The heartbreaking murder of Malam Bashar Sani, a senior administrator at the College of Education, Maru, is yet another grim reminder of the tragedy consuming Northern Nigeria.

Despite paying more than ₦25.7 million in ransomalongside motorcycles, phones, and airtimeto secure the release of his abducted family members over several years, he was eventually killed by the same bandits he had repeatedly appeased.

For years, these criminals targeted his household: abducting his two wives, his younger brother, and later kidnapping him, his wife, daughter, and several neighbours. Each time, the family mobilised resources, sold assets, and begged for help to meet the bandits escalating demands. Even after paying ₦20 million and later providing additional motorcycles, they were told to wait for further instructions. Unknown to them, Malam Bashar had already died in captivity from torture and untreated injuries. His wife and daughter returned home; he did not.

This tragedy is not isolated. It reflects the deepening insecurity in Zamfara and across the North, where communities are trapped in a vicious cycle of ransom payments, extortion, and violence. Entire villages have been deserted. Others now pay levies and taxes to bandits just to farm, work, or sleep in peace. Families mortgage their homes, auction their belongings, and launch desperate crowdfunding appeals to rescue loved ones.

What is even more disturbing is that many of these atrocities are committed by individuals who speak our language, share our faith, and come from familiar cultural backgroundsyet behave with a level of brutality that defies humanity. It is no longer tenable to pretend that these criminals are ghosts or outsiders alone. The North must confront the painful truth: our own people are deeply involved in this carnage.

In January 2018, I wrote an article titled Still on Murderous Fulani Kidnappers, where I examined how individuals identified as Fulani became entangled in violent kidnappingan occupation previously associated with militants in other regions. Police reports at the time showed suspects confessing to rape, murder, and extreme violence. Here is a smooth, coherent paragraph version of your points:

In that article, I raised questions that still demand answers today: how pastoralists abandoned their traditional livelihood for kidnapping; who supplies them with the sophisticated weapons they wield; why they kill even after collecting ransom; how they acquired the skills to operate like trained militias; and, most importantly, how communities and government can jointly put an end to this madness.

Years earlier, at a 2014 international conference on pastoralism, it was warned that terrorists were disguising themselves as herders to exploit farmerherder tensions. Recommendations for proactive security measures were made, but they were never fully implemented. Today, the consequences are evident.

The conflict has evolved far beyond grazing disputes. It is now driven by economic desperation, weak security structures, and the infiltration of organised criminal networksmany operating near lucrative mining sites across the North-West and North-Central. Maru Local Government, for instance, hosts gold and lithium deposits that have attracted illegal miners and criminal opportunists.

While the establishment of the Federal Ministry of Livestock Development is a step forward, it must be matched with clear land-use policies, mapped grazing routes, and modern livestock systems, such as ranching and livestock-tracking technologies, to reduce clashes and curb cattle theft. Strengthening rural security through community policing, early warning networks, and tighter border control is equally essential.

Dialogue remains important, but past peace deals have repeatedly failed. Banditry must be confronted at its roots by restoring state presence in remote areas, rehabilitating repentant offenders, and dismantling ransom networks. Communities must support security agencies by forming vigilance groups and sharing intelligence.

But beyond government action, the North itself must wake up. No foreign power will save us. No external military presence can solve what is essentially an internal crisis. Outsiders may express concern, but they cannot defend our villages, protect our farms, or rescue our abducted relatives. That responsibility lies with us.

Traditional rulers, religious leaders, community elders, youth groups, and civil society must unite to reclaim our communities. At the same time, rural youth need real alternatives to crime, such as skills training, micro-credit, and agribusiness opportunities.

The North cannot continue outsourcing its survival. Neither Donald Trump, nor his allies in Washington, nor any foreign troops have a genuine stake in the security of Northern communities. Stability will not be imported from abroad. The Norths salvation will come from within or it will not come at all. We must confront the monsters in their own styles, mercilessly, fearlessly, courageously, and, if necessary, brutally too not in lawlessness, but in the unwavering defence of our people, our dignity, and our future.

We must protect our communities, demand accountability from leaders and security agencies, and refuse to surrender our land to criminals who speak our language yet betray our faith and values.

There is a verse in the Holy Quran that I have returned to often in these dark times:
Fear a tumult which will affect not only those who caused it, but also the innocent among you. (Quran 8:25).

That tumult is already here. If we fail to confront banditry collectivelybeyond the rhetoric the cycle of violence will persist, and more innocent lives like that of Malam Bashar Sani will be lost.

