A Yoruba group, the Yoruba Welfare Group (YWG), has cautioned the Yoruba Nation agitator Sunday Adeyemo, popularly known as Sunday Igboho, to tread with caution.
The caution followed his renewed threat to Fulanis in the South-West.
The group warned Igboho to stop heating the polity by “ethnicising or regionalising criminal acts.”
Daily Trust on Sunday reports that Igboho recently returned to Nigeria after over 30 months.
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He left Nigeria in 2021 and was arrested in Benin Republic on his way to Germany.
Following his return, he renewed his call on Fulanis in the Southwest to vacate, saying he was back to pursue them if they failed to leave.
However, the National President of YWG, Comrade Abdulhakeem Alawuje, in a statement yesterday warned Sunday Igboho to desist from his threat on the Fulani residents of the region, saying crimes should not be ethnicised.
“Crimes such as banditry, kidnapping, cattle rustling, ritual killing, cybercrime and so on have no boundaries,” he said.
He called on Chief Adeyemo to team up with other well-meaning Nigerians to fight kidnappers, bandits as well as all criminals in Yoruba land, rather than profiling and levelling accusations against other tribes.
He said, “There are enough challenges on ground for President Bola Tinubu and Chief Sunday Igboho should not compound them. Tinubu is already resolving the problems methodically and he does not need Igboho’s advocacy or shenanigans to solve Nigerian problems. What the President needs is everyone’s support and prayers to succeed, not ethnic crises that will derail him.
“If we instigate any ethnic crisis now, we are indirectly fueling the already volatile situation. We should be wary of many saboteurs who are waiting to capitalise on any crisis to either foment troubles or cause mayhem. Those who want to spark fire must realise that fire does not recognise the one who ignites it.
“I personally love Sunday Igboho but I completely disagree with him on his style of agitation. I don’t have anything personal against him but as a Yoruba man, I am against his modus operandi.
“If all Igboho wants is peace, unity and love across Nigeria, Yoruba Welfare Group is fully with you. If he’s truly a lover of Yoruba, he should realise that he is not the only one who loves the Yoruba tribe. So, he should team up with other genuine Yoruba sociocultural groups, except he is looking for self-recognition or something else.
“How to collectively solve a nation’s problems is to start moving the entire system towards unity, love and harmony. To achieve these, we must refrain from profiling an entire tribe over the crimes of bad eggs among them.
“Let’s call a bandit a bandit, a looter, a looter, a corrupt leader a corrupt leader, a kidnapper a kidnapper, and an armed robber an armed robber without causing inter-tribal rifts. The undisputed fact is that no part of Nigeria can survive without others.”
