Special fact-finding report on Leah Sharibu’s 6th abduction anniversary as Fulani terrorists strike Yobe
By Emmanuel Ogebe
After repeated alerts from the general public regarding multiple mass atrocities in Benue State last year, US Nigeria Law Group deployed a rapid response fact-finding and relief mission to one of the massacred communities due to the overwhelming nature of the multiple massacres.
We reported on the Adoka massacre of April 2023 at the National Press Club in Washington saying:
“I went on a fact-finding mission to Adoka, Benue State, and what I was told was chilling. I was told that three days after the declaration of the presidential election results on March 1, the Fulani herdsmen invaded the community and began to rob and rape members of that community.
“They did that for 30 days, and then in the first week of April, they started killing people in the community.
“The military arrived, and after 45 minutes, they said they were leaving. The community pleaded with them. Major Awul who led that team, left with his troops, and 15 minutes later, the Fulani herdsmen came in and slaughtered 52 people in cold blood.
“Now, the members of the community tell me that these herdsmen came in to celebrate the victory of their enablers in the election. If you notice, the killings stopped just around the elections, but they have resumed with a vengeance after the elections, which means they’re trying to make up for the numbers they didn’t kill during the time of the election.”
In this same community of Umuogidi in Adoka Benue State which we visited nine months ago, the Fulani invaded again weeks ago. The youth asked them to leave and over 12 of them were massacred on the spot.
The same thing happened in Yobe State last month during our fact-finding mission commemorating Leah Sharibu’s 6th abduction anniversary.
Seven villages in four Local Govts were attacked after villagers protested looting and destruction by Fulanis who then remobilized for a major offensive.
After days of onslaught, local vigilantes captured several Fulani militia – larger than the number of Fulanis arrested by the army for the killing of hundreds in Mangu from Christmas till now.
Worse still, the army bragged about arresting one Plateau villager that it claimed was a gun manufacturer.
The Defense Industry Corporation and NNPC [Nigerian National Petroleum Company] cannot produce weapons or petroleum but rural natives can, apparently. In the northeast, local vigilantes capture the terrorists but in the north central the authorities capture local vigilantes.
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Caught between Boko Haram and Fulani terrorists
Despite the capture of a some Fulanis in Yobe, a full scale conflict continued according to locals as they are caught between Boko Haram and the Fulani terrorists. For several years now as we have exclusively reported, Boko Haram and Fulani terrorists have been in an operational alliance.
During the abduction of Leah in 2018, Fulani collaborators served as guides to Boko Haram as they came to attack the school.
Similarly, when Leah escaped and ended up in a Fulani camp, they captured and returned her to the terrorists.
For some years now, the multinational Fulani kidnap syndicate captures Christians on northeastern roadways and sell high value captives and women to Boko Haram as sex slaves while ransoming back small fry.
In 2020, the Fulani terrorists abducted American missionary Walton in Niger and transported him to Nigeria where then-President United States Donald Trump ordered his rescue by elite U.S. special forces before he could be sold to Boko Haram.
However, now in Yobe, the Fulani terrorists have graduated from kidnapping, raping and looting to mass killings just like in Adoka in Benue State. A firm and decisive response is needed right now.
Instead the Federal Government said it would commence the Pulaku Initiative, “a large-scale resettlement programme to address the causes of clashes between farmers and herders in various flashpoints nationwide” in seven states – Sokoto, Kebbi, Benue, Katsina, Zamfara, Niger, and Kaduna.
According to the programme, houses, schools, hospitals and other basic amenities will be provided for Fulani herdsmen.
Security and Food Security is more critical than housing estates. Rather than rehabilitate over 1,000,000 displaced farmers in the middlebelt so they can farm and crash food prices, Tinubu is taking their land to build estates for Fulanis who destroyed and displaced them. There are 160,000 rehabilitated terrorists but no single rehabilitated farmers.
Why this logical incongruity?
Firstly, you can loot more from construction projects than from agro but secondly this is part of a political perpetuation strategy.
