The North and Nigeria

The North and Nigeria's Leadership: Is it for Real or a Myth?

Chidi P Eze

Is the destruction of Nigeria or her survival depend on the north controlling the Nigeria ’s presidency or is the survival of the north depend on it holding on to the Nigeria ’s presidency? Why is the north so obsessed with the Nigeria ’s presidency? Nigeria ’s airwaves and news- prints have been inundated with the zoning of the Nigeria ’s presidency in the year 2007 to the north. Hypothetically, if the notion is correct, which is not, why is it that only the Alhajis are the ones parading themselves for the job? Where are the northern masses? Is it correct to ask if there is no Mr. in the north qualified or capable of becoming Nigeria ’s president?

The north has held the Nigeria ’s leadership since independence in 1960. Alhaji Abubakar Tafawa Balewa ,1960 to 1966. “Alhaji Yakubu Gowon”, 1966 to 1975. Alhaji Murtala Mohammed, 1975 to 1976. Alhaji Musa Shehu Yar’dua 1976 to 1979 with Obasanjo as a camouflage. Alhaji Shehu Shagari, 1979 to 1983. Alhaji Muhammadu Buhari, 1983 to 1985. Alhaji Ibrahim Babangida, 1985 to 1993. Alhaji Sani Abacha, 1993 to 1998. Alhaji Abdulsalami Abubakar, 1998 to 1999. In other words, the Nigeria ’s presidency has been with the north for 39 years during which not a single northerner ever raised a voice for equity, fairness and justice. There was no gentlemen agreement, there was no talk of short changing the southern interest. For these 39 years, what did Nigerians get for this northern leadership? An excessive corrupt nation, a nation that award contracts and demand 50 percent kick back and kick front, a nation of big for nothing, a nation whose security apparatus was controlled by untrained and intellectually challenged men and women, a nation with a demoralized people and battered economy, a nation whose strategic economic operations were manned only, by socially and intellectually challenged Alhajis, and absolute monetization of Alhajis and northern emirs.

The greatest disservice Obasanjo will do to Nigeria and Nigerians is to hand over power to the north so soon. Obasanjo has been trying to clean up the mess of Babangida, and co. If the north gets hold of the presidency so soon, Nigerians will go back to an army that is completely Islamized, a sharianized police force, and the custom service, the immigration service, the education, the supreme court, the JAMB and many national strategic interests will all be Alhajinized. The interest of the north in the presidency has nothing to do with the effective and purposeful leadership of Nigeria , but to continue the Islamic domination, corruption, embezzlement and abuse of Nigeria ’s oil wealth.

Listening to Alhaji Abubakar Rimi and one Alhaji senator Usman Albishr on the issue of Nigeria ’s presidency come 2007. They have already begun to count their eggs before they are hatched. Hear Alhaji Albishr, “The zoning of the Nigeria ’s presidency to the north in 2007 is not negotiable. Northern power block only agreed to allow for power to shift to the south for a while. The north would take back the power it reluctantly conceded to the south in 1999”. The Islamic power control and domination brought misery and hopelessness to Nigerians. Since the proper Nigerianization of the Nigerian army, the police and the civil service, began in 1999, the north has been very uncomfortable and insecure because it lost it’s main source of power control, the army, the police and the headships of Nigeria’s civil service and federal boards through partial federalism, an improvement on what Nigerians were used to, under northern policy.

I do hope Mr. Obasanjo is very carefully listening to the northerners as they continue to reveal their aims of wanting the presidency back immediately after him. As far as the core north is concerned, the south and the northern Christians do not exist. Why does Babangida want the Nigeria ’s presidency even after more than his 8 years of ruining the country? Alhaji Abubakar Atiku, the head of custom at Murtala international airport Lagos who embezzled him self out of control, remember the issue of 53 suite cases of 1984. Alhaji Mohammed Marwa who floated airliners just one month after being removed as state administrator. Where did he get the money? Oil money from the south.

Minus corruption, fraud, embezzlement, social injustice, violence monopolization of Nigeria ’s security outfits, the army, the police, the custom service, the immigration service, the education service, the judicial service, the constant attempt to Islamize Nigeria and Nigerians, endless military coups, what is actually the contribution of the north in the development of Nigeria ?

It is a known fact the northern monopoly of Nigeria ’s presidency desecrated and destroyed the Nigerian army, the police and their professionalism. Read major-general M.C Alli, (rtd ) the current administrator of Plateau state, on, Babangida, Abacha and co, published by the Sun News paper. What does the northern presidency mean to the northern Christian in particular, and the south and her Christian population in general? It can only mean one thing and one thing only, and that is, total sharianization and Islamization of the entire Nigeria . There are too many things to be corrected in Nigeria ’s polity before talks of northern presidency. That the country is in shambles today is due to northern control and monopoly of Nigeria ’s leadership. This monopoly and control were employed by the Islamic north to enslave the Christian north and render them economically and politically impotent to be unable to vie for the leadership of Nigeria . It denied them political and structural empowerment. Even if the presidency will go to north, let it be at least after 2023. This will be sufficient time to sanitize the military or remove the military from presidential control. Let the north have a taste of political powerlessness, so it can get a feel of what the entire south has felt for 39 long years. The era of monkey dey work and bamboo dey chop is over. Common sense should remind Obasanjo what Ndigbo, the Yorubas, the Ijaws and the entire southern and northern Christians suffered under the northern domination. Obasanjo should also consider what he himself went through under the northern control of the security forces. It does not matter how many times the north would make him president, it does not remove the fact that the Islamic north made him an ex-convict, the same north made Awolowo an ex-convict, the same north annulled a mandate given to Abiola by Nigerians, because it was controlling Islamic army. I know Mr. Obasanjo would not dump Nigerians to the mercy of the Islamic north. In the 21^st century, a section of the country is still cutting off citizen’s hands and legs for petty stealing. Yet the same section of the people glorify corruption, embezzlement, fraud, perpetual slavery , social and economic injustice.

