Serving Overseer of the Citadel Global Community Church in Lagos, Pastor Tunde Bakare, says popular Yoruba rights activist, Sunday Adeyemo, aka Sunday Igboho, must carry out his current crusade with a lot of circumspection and in accordance with the laws of the country.
The cleric, in an interview on Arise TV’s Morning Show, on Thursday, said this had become imperative to avert inter-tribal crisis in the country.
Bakare, who said he planned to meet with Igboho very soon, noted that employing indiscriminate violence in tackling the current herdsmen crisis in the South-West could boomerang.
According to him, “Igboho looks like a man who wants to fight for his people because they were murdered and raped but he must operate within the ambits of the law.
“Indiscriminate violence is an ill-wind that will blow no one any good and remember before you attack the Fulani in the South-West, there are Yorubas and other ethnic nationalities living in their own communities too and if they open fire on them, it will be so indiscriminate and we must avert it.
“It is an ill-wind and we must avert it before it gets out of hands.”
Bakare, however, noted that the Ooni of Ife, Oba Adeyeye Ogunwusi, other monarchs as well as leaders of thought in Yorubaland deserved respect.
Igboho had on Wednesday said Ooni disappointed the Yoruba people for failing to tell President Buhari the truth about the herdsmen crisis when he visited him in Abuja recently.
The activist had issued a seven-day quit notice to herdsmen accused of sundry crimes in the Ibarapa area of Oyo State and had gone ahead to enforce same at the expiration of the ultimatum.
But hours later, Igboho apologised to the monarch and begged for his forgiveness, describing Oba Ogunwusi as a father.
But while speaking on the matter during the television programme on Thursday, Bakare said, “I am glad that he has apologised. The ancient stool of Ile-Ife, the Ooni of Ife must be respected and all Obas should be respected and no one should drag them or their names in the mud.
“One of the things that men of goodwill needs to do is that we can see that what is causing this is leadership deficit in almost all over the country, South-West inclusive, we have to avoid all reckless rhetoric, we are not barbaric, we must not allow those things to be in the front burner at all.”
He also called for an end to open grazing in order to stop the frequent herders-farmers’ clashes in parts of the country.