The Arewa Consultative Forum (ACF) has urged the Federal Government to call Yoruba Nation agitator, Sunday Igboho, to order.
The group condemned Igboho’s ultimatum to Fulani leaders in Oyo State following the abduction of a pregnant woman and her relatives.
Arewa warned that such a move could inflame tensions, provoke reprisals and undermine national unity.
Naijaonpoint reports that Igboho had earlier defended his move, arguing that his campaign for improved security in the South-West and other parts of Nigeria targets only criminals and not any ethnic nationality.
However, the National Publicity Secretary of the Arewa Consultative Forum, Tukur Muhammad-Baba, told Punch that the ultimatum given to the ethnic group was unconstitutional, dangerous and capable of worsening the country’s security challenges.
According to him, the Federal Government, security agencies, traditional rulers and religious leaders must act quickly to prevent the situation from escalating.
“It is, therefore, the duty of the state, security agencies and community leaders, religious clergy, etc., to call him to order and to make it clear that ethnic profiling is a many-sided sword, a recipe for anarchy and an aberration in the modern world,” he said.
The ACF spokesman argued that the ultimatum unfairly portrayed all Fulani people as accomplices in crimes allegedly committed by a few individuals.
“The ultimatum is condemnable as it presumes the specific kidnappers represent the whole Fulani group without exception,” he said.
Muhammad-Baba noted that there was no evidence establishing the ethnic identity of the abductors, stressing that kidnapping had evolved into a criminal enterprise involving people from diverse ethnic and religious backgrounds.
“It is not clear how he has concluded that the kidnappers are of the Fulani ethnic group, when we know that the criminal enterprise that kidnapping has evolved into involves all manner of people irrespective of social identities, ethnicity, religion, gender, etc.
“Wholesale association of kidnapping with all Fulani ethnic people is clearly counterintuitive. Plainly, it is counterproductive to assume Fulani people in this location and everywhere else should be held responsible for the activities of criminal elements from among them,” he said.
He further argued that attributing criminality to an ethnic group amounted to self-deception.
“It is a trite fact that criminality has no tribe and to assume otherwise is to engage in collective illusory self-deception,” he added.
Questioning the legality of Igboho’s actions, Muhammad-Baba maintained that neither the activist nor his associates had constitutional powers to issue such directives.
“Obviously, the directive is unconstitutional. Mr Igboho and his group are not state law enforcement agents and cannot operate outside the law of the land,” he stated.
He warned that allowing non-state actors to assume security responsibilities could encourage retaliatory actions elsewhere in the country.
“Their activities pose a threat to national security, and if they remain unrestrained, there is a risk of copycat backlash from others and our slide into catastrophic anarchy and atavism.”
The professor, however, blamed the rise of ethnic champions and self-help security measures on the government’s inability to adequately secure lives and property.
“It is a sign of failure and abdication of the responsibility of government to protect the lives and property of citizens, that enable kidnappers and other criminals to operate. The same failure also encourages local non-state actors and champions of provincialism to seek to fill the gap left by the state.
“Characters like Sunday Igboho can be seen as products of bad governance, corruption, impunity and criminal neglect by government,” he said.
