Dogara Blames Violence in the North on Leadership that Promotes Greed and Inequality, Says the North is on Fire and Running Out of Time

The former Speaker of the House of Representatives, Rt. Hon. Yakubu Dogara, has blamed the violence ravaging the northern part of the country on the leadership model that promoteS greed rather than address crucial challenges.

Dogara who spoke at a Northern Security meeting convened by the Arewa Research and Development Project (ARDP) to inaugurate the Northern security monitoring committee, said North is now in the grip of what Soren Kierkegaard called “Sickness unto death” the numbing of the soul by despair that leads to moral and physical debasement. It has become a society that is driven at bits very core by death instinct; the instinct to annihilate and destroy rather than nurture and create.”

“We are confronted with a crisis that is unparalleled in our history. The death spiral appears unstoppable. Increasingly, it is becoming harder and harder to distinguish us from our enemies.

“There was no shortage of early warning signs and as a matter of fact, our philosophers such as the late Sa’adu Zungur of blessed memory had warned that this dystopian era was fast approaching but we ignored all. We are now paying for our collective negligence” the former Speaker said.

Dogara lamented that the Federal Capital Territory (FCT) and Kwara state are relatively peaceful out of the 18 states in the north.

“A peaceful and orderly Northern Nigeria then was more engaged in the pursuit of justice rather than pursuit for order. In tackling these problems, we must realise that guns do not kill and killing the violent does not necessarily bring peace except peace of the grave.

“Violence is taking roots because our leadership model has been exposed as a lie, an empty ideology used to satiate greed instead of addressing social inequality and injustice.

“We are running out of time. It is crystal clear that the North cannot withstand the kind of contradictions that exist now. The North is on fire, ignited by us either by our actions or by what we permit or allow. Those who truly love the North must now come out and accept responsibility and begin the salvage mission, bearing in mind Professor Andrew Haruna’s warning ‘That the North was handed over to us in one peace, we must therefore not pass it to our children in pieces ” he stated.