THROUGH:
ALL CITIZENS of The Federal Republic of Nigeria, At Home and In the Diaspora,
Dear Senators,
*CALL PRESIDENT BOLA AHMED TINUBU TO ORDER NOW.
Our flag does not fly because the wind moves it. It flies with the last breath of each soldier who died protecting it.- author unknown.
In Okuloma the flag of Nigeria nation didn’t just stop flying it was lowered by strange sons, imbued by the spirit of wickedness, souls who turned around to betray the nation, killing soldiers who were on the first line of patriotic duty to fatherland.
Such men should not be hidden among us, it pays to shelters ravenous beasts in human estate than leave such merchant of death undetected, but this requires wisdom, for justice is bitter when along with sinners the righteous suffers!
I can’t but share in the grief of the President and Commander in Chief of Armed Forces, and indeed all Nigerians. May the immediate family of all our gallant soldiers and fallen heroes be comforted. Brave men, not fallen at war by the bullet of eternal enemies but lost to the treachery against our sovereignty in Okuloma.
“Sugbon ti a ba sukun a ma riran”, we see while shedding tears.
I would have written this letter directly to the Senate of the Federal Republic of Nigeria, but in doubt that the senate will live up to its constitutional duties given the dependency of the 10TH SENATE led by Godswill Akpabio on the Executive as revealed by the allegation of the conspiracy of looting of our Commonwealth; vis a vis the padding of the 2024 budget which the President knowingly assented to.
I am compelled to write through the most exalted office in the land; the office of the Citizens, trusting that the contents of this letter will be processed as citizenship demands and that all citizens will be swift to call this administration led by President Asiwaju Bola Ahmed Tinubu to order in case the Senate failed to do its constitutional duties as mandated by the Constitution and the People.
On 5th December 2023, local and international media platforms were awashed with reports of what the world witnessed as one of the biggest error of military operations anywhere in the world. I will headline it as; “Nigerian Military Drone Killed 85 IN ERROR!”
The military, immediately after the unfortunate incidence claimed error of judgement for the malling of 85 people down like hay of the field on a sunny day for the feeding of animals on a raining day!
The airstrike, made in “error” hit a group of people who had gathered for a Muslim Religious event; the Maulud; a Moslem holiday to celebrate the birth of the holy Prophet Muhammad, (may the peace of Allah be with him) and may all those killed by the Military find Aljannah Firdaus; the highest level of heaven where Moslems believes the Prophet Muhammad (saws) is. What a birthday present by the Nigerian Military; 85 souls killed and sent in error to meet the holy Prophet!
The President’s response to the killing of 85 unarmed innocent citizens who were in celebration mood was made by his spokesperson; Ajuri Ngelale. In a statement released; Tinubu said the “bombing mishap” was worrying and painful. The President didn’t say more! Nothing more than accountability separate Democracy from Military Rule. On the incidence till date there hasn’t been any accountability. The government failed democracy!
Nigeria no doubt is riddled with unresolved killings, many of which their investigation like the Tundun Buri community in Igabi Local Government Area of Kaduna State “bombing mishap” followed the pattern of Funso Williams murder in Lagos under the then Governor Bola Ahmed Tinubu; now President Bola Ahmed Tinubu. Williams’s killer may still be among us if nature has not visited such person with death! Who killed the 85 in Tundun Buri? What informed the error? Is it a sight problem of civilians looking like they were carrying guns? The people with whose taxes the military is paid and maintained deserves to know.
Thorough investigation was promised to the Nation by the then Governor of Lagos State on Williams killing, the same way he did as the President on the “bombing mishap” in Kaduna. Neither has produced reports of investigations.
We can also recall the unfinished investigation into the horrorful killing of a serving Minister of Justice and Attorney General of the Federation, Chief Bola Ige, which investigation was ordered closed by the then IGP, Coomasie!
The latest crises in the Niger Delta region, particularly the community conflict between Okuoma and Okoloba to which officers of the Nigerian Army were drafted on peace keeping calls for global attention.
Gory and sickling images of alleged killings of Nigerians soldiers in the Niger Delta region in what is suggestive of an ambush is all over the internet, this has been followed by a disturbing number of emotional inspired commentaries asking the Nigerian Army to “level” the area, mostly from uninformed Nigerians. Such calls on our military is a call to commit international crime!
