Nigeria and the multitude of mediocre messiahs

By Bala Ibrahim

The Guinness Book of Records will continue to count Nigeria among the countries with a curated record of celebrated mediocre players.

This is not to say Nigeria is not blessed with the brilliant. No, the country has a mixture of both the brilliant and the bizarre.

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While the brilliant are working assiduously to bring the country to fame, the bizarre seem to be doing the same, but in the reverse direction. And posterity is continuously recording the performance of each.

Those familiar with history may recall how, on Monday, October 25, 1993, in the heat of the June 12 annulment agitations, some Nigerian youngsters under the indoctrination of Mallam Jerry Yusuf, carried out the unthinkable by hijacking an Abuja-bound Nigeria Airways airbus A310 aircraft and diverted it to Niger Republic.

The group, known as the Movement for the Advancement of Democracy (MAD), had Jerry Yusuf presenting himself as the leader and saviour of the Nigerian masses, who, according to him, have been doomed to a life of poverty due to corruption in the country.

The Airbus 310, carrying 159 people, was commandeered by the hijackers, armed with guns and knives, to Niamey, the capital of the neighboring Niger Republic. Jerry Yusuf has since then remained in detention in the Niger Republic as a price for being a madman leading a group called MAD on self-acclaimed stupidity. He is nothing but a mediocre messiah.

Sometime in March, 2013, a South African court sentenced another militant Nigerian by name Henry Okah to an effective 24 years in jail. Okah was found guilty of 13 terrorism-related charges over twin-car bombings during Nigeria’s independence day celebrations in 2010. Records showed that at least 12 people were killed and 36 others injured.

Okah, the former leader of the Movement for the Emancipation of the Niger Delta, (MEND). It was a leading a group which said it was fighting to help Niger Delta residents gain a greater share of the oil wealth from their part of Southern Nigeria. Till now, Henry Okah is in detention in South Africa as a price for being a madman leading a group called MEND. He is nothing but a mediocre messiah.

Abu Mohammed Abubakar bin Mohammad al-Sheikawi was a Kanuri man known as the leader of Boko Haram, a Nigerian Islamist militant group that was formed in 2002 with the primary objective of establishing an Islamic State under Shariah law, and the secondary objective of a wider imposition of Islamic rule beyond Nigeria. He served as deputy leader to the group’s founder, Mohammed Yusuf, who was executed in 2009. Before his reported killing in June this year, Abubakar Shekau, the infamous leader of the group, was accused of being behind the abduction of over 300 girls; mostly Christians, from Chibok.

In several videos, Shekau said their mission was to Islamise the girls. Converting someone to another religion through terrorism is certainly a stupidity by no one but a mediocre messiah.

At the tail end of last month, June, 2021, the leader of the proscribed Indigenous People of Biafra (IPOB), Nnamdi Kanu, was re-arrested and brought back to Nigeria to face trial. According to a letter written to Western Diplomats by the Federal Government of Nigeria, titled, “Atrocities Of Nnamdi Kanu”, he is accused of orchestrating the killing of 60 persons and the destruction of property in 55 attacks across the South East and South South within four months.

IPOB is a Biafran separatist organisation,which main aim is to restore an independent state of Biafra in the South East. The group was founded by Kanu in 2012, and is constantly criticising the federal government of what it describes as its poor investment, inequitable resource distribution, ethnic marginalisation, and heavy military presence in their “imaginary” Biafran region.

Kanu has since last month been in detention, after a Federal High Court in Abuja had listened to the initial charges against him, which border on terrorism, treasonable felony, unlawful possession of firearms and management of an unlawful society. The Attorney General of the Federation said more charges would be brought later. Kanu is nothing but a mediocre messiah.

Early this month, July, 2021, Sunday Igboho, the proclaimed agitator for the establishment of Oduduwa Republic from Nigeria, was declared wanted by the Department of State Services (DSS), after his Ibadan house in Oyo State was raided by the operatives of the secret police. Igboho fled the country but was arrested at Cardinal Bernardin International Airport, Cotonou, Republic of Benin, with his wife on their way to Germany.

He has been charged to court in Cotonou, on crimes that include the illegal acquisition of the passport of the Republic of Benin. This is an offense that carries a long prison sentence in Benin Republic, which can only be committed by a mediocre messiah.

Yes, Nigeria has many of these mediocre messiahs, but depending on how the leaders of the South-West play their cards, the Igboho scandal can make or mar the chances of power shifting to the region come 2023.

Certainly the system would ensure that power does not go into the hands or those that may permit sectional sentiments to override national security and the sovereignty of the nation.

Ibrahim is a public affairs analyst and he sent in this piece from Abuja.