Dear leaders,
The last time I wrote you was one year and one month ago. In a three-part letter I reminded you of the legacy the late Sir Ahmadu Bello, Sardauna of Sokoto and Premier of the defunct northern region bequeathed you. I argued that, rather than bearing the torch and further bequeathing Sardauna’s bequest to successive generations, you have abdicated your duty, your role as role models. And I submitted that the insurgency overwhelming the north today draws enough fuel from your failure as leaders, which has created a massive vacuum into which rogues like Abubakar Shekau have stepped.
Then, as bad as things were, the insurgency in northern Nigeria had been restricted to intermittent assaults on communities in the north-east, north-west and north-central. The insurgents had, like cancer, been isolated in the bushes of Sambisa and parts of the West African sub-region easily accessible to them. Administering an appropriate therapy was all that was needed to rid us of the disease, if we wanted to. But we were not determined and allowed the insurgents plenty of time and room to reorganise, rejuvenate and viciously strike back at us. Now they have fully metamorphosed into an army of occupation, annexing swathes of our land and renaming them as they wish.
We have been saddled with a lazy and irresponsive regime; one that derives pleasure in watching citizens suffer, deluding itself with endless stories of nonexistent accomplishments. But we also don’t forget that when you had the chance to make life better you let it slip.
I write you because you claim, and we believe you, that you are our leaders. You brandish before us a claim to unadulterated altruism and we trust you. You ask for and we never waver in granting you full access to our confidence. But all this – the trust, feeling of oneness etc. – fades into the oblivion as soon as you mount our back to ascend your dream pinnacle. In effect, the unity, the affinity that the north symbolises only matters during elections and not at any other time.
I send you this note because you cannot claim to be our leaders and be spectators to our decimation.
We have suffered sufficient harassments from penury, of the mind and physical possessions, and now from this madness rendering our homes rubbles and our communities to scenes of recollection – of events and things that are way beyond our reach now.
In my lengthy notes I drew attention to the progressive descend of our region into the abyss. Government Secondary School Mamudo, Yobe State, had then been invaded and dozens of school boys coldly murdered. Several Schools and homes had been attacked and teenage boys and girls carted away like some superfluous objects. No one is spared – women, men, the young and even the aged. Our cries after each attack pale away because of our insignificance not in terms of number but status. No one cries with us or for us. But you are say you are with us. How ironical!
From Mamudo, Buni Yadi to Chibok and now Potiskum our lone sobs dim ad infinitum. We are the mercy of terror, vitalized by the nonchalance of all that should cry and fight with us. But ours is a lone fight, whose insignificance is our curse.
We too often pass the blame on a president whose lukewarm is not uncertain. But are we his people? His utterances and body language don’t say so. And we don’t doubt them. But you say it and we believe you that we are your people. Yet we don’t matter, whether dead or alive. So no one speaks or weeps for us.
The refugees trooping from the conquered portions that once housed us are proof we have been well looked after. The dead don’t matter any more. Nothing will bring them back. And for them justice will only come from God, not any mortal who will fail to not forget they don’t matter. But the living matter and that is why, in spite of everything, I still write you.
Again, I write to remind you that as much as politics matters more, it matters less where a voting population is annihilated and, here, it matters much less because your dream also becomes a still birth. I know you know dead bodies don’t vote. And this should be a serious source of worry, for you, especially, and for me.
(To be continued)