Nigerian Killings: Is Enough Not Enough?

 By Tonnie Iredia

From 2009 when insurgency reared its ugly head in the Northeast of Nigeria till today, it has been killings, killings and killings in Africa’s most populous nation. Authentic figures of how many citizens have since died or suffered from traumatic kidnapping are unknown. What is not in dispute however is that insecurity is now topmost in the nation’s current record of events.

The only other phenomenon of significance that is at par with the exceedingly high degree of insecurity is the rapid growth of the nation’s contaminated democracy. Many people actually attribute the unacceptable situation to the political class hence, voters quickly lined up behind candidate Muhammadu Buhari during the 2015 elections believing that the former stringent military ruler would naturally tackle insurgency headlong.

Surprisingly, no such redemption ever came throughout Buhari’s administration (2015-2023). The best of the era was the laughable claim that insurgency had been technically degraded. In fact, it was during the period that the slogan “insecurity is everybody’s business” blossomed – a slogan which suggests that tackling insurgency should actually be the people’s duty. Former Defence Minister, Bashir Magashi, a retired army general stated that bandits were having a field day in Nigeria because they knew people in communities they attack would not fight back. He therefore charged Nigerians to resist the attacks by bandits and stop running away like cowards. Magashi conveniently forgot about the popular section 14 of our constitution which says that the security and welfare of the citizenry shall be the primary purpose of government.

The constitution clearly makes the subject the most important assignment of government. Therefore, if instead of using its security framework and policies to counter insecurity, government opts to delegate the assignment to the ordinary citizen, one is tempted to agree with the assessment that Nigerians are real cowards. Otherwise, there would have been civil unrest from the point the statement was made until the minister and the government were flushed out. But because that did not happen, many more officials have continued to chorus the absurd slogan.

Only last week, Governor Umar Namadi of Jigawa state argued that “the threat of kidnapping will continue until we, every one of us, rise up and defend ourselves. It is quite clear the Government alone cannot do it. I have warned a very long time ago, in a speech in Wukari, that our people must be prepared to defend themselves.” For a number of reasons, I disagree with both former Minister Magashi and Governor Namadi. To start with, the two leaders involuntarily amended the Nigerian constitution without following the due process of law.

If the people take over the job of government, do we still need a government?  Second, government has always prioritized security budgets. This year, as much as N6.11 trillion was allocated to the Ministry of Defence just as the armed forces had reportedly expended about $16 billion on security between 2012-2018. If the military with such huge budget is unable to stop Nigeria’s insecurity challenges, why should anyone delegate the assignment to the ordinary citizen such as this writer whose most dangerous weapon is a kitchen knife?

In addition, the new posture which seeks to change who does what in our security sector automatically reverses the old concept of the social contract principle by which people accepted to handover their lives to government in return for safety and improved living conditions. What this entails is for the people to undertake civic duties such as paying taxes and voting at elections. The concept never intended the sharing of the primary duty of government. All the people ought to do is to assist government by providing information that could position it to effectively carry out the duty. This certainly does not imply that the people’s ill-equipped local vigilantes are to take over part or all of the primary duty of government. It is thus uncharitable for our leaders to continue to talk about security being everybody’s duty just to hide government’s lethargy.

The only meaningful call for self-defence is that of Theophilus Danjuma, the legendary chief of army staff of old. Danjuma’s call is a diplomatic way of telling the people that it is certainly suicidal to rely on an inept government without the authorities declaring the call as inciting. As a firm believer in the right to life of the citizenry, Danjuma has kept his alarm ringing before all our people are wiped out by double-faced imperialists. This posture is different from those who see nothing wrong with placing each and every burden on the poor masses. It is more inexcusable as those placing the blame of government’s failure on vigilante groups have never correspondingly called for proper equipping of the same vigilantes.

Another unacceptable prism is the way analysts raise concerns whenever some people who are attacked fight back using the much talked about self-defence. Nothing appears to be wrong when the people are massively killed without resistance. It is as if the only wrong is retaliation while those who originated the first attack are seen as patriots. If a counter attack amounts to jungle justice what type of justice is the one of the original attackers who invade communities and displace indigenes from their original abodes? Those who rationalize narratives are yet to us the mission of the suspected criminals attacked in Uromi, were they mere expert late-night long-distance hunters? Is the simplistic categorization of invasions as farmers/herders clashes not heart-rendering? How do we differentiate communal skirmishes between two local interest groups from the kidnapping and or killing of numerous religious leaders in their places of worship? Do the latter locations such as churches also function as farms?

The other argument that is baffling is the one which seeks to criminalize any particular race. How come the same Fulani herders who had lived peacefully among their farmer-neighbours for more than 100 years are only just remembering to wage war amongst themselves? Again, why are our leaders behaving as if bringing both groups together is a herculean task?  A few days back, Mohammed Risku, the Chairman of the Miyetti Allah Cattle Breeders Association of Nigeria MACBAN revealed the disposition of Fulani herders in Benue state. According to Risku, “they are accusing the Fulani of kidnapping. I visited all the traditional rulers in Otukpo to allow us to form a peace committee comprising our youth so we can join hands and fight banditry together. If we join in the fight, I believe that there would be no hiding place for criminal elements.” 

Risku’s request is not unreasonable, the real problem is the official failure to hold the Bull of insecurity by its horn. In the last two weeks, hundreds of Nigerians have been killed within the Plateau and Benue corridor alone. David Mark, former Senate President while condemning renewed attacks on Otobi-Akpa, Emichi and Utonkon communities in Benue State frustratingly hoped that enough was enough. But no one knows when it will be enough as governors of both states are similarly mourning thereby remaining with the fixated strategy in Nigeria of ‘governance by condolence.’ For enough to really be enough, a new official disposition is overdue. Police who are in charge of internal security which has been our major challenge in the last two decades, don’t get from our annual budget a quarter of what the military that is facing no war gets.

There are less than 400,000 police operatives policing a population that is beyond 200million. Yet, every day since I became a youth 6 decades ago, each new police boss tells the nation that the deployment of police person to the unauthorised assignment of menial jobs such as carrying the handbags of families of the rich has been cancelled. But painfully, the force and its members appear to cherish the demeaning but booming assignment which has permanently diverted them from focusing on the substantive job of protecting our people. The breaking news when I started preparing this article was that the National Economic Council (NEC) – our foremost economic advisory body chaired by the Vice President with governors as members, listed the issue of state police but did not discuss it!

And as killings continue to devastate Nigeria, our Senate, according to its leader, Opeyemi Bamidele, is still working on a legal framework that will empower each state to establish its own police force to address the rising wave of insecurity across the country. That will probably come after another Electoral Act and after all opposition parties have defected to the ruling party just before 2027. Even at that, will our political class – the engine room of all our crises ever allow enough to be enough?

*Dr. Iredia, for NTA DG, is a commentator on public issues