• Home
  • Stories
    • Politics
    • Business
    • Arts & Culture
    • Health
      Bill and Melinda Gates

      Goalkeepers Report: Gates foundation announces $200 million commitment, pledges to reduce maternal, child mortality

      2023 Goalkeepers Report: Bill, Melinda French-Gates list seven innovations that would stop maternal mortality

      2023 Goalkeepers Report: Bill, Melinda French-Gates list seven innovations that would stop maternal mortality

      COVID-19: Bill Gates says he warned us

      Nigerians, others to get $5m Gates Foundation global health AI grants

      Why I am coming to Nigeria, Niger, by Bill Gates

      Bill Gates prediction about NIgeria: Embrace innovations, technology, he tells youth

      Bill Gates

      Next pandemic will be man-made, deadly – Bill Gates warns

      BMGF takes giant leap, expands Board as Econet Billionaire Masiyiwa makes the cut

      Does our foundation have too much influence? Here’s how I see it

      The doctor pronounced him dead in the car, they did not remove the corpse, they did not separate his wife fro him -Osita Chidoka

      The doctor pronounced him dead in the car, they did not remove the corpse, they did not separate his wife fro him -Osita Chidoka

    • Security
    • Travel
  • World
  • Africa
  • Humans of Abuja
  • Investigation
  • Development
  • Contact
Infactng
  • Home
  • Stories
    • Politics
    • Business
    • Arts & Culture
    • Health
      Bill and Melinda Gates

      Goalkeepers Report: Gates foundation announces $200 million commitment, pledges to reduce maternal, child mortality

      2023 Goalkeepers Report: Bill, Melinda French-Gates list seven innovations that would stop maternal mortality

      2023 Goalkeepers Report: Bill, Melinda French-Gates list seven innovations that would stop maternal mortality

      COVID-19: Bill Gates says he warned us

      Nigerians, others to get $5m Gates Foundation global health AI grants

      Why I am coming to Nigeria, Niger, by Bill Gates

      Bill Gates prediction about NIgeria: Embrace innovations, technology, he tells youth

      Bill Gates

      Next pandemic will be man-made, deadly – Bill Gates warns

      BMGF takes giant leap, expands Board as Econet Billionaire Masiyiwa makes the cut

      Does our foundation have too much influence? Here’s how I see it

      The doctor pronounced him dead in the car, they did not remove the corpse, they did not separate his wife fro him -Osita Chidoka

      The doctor pronounced him dead in the car, they did not remove the corpse, they did not separate his wife fro him -Osita Chidoka

    • Security
    • Travel
  • World
  • Africa
  • Humans of Abuja
  • Investigation
  • Development
  • Contact
No Result
View All Result
Infactng
No Result
View All Result

Life Has Lost Its Value Under Buhari’s Nigeria

December 12, 2021

By Daily Trust

In a space of just two days last week, 23 travellers heading to Kaduna were burnt alive in a commercial bus at Sabon Birni, Sokoto State. No fewer than 15 worshipers killed as they prayed in a mosque at Ba’are village, Mashegu Local Government Area of Niger State. A Commissioner in the service of Katsina State, Dr Rabe Nasir was gruesomely murdered in his own house located at Fatima Shema Quarters in Katsina city, while a housewife identified only as Salamatu, was killed as bandits abducted six others during a raid at Piri community in Kwali Area Council of Abuja.

Welcome to northern Nigeria, circa 2021, where life has seemingly lost its value, under a President voted en masse five times by the same populace. The commissioner was stabbed several times until he died. A 30-year-old woman watched as her mother, four children, an uncle, a nephew, and a niece, all burnt to ashes. She died too a few days later. Their attackers, of course, watched in delight as they burn.

But the horror and barbarism of these killings is only one thing. The frequency with which these gruesome killings occur and recur is another. The Sultan of Sokoto and President-General of the Nigerian Supreme Council for Islamic Affairs (NSCIA), Alhaji Muhammadu Sa’ad Abubakar III, summed up the sorrow and grief-stricken mood of the region and the nation, when he said, shortly after these events, that, “if I continue talking about the insecurity in the North, we will not leave this room… There is no single day that passes without people being killed in the North especially in the North West now, but we don’t hear it,” even as bandits continue to kill and maim in part of Katsina State and elsewhere in the North.

But beyond the blood-thirstiness of the attackers, the unending recurrence of their gruesome attacks, and the helplessness and haplessness of the victims, it is the seeming unwillingness and disinterest of the highest authority in the land to even show some concern that grates the most. What more needs to happen before President Buhari would show that he cares? What more needs to happen before the President would genuinely demonstrate that he feels the silent anguish of hundreds of communities and thousands of citizens everywhere across the north and the country at large?

Only a few years ago President Buhari too bemoaned these very events, even when they occurred at a much lower scale than now, and that his bemoaning them was part of the very reason he was elected to the presidency to solve them. It is the very people who lined up under the rain and shine to cast their votes for him to become president—at the fourth time of asking—who are routinely killed, maimed or taxed by bandits and terrorists of all hue under his watch today.

Votes and elections are expressions of hope. When has mass death become the reward for voting a candidate or party to power? And yet, President Buhari has scarcely seen it fit to visit the families of the victims or the leaders of the communities affected, to at least demonstrate compassion and solidarity with them, if not to lead a counter-offensive against the terrorists as a Commander-in-Chief. True, the President dispatched a high-level delegation of military, police and intelligence chiefs to two of the states affected, but he himself was, of course, in attendance at a book launch of a party chieftain in Lagos.

