Why is Nasir El-Rufai trying to out-Buhari Buhari in the area of ethno-religious bigotry and supremacy? Over the vehement objections of the Adara people, he forcefully created and hastily gazetted a Fulani emirate of Kajuru on the lands of the Adara, essentially killing or at least villagizing the exalted chieftaincy institution of the Agom Adara.
According to the gazette, the Chiefdom of Adara would now be reduced to the chiefdom of Kachia, with the creation of a new ahistorical emirate of Kajuru.
When the Agom Adara, Dr. Galadima, echoing the sentiments of his people, protested, he was kidnapped and later murdered. Insinuations abound about why he was murdered even after the demanded ransom was paid.
Since then, the state government have been implementing the gazette forcefully while well-armed Fulani militias have sought to create a fait accompli on the ground by effectively cleansing the areas designated for the Kajuru emirate of the indigenous Adara people, ancestral claimants to the land.
These devastating and well coordinated raids barely elicit press statements or acknowledgements from the state government. As we speak thousands of Adara are in IDP camps.
When the Adara people attempted to fight back, El-Rufai went to all national media platforms and giddily, all but called for “revenge” Fulani attack by wickedly declaring its inevitability. He excitedly sensationalized an incident of Adara attack whose magnitude remains in dispute and which turned out to have occurred in retaliation for repeated raids by armed Fulani militia, a fact El-Rufai erased in his one-sided exploitation of the crisis to serve as justification for his campaign against Adara sovereignty.
All the leaders of the Adara people, including Engineer Bawa Magaji, arguably their most prominent leader, have been arrested and detained without charges for protesting the annexation and emiratization of their land.
Below I reproduce the desperate cry of the daughter of Engineer Bawa Magaji, whose father was arrested alongside other Adara leaders and chiefs.
“There is a government gazette that shows Adara Chiefdom was scrapped and replaced with Kajuru Emirate and Kachia Chiefdom. So Adara people were to fall under either one based on where you fall under.
It seemed however, as if the government had already started acting in line with the gazette as the traditional council that consisted of my father and other chiefs noticed a change in how information was passed along. The village heads and other Hakimis suddenly seemed to be taking orders from elsewhere and not the Agom, even though the Late Agom Adara did not agree with the gazette and made it known where he stands.
A few months later he was kidnapped and subsequently murdered. When the Kaduna State Governor went to pay his condolence visit to the Chiefdom, my dad, who is the Waziri and therefore supposed to stand in for the Late Agom until a new one is installed made it known to the Governor that they had seen the gazette and do not agree to the new arrangement as that will mean Adara as a whole will be no more. Including our tradition and way of life. After a while with no word from the State Government, my dad wrote a letter seeking for audience with the Governor so that issues will be discussed and an amicable settlement will be reached. Silence.
He wrote a follow up letter to the Governor still asking for audience so the issue will be sorted. He took a copy of that letter to Emir of Zazzau and copied some other people. Still silence. In the meantime, the government were already dealing with the Adara Chiefdom as if the gazette had been implemented. My Father as the Waziri only got to hear that a Fulani man was to be Chief of Kachia. (For those who don’t get the implication, this means the Agom Adara is to be replaced with a Fulani man).
The Adara people, spear headed by my Father and other elders then took the matter to court. The first hearing of that case was a week before the elders were rounded up and locked in prison for the killing of Fulanis in Kajuru. The case is still in court.
Just thought to give a background on the Adara matter. I am not a lawyer and I don’t know much about implementing policies. But so do millions of other Nigerians. This is to call on those in government and those who are enlightened to look into this matter and let us know what should or should not have been done in this case.
I am a concerned Adara indigene and my name is Alheri Bawa Magaji.”
Source: Facebook
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