Our ‘mumu’ (is it stupidity?) has caught up with us. Now, no
one can escape the dire consequences of living in our cultural
and institutional deceit, self-denial and delusions. In brotherly
frankness, please, take these from me – Amos Akingba.
The quote is the last paragraph of Amos Akingba’s email of
January 5, 2015 to his aburo. It shall be the text for my
discourse on why the decades-long struggle for a True
Federalism Constitution stands today in danger of being
defeated.
From the backroom where ill health has confined me, I’ve been
watching this struggle for a True Federalism Constitution
(TFC) and I have a few observations to share with the elders
and captains of the struggle. The writing on the wall, as I see
it, is that the chance of winning the struggle for TFC by
dialogue and negotiation was lost on the Confab floor during
its closing session when Arewa introduced a surprise
amendment to the Confab Report, requiring that it be sent to
the National Assembly (NASS) as proposed amendments to
the 1999 Constitution. By not defeating that amendment, the
non-Caliphate majority of the delegates – from the New
South: i.e. south of Shariyaland, and comprising the zones of
South-West, South-South, South-East, and North-Central as
well as the indigenous non-Hafukawa, who are trapped in
Shariyaland itself, such as the Zuru in Kebbi State and the
Chibok in Borno State, whose new alliance had secured those
far reaching recommendations in the Confab Report – threw
away all the marvelous gains they had made. In not defeating
that amendment, the New South delegates sent the report to
a NASS, where Arewa can kill or gut it. Unless their
fraudulently built-in dominance at the NASS can somehow be
overcome, Arewa will get NASS to nullify the Confab Report
and return the struggle for TFC to square zero where it started
decades ago.
Why that amendment was not defeated is a matter for another
discussion. My aim here is to draw attention to what should
be done to begin to reverse that setback. Every struggle
suffers its setbacks, some avoidable, some not avoidable. But
once it has happened, the challenge is to recover from the
setback and push on till you achieve victory. To help promote
such recovery, permit me to make some suggestions, starting
with the quite obvious, since the obvious has a tendency to be
overlooked.
A post mortem session
The first thing a team or group should do after a setback, and
indeed, after every operation, whether successful or not, is a
post mortem (a.k.a. Criticism self-criticism , CSC) session.
During the post confab CSC session, I suggest that prime
attention be paid to understanding what Amos Akingba has
perceptively and provocatively called “Our mumu.” The second
issue that the CSC session should take up is the rebranding of
the struggle and turning it into the Nigerian Liberation
Movement, NLM.
First, what is our “mumu” and how do we end it? Here is my
take on what it is.
To guide our understanding of it, here are two precepts from
Sun Tzu, the master strategician (expert in strategics, the
science of strategy) from ancient China: (a) “One who is not
acquainted with the designs of his neighbours should not
enter alliances with them;” (b) “Know the enemy and know
yourself; in a hundred battles, you will never be defeated.”
Our “mumu”, broadly speaking, has been our ignorance and
non-application of these two precepts. But our principal mumu
has been our ignorance of precept (a). Discovering the
designs of our neighbour, by showing us that we have an
enemy and who that enemy is, will help cure us of our
disregard of precept (b). So let’s focus on precept (a).
Our “mumu” is our refusal to understand the designs of our
Caliphate neighbours (a.k.a the Hafukawa (the Hausa-Fulani-
Kanuri people), the Arewa sosei (the True North) or the
Shariyalanders) with whom we addictively insist on cohabiting
Lugard’s Nigeria. What we have refused to understand may be
broken down into the following items: Mumu #1: The
Caliphate is the subcontractor to whom the British
colonialists, under cover of granting independence in 1960,
handed over Nigeria to colonise for them. They are the
licensed sub-colonisers for the British imperialists.
Mumu #2: The ambition of the Caliphate, its design on its
neighbours in Nigeria, is to be the perpetual colonial masters
over all other Nigerians – this is sometimes hazily glimpsed
as their “born to rule” mentality. The non-Caliphate Nigerians
have failed to investigate the designs of our Caliphate
neighbours. As a result, we have not understood who it is we
insist on cohabiting Nigeria with. Without knowing their
colonialist designs, we have sought to build a “One Nigeria” in
which they are included as partners. In so doing, we have
been like mice, who insist on cohabiting a cage with a cat, on
the blind assumption that the cat is their brother, and is just
another mouse, and therefore, not a predator who eats mice.
The cat has gladly gone along with the foolish and
undiscerning mice, hoping they’ll never wise up to its designs
until it’s too late for them.
Mumu #3: The Caliphate uses religion, its project of
“advancing Sharia,” as cover for expanding its influence
beyond its Arewa/Shariyaland base area into the rest of its
inherited colony called Nigeria.
Mumu #4: The Caliphate is incorrigibly anti-democracy, and
will use whatever it can – coups, pogroms, fraudulent
constitutions, rigged elections etc. – to prevent democracy
from taking root in Nigeria. That is the prime lesson from
June 12, 1993 and the frauds of the 1999 constitution, but
we’ve refused to learn and apply it.
Ignorance of, and even willful refusal to understand, these four
things is what constitutes “our mumu.”
Our mumu has been the radical error of the non-Caliphate
Nigerians since negotiations for independence began in the
mid-1940s. It is still with us, as we go into the 2015
elections. And that is where it could accomplish our
permanent enslavement to the Caliphate.