Though, the Nigerian army allegedly has gone to battle to set some part of the communities ablaze, unconfirmed reports claimed close to a hundred innocent souls of aged women and men and young people as always the case in brigandage of power has been murdered. While the attack of Nigerian security forces remains condemnable and unacceptable, no security agency/ies should be encouraged to engage in jungle justice. I call on the Nigerians to prevail on the Senate to call Nigerian authorities to allow an impartial investigation involving international human rights organizations into this crisis to bring those guilty to justice.
No doubt, the military has a full plate to clear regarding insecurity. The Nigerian Army must restrain its officers and ensure that the rights of innocent civilians are not breached carelessly which has been the experience in past similar situations.
The vow made by President Tinubu to punish the killers of Nigerian Army personnel who were on a peace mission in Delta State is the right thing to say by a Commander in Chief who is low in performance in the area of Security, whose troop more than anything needs to be motivated.
According to the president, “The Defence Headquarters and Chief of Defence Staff have been granted full authority to bring to justice anybody found to have been responsible for this unconscionable crime against the Nigerian people.
The President erred in law by the constitution to grant FULL AUTHORITY to the Defence Headquarters and the Chief of Defence Staff to INVESTIGATE and bring to justice all the culprits of this dastardly acts. It is beyond the office of the President to give the duty of the Nigerian Police Headquarters, the Inspector General of Police and the Anthoney General of the Federation and of Delta State as the case may be to the Military Authority. This call is a subtle invitation to anarchy, a Presidential order for militarisation of the civil order of a democratic society.
The President further said, “As the Commander-in-Chief, I join all well-meaning Nigerians and the men and women of our armed forces to mourn and express my profound grief over the needless death of our gallant soldiers,” he affirmed.
At least 16 Nigerian soldiers were killed on a mission to douse clashes between two communities in the South-South state of Delta.
The troops from the 181 Amphibious Battalion deployed in the Bomadi region, were on a peace-keeping mission in Okuoma community when they were killed on Thursday, March 14, said Brigadier General Tukur Gusau in a statement on Saturday.
Fifteen bodies of the soldiers were reportedly recovered by soldiers of the Joint Task Force under the supervision of General Officer Commanding 6 Division, Nigerian Army, Major General Jamal Abdussalam.
The President must not lose sight of the constitution of the Federal Republic of Nigeria in the matters at hand. He, on Saturday morning sad, the Nigerian people and I woke up to the dreadful news of the unprovoked killings of our brave military personnel during a rescue mission in Okuama Community in Ughelli South Local Government Area of Delta State.
The incident occurred on Thursday, March 14, 2024, when our troops, responding to a crisis between Okuama and Okoloba communities in Delta State, were ambushed. A Commanding Officer, two Majors, one Captain, and twelve soldiers sadly lost their lives. One civilian was also killed!
As the Commander-in-Chief, I join all well-meaning Nigerians and the men and women of our armed forces to mourn and express my profound grief over the needless death of our gallant soldiers.
I extend my profound condolences to the families of these fallen soldiers, their colleagues, and their loved ones. The military high command is already responding to this incident. The cowardly offenders responsible for this heinous crime will not go unpunished.
This incident, once again, demonstrates the dangers faced by our servicemen and women in the line of duty. I salute their heroism, courage, and uncommon grit and patriotism.
As a nation, we must constantly remember and honour all those who have paid the ultimate price to keep our nation safe, strong, and united. The officers and men who died in Okuama community have joined the pantheon of great men and women who gave their all, with honour, in the service of our fatherland.
Members of our armed forces are at the heart and core of our nationhood. Any attack on them is a direct attack on our nation. We will not accept this wicked act”.
The President would have stopped at that, till the report of the investigation to be conducted by the Nigerian Police reaches his table. The President failed again to subject the military to the tenets of civility of a democratic society where the Army should be made to work hand in hand with the Police in matters such as we have on our hands. Little wonder it has consistently been a difficult task to get the military fused into professionalism required of them in a democratic setting.
To say; The Defence Headquarters and Chief of Defence Staff have been granted full authority to bring to justice anybody found to have been responsible for this unconscionable crime against the Nigerian people is an impeachable offence, to which the attention of the 10TH SENATE is herein called. The President has no such power to grant to institutions or persons aside those whom the constitution has vested the same.
