“I’m in the train. I have been shot. Please, pray for me.” As Dr. Chinelo Megafu tweeted those words after being hit by one of several bullets fired at that Kaduna-bound train, another female Nigerian, Jessica Bodam Wash, took to social media to make the following update. She wrote: “While they were at it, Alheri Magaji, we lost 6 (six) soldiers in our barracks same time the train attack was ongoing. We are in mourning as we speak, but the news will not carry it. Over 400 bandits attacked close to our barracks. Pray for us also”. She also wrote: “I just entered my house from consoling the wives of the slain soldiers. Scores are critically wounded and in the hospital.” According to her, this occurred at Zuma Barracks along the “Kaduna-Zuba Expressway.”
Prior to the train attack, terrorists had attacked a community in Giwa local government area of Kaduna State killing about 40 persons and rustling over 100 cows within five days. Niger State is not safe either as Munga LGA of the state came under heavy attack by terrorists on Saturday lasting into early hours of Sunday. Recently, Gov. Bello Matawalle of Zamfara State donated Toyota Hilux Vans to neighbouring Niger Republic to enhance capacity for border patrol to checkmate terrorists’ attacks that had crippled and laid the state desolate. As these attacks continue in the northern divide of the country, non-state actors, more popular as Unknown Gunmen, run riot in the South East attacking and torching police stations as well as and firing openly at people who disobey their call to sit-at-home on Mondays. South West and South-South regions are not spared either.
The summary? Nigeria is at war with itself. No external aggression, since amalgamation in 1914, has shaken Nigeria as much as internal insurrection and terrorist activities have. The reality, however, as painful as it is, is that what is happening in the Abuja-Kaduna corridor is not about Kaduna State nor about the competence of its governor to manage terrorism. This fact holds same for governors of states experiencing same reality. The undeniable fact remains that Nigerian governors lack the constitutional mandate to be wholly responsible for the curtailment or stoppage of terrorism in their states. The most they can do, and have done, is to enable the operationalization of vigilante groups which powers and activities are legally limited, or make logistic donations to the security forces. It is, therefore, for reasons of the concentration of coercive powers of state in the federal government that almost everyone looks up to the President, and his team, to do more than the eternal promise of bringing terrorists to book.
One thing, however, troubles my soul here. And it is this! How come terrorists, who move in groups and on motorcycles and also walk bush paths seem to be more precise in inflicting pain on Nigerians than the military have been in decimating them even when they (military) have the constitutional cover to do so, despite being armed with Tucano, said to be the terrorists’ nightmare? Recall in 2015, Chadian President, Idris Deby Itno, as he then was, told French magazine Le Point that “the whole world is asking why the Nigerian Army, which is a big army, is not in a position to stand up to untrained kids armed with Kalashnikovs.”
He did not get an answer till his death in the hands of terrorists.
In a recent statement declaring that Nigeria has never been as safe as it currently is, Lai Mohammed, the very unfortunate Minister of Information, reeled out efforts made to equip the military, stating that “…the Nigerian Army has procured 160 MRAPs, 150 trucks and 60 APCs to improve its equipment holding… the Nigerian Air Force took delivery of Super Tucanos and three JF-17 Thunder Fighter aircraft and other platforms… The Nigerian Navy for its part commissioned the Falcon Eye Maritime Domain Awareness Capability, the third locally-built seaward defence boat, one helicopter, four onshore patrol boats and 90 rigid hull inflatable boats”. With these, which confirms that the military was grossly ill-equipped, Mohammed said “…the terrorists and their camps are being decimated.”
However, experts say these are not enough. The manpower shortfall is a huge issue too. Former Chief of Army Staff and one-time Minister of Interior, Gen. Abdulrahaman Dambazzau, had said that the manpower situation of Nigeria’s military was terribly embarrassing.
“There are just about 190,000 personnel for the three services, Army, Navy and Air Force,” he said while speaking on the topic ‘Nigeria’s Overstretched Military: Priorities for Improving the Military’s Capability to Tackle the Country’s Security Challenges,’ at a seminar organized by Harvard Weatherhead Center for International Affairs.
In what seems like a response, Lai Mohammed stated that 10,000 persons had been recruited into the army and 1,500 into the Navy with 20,000 persons trained in the various police colleges as “constabularies” (not regular policemen but trained to assist in policed duties). He was, however, creatively silent on recruitments into the Air Force and Civil Defence. The numbers he gave, put together, remain grossly inadequate to address need. As it stands, the combined total of personnel of the Army, Navy, Air Force, Police, Civil Defence in Nigeria is not, generously put, up to one million for a population of over 200 million. This still falls short of expectations for adequate security and does not even come close to the Nasir el-Rufai prescription of 1,000 recruitments, per local government, into the military. Sadly, out of this figure, a good percentage of the personnel are assigned guard and special errand duties (like carrying food for Madam) in the homes and offices of military, police, political, religious, business leaders and other such persons.
For now, these are the realities Nigerians will continue to live with until we realize that there is need to liberalize our thinking and seek other ways of getting the problem solved. As it stands, all of us are in the same train being driven by a driver who, sadly, has lost every verve to drive.
His promise to drive us safely to destination expired long ago and his further promise to get all those throwing wedges on the rail have yielded no fruit either. It is such that even when he says that he knows who those characters are, he still lacks the will to bring them to that his book. So, till we arrive destination, everyone should pray for everyone because a derailed train never gets to destination. We have all been shot, some emotionally, some politically and some economically, but almost all have been shot physically by poverty, hunger, huge and still rising energy, housing, clothing, education, hospital and food bills but static minimum wage.