Implanting vast Fulani enclaves distorts election maps in the states – granting Tinubu sympathy and stronghold amongst the Fulani caliphate whom he successfully excluded from the presidency for the first time since the 1999 return to democracy.
That a non-Fulani presidency allows Fulani massacres of its citizens obviously means he’s not ruling for anyone other than himself. The fact is Tinubu has already finished his game plan.
As exposed in an Amicus brief in the Bagudu Abacha loot case in the USA, they borrowed $10 billion using our future oil ($3 billion) and future gas ($7 billion) earnings. The loans were not tied to any project except shoring up the naira but the currency even reached over 60% devaluation.
A banker friendly with Tinubu made $66 million from the $3 billion loan transaction which will cost an estimated $12 billion to repay. The terms of the $7 billion can only be imagined…
Even if he is deposed tomorrow, they’ve collected the money before the crude was even drilled from the ground!
Under Buhari, Fulanis in Niger and everywhere else were empowered to kill Nigerians all over.
Under Tinubu, they’ve been empowered to kill Yoruba chiefs like they killed in Plateau and Southern Kaduna for years before with impunity.
It appears Tinubu is out to punish the Yorubas for boldly voting for merit and morals. He is the state, he is the nation, he is now West Africa and they are just a tribe.
But he has consolidated all legitimate and illegitimate coercive forces under his sphere, including BH [Boko Haram] via [Vice President Kashim] Shettima and Niger Delta militants via Asari [Dokubo] and there’s still insecurity.
He even brought in the failed Zamfara governor who used to photograph with Fulani bandits as minister of state for defense. Its their political absorption that he’s seeking now.
They have really begun carving up the land they conquered in addition to the looting. And poor IDPs remain in camps in the north east for over 12yrs and in the middlebelt for nine years!
Why is it only in the northeast that we have both well-funded Civilian JTF [joint task force] and vigilante while in the middlebelt even gunsmith for local hunters are detained?
Who is born to rule men and who is born to be killed for cows in Nigeria?
The update from Yobe’s war continues:
“Thanks for prayer. this morning of friday my blood Brother was attacked on their way to market by herders along damaturu to buni_yadi they burn two cars. since morning we did not hear from him because he was running in the bush.
“but thanks Jesus we are able to talk to him around 6:pm he is now in Damaturu.
“they have started blocking roads in yobe state and attacking villangtiesr.
“we are in terrible sitaution in yobe state. we do not have place to go woo
“Even last night the fulanies herders attack one comunity that is close to where i used to go for treathing.
“they burn their food and carry their cows so and is only villangtiesr that now acting very well that many villages were depending on them than police or soldies because the villangtiesr can come at any time while they have the information.
“but if it is soldies or police they Will not come untill they have done every things.
“Saturday -Thanks great God we are able to see him [my brother] today. they killed 4 peoples and they go away with another. he escape narrowly because he see peoples were falling down being shot by the herders but as God Will save him he was not hit by any bullet or Arrows as he is running beside main road.
“because if you run inside main bush then the both side were bh and Fulanis in which all are dangerous. he run for 10 km before he can reach damaturu and his phone was off. glory belong to Jesus woo. and today we have to stayed at home because if you go to market the herders or bh Will attack you and things are becoming difficult pray over our sitaution here in yobe.”
– This is a live update from our team member who survived after being attacked by Boko Haram 13yrs ago and has already lost countless family members to terrorism.
Building strongholds in non-Fulani states
The Tinubu regime has purportedly agreed in principle to the establishment of state police but this will take time to constitutionally implement.
Tinubu has also urged governors to strengthen their forest guards and other local enforcement agencies. This is a step in the right direction. But who really has been frustrating the forest guards in the states?
In Benue State, the police declared wanted an Assistant to the state governor after Fulanis massacred a morning mass killing two Catholic priests and 17 members at St Xavier’s church in 2018.
Even after we attended the mass burial for Father Felix and other victims, some of those who were present with us were killed that night upon their return home even after the governor’s assistant had turned himself in to the authorities.
The Fulani attackers who dressed up in choir robes and released videos of themselves beating drums while desecrating the sanctuary were never arrested.
