The Nation Newspaper

Category: Emeka Omeihe

  • Imo ENTRACO, VIO’s

    Imo ENTRACO, VIO’s

    Suspension of all activities of the Imo State Environmental Transformation Commission (ENTRACO) by the state government must have come to residents as a huge relief. The measure followed an incident in which officials of the agency were implicated in the gruesome deaths of a motorbike rider and his passenger in the Owerri municipality.

    An ENTRACO vehicle rammed into the bike rider and his passenger along the Akachi-Wethedral road axis resulting in their instant deaths. It is not clear whether their action was in furtherance of the resumed enforcement of the ban on commercial motorcycles in Owerri municipality which commenced on November 9. But the incident attracted serious public outrage and evoked sad memories of the reckless and arbitrary conducts of ENTRACO officials. A trending video showed one of the victims with his two legs totally crushed. The other had his head shattered as they lay in a pool of blood.

    The incident must have so embarrassed the state government that it ordered immediate suspension of all activities of the agency with a directive to security agencies to arrest and apprehend anyone parading as its agent.

    In arriving at the decision, the government said it was guided by “recent ugly incidents where the mode of operation of the agency was brought to question by members of the public”. It promised investigations into ENTRACO’s operations and its affiliated entities to demonstrate the regime’s ‘commitment to lawful governance and the safety of Imo citizens’.

    This should be good news for Imo citizens who have been reeling under the pains of the excesses and arbitrariness of ENTRACO operatives and allied task forces.

    Last October, its officials were involved in a two-day fracas with traders, their sympathisers including some security personnel at the Toronto junction market in Owerri. This led to loss of lives, injuries and destruction of properties. Accounts of the immediate cause of the fracas vary. But they hovered around the unbearable excesses of agency officials in carrying out their duties.

    Allegations of ENTRACO officials breaking into shops at night carting away goods, cash and sundry equipment without any record were freely traded. If officials were not found destroying the wares of petty traders obstructing traffic flow, they were seen chasing and beating them with any objects at their disposal. Impunity held sway.

    About two months ago, youths from the Naze community had blocked the office of ENTRACO in protest against the alleged killing of one of their brothers in an accident caused by the agency’s operatives. It is common to see traders running in all directions at the slightest alarm of the approach of ENTRACO officials.

    Not unexpectedly, some criminally minded individuals capitalise on the agency’s improper mode of operation to raise false alarms in order to steal from petty traders as they run with their goods.  Ironically, the agency seems to be operating beyond the law that set it up. The 2008 law which established the agency charged it with beautifying and maintaining a healthy, clean and green environment. Its other mandate includes, overseeing sanitation, clearing gutters, planting trees and flowers and other efforts to bring about an environmentally healthy society. Admittedly, the agency is bound to come into conflict with residents who improperly display wares along the roads, throw refuse into gutters or obstruct free movement especially around the markets. The way it goes about this is the issue.

    It appears ENTRACO prioritizes chasing traders and motorists around, confiscating their goods and other wares than the main functions assigned it by law. The reason is not far-fetched. It is for the same reason that they are more engrossed in chasing motorists around wielding dangerous weapons as was on display during the fracas at the Toronto junction market.

    Even then, their spheres of activity seem to blur the line between their authorised functions and that of the Imo State Traffic Management Agency (ISTMA). The latter is empowered by law to handle traffic and parking violations. It strikes as a usurpation of functions and avoidable duplication.

    It is good a thing the state government has seen sufficient reasons to suspend all the activities of the agency and allied task forces that have become a nightmare to citizens of the state. The government should go ahead to empanel a commission of inquiry to investigate their activities and other task forces.

    The public should be given ample opportunity to present their encounters with these task forces to the commission. Such testimonies will aid the government in re-defining the rules of engagement for the various task forces that seem to accord scant regard to the dignity of the human person, due process and the material conditions of the citizens.

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    Of note is the type of personnel engaged by these task forces and their requisite training to carry out their duties. Things are hard. A lot of people find it hard to eke a living. Destroying goods and properties indiscriminately in the face of existential challenges will only end up swelling the army of the unemployed with dire consequences for the festering insecurity in the country.

    That was the dialectics at play during the Toronto junction market fracas. The situation calls for a greater measure of discretion and understanding. A law is as good as the people it serves.

    There is also an item in the checklist of Vehicle Inspection Officers (VIO’s) that should draw the attention of the state government-mandatory first-aid-kits for private cars. There is no evidence of the specific Imo State law mandating first-aid-kits in private cars. The requirement is traced to a resolution by the Imo State House of Assembly in 2022, directing VIO’s and other agencies to enforce compliance. The justification is predicated on public safety. Right.

