by Jude Ndukwe
The recent dismissal and jailing of Brigadier General 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 eyes 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 origins 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 those 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 others? 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 the South-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 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, is a pointer 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.
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 percent and five percent 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, is a pointer 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 Professor 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.
Jude Ndukwe is a political analyst who lives and works in Abuja, Nigeria. He tweets from@stjudendukwe.
The opinions expressed in this article are solely those of the author.