The question now is whether we will act before more innocent lives are lost.

Our destiny is in our own hands. And the time to act is now.

Yushau A. Shuaib, an Author and PR Practitioner, yashuaib@yashuaib.com

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I write this with deep concernnot anger, but concernover what increasingly appears to be a troubling pattern in the posture of the United States under President Donald Trump toward Nigeria, particularly its Muslim communities and northern leadership.

Since Trumps return to office, a narrative has steadily gathered momentum in Washington: that Nigeria is a theatre of Christian genocide, orchestrated or tolerated by Muslim political actors. It is a grave allegation. It is also one that many credible Nigerian authorities, religious leaders, security experts, and independent analysts have consistently challenged as simplistic, selective, and dangerously misleading.

Nigerias security crisis is real. Terrorism, banditry, communal clashes, and criminal violence have devastated communitiesMuslim and Christian alikein Borno, Zamfara, Niger, Benue, Plateau, Kaduna and beyond. But to reduce this complex web of criminality, governance failure, climate pressure, and arms proliferation into a one-dimensional religious war is not analysis; it is advocacy.

The genesis of this framing can be traced to lobbying efforts and reports amplified in foreign policy circlessome originating from discredited advocacy groups, whose data and claims have been publicly questioned by investigative journalists. Yet, these narratives have found fertile ground among certain US lawmakers and religious pressure blocs eager to fit Nigeria into a broader global persecution template.

President Trumps earlier designation of Nigeria as a Country of Particular Concern (CPC) over alleged religious persecution was controversial. The redesignation months later reinforced the perception that Washington had settled on a narrative, regardless of Nigerias internal complexities.

Driven by this ill-informed framing, Trump ordered a Christmas Day airstrike on Sokotohistorically the seat of Nigerias Islamic Caliphateas a symbolic gesture aimed at appeasing his Christian constituency. The strike occurred despite Sokoto being neither an epicentre of terrorism nor banditry. The Muslims did not protest the deliberate provocation, even after discovering that local collaborators were feeding Americans the so-called ‘Christian genocide’ narrative as a strategic ploy to influence Nigeria’s 2027 presidential tickets.

Now comes the introduction of the Nigeria Religious Freedom and Accountability Act of 2026 by US lawmakers Chris Smith, Riley Moore, Brian Mast, Mario Diaz-Balart, and Bill Huizenga. The bill seeks sanctionsincluding visa bans and asset freezesagainst former Kano State Governor Rabiu Musa Kwankwaso and certain Fulani-affiliated groups such as the Miyetti Allah Cattle Breeders Association of Nigeria (MACBAN) and Miyetti Allah Kautal Hore.

More disturbingly, the legislation appears designed to pave the way for categorising Muslim political leaders as well as Fulani-ethnic nomad militias as foreign terrorist organisations.

It is so worrisome to scandalise a prominent political figure like Kwankwasoa Muslim who is not known as a religious extremiston the eve of his alignment ahead of Nigerias upcoming presidential election is deeply scandalous. Equally dangerous is the attempt to criminalise an entire ethnic identity under the sweeping label of Fulani militia, setting a perilous precedent.

Criminal elements exist across all ethnic and religious lines in Nigeria. But the Fulani, like the Igbo, Yoruba, Tiv, Kanuri, Ijaw or any other group, are a diverse population numbering in the millions. Collective blame is not justice; it is profiling.

Nigeria has welcomed increased U.S. military engagement, with AFRICOM officials meeting Nigerian security leaders and American troops now permitted to operate in the country. The government has also invested millions of dollars in diplomatic outreach and strategic lobbying. Yet the shift from partnership to punitive labelling raises an uncomfortable question: what exactly is Washington seeking?

And more importantly, what does Trumps new posture mean for Nigerians, Muslims and non-Muslims alike? Should it push us toward suspicion of one another or toward questioning the motives behind externally driven narratives, including those shaped by controversial reports from certain advocacy groups, especially the Onitsha-based Intersociety operated by a screwdriver salesman and other IPOB platforms?

If the concern is truly religious freedom, then policy must be anchored in verifiable evidence, not selective outrage. Terrorisms epicentresBorno under Boko Haram, Zamfara under banditry networks, Niger under insurgent infiltrationdo not fit neatly into a Christian-versus-Muslim binary. Victims in these theatres include imams, pastors, farmers, traders, and children of every faith.

