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By Femi Fani-Kayode
The Department of State Security (DSS) have claimed that five Fulani herdsmen were abducted, killed and buried in a mass grave by members of Indigenous People of Biafra (IPOB) in Abia State a few days ago. They have also claimed that there were up to 50 more bodies in that mass grave and that they are all Fulani.
The implications of this announcement are obvious. It will create more tension and fear in the land and it will lead to reprisal killings in the North. Violence is never the way out and I have always believed that it has no place in any civilised society. Yet what I find curious about this announcement is the fact that it is unique and historic.
I say this because thousands of Igbo, Yoruba, Niger-Deltans and Middle Belters have been killed by Fulani militants and herdsmen over the last 10 months since President Muhammadu Buhari came to power, yet the DSS has never announced it or told the country about the details and ethnic identities of the victims. When one thousand Shiite Muslims were slaughtered in Zaria and buried in mass graves the DSS did not speak. When 500 Idoma were massacred in Agatu by Fulani militants, the DSS did not speak.
When hundreds of southern and Middle Belt farms were raided by AK-47-wielding Fulani herdsmen, who murdered, raped, burnt down and took over the land of their victims, the DSS never gave us details of the victims or made any announcements. When our leaders in the South were kidnapped and when men witnessed their wives and children being raped and butchered by the Fulani militias before their very eyes, the DSS made no announcements.
When the elder statesman, Chief Olu Falae's farm was raided by the Fulani militants for the third time in one year and his Oodua Peoples Congress (OPC) guard was slaughtered, the DSS made no announcements. When the villagers and farmers in the South-East were murdered and their wives and daughters abducted by the Fulani militants, the DSS made no announcements. When traditional rulers, nuns and priests were abducted and killed by Fulani herdsmen in the South-South, the DSS made no announcements. When the farms of the South-West were attacked and...
