Jude Ndukwe
The recent dismissal and jailing of Brig Gen Enitan Ransome-Kuti by the
military for various offences came to many as a shock following the
fact that just in September, the military pardoned 3,032 soldiers who
had been convicted also for various offences by a properly constituted
General Court Martial (GCM). The worry here is that the pardoned
soldiers were not said to be innocent. That they were pardoned and not
that the verdict against them was said to have been passed in error is
an indication that the pardoned and reinstated soldiers were actually
guilty of the offences for which they were convicted. This much can be
understood from the statement released by the Director of Army Public
Relations at that time while trying to clarify “that not all the
dismissed soldiers were granted pardon and recalled”, adding that “those
with criminal cases for instance, have their sentences upheld”.
The question here is: what constitutes a criminal case and what does
not in the eye of the military? Were those pardoned not convicted of
crimes? If they were actually convicted but later pardoned, does it not
say a lot about the fact that they were actually convicted of one crime
or the other? So on what basis or what criteria did the military use in
selecting and differentiating between those pardoned and those whose
sentences were upheld? The military should know that we are not all
stupid! One begins to be tempted to ask for the names and ethnic origin
of those whose sentences were upheld and those who received pardon. We
are tempted to think that one of the criteria used is ethnicity. If you
are pardoning soldiers of crime why not pardon all of them? As long as
they were all convicted by a properly constituted GCM even though some
were later pardoned, it means that they all committed one crime or the
other.
It is instructive to note that all these including Brig Gen Enitan
Ransome-Kuti were charged under the leadership of Lt-Gen Kenneth
Minimah, the immediate past Chief of Army Staff. What is curious is, why
pardon some, get them reinstated while dismissing and jailing some?
Does it have to do with their ethnic background, the religion they
profess or gravity of offence? Whatever it is, it would only be fair to
serve punishment or pardon on the basis of what is sauce for the goose
is also sauce for the gander.
It is even more curious that a former Commissioner of Police, Mr Zakari
Biu, who was dismissed by the police for his role in the escape of a
notorious Boko Haram suspect, Kabiru Sokoto, was pardoned by the police
to the consternation of a majority of Nigerians just a day after the
military pardoned the soldiers in question. Is there any correlation
between these two issues? While Zakari Biu was exonerated, Enitan
Ransome-Kuti was dismissed and jailed!
Is this all part of the script to deliberately and systematically
humiliate and further subjugate certain parts of the country in favour
of others?
With a name as famous as that of Ransome-Kuti, the thinking might just
be to test the ground with such a renowned name in the history of our
nation from the southern part of the country generally and
theSouth-Western part particularly. If Ransome-Kuti is dismissed and
jailed and no dust is raised, then the systematic and deliberate
subjugation of the South West can take a more daring dimension without
qualms. Those who wish to perpetually subjugate other regions/persons
usually test the waters in this manner. It was the same thing with King
Herod in the Bible, Acts 12:1-3. King Herod had seized James, one of the
Apostles of Jesus Christ, and had him put to death. When he saw that
this met the approval of the Jews, he went ahead to seize Peter, the
Head of the Apostles.
With the deliberate denial of strategic appointments to the Yoruba race
by the Buhari administration, a clear message is being sounded out by
the Hausa/Fulani oligarchs, and the message is loud and clear; only a
slave and those who wish to remain slaves would pretend everything is
normal right now. The Igbo and, by extension, the South-South people, by
virtue of the 97% and 5% dichotomy as elevated to an official status by
the president himself, have known their place, at least, for now, and
can only fight and react the way the youths are already doing. The only
non-Hausa/Fulani race that still needs to be declared subjugated
officially is the Yoruba race, and the process has since started.
With the growing rampage of Fulani herdsmen in the South-West that
culminated in the kidnap, torture and humiliation of elder statesman,
Chief Olu Falae, the dismissal and jailing of Ransome-Kuti when others
were pardoned, are all pointers to the bigger plans of those who wish to
keep certain parts of this country under their total control and
dictate without questioning what happens in our nation. If not for the
kidnap of Pa Falae, the other atrocities perpetrated by these Fulani
herdsmen would have gone unannounced. And if not for the uproar
generated by the kidnap of Pa Falae, it is possible those criminals
would not have been apprehended and their crime would have gone
unpunished just like the others that end up in “peace deals”, same peace
deals that are never respected in the North-Central but that lead to
more brutal attacks on the other parties to it.
Appointments by the federal government have not shown that any other
region would be treated better. Despite the hue and cry that followed
the earlier appointments by the president, he has gone ahead to still
pick northerners in his latest appointments: Dr DanAzumi Ibrahim as DG
of National Office for Technology Acquisition and Promotion (NOTAP), and
Prof Mahmood Yakubu as INEC Chairman. As it is now, Class Captains and
Senior Prefects of our schools will have to come from the North, and
where there is no northerner in such a school, be it in Lagos, Enugu or
Port Harcourt, the class/school will have to do without such “offices”.
That is how bad the situation is becoming!
It is based on the foregoing, that one is tempted to think that Brig
Gen Enitan Ransome-Kuti’s dismissal from the Army and his jailing has
more to it than we are being told.
–Ndukwe writes from Abuja jrndukwe@yahoo.co.uk Twitter: @stjudendukwe
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