Olushola Omogbehin
The Pan-Yoruba socio-political organization, Afenifere has said that the threat by the United States President Donald Trump to attacks islamic terrorists in Nigeria was a political bait on his displeasure over the resolute stand of President Ahmed Bola Tinubu on matters of public interest.
In a statement by Afenifere’s National Publicity Secretary, Mr Jare Ajayi, the claim that the Federal Government is complicit in killing of Christians in Nigeria was not only unfounded, but an attempt to give a dog a bad name for a justification to kill it.
The socio-cultural organization argues that the threat is informed by underlying economic imperatives and a desire to maintain American geopolitical dominance in West Africa.
“By sounding so harsh, Mr Trump hopes to get President Tinubu to negotiate with him with a view to having more inroads into Nigeria’s economy and to possibly force Nigeria to buy more goods, especially weapons, from America.
“Nigeria’s recent rapport with China does not seem to go down well with the US. Besides, some interests in America do not like the principled positions being taken by the Bola Tinubu administration on some issues”, Ajayi said.
According to Afenifere, Vice President Kashim Shettima’s recent expression of Nigeria’s preference for a two-state arrangement for Palestine and Israel when he represented the country during the last United Nations’ General Assembly in New York which did not go down well with America.
Continuing, the group said Trump has been very critical of South African President Cyril Ramaphosa for denouncing Israel over Gaza invasion and the latest imposition of 15% tariff on oil import by President Tinubu which invariably did not go well with Trump because Nigeria imports a lot of fuel from America.
”Nigeria is a sovereign country. The matter at hand falls within the purvey of what the government can and should deal with. And government, through its various security arms, is not resting on its oars. It is working on insecurity. Government can do more, certainly. The change of security chiefs is one of the steps being taken by Mr. President to buckle up on security.
“So, they sponsor bandits to cause mayhem in places where they spot mineral resources. When the people in those areas are displaced, the ‘sponsors’ step in and begin to exploit the resources.” Afenifere stated.
Urging Nigerians to be patriotic and avoid anything that would escalate the already undesirable situation, Afenifere said there is no doubt that Nigeria needs all the help it can get to tackle its security challenges, threatening it with war attack is not the way to help.
