“THE POSITION OF THE MBULA NATION ON THE UNGUIDED UTTERANCES OF THE POLICE COMMISSIONER”
Our Position
Having watched with great displeasure, the unfolding events in our existence as a peaceful but strong-willed people, we write to register our highest disappointment in the unfortunate and irresponsible comments of the Adamawa state Commissioner of Police in an interview he granted to Channels Television on 3rd March, 2018. The Police Commissioner was on television to mislead and misinform the entire nation and by extension the world about the unabated and increasing Fulani herdsmen attacks that are almost becoming daily occurrences on our communities and its people the latest being the attacks of Tuesday 27th February, 2018 in which we lost a lot of good people including some of our finest sons who were caught in the cross fire. These huge losses shouldn’t have happened had the Police carried out their constitutional duty of serving and protecting the lives of the Nigerian citizens; a duty for which they have been entrusted with by citizens of the country including the people of our communities who are now left to be victims of unimaginable carnage.
The unprovoked terrorist attacks by these herdsmen on the entire Gwamba community were premeditated and planned for nothing other than conquest. It is obvious that these unwarranted terror assaults were deliberately orchestrated and purposely executed to create fear and eventually subdue a hitherto peaceful people who did nothing wrong but went about their lawful and legitimate ways of lives. This was an attack brought upon a peace loving people and on their ancestral home where they have settled and lived for over 500 years; and from the events that unfolded, it will not be out of place to say that It is a clear robust calculation and attempt by the Fulani ethnic group to, through subtle and violent means, take over the entire Adamawa State. This grand conspiracy will not prevail! IT CAN NEVER WORK!! As a peace loving people, we will not sit back and fold our hands to see these evil tactics succeed; and the earlier these perpetrators and their sponsors realized this, the better.
To clear every air of doubt, we will provide a brief, accurate and verifiable account of how this whole situation started and how it got us to the dark state in which we now find ourselves.
The ugly and unfortunate situation started on Tuesday, 6th February, 2018 when Fulani Herdsmen attacked a harmless and defenceless Gwamba Young man and brutally killed him on his farm. As if that was not enough, in what is now fast becoming their trade mark massacre manner, they desecrated the body by removing his eye balls and his private parts. The defaced body was discovered in the early hours of the following day. The inhumane act was immediately reported to the closest Police Station in Borrong which yielded no results. The community, infuriated by their loss, and frustrated by the nonchalant attitude of the security agencies towards their plight, struck back at their assailants. It was at this point that the herdsmen began their build-up for full-scale reprisal warfare. They began to send threat messages of an impending attack for a sustained period of over two weeks. These threats were promptly and adequately reported to the Commissioner of Police, but no action, whatsoever, was taken. The aggressors then began to reinforce and gather their fighters and mercenaries in Camps around neighbouring boundaries not far from our community; these events were also promptly reported to the police who once again turned deaf ears to our complaints. It took persistent persuasions by our leaders for the Commissioner to send a handful of mobile police men to Borrong on Tuesday, 13 February, 2018. The Police men visited Gwamba only a couple of times on and off back as if on some supervisory duty and eventually left after only a few days.
EFFORTS TO RESTORE PEACE
Following these chains of events, the Mbula Development Association together with title holders and some elites led by Prince Fenny Fwa, visited Borrong on Thursday, 15th February, 2018 and had two meetings with the Mbula Community, especially the Youths and the Hausa/ Fulani Communities and sued for peaceful coexistence and warned that any of the sides who dared to engage or take laws into their hands shall incur huge and dire consequences.
The Commissioner of Police and all other security parastatals were all in full knowledge of these meetings and the deliberations; and were also fully aware of the entire build up of these terrorist forces and their atrociously evil plans, yet, as usual, nothing tangible was done to nib the situation at the bud until it finally precipitated, degenerated and culminated into what we now know as “Black Tuesday” – a day that will remain one of the darkest in the annals of our history as a people. A day so sad and painful that generations yet unborn will hear about it.
This situation only goes further to give credence to the alleged tacit support government, through its agencies, are providing to these marauders as facts abound about helicopter surveillance around Gwamba Communities only days before the attack.
It is therefore sickening and unfortunate to say the least, that a man who is suppose to be neutral, being the head of the security command of the state, will go on National Television and tell a barefaced, dense lie, misleading and misinforming the largely unhappy populace without the simple courtesy or decorum that his office requires. How can a man occupy an office so honourable and yet act so discreditably? Mr. Commissioner, have you no human feelings at least for the innocent lives needlessly lost as a result of your reprehensible incompetence? What happened to empathy and your ordinary sense of humanity? Are you so bereft of any form of natural decorum and respect? Are you totally devoid of conscience, tact and diplomacy? This makes one begin to wonder if the security agencies can still be depended upon to protect lives and administer justice.
We are so shocked and disappointed at your statement that this was only ‘a mere communal clash’. How can it be such? A communal clash with a group armed to the tooth that is now globally labelled and designated as the fourth deadliest terrorist group in the world?
We are so disappointed by your unprofessional but not too surprising false tales that it was our people who went for reprisal. Went where? How can our people who went for a reprisal still be the ones subjected to irreversible loss of lives and insufferable damages? People were murdered and homes completely razed to the ground? How could this have happened sir? We wish to ask again, we went where? Are you suggesting we went to our own community for retaliation? Against whom? The facts are out there for anyone who wishes to see – even the blind with common sense would perceive the truth. This is the same false line that was used on the Benue killings and we thought lessons have since been learned and such will not be repeated, but as all these recent untoward acts and utterances have shown, nothing seemed to have been gained from past experience.
We understand that as a Fulani man yourself, perhaps a son or grandson of a herdsman, your natural prejudice is to value and protect FIRST your own kind; your kith and kin, members of your own bloodline. However, we didn’t know you would go so far. The truth remains the truth no matter how much you make it up or try to give it a different resemblance and similitude. Your office is a public office and your oath is to do justice to all manner of people without fear or favour, affection or ill-will. Your office does not allow for discrimination along the lines of tribe or creed because justice indeed is blind to all that.
We have given you every support and cooperation as a people and as a community but this is what we get in return for our peaceful disposition? Therefore, for the abuse of our collective sensibilities and deliberate false representation of the facts, we hereby demand an unreserved, unambiguous and unequivocal apology and the immediate retraction of your unfortunate comments on the attacks. Nothing less than this will suffice as far as we and your oath of office are concerned.
We also demand for a full scale judicial commission of inquiry to thoroughly investigate the remote cause of this attack and to make same public with the sole aim of bringing the criminals and all people found culpable to the full wrath of the law until justice is finally served.
Long Live Gwamba District
Long Live Mbula Kingdom
Long Live Numan Federation
Long live Adamawa State
Long live the Federal Republic of Nigeria.
Signed by:
Mbula Special Media Committee
5th March, 2018
