Kaduna State Governor,
Malam Nasir El-Rufai, needs no introduction as far as Nigeria politics is
concerned. The former minister of the Federal Capital Territory(FCT),
recently
fielded questions from selected journalists in Kaduna.
He spoke on various
issues including the ban of Sheikh Ibrahim El-Zakzaky’s Islamic Movement of
Nigeria(IMN) and Southern Kaduna killings.
Southern Kaduna
crisis and killings have become almost a regular occurrence, what is your
administration doing to curtail this ugly trend?
When we came to
office, the two problems we face in the area of security were cattle rustling
in Birnin Gwari Giwa axis and these communal killings in southern Kaduna. We
were very concerned about both and we did two things. We needed to understand
what was happening in Southern Kaduna. We understood cattle rustling and we
convened a meeting of all the North West governors because the problem was
centred around the forest fringes of Kuyambana and felt state cooperation was
necessary.
We came together and
launched an operation to deal with cattle rustling. We are successful because
we degraded their ability to do cattle rustling, even though that created a
problem of kidnapping, because they moved from cattle rustling to kidnapping we
are still facing.
For southern Kaduna,
we didn’t understand what was going on and we decided to set up a committee
under Gen. Martin Luther Agwai (rtd) to find out what was going on there. What
was established was that the root of the problem has a history starting from
the 2011 post election violence.
Fulani herdsmen from
across Africa bring their cattle down towards middle and southern Nigeria. The
moment the rains start around March, April, they start moving them up to go
back to their various communities and countries. Unfortunately, it was when
they were moving up with their cattle
across southern Kaduna that the elections of 2011 took place and the crisis
trapped some of them. Some of them were from Niger, Cameroon, Chad, Mali and
Senegal.
Fulanis are in 14
African countries and they traverse these countries with the cattle. So many of
these people were killed, cattle lost and they organised themselves and came
back to revenge. That is their culture; if you kill a Fulani man, they send the
information from generation to generation until the account is settled. So a
lot of what was happening in Southern Kaduna was actually from outside Nigeria.
We got a hint
that the late governor Patrick Yakowa,
he got this information and he sent someone to go round some of these Fulani
communities, but of course after he died, the whole thing stopped. That is what
we inherited. But the Agwai committee established that.
We took certain
steps. We got a group of people that were going round trying to trace some of
these people, trying to trace some of these people in Cameroon, Niger republic
and so on to tell them that there is a new governor who is Fulani like them and
has no problem paying compensations for lives lost or stock and he is begging
you to stop killing.
In most of the
communities, once that appeal was made to them, they said they have forgiven.
There is one or two that asked for monetary compensation. They said they have
forgiven the death of human beings, but cattle. We said no problem, some we
paid. As recently as two weeks ago, the team went to Niger republic to attend
one Fulani gathering that they do every year with a message from me.
So this was the
problem, we knew this by August last year and we started taking steps. But what
is happening now, I don’t want it to be restricted to Southern Kaduna. I
noticed that some people are trying to bring religion or ethnicity into it;
what about Zamfara State? Are there southern Kaduna people in Zamfara or
Christians? That is why I considered the statement by the president of
Christian Association of Nigeria (CAN ) most irresponsible. Some people don’t
understand the burden of leadership. The same Fulani are killing Fulani in
Zamfara, it is not about religion or ethnicity, this is a pure case of banditry. They are
criminals, their ethnicity, their religion does not matter. Let’s fight the
problem, let’s not bring sentiments, sensationalism and division into it. What
is happening in Southern Kaduna today in my opinion, has roots in banditry, it
has nothing to do with what has happened in the past to a large extent.
It was a small
problem that started in Ninte village, Godogodo that could have been handled
better by the local communities; by the leaders of the Fulanis and the leaders
of the communities but they did not do it well. I was very sad, I went there.
Any life lost in Kaduna State is a burden on me because as the governor, I have
to defend the life of every one. As a government, we regret the loss of lives.
We regret the destruction of property.
