Editor’s note: In this new piece, a concluding
part of: The bloody legacy of Usman Dan
Fodio (part 1), Nigeria’s former minister of
aviation Femi Fani-Kayode writes on the
activities of colonial administrator Lord
Frederick Lugard and his wife Flora Shaw in
Nigeria.
Fani-Kayode further delved deep into the
activities of the northern elders – from the
time of late Usman Dan Fodio to the current
administration led by President Muhamadu
Buhari.
Former minister Femi-Fani Kayode
Permit me to indulge in a quick aside and take
you into a brief journey of discovery into the
deep and devious mind of Lugard.
On September 8, 2015, in an essay titled ‘Lord
Lugard’s Magic and Flora Shaw’s Spell’ (New
Telegraph, Daily Post, Naij. com, Premium
Times, Pointblanknews) I wrote the following:
“In 1916, Lord Frederick John Dealtry Lugard,
the 1st Baron Lugard, the fourteenth Governor
of Hong Kong and the first Governor-General
of Nigeria, said the following:
“Lagos has for 20 years opposed every
Governor and has fomented strife and
bloodshed in the hinterland. I have spent the
best part of my life in Africa; my aim has been
the betterment of the natives for whom I have
been ready to give my life.
But after some 29 years, and after nearly 12
years as governor here, I am free to say that
the people of Lagos and indeed the westerners
are the lowest, the most seditious and disloyal,
the most purely prompted by self-seeking
money motives of any people I have met.”
As if that were not bad enough, two years
later, on September 25, 1918, in a letter to his
colleague Walter H. Lang, Lugard wrote the
following:
“The Hausa-Fulani has no ideals, no ambitions
save such as sensual in character. He is a
fatalist, spendthrift and a gambler. He is
gravely immoral and is seriously diseased that
he is a menace to any community to which he
seeks to attach himself.”
Lugard didn’t stop there. In his book titled
‘The Dual Mandate’ (pg. 70) of 1926, he wrote
the following:
“In character and temperament, the typical
African of this race-type is a happy, thriftless,
excitable person. Lacking in self-control,
discipline and foresight.
Naturally courageous, and naturally courteous
and polite, full of personal vanity, with little
sense of veracity, fond of music and loving
weapons as an oriental loves jewelry.
His thoughts are concentrated on the events
and feelings of the moment, and he suffers
little from the apprehension for the future, or
grief for the past. His mind is far nearer to the
animal world than that of the European or
Asiatic, and exhibits something of the animals’
placidity and want of desire to rise beyond the
State he has reached.
Through the ages the African appears to have
evolved no organised religious creed, and
though some tribes appear to believe in a
deity, the religious sense seldom rises above
pantheistic animalism and seems more often
to take the form of a vague dread of the
supernatural.
He lacks the power of organization, and is
conspicuously deficient in the management
and control alike of men or business. He loves
the display of power, but fails to realize its
responsibility… he will work hard with a less
incentive than most races.
He has the courage of the fighting animal, an
instinct rather than a moral virtue… In brief,
the virtues and defects of this race-type are
those of attractive children, whose confidence
when it is won is given ungrudgingly as to an
older and wiser superior and without envy.
Perhaps the two traits which have impressed
me as those most characteristic of the African
native are his lack of apprehension and his
lack of ability to visualize the future.”
These were the views of the principal architect
and great grandfather of our modern nation-
state whose wife, Flora Shaw, gave us the
name ‘Nigeria’ . When translated from Latin
that name means “the area of darkness”.
To the both spouses we were nothing but that
darkness and a convenient commercial
venture which was to be milked dry for its
mineral resources.
That was the mindset of the man who
famously proclaimed that northern Nigeria was
the “ poor husband” whilst the south was the
“rich wife” and that “their marriage must last
forever”.
The fact that that “rich southern wife” has
been held back, brutalized, traumatized,
cheated, robbed, raped and sodomized over
the last two hundred years by that “poor
northern husband” is of no issue to evil-
minded, greedy and calculating men like
Lugard.
Theirs is to keep our people in perpetual
bondage and to ensure that our internal
colonial masters continue to destroy our
destinies, smite our fortunes and blight our
future.
