Former Minister of Aviation, Chief Femi Fani-Kayode, has urged the federal Government to declare the Fulani Nationality Movement (FUNAM), a terrorist organisation and arrest or eliminate its members in Nigeria.
Describing the group as a foreign-sponsored group affiliated with ISIS West Africa, Fani-kayode said the plan of the group is to plunge the country into a civil war.
FUNAM had claimed responsibility for the recent attempt on the life of the Benue State Governor, Samuel Ortom.
In a statement issued on Monday, Fani-Kayode said FUNAM “is a foreign-based, foreign-sponsored and foreign-manned counter intelligence operation whose sole purpose is to destabilise and destroy Nigeria.”
According to him, FUNAM is closely affiliated with ISIS of West Africa and often shares intelligence and collaborates with the latter in joint operations.
“Though they do have a few local allies,” he said, “in the main, they do not represent the Fulani of Nigeria but only the foreign Fulani terrorists and their international backers who want to throw Nigeria into chaos, drive us into a civil war and cause us to slaughter one another so that they can come into our country in full force and pick up the pieces.
“They are a cancer that need to be cut out of our body politic.
“The attempt to assassinate a sitting governor by this terrorist organisation takes this whole thing to a different dimension.
“Ortom must be fully protected and the Federal Government must shut down FUNAM in Nigeria, declare them a terrorist organisation and arrest or eliminate all their members, friends and associates before they push us into an avoidable and horrific full-scale civil war.
“The only other terrorist organisation that has had the nerve and audacity to attempt to kill a governor is Boko Haram who have tried to murder Gov. Zulum of Borno State.
“FUNAM must be viewed and treated in exactly the same way as Boko Haram and the full might and force of the Nigerian military and Federal Government must be unleashed against them.
“The murder of innocents has no place in a civilised society and those that unleash terror on our people must be utterly crushed,” he concluded.
