By Fenny Fwa
Enough of blood shed, enough of bitterness and enough of altercation. We need peace tranquility and progress. You can’t make any meaningful progress in human endeavour without peace.
All that is happening between the bachamas and the fulanis cannot in the wildest imagination be compared to apartheid in South Africa where Africans were reduced to subhuman beings in their land. They were brutalized, traumatized,persecuted, exploited and pauperized, yet Nelson Mandela’s effective and humanistic leadership put in place a mechanism for forgiveness reconciliation between the persecuted and exploited blacks and the exploiters and persecutors- the whites. He established the truth and reconciliation commission where the two races forgave each other and moved ahead. Today South Africa because it put behind it the past, they are forging ahead in all human endeavors unlike Zimbabwe who refused to forgive and forget the past, they are now one of the poorest nations on earth despite having a fertile soil, rich solid minerals and having one of the best tourist sites. In the same vein the Hutus and tsusi in Rwanda were engaged in fastfricidal war that destroyed several lives. In a spate of three months from April to June 1994, the genocide in Rwanda resulted to the death of 800000 people. This is worse than BH adjudged to be the deadliest terror group, but despite this they have recorded about 22000 compared to what happened in Rwanda. With the devastating nature of the genocide in Rwanda where people could see those that killed their parents and relations despite that, they put behind the blood letting and today Rwanda is one the fastest growing economies in the World.
This missive in therefore a clarion call on the warring factions in what happened recently in Numan and Demsa local Governments to sheathe their sword and embrace peace process by working hard to forgive and forget the painful and worrisome blood shedding and work towards genuine reconciliation. This can only be achieved through the establishment of Truth and reconciliation commission which will heal the wounds of this unfortunate an avoidable mayhem.
Fellow compatriots you may not appreciate the importance of peace until you visit Borno state. The Governor of Borno state Shetima has one of the most well articulated programme for turning Borno state from a desert to a agrarian state, but despite having several billions set a side for the execution of these laudable projects, he couldn’t do anything because of insurgency, instead sizable sum of the money is being spent to bring about peace in the beleaguered state.
I don’t think we want to be like Borno state who are in perpetual violence as peace has eluded them for the past 8 years. I know people have lost loved ones. My political boy lost his father, two of his uncles and other relatives and they buried 15 people in one day in Lawaru. In Dong, about 40 of such people were buried in one day. It’s difficult to talk to such people about forgiveness and reconciliation. But it has to be done if we want to move forward. It’s after peace has been established that we can talk about other proactive measures. Let us Imbibe the reconciliatory spirit of Mandela that comes along with development and discard the vengeful spirit of Mugabe that breeds only violence and underdevelopment.
