A former senior special assistant to Bello Matawalle, the Defence Minister and former governor of Zamfara State, has made explosive allegations that demand scrutiny at the highest level of government.
In an exclusive interview published this week, the whistleblower revealed several allegations. Matawalle maintained direct contact with notorious bandit commanders. He bought rustled cattle from them. He also supplied them with vehicles and even instructed them to coerce communities to vote for the All Progressives Congress.
These are extraordinary claims that, if substantiated, would amount to an abuse of public office and a betrayal of national security.
The whistleblower described a web of political, financial, and operational links formed during Matawalle’s time as governor. He alleges that these connections continued after the minister joined President Bola Tinubu’s cabinet.
The account includes specific, concrete accusations: purchases of stolen cattle at fixed rates, the giving of dozens of new Toyota Hilux trucks to commanders, regular meetings at Government House and continuing WhatsApp communication between the minister and named leaders such as Bello Turji and Kachallah Haru Dole. Such detail is the sort that a prosecutor would welcome.
Matawalle has sought to frame his current role in sterner terms. As Defence Minister he has publicly lauded the successes of Operation FANSAN YAMMA and told troops that most key bandit leaders have been neutralised and that only scattered elements remain.
That message is repeated across official and state friendly channels even as large scale attacks and mass kidnappings continue to blight the Northwest. The contrast between government rhetoric and the whistleblower’s testimony is stark and cannot be ignored.
The immediacy of the security crisis is underlined by this week’s kidnappings. Gunmen stormed the Government Girls Comprehensive Secondary School in Maga, Kebbi State in the early hours and seized 25 schoolgirls, killing at least one staff member in the raid.
Security forces have launched an intensive search but the abduction adds to a grim catalogue of attacks on schools and communities across the north west that raise questions about intelligence, command and control, and the possibility of local collaboration with armed groups.
It is important to place these allegations in the wider context of violence and displacement that has afflicted Nigeria for more than a decade. Independent monitors and faith based organisations have reported dramatic increases in killings, abductions and attacks on religious institutions.
Some watchdogs and church leaders speak of thousands of Christian deaths in 2025 alone and use the term genocide in their rhetoric.
Others, alongside several academic observers, caution that the picture is complex with victims drawn from multiple communities and with motives that are political, economic and ethnic as much as religious.
The dispute over terminology does not diminish the human toll or the urgent need for credible forensic investigation.
Those who defend the government point to recent operational claims and to arrests and lethal engagements with armed men. Abuja has also publicly rejected external characterisations that cast violence as state-sponsored religious persecution and has dismissed some foreign interventions as based on faulty data.
The Biden and later Trump era diplomatic back and forth over designations and possible punitive steps has itself become another theatre in which Nigeria’s internal security failures are litigated.
Yet the whistleblower’s allegation that a sitting minister kept direct lines to commanders and used them for political ends if true would expose a different and more corrosive problem: the capture of parts of the state by local power brokers.
Forensic clarity is needed. The whistleblower’s specifics — amounts, dates, named intermediaries, even the suggested price paid for rustled cattle — are evidence that requires verification. Independent investigators must cross check phone records, procurement logs, vehicle registration documents and payments to determine whether state resources were diverted to armed groups.
Journalists and prosecutors alike should seek documentary proof of the alleged transfer of 36 Hilux pickups and any procurement orders linked to state coffers.
Previous reporting has both alleged vehicle dashes to bandits and recorded denials from government offices, so documentary work will be decisive.
There is also a political dimension that cannot be ignored. The whistleblower claims Matawalle used his influence over bandit networks to deliver votes in 2023 and plans to do so again in 2027.
Vote coercion by armed groups would fundamentally undermine the integrity of Nigeria’s electoral process and would require swift response from the Independent National Electoral Commission and security agencies.
If proved, such a scheme would demand criminal investigations into electoral offences as well as into the underlying security breaches.
What must happen next is plain.
The allegations should be independently investigated by a properly empowered body free from political interference. Parliament should consider formal hearings.
Security agencies must publish what they know about the claimed vehicle transfers and the continuing communication lines alleged by the source.
Above all the families of victims of banditry and those fearful of future attacks deserve transparency and tangible steps to dismantle any nexus between officials and armed criminals. The nation’s security cannot be rebuilt on denial or on selective prosecutions.
This is an exclusive set of allegations with immense implications for national security and democratic integrity. They deserve to be treated without fear or favour and with the professional rigour that a country in crisis must insist on.
Only a full, public accounting can restore confidence and ensure that the violence consuming communities in the Northwest is neither enabled nor tolerated by those charged with defending the state.
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