The echoes of the just concluded senate retreat in Uyo, Akwa Ibom State will continue to revibrate. UCHENNA AWOM in this dairy writes that perhaps the Senate President’s outburst will remain the high point of the event.
To some people the seeming frank outburst of President of the Senate David Mark on the orgy of killings and bombings in the North was a sour grape, too bitter and very choking. To them, it was most condescending as it was demeaning of the Northern elders.
But to a host of others it was a very frank and sincere talk that exhibits all the trappings of a true and selfless patriot. These were the two schools of thought that would shape debates on the resolutions of the Senate retreat, which was concluded in Uyo, Akwa Ibom at the weekend.
Beyond that, Mark’s speech would historically represent a watershed in the struggle to find a lasting solution to the surging violent attack and bombings perpetrated by the terrorist group; Boko Haram. The Senate retreat was no doubt an elixir of some sort. It provided the opportunity and a serene atmosphere for Senators and major stakeholders to ventilate and talk in a no hold bare manner the troubling state of insecurity in Nigeria, particularly in the Northern region.
The killings, bombings and destruction of properties have become a daily affair and Nigerians have tuned to that reality until the frightening religious dimension occasioned by the bombing of Churches and then the spontaneous reprisals a forth night ago. It was indeed a development that jolted Nigeria and raised fears of an imminent religious war. It is a fear and palpable one that forced the senators to retreat in Uyo.
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That Mark’s speech.
“The problem we have in this country today and we must say it loud and clear is the Boko Haram. Whatever name we might want to give to it is just saving the issue.
“People have given reasons for the causes for the Boko Haram sect, they say it is poverty; to me, the reason is very tenuous. If every poor man in this country decides to be a suicide bomber, Nigerian strictly will not exist.
“Secondly, people have said it is lack of education, I agree that that will be an issue but we cannot overcome that overnight, somebody who is not educated cannot wake up overnight and become educated. There is a long process to it. And I think government has taken the right step by educating the Almajiris in the north. For a long time nobody in the north wanted to talk about it. Because if you did all the religious teachers and clerics will take you on but thank God we have gone past all that now. Now we have all agreed that the people and almajiris have to be properly educated.
“The consequences of the Boko Haram at the moment are so numerous and we cannot imagine them. There is already a lot of mass movement on regional basis and this is not good for this country. It is promoting ethnic and religious conflict and thinking and that is not good for this country.
“Underdevelopment in the northern parts of this country has become obvious. Already the hue and cry is that the north is not developed. With the activities of Boko Haram; will that solve the problem of development in the north? The answer is no. So we are shooting ourselves in the feet. Nobody is going to wait for the north. Akpabio is not going to wait for the north to develop, the man in River state is not going to wait for the north to develop. So the same people who are crying that under-development is in the north are at the same moment responsible for the subsequent under-development that is occurring in the north. No investor is going to bring his money and invest in Kaduna, Kano or Jigawa when his life is in danger. The investor that comes to Nigeria will be at the safe area and the safe area are the southern states.
“The northern states have to think properly before we allow what Boko Haram is doing now to bring the north to its knees; a few selected cabal on their own want to bring the north on their knees and we must do something positively about it.
“If things are allowed to go on like this, it will encourage disunity and religious war because there is a limit to patient. Christian preachers and organizers have been appealing, and I have been almost at the forefront of appealing to Christians that they should not go for vengeance. But how long will the people continue to listen to us because if a bishop consistently in his preaching to his congregation, yes God says vengeance is mine, yes we all hear that, but if we have no church anymore to reach out, if he wakes up in the morning, where will he preach?
“So there is a limit to the patience that preachers will have to tell their people.
“On the other hand, if Christians go out for vengeance then the terrorists have succeeded in what they want to do because they want to bring religious war. Again we must make sure that we continue to preach to the people hard and difficult as it might appear that there should be no vengeance and that they should leave vengeance to God and that is a religious issue for both Christianity and Islam.
“International rating of the country will go down and no investor will like to come to the country to make any investment. The submission to me is that we must dialogue with the group. Government must open an avenue for dialogue. I am a great supporter of dialogue. The sect must make their leaders known, because we cannot dialogue with nobody. You can’t dialogue without knowing who is the leader of the sect. like I keep saying, if they have genuine grievances, there is no reason their leaders will not come out. The mere fact that they are hiding behind the scene and doing what they are doing shows that they know that what they are doing is evil otherwise, if you are leaders of men who have good intentions, there is no reason to fear in coming out. If their leaders come out today and they want to dialogue, they will not be arrested and nobody is threatening them. We want to know the people who are behind this group and their leaders so that we can dialogue with them.
“We in the legislature, we must review the laws of terrorism to give more powers to security agents who are fighting terrorism. Desperate times require desperate measures. At the moment, we cannot go by mere rule of law. I think that there is requirement for us to revisit existing laws on terrorism. We must seek external support and cooperation, we should not be ashamed to do that if we cannot handle the situation.
“We need to direct our searchlight at the moment on how these terrorists are being funded and trained. It is important. We need to consider license for preachers. If an imam is preaching that if you do this you will go to heaven and we know that that preaching is wrong, we must find a way to stop such preachers. Where are the good Islamic scholars? Where are the good Islamic teachers? We need to see them and they need to come out. Because Boko Haram cannot kill everybody who oppose Boko Haram unless we summon up the courage to speak up. If we don’t speak up, it is just as bad as funding them. It is as bad as training them, it is as bad as funding them. So the good people must now begin to speak up. It is time government considers issuing licenses to preachers.
“The elders in the north, I ask, can they really stop this menace and if they cannot, let them say so. Because the impression at the moment is that there are some groups of elders in the north, who can stop it; there are groups of elders who know what is happening. My candid opinion is that they cannot stop it and they don’t know what is happening. If they were involved at all at some time, they are now completely out of control right now as we speak but if they are, I think it is proper that they come out because Nigerian has to be one for northern Nigeria to exist.
“The way the exercise is going at the moment, if Boko Haram is not halted, it may result to the breakup of this country and God forbid, because people will not take it for too long. I call on the elders that they should come out frankly and they should assist if they are in the position. But if they don’t, they will also break”.
Well, the Senate President may stirred passion and emotion, but the obvious truth is that solution must be found. Mark said “we in the senate have done our own at least we have provided the window and the positions that can quicken the resolution of the violent crisis”.
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