Forget all secessionist agitations, address economic hardship, insecurity, Muslim Group tells Igboho, Kanu, others, Govts

By MARUFH BELLO

A socio-political group, PAG, has told the Yoruba Nation activist, Chief Sunday Adeyemo a.k.a Sunday Igboho, Nnamdi Kanu, and other agitators to forget all secessionist agitations, while calling on all tiers of governments in Nigeria to address the economic hardship and insecurity in the country.

The group stated this in a communique issued at the end of their stakeholders meeting of South West Nigeria, including Kwara State, and signed by Dr Suleiman Adeniran, chairman of the meeting and Barr. Abdul-Waheed A. Olowonjaye, PAG’s chairman, in Ibadan, on 11 July, 2021.

According to the communique, the meeting was at the instance of Political Awareness Group (PAG), a Muslim socio-political group with its headquarters in Ibadan, Oyo State.

The group further stated that restructuring of the country, constitutional amendment and devolution of powers should be agitated for rather than tearing the country apart, saying that “we pledge our commitments to one indivisible Nigeria.”

The group comprising Muslim professionals of Yoruba extraction such as academics, legal luminaries, religious leaders, politicians, at their stakeholders meeting, deliberated extensively on the state of the nation.

The professionals asked the government at all levels to, as a matter of urgency, address the cost of living getting higher, fall in the value of naira, kidnapping, banditry and activities of secessionist taking dangerous dimensions should be abated.

Sunday Igboho, who is now in the police net over “immigration issues” in Benin Republic while trying to leave for Germany after he had been declared “wanted” by the Nigerian Government, Nnamdi Kanu, the leader of Independent People of Biafra (IPOB) who want to break away from Nigeria as a new independent nation, Professor Banji Akintoye, a Second Republic Senator of the Federal Republic of Nigeria and leader of Ilana Omo Oodu’a, among other agitators, have all been calling for the break up of the country on issues as insecurity, inequality, injustice, among other ills that have seemingly become intractable in the present Nigerian state.

Chief Sunday Adeyemo became very active in the agitation crisscrossing the south west Nigerian states shortly after he returned from Igangan where he went to expel the “Fulani” herdsmen allegedly terrorising the people of Ibarapa region of Oyo State.

Following the July 1, 2021 midnight raid on Sunday Igboho’s house at Soka, Ibadan, where two of his supporters were killed in a gun duel, according to the Department of State Security (DSS), and 13 others, including a woman, who were whisked away to Abuja by the secret police, Chief Adeyemo was declared “wanted” by the Federal Government of Nigeria.

About 20 days after the raid on his house, where his Nigerian international passport and other effects were said to have been seized and taken away from his house by DSS, Sunday Igboho fled Nigeria to Cotonou, Benin Republic, to fly to Germany with his wife, Ropo, and the trip was in the end cut short when the security at Cardinal Bernadin Airport found his name on the Interpol Watch List.

Sunday Igboho has since been taken to a Beninese court for trial which will continue on Monday, 26 July, 2021.

Meanwhile, PAG has also advocated for a rotational presidency among all the geo-political zones in the country to have a better political stability and decorum in governance.

Read the full details of the communique by PAG here:

Communique presented at the end of a meeting of Muslim Stakeholders from the South Western Nigeria and Kwara State on Sunday, 11th July, 2021

The meeting was at the instance of Political Awareness Group (PAG), a socio-political group with its headquarters in Ibadan, Oyo State.

The meeting, which had in attendance academics, technocrats, politicians, legal luminaries and religious bigwigs deliberated extensively on the state of the nation vis-a-vis security, economy, freedom of religion, restructuring, Constitutional amendment and devolution of power.

RESOLUTIONS

Consequent upon painstaking deliberations and extensive discussions, the stakeholders resolved passionately as follows:

1. That government at all levels should, as a matter of urgency, address the harsh economic situation in the country seeing that cost of living is getting higher while the value of the naira is sliding.

2. That the security of the nation continues to degenerate on daily basis. There is a need for more decisive and quick actions to arrest the ugly development. The spate of kidnapping, armed banditry, destruction of public infrastructures and the activities of the secessionists continue to take dangerous dimensions and should be abated at all costs.

3. That restructuring, constitutional amendment and devolution of power should be pursued with all sincerity by the Federal Government. State governments should execute, forthwith, devolution of power to the local governments, legislature and judiciary in their states. The governments should ensure fairness in the selection, confirmation and coronation of obas and chiefs as deviation from this may further worsen our fragile security situations.

4. That Muslims in Yorubaland condemned, in the strongest term, all secessionist movements and agitations and we pledge our commitments to one indivisible Nigeria.

5. The meeting opined that for a better political stability and decorum in the governance in the country, rotational presidency between the southern and northern geopolitical zones, should be favourably considered in the ongoing constitutional amendment in the country.

CONCLUSION:

The Muslim Stakeholders Meeting strongly urges governments AT ALL LEVELS to ensure fairness to all groups in their appointments into public institutions which will go a long way in promoting peaceful co-existence in the society. The Meeting prayed Almighty Allah (SWT) to continue guiding the country’s leadership towards making Nigeria a JUST, PEACEFUL and PROSPEROUS nation.

Signed:

Dr. Sulleiman Adediran, FNIM, FNAE
Chairman of the Stakeholders Meeting

Barrister Abdul-Waheed A. Olowonjaye, AFEI, ACIA, MPA
Chairman, Political Awareness Group