Headlines
Groups Condemn Northern Governors’ Silence on Kaduna Attack As death Toll Hits 51
The Northern States Governors’ Forum was on Tuesday condemned over its silence on the killings, which took place in Southern Kaduna a few hours before it met in Kaduna State on Monday.
Groups, including the Southern Kaduna Peoples Union, the Ohanaeze Ndigbo, the Middle Belt Forum and civil rights organisations, in separate interviews with The PUNCH, described the forum’s silence on the killings in Kaduna State as insensitive.
The organisations said this as the death toll in the bandits’ attack on Southern Kaduna increased to 51 on Tuesday with the recovery of three more corpses.
The NSGF had in a communiqué issued after at its meeting on Monday berated southern governors for insisting that the presidency should shift to the South in 2023.
The northern governors also faulted moves by Lagos and Rivers states to collect the Value Added Tax.
How could govs meet in Kaduna and silent on killing of 48 people, says SOKAPU
Between Sunday and Monday, no fewer than 48 people were killed by bandits in Zango Kataf and Kaura local government areas of Kaduna State within 24 hours of unrestricted bloody violence.
Commenting on the governors communiqué’s silence on the killings and their preoccupation with the 2023 presidency and the Value Added Tax, the Southern Kaduna Peoples Union spokesman, Luka Binniyat, carpeted the governors, saying they were “still in yoke with the obsolete mentality of one North.”
He specifically knocked the governors from the Middle Belt whom he described as “mere pawns to be used to further the interest of the core North.”
Binniyat said, “SOKAPU sees the Northern State Governors Forum as nothing other than an assembly of governors from the former Northern Region (today’s 19 northern states) who are still yoked in with the obsolete mentality of one North.”
“Unfortunately for governors of the Middle Belt states among them, who do not have the courage, wisdom and vision to pull out and form a “Middle Belt Governors’ Forum like their counterparts in other parts of the country, the agenda of every meeting of the NGF always proves that they are mere pawns to be used to further the interest of the core North.
“If not so, how could a meeting of the NSGF take place in Kaduna State where at least 48 persons were murdered on Sunday in cold blood in the Christian Southern Kaduna, and nothing was mentioned of it?
“Was it not the same NSGF that made so much fuss over the killing of 22 Fulani commuters in Jos recently and threatened fire and brimstone because the Fulani were alleged to have been killed by Christians?
“Are the 48 Christian women and children killed in their homes in Madamai and Adum villages in the Kaura LGA in Southern Kaduna not supposed to raise emotions of the so-called NSGF to elicit even a mention in their meeting?
“But, the lives of non-Hausa-Fulani natives of an enclave they claim as part of their North do not qualify to be that of humans.
“SOKAPU condemns such cold, snobbish and inhuman attitudes of these governors to the latest tragedy that hit us.
“Kaduna State cannot be used as ground for bickering over power sharing while the citizens of the states are being massacred as selfish and unfeeling governors meet while we are deeply mourning.
“We reject membership of such a body. We do not identify with those who don’t care about us.”
He also condemned the role played by the Governor of Plateau State, Simon Lalong.
“He (Lalong) seems to carry his curious role as Chairman of the NSGF not caring whether he is being used or not. He does not seem to bother about the opinion of our Plateau neighbours who are openly embarrassed and miffed by his poster face of anti-Middle Belt and Southern Nigeria.
“Southern Kaduna and Plateau State do not only share a very wide physical boundary, we have had centuries of inter-communal relationship and share almost the same problems of insecurity and mass murder of our people. Yet he did not have the courage of calling the attention of his colleagues to the ongoing genocide that took place less than 24hours before their meeting.”
Also berating the northern governors, the Middle Belt Forum described their opposition to power shift as selfish.
Abia State Governor, Dr. Alex Otti, on Sunday paid a solidarity visit to the Leader of the Indigenous Peoples Of Biafra (IPOB), Mazi Nnamdi Kanu, at the Sokoto Correctional Centre, Sokoto State, where he was to begin serving his life sentence.