But the police arrested, disarmed and detained the lawfully established Benue State forest guards.
In Plateau State under the Tinubu administration, local watchmen, including an auxiliary policeman, were killed by the Nigerian army and not the Fulani attackers last year.
Until every Nigerian displaced by Fulani terrorists is rehabilitated, there should be no discussion of imposing RUGAs or any enclaves on anyone’s lands.
Ironically, Nigerian farmers just want to live in peace on their ancestral lands and farm. They don’t lack houses or schools. Any construction is therefore for the intruders.
If they must, why isn’t the government building these infrastructure for the Fulanis in their own land? Well, because these are foreigners who have no villages here.
They were invited here by [former President Muhammadu] Buhari and co to occupy Nigeria and have refused to withdraw with Buhari’s tenure over.
Ironically, Buhari boldly borrowed to build a $4 billion rail line in Niger Republic, bigger than any rail line in Nigeria today. It showed where his true allegiance is but also was a power perpetuation strategy – to flood Nigeria with imported foreign voters.
Tinubu is trying to achieve the same demographic democratic re-engineering by building strongholds in non-Fulani states.
A 22-year old Nigerian NGO Stefanos Foundation took me on a fact-finding mission to see Nigerian refugees in Cameroun 10 years ago. Stefanos repatriated hundreds of them to Nigeria and got them land to rent and farm on outside Abuja since their village is still occupied by Boko Haram over a decade later.
These returned Gwoza farmers have helped food supply at lower cost in Abuja earning even the commendation of then Agric Minister Audu Ogbe.
The government can negotiate with Fulanis to settle in Sambisa forest which was designated by the British colonial government as a game reserve (after all VP Shettima governed Sambisa) but they must not take the lands of any Nigerian.
When [former President Goodluck] Jonathan used our collective wealth unconstitutionally to build hundreds of Almajiri schools in the north, he didn’t do it on lands of the middlebelt. Why is it now that they want to take other people’s land for the Fulanis?
Russia currently occupies 20% of Ukraine but the Fulanis occupy forests across the length and breadth of Nigeria with only the creeks of Niger Delta left.
Nigeria is under enemy occupation in an undeclared war all over the country and it is way past time for the country to be liberated from Trojan terrorism within.
Six years after Leah’s abduction in Yobe, Nigeria is still the mass kidnapping capital of the world and people in Yobe State are now caught between Boko Haram, ISWA and Fulani terrorists.
During the period before our arrival up to our departure from Nigeria, terrorists again attacked communities in Bokkos, Agatu and Adoka in Plateau and Benue States where we had provided relief for previous attacks.
UN intervention
Sadly, when UN Secretary General Antonio Guterres visited Nigeria, the media reported as saying: “The governor has told me that you need to create new facilities to be able to have effective reintegration of these ex-terrorists, ex-combatants, and I promised that we would be fully supportive of that project.
“The best thing we can do for peace is to reintegrate those who in the moment of despair became terrorists but now want to become citizens and to contribute to the well-being of their brothers and sisters.”
Guterres urged continued humanitarian support in Borno State and appealed to the government to help the people in internally displaced persons (IDP) camps to return to their homes “in safety and dignity.”
Why is it a crime to be a victim citizen of Nigeria and a reward to be an enemy of Nigeria?
A Nigerian official was begging the UN to help ex-terrorists when the UN begged Nigeria to help terror victims!
The report continued: “We encourage all Nigerians, who have endured similar violence in their own communities. In our victim-centered approach, perpetrators must be held accountable.”
Guterres also thanked the government of Nigeria for its support in repairing the UN House which has enabled the staff to return.
From the above, Guterres recommended a victim-centered response while the Nigerian official recommended a perpetrator-focused response.
The UN thanked Nigeria for helping rebuild their bombed office; Nigeria begged UN to build facilities for ex-terrorists and UN begged Nigeria to help IDPs return to their homes safely
Nigeria’s misrulers should side with their people for once.
Emmanuel Ogebe
Special Counsel
Justice for Jos Project
US NIGERIA LAW GROUP
Washington
Seeking to end impunity in the Nigerian Genocide
