The immediate past Deputy National Publicity Secretary of the ruling All Progressives Congress (APC) Comrade Timi Frank has reported the inability of the present government under President Muhammadu Buhari to stop what he called “ethnic cleansing and genocide in Nigeria” to the United Nation.
Frank said that the present administration lack political will to declare the alleged perpetrators of the increasing brutal attacks and gruesome killings on a daily basis in the country as terrorist group.
In an open letter addressed to the Secretary/General of the United Nations, António Guterres, through its office in Abuja on Thursday, the APC chieftain said Nigerians have lost confidence in the security outfits, especially the military, having allegedly shown complicity in the killings going on.
He, therefore called on the United Nations and other world powers to make their own private findings as to what was going on in Nigeria as it relates to security matters, saying “if we don’t get intervention in good time, there may not be Nigeria in the nearest future.”
The letter titled: “A call for urgent intervention to stop ongoing ethnic cleasing and genocide in Nigeria” read in part: “It has become imperative for me to once again bring to your attention the continuous mass murder of innocent Nigerians by Fulani Herdsmen without required mitigation from the present administration in the country. The tension between Fulani herdsmen and farming communities has existed for many years. However, there has been a dramatic upswing in recent time with increasing brutal attacks and gruesome killings on a daily basis. The impunity and brutality with which the assailants operate, without regard to law and sanctity of life, is both shocking and appalling.
“It is however surprising to note that the government of the day which was elected in an unprecedented public approval in 2015, has not deemed it necessary to summon the political will and courage to forge a lasting solution to the violence. The nation’s security is on a free float while Nigerians are being killed in their native communities where they have dwelled for ages.
“You are no doubt aware that Fulani herdsmen have been acknowledged by the global community as the fourth deadliest Terror Group in the world. ‘Fulani militants’ as they have come to be known are daily visiting deaths on innocent farmers who dare challenge them after their farms have been ravaged by cattle. For the singular reason that they want their cattle to graze on other people’s farmland, they kill and maim natives. Therefore, lives and property are perpetually endangered across the country as I write.
“Curiously however, the government of the day has refused to declare the group as a terrorist organization, as a way of bringing permanent closure to their bloodletting activities. Another worrisome dimension to this orgy of violence is the fact that President Muhammadu Buhari has consistently defended them as a group that merely carry sticks and machetes. However, to the contrary, eyewitnesses report that the Fulani militants are usually armed with sophisticated weapons and often attack their victims when they are most vulnerable, such as midnights, church services and burial ceremonies. They have consistently visited and brutally killed predominantly Christian natives in the North Central Region including some parts of the South and North of the country.
“I dare say that the United Nations cannot stand aloof and watch human lives being wasted on such gargantuan scale as being witnessed daily in Nigeria, due largely to the failure of government to rise to the occasion and stem the tide; by doing the needful to safeguard the lives of its own people.
“I therefore, call on the United Nations and the G7 countries such as the United States of America, Canada, Italy, France, Germany, Japan and the United Kingdom to come to Nigeria’s aid before it is too late. We as Nigerians have lost confidence in our security outfits, especially the military as they have shown complicity in the killings going on in Nigeria. Questions begging for answers are: Why have they not been able to prevent the attacks, make arrest and prosecute the killers? These attacks are being carried out for hours and no single suspect has been prosecuted?
“I therefore call on the United Nations and other world powers to make their own private findings as to what is going on in Nigeria as it relates to security matters. As it is, if we don’t get intervention in good time, there may not be Nigeria in the nearest future.”