    The VIO’s impose a fine of N10,000 on defaulters, many of them unaware of such requirement. This writer was taken aback during a recent visit to the state when he was contravened for not having a first-aid-kit in his car. It was a huge surprise because even the federal highway regulations do not mandate private cars to carry first-aid-kits.

    Imo has a small land mass. You can access any local government area from the state capital within one hour. And in-between, you can rarely travel three kilometres without finding a shop to buy bandages, disinfectants, pain relieving tablets and plasters that make up items in the kit. If federal highways that traverse thousands of kilometres do not punish private cars for not having such kits, its attraction to Imo presents a puzzle.

    Yes, public safety is cited. But the lure of more revenue into government coffers appears the main attraction. Not surprisingly, there is an official at a corner collecting cash, issuing receipts. Whether the cash is remitted into government coffers is another issue altogether. It is a burden the private car owner should be relieved of.

  • Beyond Trump’s threats

    Beyond Trump’s threats

    Nigeria’s designation as ‘Country of particular Concern’ (CPC) by President Donald Trump of United States of America (USA) and his threat of military action, re-opened the controversy on Christian persecution and genocide which some foreign media platforms had labelled terrorism-induced killings in the country.

    The federal government had while admitting the challenges of insecurity, faulted the attempt to read it from the lenses of religious persecution or genocide. Copious interventions were also made by officials to show that Moslems and Christians are equally targeted and killed by terrorists, to fault the imputation of Christian persecution into the killings.

    In spite of these efforts, Trump penultimate weekend, gave official backing to the narrative, claiming “Christianity is facing an existential threat in Nigeria”, even as he held radical Islamists responsible. A few hours later, Trump threatened military action and made good the threat by requesting a war plan from the Department of War. Reports have it that a war plan has already been submitted to him.

    The sequence of Trump’s response to the Nigerian situation must have jolted not a few Nigerians and observers. This could be discerned from the discordant reactions that have since inundated the political space. Not unexpectedly, the implications of threat have been variously interpreted and understood.

    Some saw it as a signal of imminent attack by the US military on Nigerian soil, while others read transactional undertones to the threat. Yet, there were those who were quick to scapegoat on individuals or groups whose activities allegedly aided Trump in reaching his decisions.

    Disingenuous profiling by some commentators of the activities of self-determination groups as the reason for the US action also joined the fray. Suddenly, imprimatur of odious past; where a cartoon in a foreign country considered offensive by religious extremists, was capitalised upon to kill and maim innocent citizens, began to creep in.

    Those who tread this path have a hidden purpose. They thought they were defending the federal government. But beneath this insincere effort, lay the contradictions that brought the country to the current pass. The attempt to pitch one part of the country against others, or hang national misfortunes on the neck of one group or the other has been the greatest undoing of this country. And it will continue to be so unless its enablers are reigned in.

    Such insincere efforts lay barefaced, the fault-lines of our federal order. Ironically, you find in this tendency, the oxygen that sustains citizen’s inability to form consensus on issues of our national being which situations like this demand.

    Even then, issues relating to killings in the country either of Christians or Moslems by terrorists and religious extremists are not hidden. The media space is awash with presentations (documentary or otherwise) from the clergy on their encounters in the senseless killings.

    At any rate, it will be patently mischievous on the part of anybody to live in the deceit that the US State Department has no knowledge of the complexities of the metastasizing insecurity in the country. Not with the prior designation of the country as CPC by the same Trump during his first tenure.

    Not with the sale and delivery to Nigeria of Tucano fighter jets by the US during the last administration to aid the fight against terrorism. The Nigerian pilots that manned those Tucano jets were trained by the US government at Moody Air Force base, Georgia in the US.

    The US works with Nigerian intelligence agencies and the military to enhance intelligence sharing and develop strategies for counter-terrorism. It is inconceivable that the same government could be naïve of the complexities posed by insecurity in the country.

    The situation does not call for scapegoating. Neither is it a time to point accusing fingers on imaginary enemies, political foes. Toeing such lines will end up activating the dialectics that brought about the current pass.

    The situation calls for realism and diplomacy. These cannot be achieved by pushing forward the hackneyed argument that terrorists kill Moslems and Christians as if human life has become a common, easily dispensable commodity. It should offend public sensibilities that citizens are killed in those numbers without any end in sight. There is everything wrong in the seeming justification of the killings on the ground that Moslems and Christians are killed.

