Former aide to the former president Goodluck Jonathan, Reno Omokri is having a heated exchange of words with the former aviation minister, Femi Fani Kayode over Facebook’s Mark Zuckerberg’s visit to the country and the social media network’s support for Hausa language.
In response to an earlier released reply, Femi Fani Kayode wrote:
Reno Omokri, now I am beginning to get a little irritated by you. Is there anywhere that I condemned you, Zuckerberg or Facebook for having your/their views? If so please point it out. Perhaps you don’t know the meaning of the word “condemned” yet you seem so eager to use it. If I wanted to condemn you, him or anyone else I would do so loudly, openly, clearly and gladly but I haven’t done that: I simply disagreed with you and I was very civil about it which I really didn’t have to be because you don’t deserve it.
In any case are you the spokesman of Mark Zuckerberg and Facebook or indeed that of the hausa people of northern Nigeria? Is that your new job since you stopped working under my friend and brother Reuben Abati at the Villa and managing social media for the Jonathan administration? Can those you want to defend today not explain and defend themselves adequately? Do they need you? Could they not have found someone more qualified? Are you really the best they have got? And if you insist on being their defender-in-chief when were you appointed? Honestly Reno my dear little brother you need to have your little bottom spanked for being so cheeky and naughty.
I have known the north and interacted with northerners far more than you and for far longer so I don’t need lessons from you or anyone else about who or what they are, either for good or for bad. And neither do I need to say only things that politically correct about them.or anyone else because, unlike you, I have paid my dues politically and in terms of public commentary for over a period of 27 years.
I worked in the Presidency as President Obasanjo’s spokeman as far back as 13 years ago. I don’t know where you were then. I ran, not one, but two Federal ministries as the Hon. Minister over 10 years ago and since then I have been in the thick of the political fray and drama.
I know who I am and I don’t need to please anyone with what I say. I was in NADECO risking my life fighting against military rule and for the late Chief MKO Abiola’s June 12th mandate when you were probably still wearing diapers. I know the north and indeed this whole country far better than you ever possibly could and over the years I have gained and gathered a lot of experience.
I have also suffered for Nigeria far more than you have. I say this all with the greatest humility knowing that it is only God that made it so and that enabled me to survive it. The result of all that is this: I do not suffer fools gladly and I say things as they are. I have no apology to you or anyone else for that. If others had cultivated the courage to be as bold and forthright as I have been on national issues over the years we would not be in the mess that we are in this country.
You dare to lecture me about northerners and I wonder how many you actually know? I wonder how many you have ever fought for or defended in the past? I also wonder how many you have stood up against when they crossed the line? I have done both over a period of 27 years and it cost me dearly but I have never shied away from it, whichever way, and I will continue to do so. I have also lived in the north for the last 13 years.
Our mutual friend Nasir El Rufai often warned me about you but I never listened to him. Now you have proved him right and all because you want to please your foreign and new-found northern friends. Sadly your gospel of appeasement at all costs is shared by many naive souls who come from the same village as you but that does not mean that we should allow you to infect the rest of the south with it.
That slavish mindset and shameless sentiment has brought much suffering to the people of the south-west and south-south and it is one of the reasons why we made the wrong choice about which side to fight on during the civil war. We will never make that mistake again if it ever comes to it no matter how hard fence-sitters and appeasers like you try.
The more our people are killed and our churches are burnt in the north the more we will protest and speak out. And the more we will resist it and warn the radical islamists of the core Muslim north together with the Fulani herdsmen from hell to desist from their murderous and genocidal ways. Not even 100 million Reno Omokiri’s can stop us from doing that and neither can they make us love those that commit these heinous crimes.
You are spouting the sort of drivel that you are throwing up here about how wonderful the core north is even though thousands of southerners, Middle Belters and Christians are slaughtered at the drop of a hat in that same core north for no just cause on a daily basis. They even come down to the south in their thousands with their cows to do it these days. Maybe you should come home and see what is really going on here rather than writing those great anti-government articles from the relative safety of California.
If you can muster the courage to do that you will discover that political correctness is a very expensive luxury which we simply
cannot afford. Some of us are right here and we have refused to run away from the evil that has gripped the land even when we had every
opportunity to do so. Please endeavour to do the same then perhaps we may take you more seriously.
Hundreds of your fellow Niger Deltans and southerners are languishing in jails all over the country today simply because they supported a southern Christian called President Jonathan during the election yet you have not even cared to visit any of them.
Have you ever reached out to their families or tried to bail them out? Have you been to the jails and cells to offer them care or words of comfort and encouragement? Have you even gone there to pray for them and express solidarity with them? Warimpa Dudafa your former colleague at the Villa has been there for over 150 days now. Have you gone to see him? What about Ikime and Robert when they were there? What about all the others? The answer is no because I have asked. Yet you were in the last government with them and many others but you couldn’t even stand in solidarity with them when they needed you the most. And if you did you insisted on doing so from a safe distance. It is a shame.
Then you have the nerve to talk about “southerners” making a mistake about northerners in a disparaging and condescending way. What a nerve you have got! Your sarcastic assertion about the BBC and the other international radio stations being “naive as well” is nothing less than asinine. The truth is that you are the naive one. You alone and not them. If you really believe the garbage that you wrote here then you are not just naive but dangerously naive and far dumber than I first thought. I say this because the governments that own and control the BBC, the Voice of America and the others know exactly what they are doing.
If only you knew the history of imperialism in Africa and indeed the Third World and how it evolved and if only you were capable of appreciating the reality of neo-colonialism and history of the African people you would be in a better position to comprehend and understand what I am saying. If only you knew what we as a people in Nigeria and Africa suffered in the hands of the western imperialists over the last 100 years you would appreciate this intervention instead of attempting to treat it with contempt just to impress your friends at Facebook and in California.
It is the naivity and ignorance of people like you that has put us in the mess we are in today and that has placed us firmly under the yoke of our internal colonial masters. I urge you to continue to attempt to appease those that see you and those that think like you as nothing more than glorified monkeys and see how far it gets you. As for Mark Zuckerberg he may do whatever he pleases with Facebook because he owns it. In the final analysis it means nothing to me. Like I said earlier, he is entitled to his views. I have no problem with that and neither should you or him have any problem with mine. It is only in your strange Warri vocabulary that disagreeing with someone or not sharing that person’s opinion is tantamount to “condemning” him.
I am sure that he is very happy with you for attempting to defend him here but surely you could have done a far better job than you did.
Keep writing critical essays against the government from California or wherever you are because it is far easier for you to do so from there. Those of us that are here and that are not just arm chair critics and political commentators but that are actually in the fray of politics will continue this fight right here in the theater of war: and unlike others we won’t run and hide in Mark Zuckerberg’s California.
My regards to your family.
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