NEWISSUES
By George Onmonya Daniel
In a new video shot on 10th October, Bello Turji can be seen sending a message to the Nigerian government, but this time, the colour of his message has changed to calling out to all Muslims in the world to hear his message. He also uses words like “Yahuda” which means “Jews” or “Zionist” to refer to others who he sees as non-Muslims.
The Fulani bandit, Bello Turji, was just a local armed Fulani leader who was a cattle rustler, armed robber robbing villages around Zamfara with his gangs, engaged in cattle rustling, kidnapping for ransome, a gangster who has committed all sorts of atrocities, from mass killings to raping women, suddenly turned to a jihadists freedom fighter.
These guys refer to themselves as “barayin daji” meaning “thieves who live in the bush.” What they do is no different from any crude and cruel unorganised crime enterprise around the globe, but they have backing from Fulani elites who exonerate them of blame but look for all sorts of reasons to justify why they have become terrorist gangs terrorising Nigeria. They are not stupid, they watch the news and listen to BBC Hausa and Voice of American Hausa, or other Hausa programme too. They are on Tiktok making videos splashing kidnap money and armed robbery money, showing their faces. The likes of Bello Turji are now trying to take the form of what Sheikh Gumi described. Sheikh Gumi had insisted government give them amnesty or they would transform into a jihadist group. Bello Turji is trying to take that shape to muscle the government into amnesty. His rant include attack on Sheikh Isa Pantami who was Minister of Communication during Buhari's time.
However, this Bello Turji tactic supported the likes of Sheikh Gumi may not work. Many Muslims, especially Hausa people, who are the victims of the Fulani bandits atrocities, are now getting disenchanted, and no longer support the bandits in anyway as in the past years when they did when the likes of Bello Turji were killing people in Southern Kaduna, Plateau, and Benue. This time Bello Turji is on his own.
