Fani-Kayode denies attack on Nigerian Youth

Nov.6 (PREMIUM TIMES) — Former Aviation Minister denies he was involved in a cyber war with a Nigeria youth.

Nigeria’s former aviation minister, Femi Fani-Kayode, has denied that he had an ignoble altercation with a Nigerian young adult on Facebook as is making rounds on various social media platforms.

Mr. Fani-Kayode, who has constantly faced criticisms over his remarks on religion and tribe, told PREMIUM TIMES, that there was no such altercation between him and the said Nigerian youth, Ibrahim Mohammed. He said his social media accounts were hacked to conjure the altercation.

The Facebook post alleged that Mr. Fani-Kayode, a minister under former president Olusegun Obasanjo’s administration, hurled racist slurs at Mr. Mohammed, calling him a “Boko Haram” who is not fit to eat from the crumbs under his table.

Part of the Facebook altercation which was munched and published on the timeline of a group called ‘Hope of Nigeria’ reads, “It is you and your goat*** father that is jobless, dirty BH animal like you. You are not fit to be served as a meat to my dog.”

Mr. Fani-Kayode allegedly told Mr. Ibrahim to move to Afghanistan or Saudi Arabia because “Nigeria despises your murderous type”.

But Mr. Fani-Kayode vehemently denied this, saying it is not in his character to engage in such abusive language.

The former minister claims that his account was hacked and that he put up an alert warning his friends and fans on facebook to be wary of messages coming from his facebook account.

He said that while trying to resolve his hacked facebook account, someone was peddling all sorts of messages to his fans.

Mr. Fani-Kayode said those words allocated to him are “despicable… and simply not me”. He says he will never utter such words to anyone.

The former minister said he has great respect for young people , “I love interacting with them, I learn from them,” he said, but he also adds that there are many despicable individuals who do things like hacking into his accounts and spreading  snaring words to the world.

As regards charges that he is a racist, Mr. Fani-Kayode said people who accuse him did not go to good schools hence do not know the meaning of racism. He described his remarks and recent articles on Chinua Achebe’s books – There was a Country- where he also accused Igbo people of introducing tribalism in Nigeria – as an intellectual discourse.

He said if people think that his ideas which he calls the “truth” is racist then they can call him that. And he does not “care”.

Listen to the full interview below.