    Beyond this, Trump’s threat should reawaken our collective consciousness to the existential danger terrorism is. He has issues with the continuing terrorism in the country and the inability of government’s efforts to stem the tide. He may not put boots on the ground, though it is difficult to predict him. He may not even attack the terrorists without the cooperation of our military given the difficulty associated with asymmetric warfare. If the target is to conclusively defeat the terrorists, it will take careful planning and execution in conjunction with the Nigerian military.

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    So, the value of threat lies more in focussing world attention to the recurring killings in the country by religious fundamentalists pursuing some weird ideology. It is a call on the Nigerian authorities to take drastic measures to eliminate terrorism from our shores. It is a campaign for the dignity of the human life.

    President Tinubu was on this path when in his reaction, he said the characterisation of the country as religiously intolerant does not reflect our national reality nor does it take into account the consistent and sincere efforts of the government to safeguard freedom of religious beliefs of all Nigerians. He has further promised to eliminate terrorism. That is the direction.

    It must be noted however, that the driving force of the terrorists and their profile is a major issue in the way they are perceived both by the international community and our nationals. In a recent discussion in Al-Jazeera featuring two Nigerians and one foreigner on trump’s threat, the Nigerian participants strove strenuously to counter the narrative of Christian persecution and genocide. As usual, they pointed at the killing of Christians and Moslems to counter such label.

    When asked the drivers of the killings, they fingered religious extremism and developmental issues. They spoke of Boko Haram, Islamic State of West Africa Province, bandits and killer herdsmen.

    Some of these terrorist groups have as their mission, the institution of a theocratic state in the country. They want sharia laws to be the ground norm in a secular state. So, their objectives and targets are not hidden. The fact that there is no official policy in support of their weird doctrinaire does not in any way, diminish their agenda.

    If they have their way, they will enforce their goal on other religious adherents. That they equally kill Moslems who do not share their ideology, does not remove anything from their agenda. That should constrict the potency of the argument about killing Christians and Moslems as guise for playing down the consuming danger.

  • Drug parties?

    Drug parties?

    A new trend in the use and abuse of illicit drugs appears to be creeping into Nigeria’s list of social vices. Nothing bears out this foreboding development than last week’s warning by the National Drug Law Enforcement Agency (NDLEA) to club operators and fun seekers against organising and attending ‘drug parties’.

    NDLEA’s warning followed its raiding of a night club in Akin Adesola Street, Lagos penultimate weekend and subsequent arrest of over 100 attendees including the club owner and his manager for organising and attending a drug party.

    The raid was sequel to intelligence which revealed that the organisers had circulated flyers, inviting people to what they called a ‘drug party’. The agency said in a statement that its “undercover agents had infiltrated the night club, made pre-purchases of illicit drugs and monitored activities for four hours before storming the premises between 11pm on Saturday and 3am on Sunday”.

    During the raid, 384,886 kilograms of Canadian Loud, a potent strain of cannabis and other illicit substances were allegedly recovered from the club’s store. The agency has filed a suit against the alleged promoters to secure forfeiture of the property in which the drug party was held.

    NDLEA did not disclose the names of other illicit substances recovered during the raid apart from Canadian Loud. But the term ‘Loud’ is a slang for high-quality cannabis that may have derived its name from the legalisation of recreational marijuana by the Canadian government in 2018.

    It would have made more sense had the agency named the other confiscated illicit substances. That would have given a clearer picture on why the event was advertised as a drug party. But we are only contending with marijuana- an illicit substance that is hawked freely around motor parks and drinking joints around urban centres. Could marijuana have been the only attraction to the advertised drug party?

     This gap notwithstanding, the development is very worrisome as it seems to have added a new dimension to the war against illicit drugs. It is perhaps, the first time the attention of Nigerians is being drawn to advertisements and invitation to a party for the sole purpose of consuming illicit drugs. It sounds somehow confusing.

    NDLEA alleged it reached its conclusion that the club hosted a drug party through flyers circulated by its organisers. That is their evidence. Though one is not privy to the flyers to draw independent conclusions on its contents, the open purchase of drugs within the club’s premises and seizure of 384,886 kilograms of Canadian Loud and other illicit substances from the club’s store appear as corroborative evidence.

    The agency is not taking the matter lightly. It considers the incident a test case because of its domino effect. “We will not allow a culture of impunity such as this to evolve in Nigeria. If you allow one, give it two or three weeks and every night club in the country will invite people to come and have a drug party. We will not allow it”, Buba Marwa, chairman/chief executive of the agency said.