Governor Otti, according to a statement by his Special Adviser on Media and Publicity, Mr Ferdinand Ekeoma, and published on social media, encouraged Kanu, during a meeting held behind closed doors, to remain strong, assuring that the engagements he started over two years ago, which the IPOB leader has been aware of, have been intensified in spite of what happened.
The Governor enjoined Kanu to remain calm, but strong, assuring that the issue will be resolved administratively and that he will regain his freedom.
Governor Otti expressed joy that the Sultan of Sokoto is on the same page with him on the need for Kanu’s freedom and de-escalation of tension, and informed Kanu that the Sultan of Sokoto had on a lighter note told him that Kanu is now his subject and he was going to turbane him, an information that got the IPOB Leader laughing loudly.
Responding, Mazi Kanu, who was beaming with smiles and in high spirits, thanked Governor Otti for the visit, and stated that he wasn’t surprised that the Governor quickly came visiting, because he had done the same thing in the past.
He told the Governor that he is very proud of his giant strides in Abia based on the feedbacks he gets from home about the state since he assumed office, a feat he said is replicating what Late Dee Sam Mbakwe did as Governor of Old Imo State, which has kept him permanently immortalised, and called on the Governor to continue to serve the people diligently.
The IPOB leader told Governor Otti that he is only interested in good governance and anything that could better the lot of the people, and prayed God to continue to be with the Governor and his team as they serve the people of the state.
Governor Otti was accompanied on the visit by the Attorney General and Commissioner for Justice, Mr. Ikechukwu Uwanna, SAN, the Special Adviser to the Governor on Media and Publicity, Ferdinand Ekeoma, and some top Sokoto State government officials, including Commissioners and advisers.
Also present during the visit was Kanu’s younger brother, Prince Emmanuel Kanu.
Cameroonian opposition figure, Anicet Ekan, on Monday, died in detention in Yaounde, the vice president of his party told AFP.
“Anicet Ekane died this morning in Yaounde, where he had been transferred after his arrest at the end of October in Douala,” Valentin Dongmo of the African Movement for the New Independence of Cameroon (Manidem) party said.
The exact circumstances of the 74-year-old’s death remain unclear.
The left-wing, nationalist politician was arrested in Douala on October 24, on the eve of the publication of presidential election results that returned 92-year-old Paula Biya to power for an eighth mandate.
Ekane was close to fellow opposition figure Issa Tchiroma Bakary, who contested Biya’s 43-year grip on power in the October 12 election.
“Anicet Ekane was arrested in Douala and then transferred to Yaounde, where he was held at the State Defence Secretariat (SED). It was there that his health began to deteriorate,” according to Dongmo.
“We repeatedly alerted the authorities, including the military court administration, requesting that Anicet Ekane be transferred to a hospital with the appropriate facilities for better care, but our requests did not receive a favourable response,” he said.
Manidem had denounced the “arbitrary” arrests aiming to “intimidate” Cameroonians.
Born in Douala in 1951, Ekane joined the Union of the Peoples of Cameroon (UPC) party in 1973 — which he then quit to create Manidem in 1995.
In February 1990, he and other members of the Yondo Black group were arrested. He was condemned in a military trial before being pardoned several months later.
Ekane led Manidem for several years and ran as its presidential candidate in 2004 and 2011.
His death has triggered a groundswell of reactions on social media.
AFP
Headlines
Pastor Bakare Advises Tinubu to Apologize to Traumatized Communities, Accept Responsibility for Failure
The Lead Pastor of the Citadel Global Community Church, Tunde Bakare, has urged President Bola Tinubu to publicly apologize to communities devastated by insecurity.
Bakare made the call on Sunday during his State of the Nation Address in Lagos, saying the gesture would mark a commitment to justice and national healing.
The cleric acknowledged that the president had taken initial steps to address the crisis but insisted that deeper action is required to restore confidence.
He said the government must first accept responsibility for decades of failure to protect citizens from terrorism, banditry and other violent crimes.
Bakare said the plan should include a Victims and Survivors Register, a national apology to affected communities after three months, and midterm compensation, stressing that accountability is crucial to restoring public trust and ending the cycle of violence.
