FULANI VS FARMERS: Sunday Akoji, Attacked for Referring to #boycotbeef Campaign as 'MOST STUPID HASHTAG'

By Terver Atsar

I am compelled to react to the comments made by Sunday Akoji on the ‪#‎boycotbeef‬ campaign being championed by some Benue Youths in protest against the invasion by Fulani Herdsmen of Benue farmlands which has led to loss of hundreds of lives, displacement of thousands of residents and occupation/destruction of farmlands. In his remarks, he described the hashtag as the most STUPID hashtag on Social Media.

And what are his reasons? First he claimed that since Nigeria does not produce as much beef as the United States, China and the other top producers, then boycotting beef in Nigeria (Infact Benue) will have no effect of beef production, thus making the campaign of no effect. Secondly he opined that since S.M is a global network, the proponents of ‪#‎boycottbeef‬ have just succeeded in irritating the global community who has no interest in what is happening in Benue. He made some further remarks to the effect that the campaign is ‘knee-jerk and reactionary’.
It is difficult to understand the motive behind this invidious outburst and I would not like to engage in speculations, but would like to imagine that Mr. Akoji is just jealous that while he was underground, for God knows what reason, some people originated a social media campaign in his own State that is gaining popularity without him being the champion. That would be a very juvenile motive and I don’t want to believe it is the case. But until he comes up with a more plausible reason, I would hold onto this assumption.
These insensitive remarks are to say the least very unfortunate, coming from a Benue indigene, in view of what the people of the state have seen in the hands of the marauders in the past decade and the recent surge in dimension and scale of the attacks. It is amazing that Sunday, did not see any need to condemn the Fulani murderers but found an easy target in the peaceful group who have chosen the boycott route to express their protest against the invaders, rather than going violent.
It is apparent from his remarks that he has a very limited knowledge of the intentions and the agenda of the group MAFO that originated the hashtag. First of all, the call to boycott beef is to those who believe that, since their killers’ product of trade is beef, they would rather feast on herbs than indulge in the delicacy that empowers them. This is a sensible approach by all standards of decorum and social protest and cannot be described as ‘stupid’ by any know standard. Of course those who do not share this belief can continue to eat beef as much as they wish because the group is not forcing anybody to comply but rather they are using persuasion to convince others. Those who refuse to be convinced like Sonny has the right not to be convinced, but that does not give them to right to insult and abuse those who are convinced. Their freedom of speech ends where our freedom to boycott beef (without being insulted) starts.
The statistics on beef production and the conclusion he derived therefrom is most laughable because it has no bearing on the agenda of the boycott. We did not set out to cripple world beef production. Come to think of it; when people undergo hunger strike, is it with the hope of crippling world food production? I doubt so. Even in the Bible, Daniel boycotted the Kings meat based on what he believed. That did not make him stupid.
I don’t know if Sunny has bothered to read the history of the country in which he now sojourns and from the comfort of which he sat to pour invectives on the natives of Benue. If he did he would have heard of the ‘The Boston Tea Party’ of 1773. Some Americans in response to the Tea Act of 1773, boycotted tea in protest to the obnoxious Act and even considered tea drinking to be unpatriotic. This led to a decline in Tea drinking during and after the Revolution, this is what led to a shift to coffee drink. Now, that was not a ‘stupid action’ simply because the whole world was not boycotting tea at that moment in time. It was instead a principled protest and the only remaining option for a people who had no other means to defend their rights. The MAFO group deserves commendation from those who know the value of peaceful protest as against violence, rather than unwarranted attacks. Nothing in the books says that Benue youth do not have the capacity to seal all abattoirs in the State, but they chose the peaceful way. That’s not stupid, stupid!
It is unduly patronizing to in the bid to run down the MAFO campaign, indulge in false and unsubstantiated generalizations. How does Akoji measure stupidity? Does he have a database of all hashtags ever generated on social media to have rated all of them and discovered that the #boycottbeef comes top on his ‘stupidity scale’? And what criteria did he use to arrive at this conclusion? As a scientist, has his assessment been subjected to rigorous peer review and found authentic? Your guess is as good as mine. Therefore the outburst against MAFO is provocative, unbecoming, unwarranted and utterly irresponsible.
The most laughable aspect of his tirade is that, by creating a global hashtag on a local problem, the proponents think the world rotates around them. This is very self-contradictory and trite for a man who has used social media broadcasting everything from the bear he drinks to the airports he has been to , to the toilets he has visited. Does he, by these act, by any means seek to imply that the world rotates around him? When an Indian for instance tweets about Buda, does he seek to convert everyone on Earth to Buddhism? No. But does the fact that not everyone is interested in Buda, make his tweet STUPID? Hell NO. Funny enough when I checked his current location, it says Sunny is at Elkridge, MD, United States. So he sits in faraway US of A but is able to react to the #boycottbeef campaign being promoted by some “stupid folks” back in Benue. Does that not in itself underscore the impact of social media and also the wisdom of the promoters off the boycott in using Social media for their agenda? Akoji himself is a testimony that there are Benue people all over the globe and the social campaigners are not stupid to have thought to reach them wherever they are.
The good thing is that social media also gives users the choice to read or ignore what does not interest them. It is therefore more civilized to do so than to profile a whole group of people who are exercising their right to freedom of expression as stupid.
Akoji needs to be informed that the MAFO group is out to fight against the annihilation of our people and the bit about beef is just a small aspect of the project. We will not be distracted by sensational attention mongering by anybody using the beef camping. We know where the shoe is pinching us, and we will continue to shout through any available medium until we are heard. Meanwhile those who cannot cope without beef can continue the feast and fiddle while their city burns.