The Islamic czar in Zamfara and his co- sharia intoxicated northern governors constantly abuse and harass Christian girls and women living and working in their domains on their dressing choice and their religious faith, yet these jihadists come to over seas and expend their state money on the street prostitutes who appeal their attraction on the same mode of dressing. Those clamoring for northern presidency are enemies of Nigeria and Nigerians. With what Nigerians have gone through for the past 39 years, that a southern Christian is agitating for Islamic president again in Nigeria beats my imagination. Before a core northern president emerges in Nigeria these steps must be taken. They are:

1. Middle belt should be carved from the north as a separate, but equal zone.

2. The army in particular and the entire national security out fits must be removed from the control of the presidency.

3. The Islamic north must wait till the year 2023 for these steps to be taken care of.

4. Babangida must be banned from politics and political activities in Nigeria the rest of his remaining life. But before then, he must be forced to account for the death of Dele Giwa, the death of the over 160 officers of southern and Christian extraction killed on the air crash in 1992, the issue of $12.4 billion oil windfall of 1991, and the purpose of his annulment of the mandate given to Abiola by Nigerians in 1993. It is very shocking that after all his sins and what he put Nigerians through for more than 8 long years, people are still thinking of him coming to rule/ruin Nigeria again.

During these periods of Islamic domination of Nigeria, their total desecration of people of delta region, lack of any visible relief from poverty, hunger and development, even though it is the bread basket of Nigeria, but in far away north, there are Defense industry corporation in Kaduna, Defense academy, Kaduna, school of senior commandant, Jaji, Kaduna, Oil refinery Kaduna, Nigerian military school Zaria, Kaduna, Nigerian civil aviation school, Zaria, Kaduna, the federal capital Abuja north, the entire north has more than 80% of Nigeria’s military installations, military presence and federal industries. The north has the best roads in Nigeria . In the north, as far back as 1970s students from elementary to tertiary institutions were being paid handsomely to go to school from the oil money from the south. The north was and still, is, so hardened and so selfish that it does not give a hoot about the south and northern Christians when it comes to leadership and distribution of national wealth.

During these years it used to be Minister of this, Alhaji Usman, chairman of this, Alhaji Abubakar, custom controller general, Alhaji Mohamed, director-general of immigration, Alhaji Hausa, chief of army staff, general Fulani, the president or head of state, either Alhaji Caliphate or general Oligarchy.

Who wants all these trash again? Perhaps Abubakar Rimi, senator Usman Albishr, Obong Victor Attah, James Ibori, Orji Kalu, Luck Igbinedion, Dapreye Alameisigha, Mohamed Markifi and Nigeria’s notorious thief, Ibrahim Badamosi Babangida. One thing that is clear about the Nigeria’s presidency is that if it goes to the north without over hauling the Nigerian polity and rectify and remedy the structural imbalance in military, federal industries and true federalism, Obasanjo can kiss his current reform good bye, as any other group other the Islamic north will never smell the presidency in Nigeria peacefully. The northern presidency in 2007 will precipitate a total decimalization of the Nigerian nation. What else does the north want the presidency for other than the control of the military and federal boards and Nigeria ’s oil wealth. The north has already through it’s hold on the military and the presidency, in control of every thing in Nigeria . All the airports in the north are internationalized even if the passengers over there are Lizards and rats, and the international airliners are Vultures, kites and hawks. Apart from the institute of policy and strategic studies, which the Islamic north reluctantly established in Jos, where else or what else did it establish in the Christian predominant Middle Belt zone? Throughout the Islamic domination and control of Nigeria presidency and oil wealth from the south, and dumping of the oil wealth in Abuja and the core north, it did not consider the Christian faith in Aso Rock to build a church. Because Arabism has no need and use for Christianity. An Islamic president in Nigeria again will legalize, legitimize and strengthen the Ayatollahs of the northern caliphate to burn churches and victimize Christians living and developing the north in the name of sharia. The north will be a living hell for the Christian faith. The Islamic presidency in Nigeria will see the Talibans expelled from Afghanistan converging and settling in Nigeria for perpetuating terrorism which they are noted for.

The middle belt military officers were only as good as being used to perpetuate the Moslem in power only to be booted out once it (Moslem) is in control. Otherwise how can these Islamists explain, who installed Alhaji Gowon , Alhaji Murtala Mohammed, Alhaji Muhammed Buhari, Alhaji Ibrahim Babangida, Alhaji Sani Abacha, that sariki yanka. What with William Walbe, Theophilous Danjuma, Domkat Bali, Joshua Dogoyaro, Jeremiah Useni, M.D. Jega and many others? As for the 2007 presidency, the ball should be thrown open to all Nigerians. Let the candidates face the Nigerian electorate, debate publicly, campaign across the corner and breath of Nigeria and submit them selves for public test and scrutiny, so Nigerians can decide on who is fully qualified to lead them out of the woods. These talks on giving the Nigeria '’ leadership to the Moslem north without any effort and without working for it must stop. The Nigerian nation belongs to all Nigerians and not the Islamic north.

Chidi P Eze.

Houston , TX .