We do not deem the delegation less worthy, but the President’s own priorities, at such a sad period for many Nigerian families, is not only of the poorest judgment imaginable, but amounts to a clear indication that he does not care enough about the lives of those killed or maimed. Yet, even the poor judgment itself and the logical conclusion it leaves in the minds of many are themselves merely part of a set pattern.

Whenever bandits strike with murderous fury at communities in Katsina, Kaduna, Zamfara, Niger or Sokoto states, or elsewhere across mostly northern Nigeria, the president’s response is easily predicted. He would announce, usually on his Facebook page, that he has directed the police and military chiefs to do more, and then wait for the next attack to regurgitate the same comments. This sends only one clear message: the President is not responsive to tragedy of ordinary Nigerians, especially if those are from the north. And it is this flippant and dismissive attitude to the sufferings of people across the north that many find most grating and unacceptable.

Bandits everywhere, yet the President is silent

That much has been said by many ordinary Nigerians, on social media as well any other channels available to them. Perhaps the only thing left to be said is that the president must recognize that this is not a problem that neither he nor his government can wish away. His reluctance to engage directly with it and with the communities affected in order to find a lasting solution would not make the problem go away.

As it has evolved in the past decade or so, what we call ‘banditry’ in northern Nigeria today is an amalgam of many complex issues, among them high levels of poverty and unemployment in the region, deeply entrenched feelings of past dispossession and exclusion, climate change, and above all, a near complete break-down of law and moral order in society. We are not oblivious of the difficulties to the problem.

Yet, we are aware, and wish to remind President Buhari today, that no one in Nigeria is better positioned than he is in helping to find a lasting solution to them; certainly no one has put himself forward—with tears in his eyes in one failed attempt to boot—more frequently and vigorously than he did. Therefore, the obligation is just as personal as official, or should be, to move the president to personally take charge of the counter-offensive against terrorists, in the north or elsewhere in the country.

Force alone will not be enough. But it is a truism that where there is the will there is a way.

The President will find all the ways once he first musters the will to say ‘not under my watch would Nigerian life lose its value’. Otherwise, history will remember because that is already happening.

Share122Tweet76Share31
INFACTNG

INFACTNG

Related Posts

Nigeria’s Trust and Tax Crisis: How Strategic Development Communication Can Save the Day
Opinion

Nigeria’s Trust and Tax Crisis: How Strategic Development Communication Can Save the Day

August 1, 2023

In this article, Olayode Abdulrasaq, a strategic communication expert, explains how communication can play a critical role in addressing Nigeria's trust and tax crisis and building a more prosperous and equitable society. Nigeria is facing a crisis of trust...

Why I am coming to Nigeria, Niger, by Bill Gates
Opinion

Lessons from Nigeria: For a bright future, invest in Africa’s young

July 28, 2023

"Throughout this visit, I was continually struck by the enthusiasm of Nigeria’s young people to make a difference, and the creative ways they are harnessing innovative science and technology to accelerate progress and improve lives across Africa. The problems...

The legend of Olurombi
Opinion

The legend of Olurombi

May 11, 2023

By Seun Akioye ( Long tale for the elderly) Long ago in a village not far from my mothers’ lived a woman called Olurombi. Despite being an orphan from childhood who had survived at the charity of the more...

Professor Saheed Aderinto: The $300,000 Dan David Prize-Winning Historian
Opinion

Professor Saheed Aderinto: The $300,000 Dan David Prize-Winning Historian

February 28, 2023

"To all young and up-and-coming people out there—how hard are you working towards extraordinary rewards that don’t exist today, but will emerge tomorrow? Do you spend more on depreciables like cars, owambe, clothes, and phones, than on appreciables like...

Leave a Reply Cancel reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed.

Recent Posts

  • Goalkeepers Report: Gates foundation announces $200 million commitment, pledges to reduce maternal, child mortality September 21, 2023
  • Political will, resource scaling, key to addressing child and maternal mortality in the world- Mark Suzman, CEO, Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation September 21, 2023
  • Imagine a World: Three changemakers get Global Change awards at Goalkeepers event September 20, 2023
  • Imagine a world as Goalkeeper awards opens in New York September 19, 2023
  • You have touched Tiger’s tail- Rivers CP tells cultists over DPO’s murder September 12, 2023

Categories

  • Africa (14)
  • Agriculture (3)
  • Agriculture (12)
  • Arts & Culture (30)
  • Business (222)
  • Cover (25)
  • COVER STORY (61)
  • Development (25)
  • ENDSARS PROTESTS (39)
  • Features (13)
  • Health (83)
  • Humans of Abuja (5)
  • Investigation (8)
  • Law (15)
  • News (765)
  • Obituary (20)
  • Opinion (36)
  • Politics (173)
  • Security (183)
  • Stories (339)
  • Travel (6)
  • World (42)

Popular

  • Six years pregnancy: A Miracle too hard to believe

    Six years pregnancy: A Miracle too hard to believe

    472 shares
    Share 189 Tweet 118
  • Akindele Oluwaseun: ‘Crying Teacher’ who receive over N1m donation and gave it all out

    384 shares
    Share 154 Tweet 96
  • How first female combat Pilot was killed

    367 shares
    Share 147 Tweet 92
  • Army throws out ‘nosey’ editor from own platform

    364 shares
    Share 146 Tweet 91
  • Missing man found dead, after four suicide attempts

    363 shares
    Share 145 Tweet 91

  • Contact
  • News

© 2020 Infactng – Investigative Journalism

No Result
View All Result
  • Home
  • Stories
    • Politics
    • Business
    • Arts & Culture
    • Health
    • Security
    • Travel
  • World
  • Africa
  • Humans of Abuja
  • Investigation
  • Development
  • Contact