As I reflected in my previous articles, the narrative that Nigerias Muslims are collectively complicit in anti-Christian persecution is not only inaccurate; it is inflammatory. It risks deepening mistrust within Nigerias fragile social fabric. It emboldens extremists who thrive on polarisation. And it externalises what should remain a sovereign, evidence-driven security discourse.

But sanctions based on politicised framing or fictitious advocacy-driven reports by secessionist and anti-Muslim groups undermine the credibility of international accountability mechanisms.

If President Trumps America truly seeks stability in West Africa, it must engage Nigeria in partnership, not profiling; in evidence, not emotion; in diplomacy, not designation.

Nigerias Muslims and Fulani ethnic groups do not need appeasement. They need fairness. Our country needs fact-based engagement, not fear.

Yushau A. Shuaib is the author of An Encounter with the Spymaster and Award-Winning Crisis Communication Strategies.
yashuaib@yashuaib.com

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Are you aware of the increasing political gang-up against Professor Pate?! a caller using a foreign number thundered down the phone line, before the call suddenly dropped off.

While I expected the caller to return the call, I wondered which of the respected academics from Northern Nigeria he was referring to.

I am aware of two professors who bear Pate as a surname. They are both solid intellectuals and leaders in their respective fields, who have reached the heights of their careers and attained global recognition.

One of them, Umar Pate, is a professor of Media and Society, while the other, Muhammad Pate, is a professor of Public Health. They have both produced exceptional scholarship, with footprints of excellence, not only in the academy as producers of knowledge but also as administrators in the public service to humanity, whether locally or internationally or across the two spheres.

While Umar is the son of a local Fulani chieftain in Adamawa State and bears the traditional title of Kaigama, Muhammad is the son of a Fulani herdsman in Bauchi State and holds the title of Chigarin Misau in the state.

They both obtained their first degrees in Nigeria. Umar graduated in Mass Communication from the University of Maiduguri and was offered an automatic teaching job in the Department following his National Youth Service. On the other hand, Muhammad graduated from the Ahmadu Bello University Medical School in Zaria, after which he started work in the institutions teaching hospital, before moving to Gambia to the British Medical Research Council Laboratories.

Umar Pate, who became a professor of Mass Communication at the age of 36, was also a senior lecturer at the Bayero University Kano (BUK), where he spearheaded the outstanding transformation of the Department of Mass Communication into a full-scale Faculty of Communication and served as its pioneer Dean.

He also established a modern radio station, set the pace for the creation of a modern television station and secured the department a huge grant from the MacArthur Foundation for the smooth running of the broadcast services on the BUK campus. He was equally Dean of the Postgraduate Studies programme of the Kano-based university before his appointment as the Vice Chancellor of Federal University Kashere, Gombe State.

Meanwhile, after serving as a catalyst for the attainment of significant impacts, through far-reaching health sector reform programmes in Africa and other continents, as a World Bank health specialist, Muhammad was appointed chief executive officer of the National Primary Healthcare Care Development Agency (NPHCDA) at the peak of the polio epidemic crisis in Nigeria. Within a short period of his appointment, his strategic engagement with traditional rulers in helping to demand for vaccines and other primary healthcare services in their respective domains laid the foundation of an aggressive emergency polio eradication response. This was implemented through emergency operation centres (EOCs) that contained, and later eradicated, polio transmission in the country.

Muhammad Pate also led the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation into Nigeria and guided their approach of direct engagement with the State Primary Healthcare Agencies. It was therefore not surprising that he was subsequently appointed as Health Minister by the Nigerian government, before he later resigned and took up the position of a professor in Duke University’s Global Health Institute, in the USA.

Umar Pate as President of the Association of Communication Scholars and Professionals of Nigeria (ACSPN) is an advocate of social accountability through the practice of investigative journalism and a leading light in capacity building through the modification of the journalism curriculum in Nigerias tertiary institutions, to address emerging trends in the industry. His scholarship is highly cited, locally and internationally, in the areas of crisis communication, political communication, communication policies, media freedom, development communication, health communication, peace and conflict communication, among others.

Umar Pate has served the UN system in Afghanistan, Liberia, Sierra Leone and the Cameroons, and was on the Board of Directors of the International Network of UNESCO Professors in Communication (ORBICOM), in addition to being a consultant to several multilateral organisations, including USAID, UNFPA, UNICEF, UNESCO, the World Bank, and Ford Foundation, etc.

