area and elsewhere were sanctioning the kidnappings, forceful conversions and marriages of underage Christian girls to the despair and pains of their hapless parents, relations and people. As I write, the Christians in Saminaka are still battling to take back some of their daughters from Muslim traditional rulers. What good governance with 'worrisome' dictatorship at the local government levels, short-changing of workers and civil servants, destruction of job security with arbitrary sacks of senior civil servants, victimisation of voices of dissents with Doctor John Danfulani, Nasiru Jagaba, etc as foremost victims. There was never any peace, tranquillity, harmonious coexistence nor good governance in Kaduna State in the first place that the activities of shiites was endangering.

I cannot understand how IMN for not being a registered organisation is a threat to peace and unity. It has a paramilitary wing, yet has never been credited with a millionth of the atrocities committed by the fulanis, yet the fulanis were never a threat to peace and security. The IMN members do not recognise or respect the laws of the country and the duly constituted authorities that have the responsibility to secure and administer the country, yet you can not tell us where and how. Besides do you, as governor, respect the laws of the country? If you do, would you deny the grass roots democracy in refusing local government elections? You don't practice what you preach, yet you grandstand alot.

Is it not better to overtly continue with what you term unlawful processions, obstruction of public highways, unauthorised occupation of public facilities including schools without regard to the rights of other citizens and the public peace and order of the State; than your loan repayment misphilosophy that has seen to the multiple destruction of lives and properties of the real citizens of the state? IMN deny citizens their rights to use public facilities and you ban them, fulani herdsmen deny citizens their rights to life and you protect them, defend their interest, keep corrupt public officers like ACP Ibrahim Abubakar to aid and abet them.

The section 45 that you drew your powers from, said none of sections 37 to 41 can invalidate any law in this section that is reasonably justifiable in a democratic state...' I put it to you, Mr. Governor, that it is not reasonably justifiable to ban the IMN who simply deny citizens their rights to use public facilities when you could not invoke the same powers to ban the activities of fulani herdsmen in the southern Kaduna climes for denying citizens their fundamental rights to life. Again, this section spoke about a democratic state which means the state legislators have to endorse it which you refused to observe since the ban took effect on Friday without passing through the state assembly. Again, the Section 97A of the Penal Code (Cap 110, Laws of Kaduna State, 1991) that empowers you to take arbitrary decision absent the state assembly was not a democracy but a military dictatorship, and this, Mr. Governor, is a democracy not a dictatorship for you to draw your powers from a dictatorial regime.            

This idea of importing a Yemen-like sectarian rivalry into Nigeria where the Iran-backed shiite Houthis would be against Saudi-backed Sunni-led government in order to secure international recognition in the Muslim world to the detriment of harmonious co-existence in Nigeria, is certainly a recipe for disaster and very unhealthy for our democracy. How did governors from Makarfi to Yero co-existed with the shiites that we have never heard of such atrocities as the Zaria massacres?

The APC philosophy that sees intimidation, violence and persecution as almighty tools of control has no respect for the rule of law nor democracy. Infact, the attitude exhibited so far by the APC government at both the federal and state levels is why the idea of constitutionality was fashioned in the first place by its founding fathers to check the excesses and abuse of power of the executive. How could you hold the legislatives by the balls with code of conduct bureau and keep the judiciary permanently under intimidation through arbitrary arrest like it was done on judges in Rivers? Even the criminal robbery of the people's choice in Edo is still fresh in our memories. And  historians like John Paden would be hired to paint the sinner to look like a saint in order to misinform children yet unborn. We will expose Paden for his criminality and twisting of facts to satisfy his pay masters.