By Martin-Hassan Eze
She has been violated. Her innocence, stolen. And now the dog has strayed because it no longer hears the whistle of the hunter. It was in her belly that the rainbow of tribes gathered, that college of tongues came in search of greener pastures. From the rain forest of Koko, the rivers of Bomadi and the hills of Nsukka. She was a home for all and sundry. She received Wazobians with a kiss of peace and tender heart. Though tribes and tongues differed as our heroes past told us, she cemented the bond of brotherhood and peace became a surplus commodity. But she crossed the village boundary into the evil forest; went wild. And so, things fell apart and peace took a hurried flight. Kaduna!
In the days of my ancestors, it was a land following with milk and honey. Until it was allowed to happen. The hand of the monkey in the pot of soup transformed into the hand of human. Sacrilege! Today, it is tears filled eyes of widowers, mournful looks of orphans and the wailing and yelling of widows is all we hear of. Blood has flooded the city. And the sacred birds of the sky are hovering over the dark sky of Kaduna. Who invites vultures to a feast? It is a feast of blood in Kaduna; the stench oozing to high heaven, the smell of rotten cadavre inviting vultures to a sumptuous meal. It is night at midday, it is doom, it is Golgotha- the place of the skull, it is a massive graveyard for innocent women and children, it is a coven for restless spirits of those with unfinished business but were finished because they are from the wrong side of religion, tribe and political party.
In Kaduna, it is harvest season. Unusual harvest, harvest of souls and blood. And as the rattling sabre continues to roar, more lives will be cut down like cassava stems. These spirits will come to hunt us, hunt us and our children. It beggars imagination, this man’s inhumanity against man. It is surely difficult for pundits not to believe that Ekwensu- the monstrous black beast with two horns and a long tail did not pass through Kaduna and forgot his left finger along the way in this city that was the darling of Sarduana Sokoto. The evil is just unprecedented!
My conscience provoked a querrel with me this weekend. Kaduna is dusty and I have avoided her like a leper because it is only a tree that does not run when she sees those coming to cut her to size. As a writer, my conscience have been flogging me because my pen have remained impotent about the evil that have enveloped Arewa. The subject is inflammable. I have battled to refrain myself from telling the emperor that he is naked. But now , I can’t just help it since the sword is no longer restless in the scarbbard. It is now free like the birds of the air “doing good” things in towns and villages. With the carnage going on in Kaduna, silence cannot be golden. Silence will be evil, it will amount to aiding and abating evil as those vast in the knowledge of law books will say.
We all know that the dark days of the black goggle wearing tyrant and military jackboot from Kano is back. The gains of our democracy is gradually been eaten by locusts. Nigeria is now the Uganda of Idi Amin where the freedom of expression is free but the freedom after expression is not a guarantee. It is pathetic that those who did not left a finger in support of NADECO during the bloody and deadly regime of the lover of Indian apple, are today, the Chief priests, presiding over the funeral of our nascent democracy.
For a young writer without deep pocket and contacts that can move mountains in Aso Rock, my pen must thread with caution. Writing without giving a hoot about whose ox is gored or elephant lost comes with a price. A costly one for that matter. If you are in doubt, ask the late Edo-born cerebral writer Dele Giwa. Letter bombs have metamorphosed into various instruments of oppression, repression and suppression today.
Freedom of expression is a grammar only the British MP Boris Johnson understands. Here the always surprised old sheriff on the throne and his rampaging buccaneers, dubious and ruinous college of cabals and mindless hailers don’t know what it is all about. Dare to become a dissenting voice of reason and you will be hunted down like an Nchi.
Nigeria is fast becoming the Zaire of Mubutu. It is a Cabaldom and state institutions do the bidding of the cabals. The whims and caprices of the cabals are not only law, they are dogma. We are in a quagmire; a political cul-de- sac because what we practice here is a government of cabals, by cabals and for the family and affiliates of cabals- Cabalcracy. Put succinctly, constitutionalism and rule of law that was on the sick bed doing the days of umbrella rule have been swept into the grave by the broom. Dead!
For a principal of opinion and potential literati like this writer, testing the depth of waters with both leg is not only dangerous but suicidal. Walahi! Not writing about the doom in Arewa and Kaduna in particular is not cowardice. When your neighbours bear is on fire, you put your own in the bucket of water. Wisdom. The short accidental Public servant; Malam from Kaduna, not minding his scholarship and prodigious ideas about state politics and governance has a tyrannical claw. And many a writer have tasted his Fascist fang. So, Kaduna is a dreaded Kurmirikiki but a writer must not betray his conscience in the name of political correctness. A writer cannot but write because to write is to live. So, I had to write.
The Jihad, pogrom, genocide and ethnic cleansing, call it whatever name you like should send shiver the spine of any creature with a human soul. I, for one, the shocker is the fact that Nigerians have found a way of using Jesus Christ, Allah- religion as a weapon of mass destruction. This inhumanity in the name of religion, rumbles the very foundation of my soul. It is regrettable, that religion should offer any man or woman the apatite to hate, maim and kill hapless and defenceless citizens.
