A former Secretary to the Federal Government, Babachir Lawal says attempts by the Bola Tinubu-led administration to dissuade Northern youths from participating in the planned August 1 #EndBadGovernance protest in the country is not yielding positive results.
Speaking in an exclusive interview with TheScrutiny, Lawal said the youths are not listening to the appeals by religious leaders hired by President Tinubu’s boys and paid huge sums to talk to them not to participate in the protest.
According to him, some of the Northern youths even went as far as attacking religious leaders who are against the protest physically and on social media platforms.
“This issue of protest, for the very first time, I can see that the Northern youths have taken over Twitter, Facebook, Tiktok and other social media platforms. They are so loud and well organised. They attack those who are speaking against the protest. It’s just as if it’s being organised by the Northern youths”.
‘I was listening to one Imam who was saying ‘What does an Adamawa man has to do with a protest organised by Igbos? What does a Sokoto man got to do with a protest by Igbos?’ It means he has not been mindful of what the youths in the North are saying. It looks like the centre of the plan is in the North”.
“The hunger and poverty in the North is so much that the youths don’t want anybody to talk to them about not doing the protest. Ordinarily, there are people that live from hand to mouth literally. They leave the house in the morning till they come back in the evening, there is nothing for their children to eat. Now, there is nothing like that. The father goes out and comes back with nothing”.
Babachir said rather than sponsor youths who will confront the protesters and lead to violence, the federal government should listen to the demands of the people and address the root causes of the planned protest.
“So, the government should listen to why the people are planning to demonstrate, not trying to organise counter-demonstration and use of threat”.
“Let me tell you something. Bola Tinubu has a problem. The problem is that some of the security agencies that are running the critical security architecture are from the North and they are people who are driven by personal interests and other motives rather than patriotism”.
“I read on social media that DSS arrested some of the protest organizers in Kano. Who would have thought that youths will be determined to organise a protest of this magnitude in Kano? All these DSS people will push Tinubu over the cliff before he realizes that they didn’t mean well for him”.
“The Tinubu I know is an activist and he doesn’t have the tendency to lock people up just because they wanted to protest. Also, he doesn’t deploy use of religion to achieve his aim. But these northerners that are surrounding him. They are the ones that coerce him into introducing religion in his politics”.
“They are the ones that went round and recruited Imams and Bishops into his politics. Now in the North, nobody listens to the religious leaders again because we know they have collected money from Tinubu’s people. We know those people who gave out the money”.
“People are openly attacking their Imams on social media and some even physically”.
“Now, these Tinubu boys from the North have gone round again and recruited Imams into campaigning against the planned protest. The Imams and Pastors have collected the money and doing their best to fulfill their part of the bargain but nobody is listening to them. The youths are saying the protest must go ahead.
“You come to the North now. The Imams and Pastors that we usually respect and call us to order, nobody is listening to them again. They have become worse than the politicians”.