And nothing seems to have changed. Two
hundred and twelve years after Dan Fodio’s
onslaught in what was to later become
northern Nigeria and fifty six years after his
great grandson, Sir Ahmadu Bello, the
erstwhile Saurdana of Sokoto and the man that
I have described as the ‘second Mahdi of
Nigeria’ , proclaimed that it was his intention
to “dip the Koran in the Atlantic ocean” and
thereby Islamise and conquer the people of the
south, their descendants are attempting to do
precisely the same thing under the leadership
of Muhammadu Buhari.
Chief Solomon Asemota SAN captured the
moment in a graphic and accurate manner in
an excellent essay part of which reads as
follows:
“Islamist Jihadists of the Hausa, Fulani and
Kanuri Ethnic Nationalities, who are Negroid
immigrants to Nigeria, are pushing the nation
to an implosion. It is therefore imperative that
the remaining 386 Ethnic Nationalities of
Nigeria should, as a matter of priority, convene
a Conference to demonstrate to the few
Islamist Jihadists of the three Ethnic
Nationalities the grave danger of Islamism as a
system of governance.
Nigerians are reminded that the present
distress in the nation is not an act of God but
man-made. The brazen and audacious
imposition of Islamist Jihadists into key
positions in the country is not an expression
of religious piety but a deliberate manipulation
of religion for cultural and political domination
by three Ethnic Groups.
This Agenda commenced in 1975 after the
overthrow of General Gowon. The Islamist
Jihadists are a violent and domineering strain
of Islam rejected by mainstream Muslims”-
(‘DISCRIMINATORY APPOINTMENTS AGAINST
NON-MUSLIMS IN NIGERIA’, Naij. Com, Trent
On Line, 10th August 2016).
Asemota has put it very well. This is the
challenge that we face in Nigeria today. Buhari,
who I have described as the ‘third Mahdi of
Nigeria’ has perfected the script and he is
executing the master plan and the not-so-
hidden agenda with ruthless precision.
It is left for us to either continue to act as if
all is well and continue to wallow in our
ignorance, self-pity and shameful cowardice or
to stand up, step up to the plate, confront the
challenge, say it as it is, do what is necessary
and resist it with every fibre of our being.
Those that believe in the agenda of the three
Mahdi’s and that subscribe to their views are
nothing short of modern-day terrorists and
their intent is to kill, destroy, enslave and
subjugate.
We must never succumb to them. We must
resist their tyranny and oppression. We must
shed the toga of political correctness and
uproot them from our land.
We must remember who we are, where we
came from, what we stand for and refuse to
shy away from fighting for our rights.
The ‘gospel’ of Usman Dan Fodio and his
legacy of blood, compulsion, death and
destruction cannot be a lasting foundation for
any civilised modern-nation state and we
must rid ourselves of it. Such a foundation is
not of God and therefore it cannot endure.
We must repent and make reparations for the
oceans of innocent blood that was spilt in our
nation by Usman Dan Fodio and his
descendants over the last two hundred years
and we must appease the affected souls.
We must pray to the Lord God of Hosts and to
the God of Heaven for forgiveness for our
cowardice and complicity and we must
rededicate our nation to the Ancient of Days if
we want to break the spell, break the curse, rid
ourselves of the jinx and be free from His
judgement.
Permit me to end this contribution with a word
for those that have chosen to support and
assist our collective oppressors and who
consistently defend and rationalise their
wickedness, tyranny and murderous ways.
I proclaim that the blood of all those that have
been slaughtered over the last two hundred
years in the name of ethnic domination,
conquest and jihad shall haunt you and yours
from generation to generation. The Prophet
Obadiah said,
“all your allies will turn against you. They will
help to chase you from your land. They will
promise you peace while plotting to deceive
and destroy you. Your trusted friends will set
traps for you, and you won’t even know about
it”-(Obadiah 1:7).
This shall be the portion of our collective
enemies and those that stand with them to
impose their faith, to terrorise our people, to
kill our loved ones, to enslave our children, to
take our land, to rubbish our heritage, to
destroy our future and to bury the gospel of
our Lord and Saviour, Jesus Christ.
by fani kayode