The same exuberance and arrogance of power that saw the subsidy removed on his inauguration day that armed the economy with hunger string that has seen many to their early grave is now issued to the Defence Headquarters and Chief of Defence Staff!
While calling on the Military and Chief of Defence Staff who by nature of training are expected to “Obey the last order” to in the understanding of democracy discountance this unconstitutional order of Mr President in their own interests.
The Senate should reflect on the Odi catastrophe to relearn the lessons that seems lost on us to be able to tame the President before the roof falls on all of us.
In Okuloma Nigeria seems to be recalling for the tragedy of Odi, hypocritically calling for what they are condemning in Gaza at Okuloma!
The masterminder of the police massacre at Odi was a political thug named Ken Niweigha, aka Daddy Ken. He graduated from political thuggery into everything crime; a career militant, highway robber, renowned cultist, kidnapper, and a sea pirate on Nigeria water, name the crime; Ken hands was in it!
It was Ken, that led the ambush that led to the killing of police officers and men in Odi Balyesa State South South Nigeria.
The Intel available to the then President, Chief Olusegun Obasanjo made it mandatory to act in the manner he did, a Balyesa state backed criminal gang was terrorising the state under the cover of the state authority!
Obasanjo gave a marching order to the military!
The soldiers got to Odi and came under what they reported as “heavy and sustained fire”. The militants were shooting at the soldiers from built up areas, inside houses and buildings. In what looks like the pattern the world is presently witnessing in Gaza, using civilians as human shields. Soldiers were forced to adopt a tactical assault plan; destroy every building the militants fired from. Confronted with a superior fired power by the soldiers, the militants retreated to the creeks, again, Ken escaped but bodies were counted mostly of innocent civilians, over 375 people were reportedly killed by the military, on Wikipedia it was found over 900. 375 or 900, the body of Ken was not in the number.
Left behind in Odi was four (4) buildings; a church with no one to worship, a school with no student to attend, an hospital with no one to care for and a bank with no economy to service. Aside from those, all insight were rumble and dead flesh of humans and animals. Professor Wole Soyinka, Nobel laureate, a friend of Bola Ahmed Tinubu and an ally of APC called it; “a callous overkill”.
The then commander in Chief of the Armed Forces who gave the order, later called it, “the animalism of the military”, whatever this says to the Senate and the citizens of the Federal Republic of Nigeria!
Ten (10) whole years later the long arm of the law caught up with Ken, he was finally arrested in 2009 by the Nigerian Police. Reasonableness demanded of the authority to have waited and allowed the police to do their preliminary job of investigation.
Dear 10th Senate, and all Senators of the Federal Republic of Nigeria do we need to halt the ongoing rampaging order of Mr President that is exposing innocent citizens to unreasonable death? Should we wait and watch the wasting of innocent civilian souls in Okuloma at the order of Mr President while the actual criminals may be away? On the shoulders of the Senate rest this decision. What you save Nigeriens from by refusing the cowboy from Chicago’s exuberance for war, please, act fast to save Nigerians from senseless killings of innocent citizens.
Do I need to remind the Senate the opinion of its President His Excellency Godswill Akpabio on the unfortunate incidence; “we are not at war, the killer may be foreign machineries” the possibility of his claim must be investigatively explore.
The Defence Headquarters” should be reminded by the Senate that individual officers carrying out these unlawful orders are going to be held liable per “Nuremberg principles” in case they don’t know, they can not go and commit genocide in Delta state or any state for that matter, under the guise of a so call “Presidential order” they should know this and know peace – even after they retired they may stand trials not just locally but at the International Court of Justice.
“Ti sobia o ba di egbo, oluganbe laa ke si”, meaning, if guinea worm will get out of hand to become a sore; to the herbalist one should called.
May I call on the Senate and all Democrats to save our hard earned democracy before it is truncated by recklessly issued presidential order!
Dr Bolaji O. Akinyemi is an Apostle and Nation Builder. He’s also President Voice of His Word Ministries and Convener Apostolic Round Table. BoT Chairman, Project Victory Call Initiative, AKA PVC Naija. He is a strategic Communicator and the C.E.O, Masterbuilder Communications.
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