Remembering Victims Of Terrorism

 By Ike Willie-Nwobu

The United Nations pauses on August 21 annually to remember and pay tribute to victims of terrorism. Terrorism represents what is arguably the greatest evil of the modern world. This tragedy of creed and cruelty has made the world riotously unsafe as things stand. Today, more than ever, its victims are deserving of reflection, attention, action, and tribute.

In Nigeria, the effects of terrorism are as stark as they come. In April 2014, a bomb went off in the Nyanya Area of the FCT. About 15 people were killed and many more injured. In April 2011, a bomb went off at the UN office in Abuja killing 21 people and wounding about sixty. In December, 2011 while worshipers looked with eager expectation at Christmas that was just a few hours away, a bomb went off, killing dozens and leaving many others injured.

Nigeria’s Heroine In Captivity: Let Leah Go! – Cardinal Okogie

By Anthony Cardinal Olubunmi Okogie

Leah Sharibu has become a symbol of Nigeria in captivity. Yet, this powerful symbol is ignored. How does one explain the fact that in the latest scramble for Nigeria’s wealth that the 2019 elections were, not even once was her name mentioned in any speech? No one even said a word about the Chibok girls! What mattered most to our political gladiators was how to win votes, or, to put it more accurately, how to be declared winner. Are these daughters of ours disposable? 

*Cardinal Okogie 

The insecurity that led to the abduction of Leah and the Chibok girls was given no attention.  Yet, it was caused by a combination of recklessness and negligence of our political leaders in matters of security. They had an opportunity during the campaigns to tell Nigerians how they would take responsibility for security and for the economy, for education and for infrastructure. But they settled for sophisticated forms of vote buying, dashing pittance to Nigerians whom they have impoverished by their politics. They resorted to the use of violence as potent instruments at the service of their inordinate ambition, using as militia young Nigerians deprived of access to good quality education by successive governments.

President Buhari, Leah, Hauwa And Other Hostages

By Paul Onomuakpokpo

With the murder of Hauwa Liman, we have once again been starkly reminded of our lack of governmental bulwark against the savagery of those who are unmoored from all legal and moral boundaries in our midst.

*Leah Sharibu

Yes, it is only a reminder. Successive governments have abandoned the citizens in a gruelling struggle with their challenges. But the battle for daily survival only becomes more tormenting with the lurking reminder that these challenges are not just existential; they are unconscionably inflicted by a pestilential leadership deficit. Now, consider this: Despite the billions of dollars that are yearly voted by the government for electricity, security and other forms of infrastructural development, the citizens are saddled with the responsibility of providing these for themselves. 

Dapchi Girls: Of Sham Release And Cynical Citizenry

By Sufuyan Ojeifo

Between February 19, 2018 when the Dapchi schoolgirls were abducted by supposed Boko Haram insurgents and Wednesday, March 21, 2018, when the news broke that 101 of them had been released, I had offered perspectives on the incident in two articles. The first was titled: “Chibok and Dapchi girls: The whoredom of Karma” while the second was titled: “Gbomogbomo as metaphor.”

The second article, in particular, provides the take-off point for the current intervention. Therein, I had expressed a concern at the role abductions of schoolgirls play in our presidential politics.  My thesis was that our abducted schoolgirls in the northeast zone have become objects of political bargain in the hands of our modern day real or prearranged gbomogbomo, a Yoruba word transliterated as stealer of children.