A new song in Zamfara?

This week, there has naturally been a lot of furore about Daily Trust’s reportage on the Samoa Agreement and its alleged attempt to legitimise the LGBTQ agitations that Western Governments seem to think are more important than child’s rights and Nigeria’s out-of-school children menace.

The bulk of my research in my doctoral studies has been on Information Disorder, which has become as pressing an issue in the mediascape as sex relations have become, especially in non-African countries. So, of course, my inclination was to address this issue in this column to highlight how Daily Trust perpetrated misinformation, as distinct from disinformation, and the attendant slovenliness that facilitated that report. But my fellow columnist, Suleiman Suleiman, I see, has already taken the paper to task on this and I feel there is no need to rehash the argument.

However, one important thing to highlight is the importance of the report in raising concerns about how Nigeria proceeds to sign treaties and agreements and sometimes adopts anthems without widespread consultation or seeing the need to educate Nigerians about these developments. And, if the latest coming out of the National Assembly is to be considered without following due process. As the House of Representatives calls for a review of the agreement, the hope is that the government has learned a valuable lesson in information management, and that Daily Trust has been amply reminded of the essence of CYA (cover your ass) in journalism, and supporting claims with facts. After all, one of journalism’s central roles is to keep both the government and the governed on their toes and this report managed to do that for all, including journalists themselves.

So, I move from the moral policing that report teased to the policing that Nigeria actually needs, especially as it relates to the northwestern state of Zamfara. Zamfara is crucial to the security challenges in that region of the country because our history of banditry cannot be definitively recounted how it took off from Zamfara. While banditry was seeded by civil clashes over scarce resources between farmers and herders, weak governance at the local level cultivated this seed until it blossomed into this dark forest we are ensnared in, a forest that continues to grow and deepen.

That failure to deal with the nascent criminal gangs in the state in the early 2010s, who started off raiding illegal mining communities, soon became our bane. And if Nigerians had raised as much outcry then as we are doing now over this Samoa bruhaha, perhaps the government would have paid more attention and the story could have been different.Recently, Governor Dauda Lawal of Zamfara State reiterated claims made by his predecessor and many other governors before them regarding the state of security in their states.

“By name, I am the chief security officer of my state, but when it comes to command and control, I don’t have control over any of the security outfits, whether the military, the police or civil defence,” he was quoted in a Channels report last month.

In cases like this, the immediate inclination is to dismiss this as a preemptive excuse-making for nonperformance. I wanted to know, in the absence of this power to command the military and the police, what could the governor have done to change the fortunes of his state and its people.

Interestingly, the governor has made all the regular gestures of mobilising soldiers and police to the dangerous highways in the state and shutting down markets suspected of selling rustled cattle. But the situation in Zamfara demands more than that. Fortunately, the governor realised that and has taken measures to boost the efforts of the security personnel.

One of those measures is the inauguration of the Zamfara Community Protection Guards. These are locals who know the terrain and know the people, and they have now received professional training to help them secure their communities. While this may seem like state-sponsored vigilantes, the truth is that villages and communities in the state, abandoned to their fates in previous years and by previous administrations, have often had to form pockets of vigilantes without the training and equipment to fend for themselves.

Centralising this system and providing training and equipment is a key step in wresting control of the security situation in Zamfara. It is a crucial intervention that gives the governor and people of the state the agency to do something substantial to help the people and themselves instead of the habitual whining trips to Abuja.

While Abuja remains central to addressing security challenges in the country, it is, therefore, prudent that the governor has continued to engage with the powers at the centre through meetings with President Bola Tinubu to see how the security agencies could improve their efforts in the state, in addition to taking local measures to curb the bandits.

My major critique of such interventions is that they are often designed for the short term. They seem to focus on addressing the immediate threat and ignore the medium and long-term social impacts that this social malaise afflicts the state with.

So, in this sense, it is commendable that the state government has established the Zamfara State Security Trust Fund. At the recent inauguration of the Trust Fund’s offices, the governor expanded its mandate to include the desensitisation of citizens in the state to the violence they have been subjected to for years.

I cannot emphasise enough how crucial this intervention will be.Disarming gunmen is often not enough; it is also necessary to disabuse their minds and the minds of their victims from the impact of violence. There are thousands who have profited from banditry and killings. Some have been lured into banditry by their circumstances, driven by want.

Without reorientation and therapy, Zamfara would become populated by a traumatised and trigger-happy group of people in the coming years. The Hausa expression ‘yan bindiga dadi’ best captures this category of people.

One of the crucial ways to cut off the supply of recruits for banditry is through education and job creation. It is a shame that Zamfara remains one of the least developed states in terms of education in the country. However, the state government seems determined to train its citizens in various areas of knowledge through scholarship offers, both at home and abroad. The decision to employ jobless youths in the state as sweepers and cleaners may seem patronising, but in reality, it is an urgent and necessary intervention to provide legitimate livelihoods for idle hands in the state and keep them busy, away from the influence of bandit groups.

Overall, I believe that years of maladministration have lowered the standard of public expectations of political office holders. As a result, the construction of roads in the state, which the governor has undertaken, may appear miraculous and impressive to those who have not experienced such governance in the past. However, it is important to challenge the governor, who has already accomplished a significant amount in the past year, to push further and expedite the progress of Zamfara. If the past year has shown anything, it is that a great deal can be achieved in a year and that groundwork can be laid to address long-standing issues that have been plaguing the state.

I don’t believe that the governor alone and his team can’t accomplish this. During an interview on Channels in June, Gov Lawal lamented the political kerfuffle in the state, which is not only a distraction but also an obstacle to putting the state on the right path. All vested interests in the state must come together to get this right and make up for the wasted years.

Getting Zamfara right is crucial to putting an end to banditry, considering the strategic location of the state and its history with these marauding gangs. Gov Lawal, through his efforts in the past year, has raised expectations that it is possible to change this narrative. It will be interesting to see how far and quickly he can progress. So, no pressure, Mr Lawal.