I am giving you the
background because it is important to understand this and not to encourage
those that want to give this a dimension that thrives on division of religion
and ethnicity, that is not it.
Today in Kaduna
State, we have 400 people for kidnapping and cattle rustling and armed robbery.
All but about five of them are fulanis. I am fulani, does it mean I should not
have them arrested and prosecuted? I don’t consider them Fulani, I considered
them as criminals. Whenever I sit with Fulani leaders, I tell them that we
arrested over 400 suspects and 99 per cent of them are Fulanis and they should
ask themselves why is it only fulanis that are doing this. Is that part of the
culture of the fulanis, since when did they start carrying AK47 and so on.
We are trying them
and some that resisted are being killed and some people are saying this and
that. It hurts me when people that are supposed to be leaders try to politicise
death and destruction of property; it is irresponsible. It amounts, in my
option to hate speech, you can’t say things like that. There is enough of these
banditry going on in the country for you to know it has nothing to do with
religion or ethnicity.
From a small problem
in Ninte, some people found a way to add fuel to the fire, because it is
politically expedient to do so, not caring how many people get killed. Over
time, the culture of impunity has permeated also segments of society, people
think they can do anything and get away with it. There is very weak law
enforcement or uneven law enforcement. If you are from this ethnic group or
religion, you can do something and get
away with it but the other one cannot. There is a mindset that you can take the
law into your hands. This is what has been happening and escalating the
problem.
So, it is most
unfortunate, but honestly the whole challenge is that of banditry and it has to
be addressed. Secondly, I think that those that preach the message that, this
one is a settler, he shouldn’t he here or this one is of different tribe and
religion, he should not live with you, are more responsible for what is
happening than anything else. How can you look at somebody that has stayed in a
place for 200 years and say he is a settler. How long have you lived there? We
all came from somewhere.
Why did you ban the Islamic Movement in
Nigeria (IMN) ?
The issue of Islamic
Movement in Nigeria ( IMN) and their declaration as an unlawful society is
something that we did with all sense of responsibility. Many media outlets have
presented what we did in various ways which are misleading.
What we did was not
to ban any organisation, we have no power to ban an organisation if it exists,
we cannot ban religion or religious practice. What we did is to say that the
Islamic Movement in Nigeria is an unlawful society and we derived the powers to
do this under the penal code that was passed in 1963, so, it is not a new thing
that we did.
The governor can
declare any organisation an unlawful society, if it poses a threat to the
security, peace and governance of the state and we concluded, after receiving
the report of the judicial commission of inquiry that looked into the clashes
between the IMN and the army, that the IMN poses a threat to the peace,
security and good governance of Kaduna state. That is what we did.
We did not ban
Shiism, we did not ban Shiites. We did not say they cannot practise their
religion, because in Kaduna state, there are at least two Shiites organisations
that we know. There is Alkafaalin Foundation,
there is Rasulaazam Society. These are all Shiites organisations and
they are not outlawed. They are not outlawed because all they do is to preach
their brand of Islam and they practice their brand of Islam and they are free
to do so.
There is also a
misconception that IMN is the same as Shiites; IMN is only one out of many
Shiites organisations. There is a prominent Shiites organisation with its
headquarters here in Kaduna that is headed by Sheikh Hamza Lawal. He is well
known, he used to be with IMN, he left them because he realised that IMN is
more interested in political struggle than religious development.
Because IMN doesn’t
recognise Nigerian laws, they are not registered with CAC, so they cannot be
sued or held responsible. They build anywhere they want without approval. They
don’t even bother to acquire title to land. Their allegiance is not to Nigerian
government, their allegiance is to somewhere else. I want to ask you, if you
put all these facts together, what does IMN look like? IMN looks like an
insurgency waiting to happen. You say you don’t recognise the constitution, you
don’t recognise the President and the governor and they don’t register to vote,
they don’t believe in it. So, when they said that we went to Ek-Zakzaky during
the election, it is a lie. I visited El-Zakzaky’s children, that is the picture
they are saying I went to campaign. El-Zakzaky was in the university with me.
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