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…says proximity to conflict actors not evidence of complicity
Former Minister of Youth and Sports, Solomon Dalung has said the allegations against Senator for Bauchi South, Senator Shehu Umar Buba require more maturity than social media is currently offering.
He warned that the same qualities that made the senator useful to security agencies are now being used to cast suspicion on him.
Dalung made the assertion in a lengthy Facebook post on Friday, following renewed allegations linking the senator to banditry and terrorism.
The claims, which have circulated in viral videos and media reports since 2024, allege that high-profile bandit leaders visited Buba’s residence and that he sponsored some of them.
Dalung said a recent TheCable piece, “The Insider: Shehu Buba, the maverick senator who is loved and loathed in security circles,” exposed a side of the senator largely missing from public conversation.
He described Buba as a Fulani nationalist who has worked for the advancement of Fulani communities, particularly in education and peaceful coexistence.
But he drew a clear line between that identity and criminality.
Dalung said, “There is a difference between being a Fulani nationalist and being a defender of criminality. That distinction is being deliberately blurred in some of the conversations around him.”
He pointed to Buba’s reported engagements with the security establishment.
According to TheCable, Buba’s deep knowledge and contacts in pastoralist communities made him an asset to security agencies over the past 10 years. He was appointed by then Chief of Defence Staff, Lucky Irabor, to the committee that investigated the March 2022 Abuja–Kaduna train attack. His name also came up during hostage negotiations, and a senior security official reportedly wanted President Bola Tinubu to acknowledge his contribution to the rescue of the 287 Kuriga schoolchildren in March 2024.
The ex-minister stated, “The qualities that made Shehu Buba useful to the state are the same qualities now being used by some people to raise suspicion about him.
“Since when did knowing a community become evidence of complicity in the crimes committed by some members of that community?”
Dalung recalled his own experience during the Boko Haram insurgency, when he was involved in efforts around the negotiation for the release of the Chibok girls.
He said Boko Haram publicly named him as one of the few people they could trust to mediate, only for critics to later accuse him of sponsoring the group, a notion he called an “absurdity”.
Dalung said, “The very fact that you are trusted enough by people holding innocent girls in captivity to sit across the table and negotiate their release can suddenly be presented as evidence that you are one of them. I experienced that myself.”
He also referenced his time in President Muhammadu Buhari’s cabinet, where he was involved in dialogue efforts in the Niger Delta.
He argued that government cannot solve every security problem by sending soldiers, and that sometimes “somebody has to talk. Sometimes somebody has to listen. Sometimes somebody has to enter a space where the government itself cannot easily enter.”
Dalung cautioned that intelligence work and conflict resolution cannot be judged by photographs and fragments alone, especially when private conversations can be recorded and later weaponised after a political disagreement.
He clarified that he was not arguing that Buba should be shielded from scrutiny.
“If there is evidence that he sponsored, financed or facilitated criminality, let the security agencies investigate it and let the courts determine his culpability,” he stated.
Buba, who chaired the Senate Committee on National Security and Intelligence for two years and now chairs the Committee on Livestock and Animal Husbandry, has repeatedly denied the allegations.
He described them as fabricated and politically motivated, linking the campaign to his defection from the All Progressives Congress (APC) to the Peoples Redemption Party (PRP) and his ambition to contest the Bauchi governorship in 2027.
He added that he has submitted criminal complaints to security agencies in Nigeria and in Niamey, Niger Republic, against those behind the videos.
The Supreme Council for Shari’ah in Nigeria has also called for an independent probe, saying accusations involving terrorism and banditry were too serious to be settled through political claims or media narratives.
Dalung stressed that a Fulani man can be a Fulani nationalist without being an enemy of Nigeria, and can maintain relationships with difficult people because “sometimes that relationship is precisely what makes dialogue, intelligence gathering or negotiation possible.”
“Shehu Buba should answer legitimate questions. His accusers should also provide evidence. But let us not convict a man because he understands the people we have failed to understand,” he stated.
