Prioritizing politics over the lives of citizens

The New Year started on a particularly bad note with violence and killings in Kaduna, Rivers and Benue states.  While the Rivers killing is cult-related, those of Kaduna and Benue were the works of terrorist Fulani herdsmen who had been on a genocidal mission, killing and maiming communities across the country since 2015 unchallenged. The government however, instead of meeting to strategies on responses to these existential threats, is on a different and more urgent mission. Ministers were directed by the president to go to their various constituencies to begin necessary grassroots mobilisation for his re-election.

The federal Executive Council meeting, a forum used by the cabinet to discuss pressing national issues, set the agenda for the nation as well as address urgent issues like the brutal killings in Rivers, Benue Kaduna and Borno states over the new year weekends which claimed several lives, failed to hold a fortnight ago as virtually all the ministers were busy mobilising support for the president’s re-election bid in their constituencies. The vice president was also said to still be on holidays in Dubai.

Same day, the Minister of Communications, Adebayo Shittu, was at the presidential villa to brief the president on the outcome of his visit to his constituencies boldly telling news men at the State House that “he has appointed a national chairman for the board of trustees of Muhammadu Buhari/Osinbajo dynamic support group”, which will be inaugurated on January 20 at the commissioning of the Southwest zonal office of the Buhari/Osinbajo campaign organisation.

Worse, on Thursday, President Buhari was in Kaduna – one of the states hit by the killings – to commission ten coaches and two locomotives and the Kaduna Inland Dry Port and surprisingly did not take the opportunity to visit the victims of the attack nor did he make any mention of the killings while in the state. The body language of the president was clear; those killed do not matter; and he considers the commission of ten miserable coaches and two locomotives far more important than the dozens of lives lost due to his administration’s incompetence, indecisiveness and unwillingness to confront the threat that the terrorist and genocidal Fulani herdsmen have become in the entire of North-central states and beyond.

In 2015, the Global Terrorism Index ranked the Fulani herdsmen as the fourth deadliest terrorist group in the world with 80 victims in 2013 and 1, 229 victims in 2014. However, since 2015, the numbers have risen astronomically. 2016 figures were said to be in the region of 2,500. Yet, Mr president has never made any comments regarding this threat but wasted no time in despatching the army to crush a raucous but peaceful secessionist group – the Independent People of Biafra (IPOB) – that is yet to kill a single person. Meanwhile, throughout this time, not a single herdsman has been arrested for the killings.

It is only an irresponsible government that goes around campaigning for re-election when its citizens are being helplessly killed by a foe it has refused to confront. It is only an irresponsible government or leader that prioritises the commissioning of some miserable coaches and locomotives over honouring dozens of his citizens gruesomely murdered by a known enemy that has successfully challenged the states’ monopoly of the means of violence. Going by the social contract theories and even in saner climes these days, such a government would have lost its legitimacy and all rights to remain in power. But not so in Nigeria. The government still goes about shamelessly advertising its and failures and incompetencies as achievements.

We must appreciate the threats we face as a country: A situation whereby a group goes around killing others wilfully in large parts of the country and where government’s response follows a pattern: deafening silence at first and only half-hearted response that fails to stop the killings and refusal or inability to apprehend the killers and bring them to justice, the result will be a resort to self-help. This can only lead to anarchy and chaos.

We urge the government to do a thorough self-introspection and begin to take measures to strengthen its capacity for maintenance of law and order and ensuring that justice is done to all wronged parties promptly to strengthen their belief and faith in the rule of law and the legal process. We also feel the seeming silence of the President and the non-challant way the administration has been responding to the crisis is condemnable. It gives the impression that the government favours a side to the conflict and is out to protect them.