By: Femi Fani-Kayode
The Bible says “knowledge is power”. It also says “know the truth and it
will set you free”.
This is made all the more important given the fact that history is not
taught in Nigerian schools.
Let us join hands and walk down the beautiful path of knowledge, truth
and history together. Our focus and subject-matter for today is the
Fulani tribe of northern Nigeria.
The Fulani are only partially African and only partly negroid. They are
the product of cross-breeding between the Taurags, Berbers and Arabs of
north Africa on the one hand and the local black African women of Futa
Jalon, Guinea in west Africa, on the other.
In those days Futa Jalon was a popular trade route between north and
west Africa. After hundreds of years of cross-breeding the final product
of this union was the Fula race.
If you doubt this assertion I challenge you to look at the texture of
their hair, their thin lips, their slim and pointed noses, their tall
and slight build and their, more often than not, light complextion and
you will know that they are only partially African and only partly
negroid.
Like their Tutsi cousins (who also originally came from Futa Jalon but
who migrated to central and east Africa over the centuries) they are
primarily and in the main gypsy-like wanderers and nomads who are deeply
courageous and notoriously ruthless and ferocious in battle yet who have
a strange and inexplicable attachment to and affinity and affection for
their cattle and cows.
They betray little emotion, even in the most difficult times and even
when going through immense and the most gruelling form of hardship and
they are focused, mentally-strong, disciplined, patient, calculating,
proud, ruthless, wise and totally unforgiving.
They have long memories: never forgetting a friend or a favour and never
forgiving an insult or a slight. Most important of all is the fact that
they overwhelm and conquer very slowly and incrementally and they do so
primarily by infiltration, assimilation and guile.
It is only when they are fully entrenched and empowered and when they
have totally won the confidence of their host community and infiltrated
them that the sword is brought out and the most extreme forms of
barbarity and violence are employed to achieve their objective.
That is how they conquered the Habe Kingdom, subjugated the Hausa and
turned them into vassals and that is how they took Ilorin from the
Yoruba Aare Ona Kakanfo, Afonja. In both cases they dethroned and
murdered the sitting Kings that they had earlier befriended.
Some historians have argued that they value the life of cows more than
that of human-beings. This may be true of the uneducated herdsmen and
pastoralists amongst them but I do not believe it is entirely true of
their traditional rulers and their educated and political elites.
Some have also argued that their greatest desire is to establish a
homeland for themselves by grabbing the land of others because there is
nowhere in Africa that they can call their own.
Even in Guinea where they originally came from they constitute a tiny
minority of the population, they have never been trusted with political
power and they are viewed with the utmost suspicion.
They arrived in the shores of what later became known as northern
Nigeria in 1804 when they launched their first jihad, under the
leadership of Sheik Usman Dan Fodio, and conquered the Habe
(Hausa-speaking) Kingdom of Gobir.
That is how they got a foothold in Nigeria and they have been here ever
since, imposing their Emirs over the local indigenous populations all
over the north in the name of Islam and turning the children of the
conquered Hausa into almajiris.
They constitute only 7% to 10% of the 200 million-strong Nigerian
population yet they wield and control more power and authority than any
other tribe or ethnic natioalnality in the country.
This has been the case since Nigerian independence in 1960 by either
holding power directly or wielding it through a series of spineless,
cowardly, pliant, willing and loyal surrogates who do their bidding out
of ignorance, fear and a pitiful inferiority complex and who consider
them to be the “master race” that were ordained by God to lead Nigeria
and that were “born to rule”.
Through Islam they have conquered most of the core north because the
Emir is not just an ethnic overlord but he is also the leader of the
Islamic faithful in his domain.
This is a powerful and dangerous mix of religion and ethnicity and it is
one that the Fula’s have used very effectively in their quest to
dominate, conquer and subjugate the whole of Nigeria and impose their
will on the local indigenous tribes and populations that have been there
for thousands of years before they came.
Other than Usman Dan Fodio, two other Fulani leaders stand out as the
custodians and flagbearers of this messianic mission. The first of the
two is Sir Ahmadu Bello, the erstwhile Saurdana of Sokoto and tye
Premier of the old Northern Region and the second is General Muhammadu
Buhari, the President of the Federal Republic of Nigeria.
It is for this reason that Usman Dan Fodio is often referred to as the
First Mahdi of the north whilst Ahmadu Bello and Muhammadu Buhari are
referred to as the second and third Mahdi’s of the north respectively.
You can say what you want about the Fulani but one thing you cannot take
from them is the fact that they fully understand and appreciate the
awesome power and beauty of ethnic and tribal unity in a wider
multi-ethic, multi-religious and multi-cultural nation like Nigeria.
Despite all pretentions to the contrary and rather like the English of
the United Kingdom, the Fulani will always put the Fulani interest
before the Nigerian interest and this has served their tribal purpose
and vision very well.
That is a lesson that other Nigerian tribes and ethnic nationalities
would do well to learn.
Mr. Obadiah Mailafia, who is a former Deputy Governor of Central Bank
and a former Presidential candidate from Southern Kaduna said the
following on 25th August 2019,
“Loyalty, honour respect, integrity are defining features of the Yoruba
leadership tradition.
Fulani leadership traditions is rooted in feudalism, pretence, hiding
ones thoughts and taqquiya.
The game plan is to exploit to the fullest the political and financial
capital of Tinubu. They will keep him onside until they’re able to
destroy him.
To turn Nigeria into a Fulani Caliphate they will happily sacrifice
social progress for ambition. They understand that hungry desperate
people would be too broken to raise their heads.
To assist they continue to allow murderous and terrorist hordes from
Central and Western Africa to take over ancestral lands by force.
They are ruthlessly imposing total control over culture, mass media,
public administration and the economy.
They govern by fear and are willing to plunge us into another civil
war.”
I concur.
Obadiah is an old friend of mine. He studied at Oxford University and he
is one of the brightest stars and most formidable intellectuals in
Nigeria today.
Judging from his words he appears to know the Fulani very well indeed. I
do too. How? Because even though I am a proud Yoruba man, my maternal
great grandmother was a full-blooded Fulani woman and consequently 1/8
of the blood that runs through my veins is Fulani.
I have never hidden this and I never will. As a matter of fact I wear it
as a badge of pride and honor because it proves that I cannot possibly
hate the Fulani because I cannot possibly hate myself.
Criticism is different to hate. The former is healthy whilst the latter
is not. That is the point that many of my Fulani brothers and sisters
fail to appreciate and find it difficult to comprehend.
In any case not all Fulanis are bad and not all non-Fulanis are good.
What I hate are not the Fulani people but the callous, barbarous and
unspeakable atrocities that the Fulani herdsmen and terrorists are
perpertrating in my country and the racist, hegemonist, ethnic and
religious agenda that the Fulani leaders are seeking to impose.
What is also clear to me is that the history, the disposition and the
ignoble intentions of the Fulani ruling elite raises concern and has
serious implications for the peace, welfare and unity of Nigeria.
If the Fulani do not retrace their steps, change their ways and moderate
their actions and if they do not reign in their vaulting ambition of
conquering the Nigerian space and becoming Nigeria’s “master race”, they
can be rest assured of the fact that history, posterity and the Nigerian
people will be very harsh on them.
Worse still they may plunge our nation into a second savage, barbaric
and fratricidal civil war which would make the first one look like
child’s play and which would shatter the very foundations of the West
African sub-region and tear the African continent apart. Let us pray
that it never comes to that.
This is the end of todays history lesson. Thanks for finding the time to
read and learn.