‘Nigeria govt dining and wining with terrorists?’ – Ohanaeze, Afenifere
* As Tunde Bakare, Sheikh Abubakar, Onaiyekan fume
By Steve Oko
The apex Igbo socio-cultural association, Ohanaeze Ndigbo has sought to know if the Nigerian Government is “dining and wining with terrorists?”.
This is as the pan Yoruba ethnic association, Afenifere said Nigeria “has terribly shrunk under banditry”.
Both organisations spoke on the heels of the alarm by Pastor Tunde Bakare that Nigeria is now under siege by terrorists.


Bakare had also lambasted the presidency for comparing Ohanaeze and Afenifere with Fulani Miyetti Allah cattle breeders.
The verbal war was triggered by the insinuations that the Federal Government was negotiating with Miyetti Allah which demanded N100 billion inducement to stop the killings by herdsmen.
In its reaction, Ohanaeze aligned with Bakare that “Nigeria is under siege”.
Ohanaeze’s position was dropped by the Media and Information Adviser to the President General of Ohanaeze, Emeka Attamah.
He said Bakare was “right because terrorists are really in charge of whatever is happening now in Nigeria.”

Continuing he said : “If terrorists are not in charge, why should officials of this government negotiate with leaders of Miyetti Allah who are demanding N100 billion to enable its members stop killing Nigerians?
“I am not even sure that they have not paid the money.
“I would not like to be quoted as saying that all the officials of this government are terrorists but I never knew that Nigeria would descend to this level of open brigandage.
“It has never happened before. There is nowhere in the world where the government is in tacit understanding with terrorist organisations.
“Governments usually fight to eliminate terrorists and not to encourage them. The Nigerian government should face terrorists and treat them as such and not to eat or dine with them.”

Corroborating this position, Afenifere in a statement by its National Publicity Secretary, Yinka Odumakin said that Bakare only spoke the bitter truth which government never wanted to hear.
“The statement by Pastor Bakare is very true as the country now reels under terror .
“The governable space in Nigeria has terribly shrunk under banditry”, the statement said.
Worried also by the worsening security situation in the country, a renowned Islamic scholar, Sheikh Abdulrahman Abubakar, has chided the federal government for paying ransom to terrorists.
Sheikh Abubakar said “the failure of the security forces to minimise its own daily casualties in the fight against terror and the government’s alleged payment of ransom to terrorists are signs of weakness”.
The cleric called for a drastic and urgent measure against terrorists in Nigeria before it was late.
This is as the Catholic Archbishop of Abuja, John Cardinal Onaiyekan, has said that the federal government “can no longer guarantee security of lives” in the country.
The cleric said that the Federal Government’s perceived “powerlessness in the face of Nigeria’s mounting security challenges”, was a sign that “the security of the people can no longer be guaranteed by the government.”
There has been growing concern among the populace why the federal government which was quick to proscribe the Indigenous Peoples of Biafra, a non-violent group agitating for independence, is reluctant to at least designate the killer herdsmen a terrorist organization.
Government has also failed to see anything wrong with Miyetti Allah despite the group’s open defense for the killer herdsmen who had attacked some communities in parts of the country.
End
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