One major challenge that stares the All Progressive Congress (APC)-led Federal Government of Nigeria in the face is the gargantuan security problem.
\nNigeria is besieged by an army of blood tasty demons that do all in their powers to wreak havoc and unleash carnage. Kaduna, Kano, Zamfara and Bornu state have had a disproportionate share of carnage.
\nThe states of the middle belt like Benue and Plateau are victims of rampaging herders who prefer cow to human beings.
\nUnfortunately, the Boko Haram insurgency in the north east has left hundreds of thousands of people dead in the unending feud purportedly targeted at western civilization. In more than a decade of crisis in the north- east, Bornu State residents have been butchered, decapitated and rendered homeless. Internally displaced persons (IDP) have grown like a swarm of bees. Mendicants have also invaded city centre\u2019s to eke out a living in spite of the social problems resulting from enormous displacements.
\nThe hues and cries of the vagabonds, the putrid smell of rotten corpses, and the menace of hunger in the IDP camps paint a picture of a nation in disarray. One Nigeria, unity in diversity and sundry other cohesive slogans are best written as epitaph on the graves of victims of the carnage. But most victims cannot boast of occupying their own graves as they are often buried en mass.
\nSadly, those who swore to protect lives and property of citizens, end up protecting themselves and their families. Regrettably, the iniquitous inequality widens by the day fueled by rapacious greed of our leaders. While the led are slaughtered daily in their numbers, there is a terrible complacency on the part of the leaders. The iniquitous prejudice of ethnicity has become the bane of mutual patriotism. Federal character is slaughtered on the altar of sadistic fidelity to tribal cleavages.
\nAlthough, loyalty to the dictates of federal character in representation diminishes and sacrifices excellence but the beauty of excellence doesn\u2019t reside in a particular region or location.
\nUnfortunately, in a government peopled by the mediocre, excellence is abhorred and dreaded, while mediocrity is often fetched in the recycling bin: after all, rust is ripeness.
\nInteresting, the National Assembly wants to make law on equitable distribution of service chiefs in compliance with federal character representation. But how far has the character representation been complied with in other areas? Iniquity has been naturalised in Nigeria.
\nGovernor Samuel Ortom of Benue State was recently attacked by hoodlums, who are believed to be herders acting on malice over the anti-open grazing laws. The herders have owned up to having attacked the governor and vowed to eliminate him.
\nOrtom, the Governor of Benue State is in charge of affairs not herders. Also, the truculent herders traversing the whole nation with malice do not come from Benue state. Many herders wreaking havoc in the country today are suspected to have come from neighboring countries like Niger and Chad.
\nHowever, FG\u2019s reluctance to decisively deal with both the herders and Boko Haram insurgency is suspected to be mired in ethnic and religious biases.
\nThe attack on Governor Ortom is the climax of nationwide insecurity. It is a clarion call to the federal government that the herders cannot be treated with kid gloves anymore.
\nIf the Governor of Benue State can be attacked by herders, no one is safe anymore.
\nThis attack must be seen as a lesson to modernize the country\u2019s security apparati. Small arms and ammunition are getting into the wrong hands except for the security agencies and the military, others that carry arms mostly do so illegally and the society has acquiesced the unwholesome illegality. Government inaction has conferred a level of legality on the hitherto unlawful acts.
\nIndeed, communities have learnt how to solve their own problems heuristically in spite of government\u2019s negligence. Federal Government\u2019s inability to establish community police has led to all manner of self-help. The abandonment of the rule of law and resort to self-help has reached its apogee in the present administration.
\nThe states are craving for state police to shore up law enforcement while communities demand community police more than ever. The hand writing on the wall is legible and pointedly reminds us of the state of our nation; a decrepit one indeed.
\nWhile regions and ethnic nations are singing discordant tunes, apologists and beneficiaries of the skewed Nigerian federation are at peace with the system. They law lay emphasis on section 2(1) of the constitution of the Federal Republic of Nigeria 1999 (as amended) which states thus;
\n\u201cNigeria is one indivisible and indissoluble sovereign state to be known by the name of the Federal Republic of Nigeria.\u201d
\nEverybody is coerced to accept the indissolubility of the Nigerian state but no effort is made to engender unity and patriotism.
\nThe right to life protected by section 3 of the aforesaid constitution has become rather bogus in the fa\u00e7ade of wanton carnage in the both rural and urban centres.
\nKidnapping of school children in the north east has become fashionable in the face of government\u2019s willingness to pay ransom to criminals. That is exactly where we are. The bludgeoning corruption is fostered by weak institutions and strong individuals who are laws unto themselves, while the youths whose future is plundered applaud their neocolonialist. The captivity of the psyche has worsened the plunder.
\nSagacity is murdered and foolishness is enthroned. It is because the good people have refused to call a spade a spade that corruption sits on high places.
\nInsecurity is heighted by the exploitation of the poor by few affluent ones in the midst of pervading poverty.
\nThe recycling of politicians with jaded sensibilities has been the bane of Nigerian democracy. Those who ruled some decades ago are still on the saddle today even when they are benefit of the knowledge to lead a large and multi-ethnic nation like ours in the 21st century.
\nThe widening inequality between the haves and the have-nots is evidenced in the tragic violence that has become the country\u2019s lot.
\nThe embers of insecurity are fanned by those who desire to maintain ethnic chauvinism of a select few who are born to rule forever.
\nWith the blatant failure to reprimand a reprehensive act exhibited the herders as well as bring the culprits to book, our country finds itself on the throes of a revolution as ethnic nations are victimized by ubiquitous marauders.
\nBefore the attempt to kill the governor of Benue state, farmers, families and tribes had been victims of genocide yet still after inconsolable rhetoric\u2019s, the government continued in business as usual. The idiotic ineptitude of the Federal Government is playing out despite the ranting of leaders on their ability to protect the territorial integrity of the nation.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
By:\u00a0Chidi Enyie<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
One major challenge that stares the All Progressive Congress (APC)-led Federal Government of Nigeria in the face is the gargantuan security problem. Nigeria is besieged by an army of blood tasty demons that do all in their powers to wreak havoc and unleash carnage. Kaduna, Kano, Zamfara and Bornu state have had a disproportionate share […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-258518","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-city-crime"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.thetidenewsonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/258518","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.thetidenewsonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.thetidenewsonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thetidenewsonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thetidenewsonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=258518"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.thetidenewsonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/258518\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.thetidenewsonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=258518"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thetidenewsonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=258518"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thetidenewsonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=258518"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}