The Oodua People’s Congress (OPC) has advised the presidency and the Arewa Consultative Forum (ACF) against playing politics with the worrisome state of security in the South-West.
The group also offered to assist Governor Rotimi Akeredolu in enforcing the deadline issued to herdsmen to vacate forest reserves in Ondo State.
In a statement issued after an emergency meeting of its leaders at Century Hotel, Okota, Lagos on Monday, OPC noted that no Southerner would dare go to the North and carry out killing, kidnapping and banditry that suspected Fulani criminals have unleashed on Southern communities and highways in recent time.
The statement, signed by Wasiu Afolabi, deputy president to the late OPC founder, Frederick Fasehun, expressed the group’s backing for the pronouncement issued by the Ondo governor ordering herdsmen to leave forests for open areas.
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“ACF is threatening reprisals instead of telling its prodigal sons to halt their criminality. ACF should know that nobody has a monopoly over violence,” said the Yoruba socio-cultural group.
“Although the millions of law-abiding Fulani men and women living in our midst have absolutely no cause for alarm, those Fulani criminals hiding under the cloak of being herdsmen to perpetrate evil against law-abiding citizens should know their time is up. Henceforth, it will be fire for fire,” the group said in the statement.
OPC said it is fully prepared to help enforce Governor Akeredolu’s quit notice in Ondo State at the expiration of the two-week deadline.
“Anybody found in the jungle will be regarded as a kidnapper and bandit and will be appropriately dealt with. We Yoruba shall rise up to defend our land from foreign marauders who daily rape our women, kill our farmers and kidnap Nigerian citizens. Enough is enough,” it said.
OPC also described the manhunt launched by the police for the Yoruba activist, Sunday Igboho, as misguided and provocative.
“The government must guarantee the life of Sunday Igboho. Rather than declare Sunday Adeyemo an outlaw, the Federal Government’s security agencies should turn their attention against criminal elements engaging in kidnappings and killings in the South,” the group said.
OPC further said the presidency’s opposition to Akeredolu’s order was divisive, provocative and ill-advised, as well as an insult to the country’s Federalism and the principle of Separation of Powers as enshrined in the Constitution.
The OPC urged all Yoruba to speak with one voice against the rising insecurity in their land, adding that the race currently faces an existential threat to its survival as foreign criminals had turned highways, forests and farms into danger zones while the Buhari government turned a blind eye.
“In this Federation, one level of government will be overstepping its bounds by dictating to another level of government. The evil of kidnapping and killing being perpetrated by Nigerian Fulani and their foreign cousins can no longer be tolerated. This kids-glove treatment was how authorities encouraged Boko Haram to transform into a full-blown terrorist organisation that has made the North-East the most dangerous place to live in the world.
“Therefore, in line with His Excellency’s directive as the Chief Security Officer of Ondo State, herdsmen, tourists and farmers alike must vacate forest reserves to enable security agents and vigilantes move in to smoke kidnappers out of their hiding places and restore sanity to the backwoods.
“Time has come for all Nigerians, especially the National Assembly, to compel the president to alter the security architecture to conform to the Federal Character principle of the Nigerian Constitution he swore to uphold. What obtains now is lopsided in favour of a section of the country and this is dangerous,” OPC said.
