Miyetti Allah Cattle Breeders Association of Nigeria sometimes called MACBAN started off as a loose partisan advocacy group centered on promoting the welfare of Fulani pastoralists in Nigeria through self help.MACBAN represents the interest of about only 100,000 semi-nomads and nomads Nigeria.
The organization was founded in the early 1970s with headquarters in Kaduna led by Muhammadu Sa’adu who was born in Jos but spent his adulthood in Kaduna, with membership in Kaduna and Plateau States . It became operational in 1979 and gained wider acceptance as an advocacy group in 1987. But as the association expanded to more states, aims favoring nomadic education and access of grazing reserves by cattle breeders became a common theme.
The Fulani herdsmen are largely located in the Sahel and semi-arid parts of West Africa, but due to relatively recent changes in climate patterns, many herdsmen have moved further south into the savannah and tropical forest belt of West Africa. The herdsmen are found in Nigeria, Niger, Senegal, Guinea, Mauritania, Mali, Burkina Faso, Ghana, Benin, Côte d’Ivoire, and Cameroon. In Senegal, they inhabit northeastern Ferlo and the southeastern part of the country. In many of these countries the Fulanis often constitute a minority group, but they met and chose Nigeria as their home base for expansion through dormination, and use of force and fear.
Yerima Abbas Shettima the current Leader,was involved in the fierce battle to consign military to the barracks, and to pave the way for the current democratic dispensation. He had on many occasions been a guest to the State Security Services and police cells for standing up to democracy, equal rights, freedom and justice in Nigeria. He was involved with pro democracy groups like NADECO, Canpaign for Democracy under late Gani Fawehinmi, which helped him to form the Arewa Youth Consultative Forum(AYCF),which platform he to forge a new relationship with the the OPC of ther South West, worked with the Progressives like Professor Wole Soyinka, Anthony Enahoro and Beko Ransom-kuti, popularly known as PRONACO, and emerged as Director of Youths affairs for the Group. He became known among those circles as an equality fighter earning him some awards from organisations in the South West, and South South. A University of Lagos graduate of Public Administration he is from Kaduna State,with kids from two wives, the first Halima being from Cross River State,and Fatima form the north.
The change in Yerimas direction began when Rtd General Muhammadu Buhari became the Patron of the the Miyetti Allah in 2012, preparatory to the campaign for 2015 elections.
His first volt fire was a Quite Notice he issued to all Igbos in the North to vacate the North before October 1 of that year. That was when for the first time his name rang any bell to me and many others.
He tells the world he is married to an Igbo Woman betraying the general lack of classification of who is Igbo Man among northerners. To all of them in the north, if you are not from the South West, or Edo, you are an Igbo Person.GEJ is still an Igbo Man as far as they are concerned, but he is an Ijaw Son.
Yerima is the voice the the Fulanis use to deliver bitter pills, effect manipulative plans and dormination to Igbos and the South, leveraging on his relationships with the Movement for the Actualisation of the Sovereign State of Biafra (MASSOB) led by Ralph Uwazuruike, who inturn gave him access into Ohaneze Ndigbo under Nnia Nwodo.
The Igbo Governors lobby and fear him since Buahri, their Miyetti Allah life Patron came into power in 2015.
It will recalled that Bokoharam was formed by Mohammed Yusuf in 2002, and was led by Abubakar Shekau in 2009. When Boko Haram first formed, their actions were nonviolent,their main goal was to purify Islam in northern Nigeria, upon the principles of Salafism which advocates strict adherence to Sharia law, based on an extremely strict form of Sunni Islam that sees many other forms of Islam as idolatrous.They denounce the the Sufi and the Shiite sects as infidels, with the strong and tacit support of the Sultan of Sokoto. It developed into a Jihadist group in 2009 after their founder was killed.It seeks seeks an Islamic state in Nigeria, and opposes the Westernization of Nigerian society and the concentration of the wealth of the country among members of the Christian South.
Yerima who never supported the APC and Buhari openly, as the leader of his Arewa Youth Consultative Forum, AYCF, intended to contest for a political sit under PDP, took a different direction as the head of Miyetti Allah.
Buhari is life patron of Miyetti Allah, and With his failure in the 2003 Elections,wept bitterly, and resolved to take political power at all cost.
He got the nodd from the Northern Muslim Leaders, and a relationship with Bokoharam was created.
Shetimma Yerima,with the South West connections, was drafted into the political war the North had always waged against the South with Buahri as their annointed Leader.
Yerima as the Miyetti Allah leader became heavily influenced by the inputs from Bokoharam, thus Fulani herdsmen became armed as the foot soldiers of Islamization accross the nation. The modus operandi was and remains mainly to kill Christians in the North and take their lands for the herds men; Kill leaders of non-muslim communities that become vulnerable, chase the men away, and take their land; Spread fear eof the Fulani herdsmen into thr spines of all non-muslim communities in Nigeria.
The Government of Buhari on its part will continue to make policies that will back the spread of Fulanis accross the nation, to give them settlements which eventually will form the bases or locations for the launch of attacks when the time comes.
This Buhari started with Cattle Routes, Grazing Routes, RUGA, Cow Colony, Coastal Land acquisition, all of which have so far failed but they still insist on pushin ahead.
Miyetti Allah have wrecked havoc on Nigerians since Buhari came to power in 2015; over 2500, homes and over 5000, persons have been killed by herdmen in the Plateau-Nassarawa Bauchi axis; Over 5000 Christains killed in Southern Kaduna, and Katsina areas; Close to 18000, killed in Benue State, with over 5000 homes and communities destroyed;
Over 200 killed in the South West, over 2000 killed in the South South, and about 1000, in the South East.
So far over 30200 persons have been killed directly by Miyetti Allah and over 10000, died as a result of the these attacks for various reasons ranging from hunger, to poor medical attention and care to victim families.
Miyetti Allah which started off for promotion of safe and good life for the Fulani herdsmen tranformed and today has over 40,000 deaths to its Fulanization Campaign.
The Governments of Nigeria including States should help themselves by declaring Miyetti Allah as a terrorist Organization.
To proscribe peaceful IPOB as a terrorist organization stands truth on its head, while leaving Miyetti Allah to continue the blood letting, is the biggest danming excrement the Buhari Government has robbed on its face, the world knows this!