Nigeria loses more people than a nation at war. The Boko Haram insurgency, which saw to the displacement of thousands of Nigerians, and sending several thousands to the great beyond, has been with us for a while. The security breach has lasted longer than the Nigerian civil war. It is amazing that the nation got a people to surrender in 30 months but has been found flat-footed in battling insurgents that have infested the nation like termites for over 10 years.
Those who made their defeat a campaign promise have done four years in office, and claim to have even ‘technically’ defeated the insurgents, yet the menace has not abated. The governor of Borno State has even wept before the President in seeking help, only to go home to be confronted by a rag-tag army that has held the nation to ransom. In the midst of the prevalent insurgency comes the latest entry into the security problem in the northern parts of the nation: kidnapping.
Over the years, taking people for ransom was the tool of agitators in the Niger-Delta, who would grab oil workers in their zone and force the companies to pay huge sums in exchange for the life of their workers, although it turned out that state governments paid the ransom, not the targeted companies.
Unlawful as it was, the act became the way for the agitators to get back at oil firms that drained their nation and gave nothing in return. They made their point, and, indeed, got the attention of everyone. They hardly wasted their victims because they embarked on the kidnap to make a point. Amnesty, and other palliatives came into the picture. The matter abated but no one knew that the boys in the South East had found a lucrative venture.
Kidnapping became the vogue in Aba, and virtually all parts of the South East. The menace moved several notches higher than what the militants intended. Nigerians in the diaspora dreaded trips to Nigeria. It was so bad that my village boy, Nnamdi Oduamadi, who plied his football trade in foreign lands, did not come into town for his father’s burial. He reportedly came into the nation, but stayed away from the event, perhaps to stay off the hook of kidnappers.
It was that bad. Mikel Obi’s father was kidnapped on more than one occasion, forcing the football star to pay huge ransoms. There were several incidents, which made the police and security agents celebrate when they effected the arrest of kidnappers. It became a means of wealth redistribution by kidnappers who targeted men and women of means in their nefarious activity, to get large chunks of their money. They also began to waste those who could not pay. They became notorious, attracting security agents who did their best to unmask the likes of ‘Osisikankwu,’ Chuwkudumebi, aka Evans, and other notorious kidnappers. The Anambra State government became scientific in the use of vigilance operatives, such that the hitherto dangerous place became the safest in the land. What security agents did not know was that youths in the northern parts of the nation also fastened their eyes on what happened in the eastern parts just as the oriental boys watched the militants.
Today, the menace has shifted to the North such that the Abuja-Kaduna highway has become the new kidnap hub. No day passes without a kidnapping incident in that area. When the Abuja Airport was shut down for repairs, forcing passengers to use the Kaduna Airport, safety on that road was a major concern to the authorities.
The security agents stood on their toes within the period of closure. The road has become hot again, and the security agents have stepped in yet again. Some arrests have been effected, and we hope it would not be like the regularly celebrated arrest of Boko Haram insurgents, which led to no reduction in their operation. At some point, the Boko Haram leader, Shekau, became a cat with nine lives, who died today and appeared in videos tomorrow.
The hope is that the kidnappings on that road will abate with the arrest of the hoodlums, and not be a face-saving gimmick. But the fishbone in the throat of the nation and security agents is the killings in Zamfara State. In one day, 50 people or more were reportedly killed in a state that is not at war.
The bloodletting had become a daily routine, forcing the governor to raise his hands in helplessness. It has come to light that a sort of gang war among illegal and legal miners is happening in that state. The details have not become public knowledge but the Federal Government has ordered stoppage of all mining activities in Zamfara.
The security agents know how the water got into the coconut, which is why the killings should be nipped in the bud. It took wide protests led by journalists and human rights crusaders in Abuja for some action to be taken. The saddening revelation is that the traditional rulers in that state are aware and implicitly back the killings. Nothing can be more depressing than for the proverbial dog to eat the bone kept in its custody.
If the kings are complicit in these killings, the tendency is for the solution to be out of reach. It would seem the governor did not know this in his days of lamentation. The law should take its course on this matter for a lasting solution to come to the fore. The killings in Zamfara have tended to defy solution.
Now we know that miners are fighting for territory, turning the state into a killing field. If traditional rulers are involved in this seeming gang war, then the law should have no respect for them. There is so much insecurity in thet land that this tractable one should be dispensed with without delay.