Pitiably, the dubious crooks in Roman collar- Pastorpreneurs are having a bumper harvest reason in Nigeria. These swindlers bearing the name of God on their lips have help in no small way in fanning the embers of hatred with their hate speeches and inflammatory sermons.
Our Churches, Mosques, Pastors and Imams instead of becoming instruments of peace and reconciliation have satanically become agents of hate and bigotry. Interestingly, these so called men of God have thrown their sacred duties to the dogs in chase of filthy lucre. The call for repentance from evil and living a virtuous life have been related to the backyard. What surges from the pulpit and Jumat sermons are derogatory and hateful speeches. And, the consequence of this dastardly use of religion for mundane gains is that we have litanies of country- men whose heart and soul are filled with hate, bigotry, anger and other forms of evil. Citizens have been indoctrinated to degrade, deride, disrespect, dishonour, maliciously disagree and evil kill anyone that is not of their tribe nor religion. Sad. Saddening!
I am gripped by the endless spilling of human blood in the North. Nobody with strong link with the North is happy about the gory and sorry state of Northern Nigeria. The inhumanity in the North beggars believe. Human life cheaper than poultry birds? Haba mana!
I must confess my disappointment that Kaduna our beautiful city and pride of the North is always on the news for the wrong reasons- killing field. A profound disappointment that after the fratricide Biafran war, the Zagon Kataf massacre, the Miss world blood orgy, the political Sharia blood bath, Kaduna is naked in the market square again. Tufiakwa! Who did this to us?
It seems, that, nemesis have caught up with us. The evil in our hearts have come to dwell among us. We profess God with our lips but God is as far as Timbuktu from our hearts. Kaduna is infested with evil. It is the seed of evil that we are constantly reaping. The seed of tribalism, geolatry, bigotry and extremism. How can one be a Catholic and go to Holy Mass on Sundays, how can one be a Muslim and observe that Jumat on Fridays, and, yet hate another human being created in the image and likeness of God? Evil. Monstrous evil!
No man who loves Allah will go about shouting Allahu Akbar while spilling human blood. Allah is not a vampire that feeds on blood. He does not drink human blood or eat human corpse. How can we call others derogatory names: Infidel, Arne, kafiri because they worship God in a different way and yet lay claim to civility and proclaim Islam a religion of peace? It is baffling to sane minds.
You cannot be a Catholic who loves Jesus Christ, the Messiah of the World and honour his Blessed Mother- Mary and turn around to hate another creature of God. It is sad, sadly that most of us Christians, Catholics, carry hate in our heart like Talisman while Catholicism or Christianity is built on love and forgiveness. The heat of hate that some of us harbour in our hearts against Abokis- Hausas, Fulanis, Muslims can roast a thousand tubers of yam under the rain. Disgusting, so disgusting! Could Jesus have behaved in this manner? Is this Christ like biko?
Churches are littered in our streets like almajirai yet God is not in our hearts. Mosques are built with money meant for critical infrastructures everywhere in the North. It is a bazaar of Mosques instead of schools, hospitals and industries. Very soon even brothels will have Mosques. Yet, we lack the capacity to love, to tolerate and to forgive.
Who is a settler? Who is a son of the soil? All these are divisive and cave age bullshits. I concur. It is all about tribal and political dominance. Yes. But, it is equally about the heart of man that our religious practices have failed to refine and reform. God is absent in our society. Evil is the absence of God. And, when God takes a vacation in any society, doom moves about with swagger. Rabid tribalism, pervasive bigotry and historical prejudice are evils that proceeds from the heart of men and women.
I can’t still get a window into the popular held believe in Kaduna or in the North that denying another law-abiding citizen right to life, freedom of worship and association because he or she is not a Muslim is a virtuous act pleasing to Allah. I refused to accept that the sword of Damocles will be dangling fiercely and ferociously towards the throats of Kafiris in this Lunar age. Must I be a Muslim, Fulani or Hausa before I enjoy the dignity inalienable from every human being? Who says Southern Kaduna must be another Vatican where Muslims must not trespass? Wickedness. Heartlessness. Callousness. Meanness.
Muslims and Christians, Man and women, who profess God with their lips but wear evil in their sleeves, maiming and killing innocent souls. We rationalize, condone, and defend murder when the victims are not of our tribe or religion. This is the road to Kigali, a road any Arewan must not ply.
It is my concerned opinion that humanity is a constituency. Tribe, Tongue, religion or state of origin are accidents of life. How can we refuse to accept that we were all created in the image and likeness of God?- Allah. Oseburuwa. Olodumare. We are all sons and daughters of the same father- Abraham or Ibrahim. It is the zenith of stupidity for any mortal who is here today and no more tomorrow to be killing over land. Geolatry is evil. The mortality of every mortal should led us towards virtues.
I beg to wear the big shoes of Joe Bidden, the Ex American VP and Presidential hopeful: “You can’t reclaim the soul of a nation without first taking seriously the state of your own”. For the people of Kaduna and Arewa, this is the road to travel.
May we not reach Kigali, may we retrace our steps from this monstrous path that will led to our collective destruction and may we find this elusive peace in Kaduna. Allah ya kiyaye!
I, so, submit.
Wow! Deep and touching. God help Us!