PRESS RELEASE
We should put the recent Ife mayhem which claimed so many innocent and defenceless lives in proper and historic perspective in order to understand and appreciate the enormity of the damage and desecration of the sacred ancestral home of all Yoruba people worldwide.
A Fulani or Hausa man was reported to have violently assaulted a Yoruba housewife who went home to report the unprovoked attack to her husband. When the husband arrived the scene the Hausa or Fulani man gave the husband a dirty slap and poured invectives on him and his wife. The situation got out of control and degenerated into a free for all fight. The Hausa and Fulani elements that were said to be spoiling for a fight drew out their dangerous arsenal and joyfully beheaded one Ife vulcanizer whose decapitated head was hung on a pole and gleefully paraded in a show of bravado and recklessness.
This kind of beastly display would naturally provoke any host community to anger anywhere in the world, more so at Ile-Ife which has just come out of a vicious communal war.
What is now worrisome is the attitude of the Nigeria Police to the imbroglio. A referee has suddenly become a player on the side of a team. Several arrests were made and when those arrested were paraded it turned out that not a single Hausa or Fulani man or woman was among the list. A respected Ife traditional ruler was also paraded.
Nigerians are alarmed that the suspects were all whisked to Abuja, a city far removed from the scene or state of the incident. The police who are supposed to be umpires in this case have become interested parties. By the singular act of sectional and selective arrests, the police have removed themselves from being impartial arbitrators.
Very many very important personalities and prominent politicians from Hausa and Fulani communities in the North are said to be descending on Ile-Ife in droves with questionable and suspicious motives thereby fuelling the fear and apprehension of the host community in Ile Ife.
G9, the umbrella body of Organizations dedicated to the emancipation of Nigeria from the clutches of internal imperialism and tyranny is worried that guests to a host community are trampling on the liberty and civilization of their host and are seen to be encouraged by those who are supposed to be just and even handed in adjudication.
Inspector General of the Nigeria Police is hereby called upon to return all those being paraded in Abuja to Ile-Ife which has jurisdiction to try them while at the same time setting up his dragnet to arrest all the Hausa and Fulani provocateurs including the gruesome murderer who first killed and cut off the Ife Vulcanizer’s head and those who callously paraded the severed head. Holding the detainees a day longer in Abuja or sentencing them in any kangaroo arrangement may further aggravate an already tense atmosphere and the consequences may be anybody’s guess.
Justice must be served in a manner that must be transparently impartial, just, credible and trusted. As things stand with Ife mayhem, the Police have portrayed themselves as partial, partisan and unprofessional.
If Nigeria must remain one, it has to respect each and every member of the constituents.
Chief Tola Adeniyi,
Convener G9.