On the other hand, Professor Muhammad Pate has taught comparative health systems to postgraduate students at the Duke Universitys Global Health Institute. Also, his record of service includes being global director of Health, Nutrition and Population (HNP) at the World Bank, a director of the Global Financing Facility for women, children and adolescents (GFF), and professor of public health leadership at the Harvard Chan School of Public Health. His technical expertise was felt when he led the World Banks COVID-19 global health response, during which he represented the Bank on various boards, including those of GAVI (the Vaccine Alliance), the Global Fund, and UNAIDS.

Without any form of equivocation, the lives of the two Pates are synonymous with hard work and excellence across the intellectual spheres and service to humanity, which is enhanced by the testaments of witnesses to their selflessness, senses of contentment, tolerance, and easy reciprocation of good.

. Beep. Beep. Beep, my phone rang again, displaying the same foreign number.

The call came through without breaking this time, and I realised the caller was an old acquaintance, who admitted to have been the one who called earlier. I then quickly asked which of Professor Pates he was referring to, in apprehension of the line breaking off again, before the message was complete.

The caller said he was referring to Professor Muhammad Pate, who had just resigned as the chief executive of GAVI, the Vaccine Alliance so that he could return to Nigeria and make positive contributions to the health sector under the current administration of President Bola Ahmed Tinubu, even as a formal announcement is yet to be made.

GAVI, formerly known as the Global Alliance for Vaccines and Immunisation, is a publicprivate global health partnership with the goal of increasing access to immunisation in poor countries. It remains the main donor-funder of vaccination in low- and middle-income countries, which a budget in excess of $7 billion.

The caller added that he was aware of the subterranean and at times open campaigns of some politicians to discredit his nomination for a possible federal appointment because he was not on the ground during the political campaigns.

It is interesting that despite Pate being appointed as CEO of GAVI with an enviable package of remunerations in February 2023, following a year-long recruitment process, he appears to have chosen the yeomans job of public service in Nigeria. This points to a quality beyond self-seeking that is almost alien to much of human nature. Pate was expected to have officially resumed in GAVI on the 3rd of August, when he announced what many consider his shocking resignation, as he was noted to have said that he has taken an incredibly difficult decision to accept a request to return and contribute to his home country, Nigeria.

While I cannot confirm the authenticity of the alleged gang-up and conspiracy against Professor Muhammad Pate, although one has stumbled upon a few not-so-complimentary commentaries about his imminent federal appointment on social media, it is necessary to urge President Tinubu to keep on the front burner the crucial task of national rebuilding that incumbent upon him in his search for and recruitment of those to help him achieve his mandate of a re-engineered country.

The President needs beyond finding the appropriate ways of rewarding those who worked for his election persons with track records of significant service and leadership experience, alongside technical expertise in relevant fields, who can help in salvaging Nigeria from the very bad place in which it is presently.

Nigeria deserves the very best of qualified male and female persons who can man critical sectors of governance such as health, the economy, security and education, among others. Appointments should therefore be on merit and not as patronage to feather the nests of political godfatherism.

As the two eminent Pates Umar and Muhammad go about deepening their intellectual and public engagements, I wish them more wins, and years of rewarding work and excellence. May the spirit of excellence that they are bearers of, define the Nigeria that we are all striving for.

Yushau A. Shuaib is the author of Award-Winning Crisis Communication Strategies.
www.YAShuaib.com, yashuaib@yahoo.com

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“Terrorists Now Disguise as Fulani Herdsmen” – President Goodluck Jonathan June 2014

The above quote was the news headline after a speech by former President Goodluck Jonathan at an international conference on Fulani Herdsmen in Kaduna in June 2014 before they now become major kidnap kingpins.

I must admit from the onset that I would deliberately avoid discussing other bewildering developments, especially in Northern Nigeria. I won’t delve into the appointment of a retired operative of National Intelligence Agency (NIA), Ahmed Abubakar from Katsina who is now the Director General of the foreign secret service when a retired Director Department of State Services (DSS), Lawal Daura also from Katsina was also appointed and currently the boss of the internal intelligence agency.

Why should I even talk of odd appointments of ghost political office holders when sometimes ago, a widow and a chartered accountant from Borno State, Mrs Maryam Danna Mohammed was unlawfully and arbitrarily removed from her position as General Manager Audit of NDPHC without any justification. The media, including Foreign Hausa Service radio stations which we learnt President Muhammadu Buhari listen to, expressed their misgivings over the plight of the innocent woman who was victimised for being a whistle-blower in the organisation. Not even a memo from Justice Minister Abubakar Malami recommending her reinstatement and campaigns by Non-Governmental Organisations (NGOs), were enough to assuage the high and mighty on all the entreaties on the plight of the incorruptible woman.

