Sabre-rattling
Notorious terrorist leader Bello Turji issued a grave warning to the Hausa people of northwestern Nigeria in a newly released video. Turji…
Notorious terrorist leader Bello Turji issued a grave warning to the Hausa people of northwestern Nigeria in a newly released video. Turji accused the Hausa community of being traitors and hypocrites, alleging that they have been responsible for the killing of innocent Fulani people and their livestock in the past. Turji declared that he would wage war against the Hausa people if the killing of Fulani tribes does not cease. In the video, Turji claimed that his group possesses a variety of weapons and that the Hausa people are his primary targets, not the security operatives.
Bello Turji is known to have been responsible for numerous massacres and terrorist attacks against civilians and security forces in the Northwest region of the country, especially Zamfara and Sokoto States. In September 2021, a Yan Sakai group attacked a mosque in Gwadabawa, Sokoto, killing 11 people. Turji responded by leading his bandits towards a market in Goronyo, also in Sokoto. The bandits entered the bazaar and killed at least 50 civilians. In December 2021, Turji’s forces attacked a bus in Sabon Birni, Sokoto, setting it on fire and burning the 30 passengers inside it to death. Turji was the mastermind behind the slaughter of over 200 people in Zamfara in January 2022. Turji’s current accusations tap into a broader context of ethnic conflicts in Northern Nigeria. Some centuries ago, the areas that became Northwestern and Northcentral Nigeria were marked by conflict and dominance, with Hausa rule overturned by Uthman Dan Fodio’s 1804 jihad, leading to Fulani ascendancy. Despite intermarriages and an uneasy coexistence, banditry and cattle rustling became persistent issues. This never went away even after the British became the overlords of the area. By 2011, banditry had escalated into a national crisis from Zamfara, exacerbated by the breakdown of traditional dispute mechanisms, the corruption of the traditional ruler system, and diminished access to justice in the context of widespread arms availability and farmland destruction. The Fulani-Hausa clashes are often linked to disputes over land, resources and livestock, but the rhetoric of ethnic retribution in this case is particularly alarming. Turji’s explicit threats to wage war on the Hausa community create a dangerous narrative that could lead to further bloodshed, with potentially catastrophic consequences for both ethnic groups and the region as a whole. Fundamentally, Bello Turji’s threats highlight, once again, the issues of limited state capacity and the absence of political will that have long plagued the country’s ability to address insecurity, ethnic tensions and conflict. Several clashes between Fulanis and Hausas in the Northwest, the foremost of which appeared between 2022 and 2023 in Zamfara, went unaddressed by state governors, most of whom are Fulani. Successive Nigerian governments have failed to address the root causes of interethnic violence and terrorism, focusing more on managing crises than on long-term solutions to poverty, unemployment and resource competition. There is also no clear, sustainable and accountable plan for the teeming vigilante groups set up to augment the efforts of regular security forces. There is a reason to believe that Turji’s angst stems largely from extrajudicial killings carried out by vigilante groups locally known as Yan Sakai, but who are now formalised in the state system under various names such as the Katsina Security Watch Corps as well as the Community Protection Guards in Zamfara. While Bello Turji’s threat is credible, what is truly astonishing is the state’s inability to prevent the usurpation of its role as the primary arbiter of disputes among its people. However, considering Nigeria’s history with ungoverned spaces and the influence of non-state actors, this is not surprising.