Presidency, Nyako Engage In War Of Words Over Genocide Claim

 

The Presidency described a memo written by Governor Murtala Nyako of Adamawa State to the Northern Governors' Forum as a sad betrayal of trust by a major beneficiary of Nigerian nation.
The memo highlighted Governor Nyako's fears that the Presidency may intentionally not be doing enough to solve the many problems of insecurity in the North. Reacting to the claims, the Presidency said the Governor's positions smacks of "an unmitigated leadership disaster."
Senior Special Assistant to the President on Public Affairs, Dr. Doyin Okupe, said the content of the governor's letter betrays his lack of a sense of history. According to Okupe, the memo portrayed the governor as incapable of rising above parochial sentiments as a result of his deep rooted disdain for facts and truth in public discourse.
The SSA, who said the memo is extremely divisive, added that it was intentionally meant to incite one section of the country against the other.

"Governor Nyako claims that President Goodluck Jonathan is from the Eastern region which according to him was responsible for the killing of Northern political elites on the 15th of January 1966. This is a very disgraceful remark by the governor and a pathetic embarrassment to the Nigerian Military from where Nyako derives his career antecedents. It is certainly a reflection of the Governor’s ignorance and unpatriotic inclinations."

"Similarly, the Adamawa State governor referred to the Boko Haram terrorist group as a 'phantom organization' which he believes does not exist! How hypocritical? In his unwise and desperate attempt to demonise the Federal Government, Governor Nyako likened the military operations against insurgents to the activities of German dictator, Adolf Hitler.

"In his befuddled mind and apparent hallucination, the Federal Government should be held responsible for the activities of insurgents in the North East and the sad killings, wanton destruction, murder and kidnapping of school children as well as other horrendous activities of Boko Haram should be hung on the neck of the Federal Government!

"He therefore invited his colleague northern governors to join him to sue the Federal Government. This definitely defies common sense and portrays Mr. Nyako as unfit for the hallowed position of a state governor.

"It is obvious that Governor Nyako's opposition to the declaration of a State of Emergency in three affected states of the North East as well as his repeated calls for the withdrawal of the Military from troubled states without any credible alternative or security road map, is an open endorsement of the activities of the insurgents which is meant to provide them unrestricted opportunity to further unleash terror on innocent citizens in order to precipitate chaos, further instability, mayhem and anarchy, a situation which they intend to exploit to undermine the administration and truncate our growing democracy. This, Nigerians will surely not allow to happen."

Okupe restated the federal government's "continuous determination to defeat terror and restore peace to every part of northern Nigeria so that every law abiding citizen can go about with his/her socio economic pursuit without let or hindrance."
Nyako retaliates
Reacting to the presidency's statement same day, Governor Nyako said the response by the Presidency to his memo to Northern Governors has further proved that those running the Federal Government are too arrogant and confused in their handling of the affairs of the country.
Accusing the Presidency of telling lies and feeding the public with untruth in its response to his memo to fellow Governors of the northern states on the activities of the dreaded Boko Haram Islamic sect and other issues of insecurity, Nyako, in a statement by the Director, Press and Public Affairs in the Government House, Ahmad Sajoh, said it is now very clear that President Goodluck Jonathan is very complacent about the insecurity in the northern part of the country.

According to him, "They arrogate all knowledge and wisdom to themselves alone. We hold the statements we released as true and challenge those who claim to have a sense of history to cut-off the use of jaundiced semantics to address the issues raised in this and several other documents before it. By telling black lies about the attack on Governor Nyako which was never investigated nor ascertained, the Presidency is providing further proof that it knows more than it is willing to admit in the whole saga."

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The statement accused the federal government of misleading the populace on all fronts saying, "Feeding the public with untruth is becoming a new culture in Abuja. The statement on the supposed rescue of the abducted girls is enough to prove that. It is a pity that responsible and supposedly educated people could manufacture statements and attribute them to others just to create an escape route from their glaring failures. None of the statements attributed to Governor Nyako by the Presidency were ever made by him. They were all manufactured for lack of a sound counter argument."

The Adamawa helmsman challenged the President to react directly to the issues raised in the memo instead of making up statements that were not part of the correspondence in question.

He continued, "If indeed the Presidency is not complacent about the killings in the country how come the President went dancing a day after several citizens were killed in Abuja? If they claim that Nyako does not deserve to be Governor, are they fit to be where they are? When we say the Boko Haram phenomenon is phantom we are talking based on several testimonies by the President.

