TEXT OF SPEECH OF THE NORTHERN PEACE FOUNDATION’S PRESS CONFERENCE, RELEASED ON 29th JUNE, 2018 AT THE NORTHERN PEACE FOUNDATION HOUSE, ABUJA ON THE SPATE OF MINDLESS KILLINGS OF NIGERIANS BY FULANI TERRORIST ELEMENTS, WHICH HAVE REMAINED UNABATED
We Welcome You Distinguished Ladies and Gentlemen of the Fourth Estate, to this Pertinent and long overdue Press Conference of the Northern Peace Foundation. My Name is Ambassador Saliasu Sageer Zarewa, the National Coordinator of the Northern Peace Foundation. With Me in this Press Conference is Amb. Tony Horsfall, Amb. Hamza Abubakar Haruna, Alh. Haruna Abubakar Ahmad, Amb. Keng Keng Ati, Comr. Mohammad Sani Tsoho, Miss Susan Akpoga, Alh. Abdulaziz Yuguda Kabir, Miss Shidoabani Akoga, and Comr. Salahuddeen Shuaibu Planner. The Northern Peace Foundation is a foremost Youths Owned and ran Peace and Sustainable Development Movement that came about, when Cerebral and Patriotic crop of Young Nigerians across the 19 Northern States of Nigeria came together with their Purposeful Intellects and Energies to start a front that will bring about Peace and Sustainable Development, Equity and Fairness, Justice and Good Governance irrespective of Their Tribe, Religion or Region, for the Overall advancement and Socioeconomic development of Their Primary Constituency, Northern Nigeria and Nigeria at large. We have in the outgone year, months, weeks and days vigorously pursued peace development and conflicts Prevention strides by scores of Education, Activism, Reorientation, Partnerships, Sensitization and Advocacy across boards to Traditional Rulers, Religious Leaders, Youths Leader and Groups, Civil Authorities and Critical stakeholders within the Northern Nigerian States with a view to concentrate and contain lasting Peace and Sustainable Development within the region.
We have watched with sadness and dismay, how It has become a recurring decimal that communities across the nation are being visited by violent herdsmen attacks and mindless killings of innocent Nigerians. How Government have been inconsistent and incoherent with giving the menace all sorts of suiting nomenclature, whilst defending or justifying this dastard killings by terrorist elements called Fulani Herdsmen. This Terrorists and Whosoever is sponsoring them, have with their ceaseless attacks, succeeded in pitching Christians against Muslims, Farmers against Herders, Indigenes against Fulanis, and now they want a war to break out. They want Nigeria to slip intoa No Nation.
Today Plateau is bleeding and mourning just as has been the case with communities in Benue, Southern Kaduna, Adamawa, Taraba, Cross Rivers, Edo, Zamfara, and many more states across the nation.
We have looked to Government for so long to stem and abate this gruesome killings, but We got disappointed. We have waited for Elders of the Land to show Leadership and Prevail on the Government, they Prevailed on Us to Vote into Power in 2015, but they have failed Us. It Has therefore, become imperative, that We must take Our Future into Our hands by Our Own Selves, to bring an end to this monstrous killing of Our Brothers and Sisters. We want to make Our Position known that:

It is indeed with a heavy heart that We join all well meaning citizens of Nigeria in saying that Our hearts go out to the Governor, Government and People of Plateau State at this moment of grief and pain.
As we mourn and bury the dead, we must not lose sight of the fact that the threat of further attacks is still with us as the government has not appropriately responded to the menace of the herdsmen insurgency.

The responsibility that is constitutionally vested on the government to secure and protect lives and property of citizens has not been activated nor deployed to the proportion to match the threat that victim communities are exposed and subjected to from the violent attacks.
The onus of arresting this murderous and horrendous criminality lies with the federal government as the sole guarantor of security and public safety. This is a statutory responsibility that must discharged. Unfortunately, rising insecurity across the country is a manifestation of the failure of the Federal Government to discharge this duty.
It must be reiterated that the most fundamental of all Human Rights is the right to live as all the other right only devolve to the living! That is why the constitution asserts that the primary responsibility of government is the security and welfare of the people!
Moreover, Nigeria is a signatory to the “Responsibility to Protect (R2P)” an International Convention that require governments to protect their citizens from mass killings of the type that the herdsmen are carrying out in Nigeria.
We must register Our disappointment with the Presidency, for its Blame Game reaction on the Killings in Plateau, when it, through the SSA on Media and Publicity instead of owning up to a lack of prioritizing Live and Properties on their part, went on to push the blame on Politicians in the State. As if this was not enough, the Presidency went Further to Fashionably justify the killings of Over 200 innocent Nigerians by giving a narrative that ‘about one hundred Cattle’s were initially rustled by a Community in the State and that some Herdsmen were killed, ‘that Governor Simon Lalong had invited the aggrieved groups and pleaded against further actions, while the law enforcement agencies looked into the matter. (Which warranted) violence to break out 24hours later. This stylish justification of the killings by the Presidency was most insensitive and incredibly unfortunate.
From the Presidency’s revelation, Governor Simon Lalong knows the Perpetrators of this killings, since He had invited them and tried to plead with them. As Nigerians are demanding for Justice, We therefore, give Governor Simon Lalong 5days, to fish out, Point out and hand over for prosecution, the ‘aggrieved parties’ whom He purportedly tried to settle. As a matter of urgent importance, Governor Simon Lalong should provide both parties, the ones that rustled cows, and the ones, who instead of reporting such criminality to appropriate authorities, took a field day killing innocent Nigerians. They both should be brought to face the full wrath of the law. Failure to Produce this culprits will leave Us with no choice than to produce damning revelations similar to the Presidency’s, of How Governor Simon Lalong have been romancing all the while, with Murderers of His own People and allowing them go Scott free. We will not only indict Him in the court of Public Opinions, but We will also Petition Him to the UN Human Rights Council, the Donald Trump’s US Presidency and the International Court of Justice. Have cattles been rustled? Those who rustled the cattles of the Fulanis MUST be PUNISHED. Those Fulanis who retaliated and killed people MUST be SANCTIONED. Those who blocked roads & slaughtered innocent travellers MUST be dealt with. JUSTICE must be served across board.
Only when there isJustice, Fairness and Equity, Can Peace reign in a Nation.

We therefore use this opportunity to call on the Federal government to translate it’s rhetorics on security into reality by taking action that will assure citizens across the nation of their safety from Herdsmen attacks.

As Nigerians, we owe it to one another to coexist peacefully and engage ourselves constructively.
Violence must not be an option in resolving differences and disagreements except if the purpose is to pursue an agenda that is to forcefully and permanently displace other citizens from their ancestral abode.
Thank You.

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Nothern Peace Foundation codemnm mindless killings of citizens, sues for peace