For some 70 years now, we have assumed that the Caliphate
is simply our partner in the project of winning independence
from Britain and building Nigeria into a nation. But, in fact, the
Caliphate has always had other designs. It has been a
colonialist predator and not our partner in building “One
Nigeria.” We non-Caliphate Nigerians have been acting on this
lack of understanding of our Caliphate “partners.” Here are
key examples:
(a) 1950s: Because they wanted a big One Nigeria, the South
(the Eastern and Western regions) delayed their independence
and waited for a North, which claimed it was not ready. Had
they understood the colonialist designs of the Caliphate, they
would have refused to even consider the idea of co-existing
with the Caliphate within Nigeria, and would have taken their
independence separately in 1956. In waiting for the North, the
South were like mice on a ship who refused to set sail until
the cat came on board. That was our Mumu #2 in action.
(b) 1970s: During the negotiation for the 1979 constitution,
the North insisted on inclusion of Sharia in a secular
constitution. They were accommodated without our realising
that we were accommodating a cat among the mice. That
was our Mumu #3 in action.
(c) 2014: At the Confab, the Arewa delegates came as a
militant colonialist corps determined to protect their empire at
any cost. But the non-Caliphate delegates went there without
consciously organising as a militant anti-colonialist crusader
corps to battle the Caliphate colonialist Jihadist corps. The
non-Caliphate delegates, therefore, approached the Confab as
if it was a boardroom negotiation between partners in building
“One Nigeria,” whereas it was a serious battlefield. That,
again, was our Mumu #2 in action.
(d) Then, after having made significant gains in the
negotiations, the non-Caliphate delegates failed to defeat the
last minute Arewa amendment that, rather than by-passing
the NASS and treating the report as a basis for an entirely
new constitution, sent the report to the NASS as mere
recommendations for amending the fraudulent 1999
constitution. Had they gone to the confab with the militant
spirit of freedom fighters for liberation from Caliphate
colonialism, they would have been on high alert and would not
have allowed that trickster amendment to go through.
Again that was our Mumu#2 in action.
(e) 2015: As we head towards the February elections, our
voters, not having learned the prime lesson of June 12, 1993
are ignorant of the incorrigible anti-democracy character of
the Caliphate colonialists. They therefore, regard the
Jonathan-Buhari contest as just another contest between two
Nigerian democrats. Not recognising that Buhari is the
candidate and agent of the anti-democracy Caliphate
colonialists who aborted June 12, or not recognising what
that would mean should Buhari wins, many are prepared to
vote for Buhari rather than against him. That is our Mumu #4
in action.
This is quite ominous. Just as the Caliphate, from its fear of
democracy, aborted June 12, you can bet that, through an
elected or rigged-in “President Buhari,” it will abort the
present experiment in democracy, using any means it finds
necessary – coup, army mutiny, pogrom, martial law, state of
emergency, the illegal suspension of the constitution or some
other gimmick that would help them eternally entrench their
fraudulent 1999 constitution. Buhari is hypocritically posing as
a democrat, who will sweep the political stables clean of
corruption etc. From his history we know he won’t. Enemies
of democracy have been known to get into office through
democratic election only to turn and destroy the democracy
by which they won power. That’s exactly how Hitler got the
power with which he plagued the world. So, beware of
Buhari’s democratic posturing. Recall his transgressions when
he was military head of state and learn your lesson. Can the
leopard change his spots or the cat stop mousing? So, the
paramount issue in this election is Buhari and the Caliphate
colonialism that he represents. Do we want them to
perpetually enslave us and rub pepper into our eyes? That’s
what our history says should determine how we vote. If Buhari
wins, we are defeated and will end up enslaved to the
Caliphate Colonialists. If Buhari is defeated, we have a chance
to continue our liberation struggle.
The first task of Nigerians today should be to understand our
“mumu,” and having done so, to work out ways to end it. After
recognising the designs of our Caliphate neighbours for what
they are– namely Caliphate colonialism, that is to say, the
perpetual enslavement of all non-Caliphate Nigerians, we can
understand that they are the enemy in our midst and why.
Having come to know our enemy, we would have fulfilled the
first part of Sun Tzu’s precept to “know the enemy etc.”
Without knowing that the Caliphate is our enemy, we can’t
hope to win our struggle for TFC.
After the leaders of the TFC struggle understand all that, their
next task should be to get the tens of millions of non-
Caliphate Nigerians to also understand and end this our
“mumu.” Only then can they vote in their own basic strategic
interest and vote against Buhari and the Caliphate.
Whether that public enlightenment task can be accomplished
before February 14 is another matter. But however, much can
be done should be done. The enlightenment campaign should
be continued thereafter so as to prepare the minds of non-
Caliphate Nigerians for the post-election resumption of the
struggle for TFC. That knowledge will help to mobilise them
for the rest of the struggle.
Let me sum up briefly. We need to know that the Caliphate is
an incorrigible coloniser and anti-democracy feudalist. It is
determined to colonise and perpetually enslave all the other
Nigerians. You can’t defeat an enslaver until you recognise
that his mission is to enslave you. It is only after gaining that
precious insight that you can organise appropriately and do
whatever is necessary to defeat him. Gaining that insight and
acting on it would constitute the ending of our “mumu.”
If Buhari wins on February 14, then all of us of the New South
lose — regardless of our religion, regardless of our ethnicity,
regardless of our political party. We all and our posterity
become slaves of the Caliphate colonialists.