I will also deliberately avoid discussing the mass burial we have witnessed in Northern Nigeria, when the country is not in a state of war. From the Massacres in Zaria of Shiite members to families of Farmers in Benue, Families of Herdsmen in Taraba and Plateau genocide among others.

It is, therefore wrong for anyone to claim that some of the incidents are motivated by religion, ethnicity, tribalism and elitism when we are living witnesses to the fact that Sheik Ibrahim El-Zakzaky of Islamic Movement of Nigeria and Sambo Dasuki, the former National Security Adviser are both Muslims and Northerners, who have been in detention for more than two years against all conventional laws and court orders.

Back to the issue of Fulani Kidnappers. In the last one year, at least, the Police Spokesperson, Moshood JImoh has pushed out several press releases on the arrest of “vicious, murderous, deadly, dangerous kidnappers” where he provided the names and pictures of the suspects. The spokesperson is magnanimous in allowing journalists to interrogate the suspected kidnappers. Apart from the list mostly bearing Northern names, I won’t say Islamic, they are mostly Fulani men from their confession and accents.

The arrested Fulani criminals in their chilling and graphic confessions admitted to raping, killing and even drinking the blood of some of their victims, sometimes after collecting the ransoms.

My concerns as a Northern Muslim is how come Fulani people have now taken over the job of kidnapping which prior to the arrival of President Buhari’s administration was common with militants in the Niger Delta and occasionally armed robbers in the South-East and South-West? What influenced the Fulanis to take into this kidnapping profession? What happened to their business of husbandry/pastoral? What motivates them into killing some of their victims after collecting ransom? Where did they acquire the intimidating skill of handling sophisticated weapons? How do they get the supply of the weapons? What intoxicates them into raping their victims including pregnant women? How can all these be addressed by the people and the government?

The answers to some of the questions above can be found at the event addressed by President Goodluck Jonathan in Kaduna in June 2014. The Office of the National Security Adviser (ONSA) under Sambo Dasuki (Dasukigate?), funded and organized the International Conference on Security and Development Challenges of Pastoralism in West and Central Africa, with the theme ‘The Role of Pastoralists in Preventing Insurgency and Conflicts for Sustainable Development.’ The conference which was attended by Fulani herdsmen and policymakers from Nigeria, Cameroon, Chad and Niger, identified the key challenges facing herdsmen and other stakeholders, and their consequences on national security. It also encouraged synergy among stakeholders to tackle the menace of terrorism, insurgency, cattle rustling, communal clashes and other threats to national security.

As the Special Guest of Honour at the Conference, President Jonathan said terrorists and criminal elements masquerade as Fulani herdsmen in order to inflict maximum damage on the peace, stability and security of the country. Represented by his deputy Namadi Sambo, Jonathan argued that insurgents were hiding under the umbrella of herdsmen to exploit the conflict between pastoralists and farmers in Nigeria to propagate their activities.

Also speaking at the event, Sambo Dasuki as the NSA urged government at all levels, traditional rulers, mass media and other relevant institutions to work together in finding solutions to violence saying, “peaceful coexistence requires compromises.”

In his remarks, the then Speaker of the House of Representative Aminu Tambuwal commended ONSA for organising the conference and urged stakeholders to collectively find a solution to the crises which if not properly handled, could degenerate into very serious security situations in the country.

The then Agriculture Minister, Dr. Akinwumi Adesina said Fulani herdsmen were facing a lot of pressure with the increase in population and desertification, adding that the increase in criminality had made livestock production a risky business. He called for regional solutions to the menace of rustling because most of the cattle raiders have the affinity with others in neighbouring countries that often ignore international boundaries.

A leader of Miyetti Allah Cattle Breeders Association of Nigeria (MACBAN), Ahmadu Suleiman said the frequency of livestock theft was increasing. He claimed that thieves attack herders with weapons and often inflict heavy casualties on herders’ camps.

Recommendations from the conference, which was well attended by traditional rulers, service chiefs, political leaders and the diplomatic community, were forwarded to federal and state governments for action. One of the major recommendations was on the need for security agencies to be proactive in recognizing and addressing security challenges involving Fulani herdsmen and farmers to avoid the manipulation and hijacking of the situation by violent actors which could further exacerbate and worsen the conflicts. The implementation of that report could go a long way in addressing some of the challenges Nigeria faces now.

Yushau A. Shuaib, Author of An Encounter with the Spymaster
yashuaib@yahoo.com
https://yashuaib.com/

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