A Nigerian Governor Asks The Us Government To Stand Up Against Buhari’s Rule As It Is A Moral, Security, And I – The Nigerian Voice

For the first time in African history, a sitting Nigerian governor, Samuel Ortom of Benue State, asked the American government and allies to see President Muhammadu Buhari and his circle as a troubled administration where the well-being, freedom, safety, and justice for all Nigerians is not just a threat to Nigeria but to America itself as well as the advanced world.

Last year at this time, the Catholic Bishop of Sokoto Diocese, Mathew Kukah, informed American lawmakers that under President Buhari, insecurity, nepotism, and persecution of Christians had worsened. The Buhari administration emotionally continuously accused the bishop of hatred of its regime and of using the pulpit to play politics.

However, as a sitting Governor, Ortom is now directly informing Western governments, including the Biden administration and the United Kingdom, that religious freedom and persecution of Nigerian Christians are at an all-time high under Buhari, a Muslim Fulani President.

The American government and the international community should decide to monitor Buhari and his circle as the expanding food crisis, increased deaths of innocent citizens, arbitrary terrorism, politization of religion, and mass fear of the government could expose America to migration problems from Nigeria.

For far too long, Buhari continues to tell the western world that the herders/farmers crisis is more of a cultural and traditional land dispute than a religious issue, but Ortom pointedly informed the western world that under Buhari, who is ethnically linked to Fulani herdsmen, the situation now appears as a religious genocide.

With America and Britain as historically Christian nations, Ortom, who speaks for the vulnerable Christian farming and other communities across the nation, tells the international community they cannot keep ignoring the systematic killing of Christians in Nigeria.

And yet, Ortom appears to understand that under Buhari, a Fulani and a Muslim man, who still has a good number of months left in office, could not be ignored knowing that he is not reportedly openly against the importation of religious violence into Nigeria.

As such, the western world could see more communities in disarray and Nigerians seeking refuge in Internally Displaced Persons (IDP) camps, and displaced persons fleeing, risking migration beyond Nigeria.

The Buhari administration, known for its close ties to Turkey, Russia, and China, nations that promote poor accountability for human rights violations, should not be allowed to continue behaving indifferently as violent attacks on communities in Benue State continue, with alleged threats to Governor Ortom’s life by Fulani herdsmen.

There’s no need for Biden, or anyone else, to soft-pedal human rights and security concerns in Nigeria as Ortom is expressing, especially when religious-based violence remains widespread.

While I would not directly say Ortom accuses Buhari of stirring turmoil in Nigeria, the daily killings and sufferings are becoming too much for a nation in distress.

Buhari, a man who is always on the move, traveling outside the country during times of distress in the streets of Nigeria, is a testament to his apparent indifference to human suffering and his apparent endorsement of unhinged violence, insecurity, poverty, corruption, and human rights abuses.

Under Buhari, widespread human rights abuses by government security agents and armed groups of Islamic Fulani extraction are a daily occurrence in the north, and in the south, vulnerable Nigerians and state government sanctioned security networks are denied gun licenses to defend themselves against armed groups reportedly of Islamic Fulani background.

The United States especially remains proud to be the largest single donor of humanitarian, democracy, and human rights assistance all over the world, so it cannot ignore Buhari and his circle, as reported by Ortom, with Nigeria getting more and possibly dangerous for its people, America, and the international community.

The Buhari presidency Instead of thinking loudly that the governor harbors hatred towards Buhari and his administration, it should find objective ways to correct unjust social, economic, and religious fears across the country, before the American government and its closest allies start to take a firm and precision-guided look at Buhari as a leader and as a person.

Internationally, to ignore Ortom regarding Buhari under the principle of noninterference is to allow Nigeria to keep tilting towards destructive and very dangerous times.

John Egbeazien Oshodi, who was born in Uromi, Edo State in Nigeria to a father who served in the Nigeria police for 37 years, is an American based Police/Prison Scientist and Forensic/Clinical/Legal Psychologist. A government consultant on matters of forensic-clinical adult and child psychological services in the USA; Chief Educator and Clinician at the Transatlantic Enrichment and Refresher Institute, an Online Lifelong Center for Personal, Professional, and Career Development. He is a former Interim Associate Dean/Assistant Professor at Broward College, Florida. The Founder of the Dr. John Egbeazien Oshodi Foundation, Center for Psychological Health and Behavioral Change in African Settings In 2011, he introduced State-of-the-Art Forensic Psychology into Nigeria through N.U.C and Nasarawa State University, where he served in the Department of Psychology as an Associate Professor. He is currently a Virtual Behavioral Leadership Professor at ISCOM University, Republic of Benin. Founder of the proposed Transatlantic Egbeazien Open University (TEU) of Values and Ethics, a digital project of Truth, Ethics, and Openness. Over forty academic publications and creations, at least 200 public opinion pieces on African issues, and various books have been written by him. He specializes in psycho-prescriptive writings regarding African institutional and governance issues.

Prof. Oshodi wrote in via [email protected]