I read with keen interest the recent piece on Saharareporters.com by Pindar G. Mshelia who wrote from Maiduguri Borno State with the above title. I sympathize with the author for the death of his relatives who were killed in the latest violence in Jos. Although the author claims to be a Christian from Biu in Bornu State, it does seem like he resides in another planet instead.  I say that because as recently as four months ago the entire north-eastern Nigeria, which includes Borno State was held hostage for six days running by the Boko Haram fanatics.  Was Pindar G. Mshelia in Maiduguri at all then?  It is on record that the worst acts of economic and political discrimination against Christians take place in Borno and Kano States.  Virtually every Bura/Babbur person of note in the Bornu State civil service meets the same fate: get pushed out after you train new Kanuri hires.

Those of them employed in federal establishments in Borno State are not spared in this pattern of sectarian inspired discrimination and victimization.  A case in point exists in the person of Professor Sunday Bwala the best Neuron-surgeon in the north-east and scholar of international repute who has been denied both the positions of Chief Medical Director and Vice Chancellor of the University of Teaching Hospital and University of Maiduguri respectively simply because he is a Christian.  There are many other southern Borno indigenes who have been frustrated out of the Borno State civil service on account of their religious fait or ethnicity.

It is an open secret that no southern Borno indigene can be allowed to become a state governor in Borno State. All these pointers on the specific acts of discrimination directed at indigenes of Bornu State simply because of they profess Christianity constitute cause for one wonder if Pindar G. Mshelia and others who subscribe to his perspective on the state of affairs in the state might be either liars or they are in denial per se.  In fact, it is the governor of Bauchi State, Isa Yuguda who is supposed to be arraigned before a human rights court for unconscionable acts genocide that he condones time and time again against Christians in Bauchi in the last few years. 

The sad aspect of it all is that this unwarranted persecution of Christians all over northern Nigeria is not restricted to Bauchi State alone. As at this very moment Professor Andrew Nok who is obviously a well qualified candidate in the running to be Vice Chancellor at the Ahamadu Bello University, ABU Zaria is in the bad books of Islamists who are hell-bent on denying him the office on the rationale of his faith as  a Christian.

One is compelled here to ask Mr Pindar G. Mshelia why Bornu State should not accept a Christian to occupy the office of deputy governor or the speaker of the House of Assembly given that Christians constitute the majority population in at least nine of the Local Government Areas, LGAs in the state. 

In contrast, in Plateau State where Muslims constitute the majority population in just a single LGA, Kanama, a Hausa Muslim settler is the deputy speaker of Plateau state House of Assembly.  Yet, Hausa Muslims in the state take to violence so quickly at the least provocation.  Would anyone who decides to view Muslim settlers in Plateau State as an ungrateful bunch be called crazy?  Perhaps the best that voters in Jos North/Bassa LGA could do the 2011 elections would be to refuse to cast their vote for any Hausa Muslim settler again especially to the House of Representative.

Finally I can see that Ibrahim Dasuki is gradually coming out of his frustration as a result of his being deposed as Sultan of Sokoto.  I can see that he is trying to blame everybody but the Hausa Muslims who are actually the problems of Nigeria for now.  The only viable solution to Nigeria’s socio-political problems is the Sovereign National Conference. Let us all sit down and talk things through rather than resorting to free for all blood letting that consumes the lives of innocent people. Going by its refusal to bring the perpetrators of all the violence in Plateau State since 1999, there is little doubt that elieve the Federal Government has a hand in it.  Those who sponsor the violence are based in Abuja.  Hence, the silence from Abuja each time. 

Goodluck Jonathan said that this latest blood letting will be the last.  That will be true only if the sponsors and their foot soldiers are brought to justice in Jos.  Unless “Sheik” General Saleh Maina who has been found wanting should be discharged from the Army for the cloud that hangs over his head as regards the blood letting in Jos no one will take Jonathan seriously. 

As for you Mr. Pindar G. Mshelia, I really pity you and your own, because as Christians in Borno State, if you are truly from there, the future does not hold much good in stock for you. Unless you and people like you wake up and fight for your rights, your faith will continue to condemn you to sectarian discrimination.  A word is enough for the wise. n.

•Ndiameeh Babrik is based in the UK.  He can be reached at ndiame_2005@yahoo.co.uk