| YOUR LETTERS
Re: Plateau State: Alli and the verdict of history
It is not in my character to
respond to rejoinders to
my articles. Whenever I am convinced that I have made myself clear enough I expect readers to either agree or disagree with me. Whichever way it goes, I believe readers have the right to their opinion. So, if a reader writes to disagree with me I respect his or her right to do so and therefore find it unnecessary to engage in further debate all in an effort to justify myself.
Thus, initially I did not want to join issues with Mallam Mohammed Kabir who responded to my earlier article of the above title in his rejoinder of August 2, 2004 (Daily Trust). I am however writing to point out that the article to which Kabir was reacting did not adequately reflect my thread of thoughts owing to ‘heavy’ editing by the sub-editors of Daily Trust. When I read the published version I almost did not recognize it. As a former editor myself, I respect the right of an editor to edit articles for publication but I did not understand the professional reason for editing a material beyond the recognition of the author! However, I am indebted to the Editor for considering the article fit for publication at all.
For the information of Kabir and others, who want to read the original article in its raw form, a copy of it can be browsed or downloaded from the Internet, especially on www.Gamji.com where I regularly contribute opinion.
Maybe this would not have changed the thrust of Kabir’s rejoinder but I argued, in the original article, that settler/indigene dichotomy has its roots in the constitution, and therefore, not a creation of Plateau State as its erroneously being peddled. Section 147 of the ‘constitution explicitly uses the word indigene. Thus, in my humble opinion, the way out of the Jos imbroglio, as it were, is to follow the precept posited by Alhaji Garba until a sovereign national conference resolves the constitutional entanglement. With the strand of thoughts broken; my views were likely to be misunderstood.
Mallam Kabir questioned my democratic credentials for daring to suggest, following Alhaji Garba’s line of thinking, that indigenes of Jos should be allowed political control of their affairs. I agree with Kabir that democracy is based on majority rule but I dare say that, that alone is not the ideal. Anyone familiar with history ought to know how some of these ‘majorities’ have been forged in some climes. This quest for ‘majority’ has resulted in some worst cases of injustice known to the history of mankind.
In apartheid South Africa the ‘white majority’ was artificially created in urban cities by banishing the black populations to ‘homelands’ and shanty towns. In the former New World, America and Australia, the natives were literally wiped out and a few survivors encamped in what are now called ‘reserved areas’ to make room for white emigrants, the ‘new majority.’
The foregoing examples underline the sublime injustices of majority rule. Kabir’s boast of the so-called majority population of the Hausa Fulani in Jos is completely misplaced. I am not about to engage ‘in a disquisition on the founders of Jos. Such Mungo-Parkian exercise is for infantile polemicists. 1 will simply say that if the indigenous people of the Plateau had wanted to protect their majority, they would have developed xenophobic’ attitudes towards visitors including the Hausa ‘Fulanis. Rather they extended an open arm to all and sundry to partake in the mining activities, at the turn of the century. If there is a majority of Hausa Fulani in Jos today, as Kabir claims, it merely goes to confirm the hospitable disposition of the indigenes.
Again it is a pity to learn from Mallam Kabir’s article that since Alhaji Garba made his famous declaration his own people have gagged him. It is a pity indeed that a democrat like Kabir would gloat at this display of intolerance. I pray that no harm will come to such a man of unequal courage; the government has an obligation to free him from his traducers.
On the burning of the Jos Main Market, there is nowhere I said in my article that it was burnt by some members of the Hausa Fulani group. I said that if the Sole Administrator needed a clue to unravel the identity of the villains of the September 7, 2001 violence and the subsequent burning of the market he should take a critical look at the perpetrators of the vandalisation of the Rwang Pam Stadium on July 4,2004.
The supporters of Mighty Jos football club, who exhibited this act of violent behaviour, displayed a typical psychosis with the perpetrators of violence in peace-loving Plateau State.
The people who burn the Jos Main Market did not care whether indigenes owned the market, or, as Kabir argued, the Hausa, Yoruba and Igbo did. If these fans could burn down their popular weekly rendezvous (the stadium), they could burn just anywhere else; It is too bad if they are defined by any ethnic identity but they surely are “a force with highly combustible ethno-religious tendencies.” This is because a counter-action that day could have easily led to a repeat of September 7. That was the point I made.
Jonathan Ishaku Email: [email protected] |
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