The Federal Government has accused former President Olusegun Obasanjo of seeking to divide Nigeria in his old age over his comments that the Boko Haram insurgency has become an agenda to ‘Fulanise’ West Africa and Islamise Africa.
The government in a statement by the Minister of Information and Culture, Alhaji Lai Mohammed, urged Obasanjo not to allow personal animosity override his love for a united Nigeria, saying it will not be out of place if he withdrew his statement and apologize to Nigerians.
The government said comments imputing ethno-religious motive to Boko Haram and ISWAP were deeply offensive and divisive, and far below the status of an elder statesman who had taken bullets for Nigeria’s unity. The Federal Government’s position was toed by an Islamic group, the Muslim Rights Concern, MURIC, which asked the former President to come clean with any grouse he may have against the Fulani ethnic group, saying his recent comments on the threats of Boko Haram and armed herdsmen in the country were unbecoming of a statesman.
However, Christian leaders and some stalwarts of the National Democratic Coalition, NADECO, said former President Obasanjo was in order and urged the government to do the needful to halt the slide into anarchy. Among those who agreed with Obasanjo were the Christian Association of Nigeria, CAN; The Catholic Archbishop of Abuja, John Cardinal Onaiyekan; Archbishop of the Metropolitan See of Lagos, Most Rev Alfred Adewale Martins and NADECO stalwart and elder statesman, Chief Ayo Adebanjo. Others include National Vice Chairman (South-West) of the Peoples Democratic Party, PDP, Eddy Olafeso; National Chairman of the Social Democratic Party, SDP, Chief Supo Shonibare; South-South leader, Col Tony Nyiam, retd; and Brigadier-General Idada Ikponmwen, retd.
In the statement, the minister said it was particularly tragic that a man who fought to keep Nigeria one was the same person seeking to exploit the country’s fault lines to divide it in the twilight of his life.
Mohammed said Boko Haram and ISWAP were terrorist organizations, adding that they cared little about ethnicity or religion when perpetrating their senseless killings and destruction. His words: ‘’Since the Boko Haram crisis, which has been simmering under the watch of Obasanjo, boiled over in 2009, the terrorist organization has killed more Muslims than adherents of any other religion, blown up more mosques than any other houses of worship and is not known to have spared any victim on the basis of their ethnicity. ’ It is, therefore, absurd to say that Boko Haram and its ISWAP variant have as their goal the ‘Fulanisation and Islamisation’ of Nigeria, West Africa or Africa.’’
