Yet again, we find ourselves at the crossroads of a national tragedy and greater national ambivalence. The massacre of over a hundred people by armed marauders has left the country at this crossroads, as it has done many times before in our recent history.
The tragedy is that about half of the fatalities were already victims of a previous conflict that displaced them from their homes and forced them to leave in displaced persons’ camps like children of an absent country. And they have been living there for quite a while before the armed marauders raided the camps and permanently put them out of their misery.
But these marauders, it is not their task to put these people out of their misery, neither is this form of putting them out of their misery acceptable. These people, husbands, wives, mothers, children, young and old, were waiting for their traditional homes to be secured and for them to be resettled, not to be wiped off the face of the earth in a sheer display of brutality and savagery.
In the same weekend, we had armed bandits raiding yet another school, this time in Birnin Yauri in Kebbi State and abducting 80 students. This recent abduction barely made a dent in the newsprints because, well, everyone is tired of reporting these acts of barbarism that cast Nigeria as the Wild Wild West of old—a lawless expanse of dust, blood, unpunished killings and unmourned deaths.
But this is not the case. At least in most instances. The killings might be without consequence for the killers—because who has seen any of these killers, bandits or terrorists actually prosecuted and convicted for their crimes? These deaths are not unmourned. There is such a thing as grief fatigue and I think Nigerians have had it several folds over. Every week we are mourning one national tragedy or the other, most of it inflicted on us, not by natural disasters, but by some criminals the state is too timid to pursue.
Since the massacre in Benue over the weekend, which of the killers have been apprehended? The president of course issued a “statement” as usual condemning the attack and directing that the perpetrators be found and dealt with. We all know that is “wash,” as is said in street lingo. A mere bothersome formality presidential media aides have had to dispense with, one that carries neither presidential might nor interest. Otherwise, how does one explain the persistence of these crimes and the persistent lack of consequence for the perpetrators?
Yes, pastoralists and herders conflicts have been going on for quite a while. In its present iterations, it predated this government and in its previous ones, records exist of clashes during colonial Nigeria, leading to the federal government in the 1960s proposing grazing reserves to curb the conflict. But in the last decade, these clashes have increased in intensity and frequency. The killers have acquired new audacities and the victims have suffered greater neglect. There have been cosmetic attempts to address the outrage, mostly for the optics of it, but what has really been achieved?
A decade of debates in the National Assembly over the grazing bill has not translated into any meaningful, actionable legislature. Yes, we have signed a grazing bill but whose life has it saved since then and what concrete measures have been taken? We even have a National Livestock Transformation Plan in place, commissioned by the federal government and submitted to the agric minister in 2018. No tangible action has followed since.
We have seen a resort to self-help, to the establishment of state-owned vigilante groups like Amotekun in the Southwest region and the Benue State Livestock Guard. Sadly, both of these have not done enough to curb the menace as they instead moulded themselves into morality police of some sort. The commandant of Amotekun in Osun State once threatened to arrest young people for “indecent dressing” and “speaking the Yoruba language incorrectly.” Talk about taking grammar policing literarily.
A couple of students have since lost their lives, shot by members of the Amotekun Corps for such minor infringements. And the Benue State Livestock Guard was caught up in some controversy a few months ago when during a routine patrol in the cities of Makurdi, they decided to turn hairdressers and shave the hair off women whose hairstyle they did not approve of based on some undocumented moral code. That was not what they were established for.
We see now how powerless they are to stop the massacres in the state. And in what would seem like an obvious admission of the failure of this cosmetic enterprise, the Benue State government has ordered the suspension of the guards for two weeks, to allow herders they couldn’t stop from entering the state to exit it.
This is not mollycoddling the issue. The Benue State government, according to the constitution of the country, does not control the security apparatus to effectively curb this. That responsibility has been retained by the federal government.
Yet, in the last decade of increasing insecurity and wanton killings, one is hard-pressed to point at a definitive approach the government has adopted to tackle the situation. We have been raving that Nigeria has been under-policed. Yet, what we have seen is the increased issuing of inane press statements condemning killings instead of increased police and military recruitments to face the challenge. We have not seen any increased zeal on the part of the security apparatus to hunt down killers of innocent Nigerians and bring them to justice rather an increased timidity from our uniformed protectors to stand with onlookers after the crimes, shrug their shoulders and say, “Kai! This is bad.”
This administration has mentally checked out of office already and what they have failed to do in the last eight years, I don’t think they can be bothered to do it in the next few months when they are busy lining their retirement nests. And so, this problem will be passed on to the next administration.
To address these problems, the priority would be to immediately improve security and end impunity. The attacks must be stopped at once, either by recruiting and training more security personnel to guarantee the safety of Nigerians who go about their legitimate businesses. This must be followed immediately by identifying the perpetrators and giving them the justice that they deserve. Subsequently, the authorities must permanently address the causes of these clashes.
Yes, the pastoralists have had a way of living for centuries but this is a new age and with an exploding population, that is expected to triple in the next few decades, that lifestyle is unsustainable and must therefore, be adapted to ensure a peaceful co-existence between Nigeria’s peoples. Tough measures must be taken. The massacre of hundreds of people must never be accepted as a norm. There is nothing routine about it.
