I delayed calling him until after concluding preliminary contacts, then get an appointment, brief him and then get his input. But, like they say, man proposes, God disposes. The cold hands of death shuttered my plan. Early Friday morning I got the shocking phone call – the man died.
I always trusted the judgment of late Dr Mahmud Tukur. Though he had been ill on and off in the last two years, it wasn’t serious enough to stop him from important interactions or phone conversation. I worked with him as Assistant Secretary of a certain association in Kaduna, just before the return of the third republic. A real master strategist that had no equal.
I wanted to contact him because I had on the drawing board, a proposal of convening a special Hausa/Fulani summit for the purpose of finding solution to the menace of banditry and kidnapping in the North and to also investigate the allegation by some communities in the South that Fulani herders have been raiding and killing their people.
Personally, I find the allegation by the southern communities hard to chuckle. Like I argued at a recent forum, if the thousands of Fulani herders in the North, with massive home advantage, neither target to kidnap nor kill southerners living in their midst in Katsina, Sokoto, Zamfara and Kebbi states, how credible is the claim that a handful of herders living in the South have been unleashing mayhem on communities in Yoruba and Igbo lands?
These questions and many more were to form part of the proposed discourse that the meeting would tackle and proffer solution in either form recommendation to the federal government or implementation by a committee. Banditry in the North must be stopped and so is the selective killing of members of the Hausa/Fulani community in the South.
It appears that the perpetrators are no longer afraid of the authorities and are becoming more daring by the day.
There appears to be misconception and confusion by some Northerners as to whether, what is happening is as a result of handiwork of the opposition as being alleged from certain quarters, or it is as a result of sheer incompetence by the authorities.
Whatever it is, solution needs to be found as urgently as possible. The North cannot afford to wait a day longer. People are dying and the perpetrators are getting bolder. The politicians (Governors) have tried, but failed; traditional rulers are in dilemma, afraid of both government and the bandits, while the rest of our prominent citizens try to play safe by keeping mum.
An Islamic scholar, Dr Ahmad Gumi offered to mediate, yet, his approach is unsatisfactory to many and is viewed as capable of encouraging other maniacs to join the lucrative industry of kidnapping and banditry.
An input from late Dr Mahmud Tukur would have been wonderful. Some of us who he mentored will certainly uphold his principles as guide to all our dealing and to whatever endeavor we chose to pursue. A star is gone. Allah yaafu Doctor.
- Iyawa is former Nigerian Ambassador to Mexico
