17-10-2024.

A couple of weeks ago I penned an article with the title, ‘Who Operates An Illegal Airport In Zamfara State?’ In the piece, I asserted that ‘some big people in the state and their friends across the country must be behind it for the purpose of siphoning the state’s gold to foreign markets for sale’.

Unknown to me then was the existence of a whole factory in the state, which was specifically built the purpose of the illegal operation of the mining, examining and shifting out of diamond to a (probably) Western World market for disposal. The West is notoriously known for wanting to deny (does so often) Africa use its God given abundant raw materials and mineral resources above and beneath its soil for its own development.

The West wants everything that Africa has for its own factories at next to nothing cost (where such a cost is deemed necessary) and nothing but the finished products for sale at the many markets in the big black continent at very exorbitant prices. And it is always a matter of ‘take it or leave it’. Take it the hapless Africa would always do, because of the bad leaders that hold sway in many parts of  continent.

The diamond mine was controlled by a White man, who was also the examiner of the quality (of the mined raw diamond) and (possibly), the eventual disposer at the foreign market. A viewer of the same video remarked that the illegal mining was taking place because the federal and Zamfara state governments were not aware of it. But another viewer pointed at the impossibility of the total ignorance of the two governments.

According to the second person, no foreigner, however daring would dare illegally enter a foreign independent country and start illegally mining of any kind there, without the support, protection and participation of some powerful locals. All respondents who commented after agreed with that position.

So the question that is begging for an immediate answer is, ‘who are the unpatriotic elements collaborating and conniving with a White foreigner to deny the country of the benefit of its resources, for their personal gain’?

Zamfara, Sokoto and Katsina states are the hotbed of the dastardly activities of bandits, which Dan Bello once alleged as responsible for the intractableness of those activities. It is believed by him that the abundance of mineral stones in the three states was behind the persistence of the banditry in those states.

He asserted that there were sufficient precious stones on commercial quantities in more abundance than the availability of petroleum products and gas in the country. Since there have been persistent agitation from the other section of the country, which considers the north as a ‘parasite living on the products of the other side’, it is felt that the discovery and utilisation of the resources by the federal government would kill the agitation for good.

In a video clip he recently released on the social media, the intrepid, courageous and immutable Dan Bello alleged that the banditry in the north, particularly the north west, was ‘financed’ by powerful northerners and their accomplices from other sections of the country because of the large deposits of precious stones found in the area. The three states of Zamfara, Katsina and Sokoto are most endowed, according to him.

It was his further belief that the underground deposits of the precious stones were by far greater than the oil deposits in the country. The three states are said to be rich in diamonds, rubies, emerald, sapphire, topaz, opal and their like. Hence the intense activities of the bandits in the states.

But some powerful individuals, whether wittingly or otherwise, do not want the earning for anybody but themselves. These are the ones whose hobby may appear to be collecting and hoarding money, without the thought of accounting for it before their Creator. Such people are either not believers in the resurrection, or the accounting in the afterlife, or choose to disregard them for the ‘gains’ they are making in this life.

A Christian I went to school with, sent a very powerful reminder in the Holy Quran on our common WhatsApp group, to remind Muslims of accountability in the hear after before God, on and about, what we did and possessed while in the temporary world. He was obviously satisfied in the Christian belief that Prophet Isa AS (Jesus for the Christians) ‘died’ for their sins, they therefore, do not need to account for anything they did or atone for whatever sins they committed while alive.

In my Wednesday (16-10-2024) article on ‘Using Religion For Self Enrichment’, I asserted that most of the politicians in the country prefer to give huge amount of money, which they frequently do, to praise singers, than to the people of God. This morning I saw a video clip on Youtube of a governor from the north western part of the country jokingly holding the shoulders of a Hausa praise singer, and playfully ‘protesting’ not getting the song sung for him by the singer.

Upon the singer’s reply that seeing a governor without his ‘say so’ was not like a walk in the park, the big man (not so manly in the case of this ‘His Excellency’) showed an important and well fed looking man in his entourage and said to the singer, “Now, you cannot tell me that you have no access to me again”. The power and ‘utility’ of the praise singers to some of the Nigerian politicians.

 May the little we legally possess be sufficient enough to satisfy us, and put off our inordinate desire for much worldly acquisitions.

Malam Malumfashi wrote from Katsina.