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MEND´s Attack On Lagos Isn´t Targeted Upon Yoruba Nation

July 22, 2009

It’s with a sense of shock and awe that I’ve followed the responses coming from so-called ace people representing the Yoruba Nation over the Lagos oil facility attack by MEND. The tribal masculinity and testosterone-laden ways and means via which they’ve been moving and shaking the MEND attack out of proportion, would make anyone’s skin crawl and stomach churn. Tirades have been running amuck from the horse’s mouth of self-appointed Yoruba supermen and their Native Institutions suchlike Yoruba Council of Elders, Afenifere, Odua´s People Congress &co.&co. 


The latest of this crap talking came from senators representing Lagos State. It’s most interesting to read of Senator Olorununbe Mamora and his cohorts of senators from Lagos telling MEND to tender an apology to Lagos State and her dwellers for bombing an oil facility belonging to Federal government of Nigeria. And I ask, where were these senators to condemn a Northern senator who opined that 20 million Niger Deltans be decimated to death to give a breathing space for easy flow of oil for the sole enjoyment of the higher-ups? Same senators who couldn’t condemn their coequal for craving holocaust in Niger Delta are all of a sudden gung-ho and militant in asking MEND to do amends. It’s not too late for the whole senate to lampoon the said northern senator and ask him to apologise to Deltans and across the Nigeria board.

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I’m not fooled that all these hubbub of tribalism belching from the mouths of YCE, OPC and Lagos senators are legit hustle on the part of Yoruba Nation as a whole. I take it that these mouthpieces of Yoruba sectionalism are only raising their own personal stakes under false pretence of Yoruba unity and tribehood. These people are only afraid that MEND, which is the only opposition to government and the corrupt top shots in Nigeria, is damn right in their backyards. They’re paranoid with fear that should MEND include corrupt politicians and movers and shakers in Nigeria into their manifesto of elimination  - they, their families and their investments scattered over Lagos and Nigeria-wide would be easy prey and soft target for MEND. Suchlike the ex-governor of Lagos State Tinubu will by now be agog with fear that he and his ilk, their investments and family have no hiding place should MEND include corrupters and corruptees in Nigeria in their menu of destruction. Most Nigerians had wished MEND took the fight directly to Aso Rock and those fakers in Abuja pretending as legit representatives of the people. For those in South-West turning the MEND attack on its head, their fear is that the prayer of the masses wishing the preponderance of MEND all over the place is getting closer to their homes and corrupt investments.

Only the position taken by Afenifere has been most civilised from the rest. Afenifere had warned that the MEND attack was not a direct attack on the Yorubas. And this is the gospel truth. MEND trended not to attack or humiliate any tribe by their self-struggle tactics. If MEND has any palaver with Yorubas, how come Falana is their choicest lawyer? They could’ve had their native man lawyering for them instead of Falana. How come Professor Wale Soyinka is their most quoted person? I suppose the owner of Saharareporters who’s the most ardent publisher of MEND is also Yoruba. I know MEND is very thankful to these and other Yorubas who buy into their agitation. Those over-blowing this attack into the ho-ha of tribal arena are inconsequential others. MEND knows this and most Yoruba are aware too, no matter how the cabal hype this attack asunder for their sole advantage.

Lagos State governor didn’t err a lot on the side of caution in his speech condemning MEND: you could almost hear Tinubu speaking via Fashola. This fear of MEND´s attack on corrupt politicians is now well founded amid Yoruba politicians. OPC wasn’t better either, although they were neither here nor there in their condemnation, their tribalism sufficed. Yoruba Council of Elders were totally offline, their tribalism in this matter was well advertised. Leave aside the fact that these mouthpieces of Yoruba Nation are hiding under the auspices of Yoruba solidarity to save their skins from MEND´s attack, there is also the angle of them wanting to use this attack to get short-term fame. Supposing Yoruba Nation is under attack, is president Yar´adua whom YCE intended visiting, a Yoruba man? They’re only cashing in on this palaver to up their personal self-gratification while pretending to front for the collective Yoruba people.

Up till now the MEND is not a tribe but a self-determination sect. Not all Niger Deltans cue alongside them and more so, the MEND is membered by more than one tribe. How they’ve graduated MEND to a tribe attacking another tribe is mystery. The facility attacked by MEND belongs to Federal government and not any particular tribe.

While we all weep the lives lost in the said attack, the entire singsong by the various Yoruba groups to promote the attack into tribal jingoism is self-serving. They should stop parading their self-interest as general good for all Yorubas. MEND is the one and only hope of opposition to PDP and all thieving politicians for now. If there be any kind of immediate revolution at present, it´d come from MEND. Now all politicians are afraid and corrupt politicians from the North have given their Southwest cohorts the contract to make this a tribal war by badmouthing and bad-minding MEND before the public. We know who our enemies are. And it’s not MEND. MEND is hope to the down and out in our society. Only the crooks in our midst should fear MEND and its behaviour in awakening the revolutional spirit in Nigerians. The 'inconsequential' masses impoverished by the corrupt wheeling and dealing of Satanist faking as politicians, should embrace MEND as the amazing grace of our generation.

MEND is stand-up and those trending their genuine efforts as tribally sectional, are the fall guys.


S. Njokede writes from The European Union.


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