"At one point he said there are Boko Haram in his government, at another point he said they are ghosts he cannot dialogue with ghosts, yet recently he admitted that the young poverty stricken persons so far arrested cannot afford the guns they carry. And we say to them you have full command and control of the Armed Forces and security outfits with all the Intelligence units, investigate their activities, expose their patrons, sponsors and strategic commanders and arrest them."

He challenged the Presidency to expose the source of the arms used by the insurgents.

"We still repeat the earlier questions we raised. How come the insurgents move about unchallenged at night in our states under so called Emergency Rule when we have a night time curfew in place? How come the insurgents operate for many hours unchallenged when we have military units all over the place? How come the insurgents move with a large convoy of vehicles through routes that have 24 hours military check points? How come statements by the Presidency and other authorities in Abuja are always at variance with realities on ground at the theatres of conflict? We want answers not insults or empty rhetoric."

On allegation against the Governor that he is creating divisions among the people with his utterances, the Adamawa State Government said President Jonathan is the chief culprit in this.

"On the issue of creating divisions among the people, no one does it better than the Presidency that urges its backers to direct its people to implicate innocent Northerners in bombings they know nothing of, or one whose known official uses online sources to implicate someone it chooses to hate for no just cause. This Presidency also encourages some of its spokespersons to speak ill of certain persons and religion without a reprimand."

He accused the Presidency of being the most divisive administration in the country to date: "This is the most divisive leadership in the history of this country and it also the most desperate to cling to power even at the cost of several lives of innocent citizens. Unfortunately it is also the most inept, confused, greedy, corrupt and incompetent regime ever. On the corruption mantra, while the Presidency is fond of asking Governors to account for allocations given, we challenge them to live by the same token, declare what you got and account for it."

He accused the Presidency of not executing project that funds have been disbursed for. According to him, "After all we now have proof that certain projects which are not executed have been announced as completed such as the Hong to Mubi road in our state which the Minister of Information announced its execution at their Bauchi Rally. Meanwhile, someone should help us ask the President under what Budget sub-head did he get the money he allegedly gave Governor Kwankwaso to bribe delegates to vote for him which was allegedly diverted.

"We think rather than vent their venom in insulting people, presidential spokespersons and media managers should do better by re-focussing the man to be more open minded and competent in grappling with the myriads of challenges facing the nation," Nyako said.

The governor had in the now controversial memo accused the administration of President Jonathan of carrying out genocide against northern states with impunity. The Governor said the adverse security situation in the North in particular and Nigeria in general is being felt by all genuine stakeholders but lamented that while every state government is doing everything possible using virtually all its resources to stem the tide of near disaster facing the North, the present federal administration has become a government of impunity run by an evil-minded leadership for the advancement of corruption.
Nyako regretted that the protection of life and property of innocent citizens in Northern Nigeria and recognising their human rights and voting right in the forthcoming general elections is no longer a cardinal principle of the administration.

"Clearly the victims of the Administration's evil-mindedness are substantially Northern Nigerians. The administration is bent on bringing wars in the North between Muslim and Christians and within them and between one ethnic group and another or others in various communities in the region. No wonder, we in the Northern Nigeria are now facing an organised ethno-religious campaigns of hate fuelled by the federal administration to make communities which hitherto have remained peaceful for centuries to start killing the minorities in their midst and to facilitate mass killings of the innocent and the arbitrary arrests and torture of elders of minority ethnic groups in the various Northern communities."

Listing occurrences of violence the governor wrote, "We, in Adamawa State, have been battling this heinous machination in the last three years. We also saw it as the Beginning of Genocide. Genocide kingpins are now on prowl in Northern Nigeria! Fulani communities in parts of the North who have been in their locations for over 100 years are now being raided and uprooted by paid killers within the Nigerian Army for the satisfaction of the Federal administration instead of being protected as citizens with their rights and dignity safe-guarded."

He observed, "The Federal administration’s affront to frame Northerners is also an open secret. Senior Special Assistant to Mr. President tried to hoodwink us into believing that Malam Sanusi Lamido Sanusi was kingpin of Boko-Haram. Mr. Henry Okah, the convicted leader of MEND also stated under oath that he was being put under pressure by the administration to implicate senior Northern elements such as Generals Ibrahim Babangida and Muhammadu Buhari as financiers of Boko Haram terrorism. We are in deep trouble. We have begun to sleep with ‘both our eyes widely open."