    His warning to club owners, hoteliers and facility managers that their buildings risk being seized if they are used for drug-related activities underscores the determination of the agency to nip the emerging trend in the bud. The agency is right to be apprehensive of the fast spread of such acts of impunity if stern measures are not taken to punish offenders. The nation’s experience with other social vices including the festering insecurity has shown how tardiness could aid their quick spread.

    There is little doubt that much of the consumption of hard drugs takes place in and around entertainment centres, hotels and motor parks. The usual practice is for some agents to lurk around these venues either on their own or in connivance with their owners to sell the substances to willing buyers.

    It is usually a secret affair only open to those initiated to the act. It must have therefore struck Nigerians as a huge shock that flyers inviting people to come and consume illicit substances could be brazenly circulated in the public space. That is a new high in the abuse, spread and consumption of illicit substances.

    But it also says something about the efficacy of the campaigns by the NDLEA against the circulation, sale and consumption of hard drugs. It is either the organisers of the drug party were ignorant of the implications of the contents of the flyers or they thought they could get away with their act of indiscretion. Whichever way, the advertisement was a very reckless endeavour.

    Before now, Nigeria used to be a transit route for illegal drugs’ exportation. For the years our borders served as transit routes for hard drugs, many of our citizens had little idea of what such banned substances looked like. Neither did they indulge in their consumption.

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    But all that changed with time. Consumption, sale and patronage of illicit drugs are now commonplace within our shores. Nigeria’s most recently widely cited national drug consumption prevalence rate was put at 14.4 per cent among a population aged between 15 and 64 years. This figure which represents approximately 14.3 million people came from two major national surveys conducted by the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crimes (UNODC) and the National Bureau of statistics (NBS).

    It is nearly three times the global average of 5.5 per cent. The figure speaks eloquently of the alarming progression of the country from transit camp to consumption home. Not only are Nigerians involved in the export and sale of illicit drugs, they are also reported to be into their cultivation and production.

    It is not surprising that the country is now posting consumption rates nearly three times the world average. That should be a big source of concern. And for a country that houses the poorest of the poor in spite its huge natural endowments, this figure is bound to grow further unless serious measures are taken to stem the tide. It is not just enough to mount campaigns against illicit drug consumption without addressing the factors that predispose our citizens to it.

     The link between abject poverty, high level of unemployment and the consumption of hard and illicit drug substances has long been established. World Bank’s October 2025 report showed that approximately 139 million Nigerians live in poverty, representing about 62 per cent of the population. NBS had also reported in 2022 that 63 per cent of the population or 133 million Nigerians were multi-dimensionally poor.

    Even then, the alarming number of arrests and seizure of huge quantities of illicit substances by the NDLEA only reinforce how widespread the abuse has become.  In the last 30 months, the agency made 45,853 arrests, seized 8.5 million kilograms of assorted illicit drugs, secured 9,263 convictions and rehabilitated 26,613 drug users. The data is scary. But it illustrates most clearly the daunting nature of the war against illicit drugs.

    It requires concerted action not only in arresting and punishing offenders but addressing the objective conditions that predispose a preponderance of our citizens to their use.

  • Leaked DSS terror alert

    Leaked DSS terror alert

    What interest was the leaking of the security alert on the planned terror attack by Islamic State of West African Province (ISWAP) on Ondo and Kogi states meant to serve? And who was responsible for the leak?

    These are the puzzles raised by the circulation of a memo from the Department of State Services (DSS) to the 32 Artillery Brigade of the Nigerian Army, Akure, Ondo State on the planned terror attacks on the two states.

    In that memo, the DSS alerted the army in Ondo State of credible intelligence confirming plans by ISWAP to launch coordinated attacks on several communities. The agency specifically listed Eriti Akoko and Oyin Akoko in the Akoko North-West Local Government Area as well as Owo town in the Owo Local Government Area as possible targets.

    The terrorists were said to have already commenced surveillance on soft targets in the affected areas. “Intelligence confirmed plans by members of ISWAP to carry out coordinated attacks on communities in Ondo and Kogi states anytime soon. The level of security alert across the identified communities should be immediately scaled up to prevent loss of lives and property”, the memo stated.

    The leaked alert came at a time the authorities have been fighting strenuously, to correct reports in the international media of alleged genocide against Christians. This reality instructs that the leak should not be allowed to escape public scrutiny. Not with the current altercations between the special adviser to the president on Media and Policy Communication, Daniel Bwala and the Christian Association of Nigeria (CAN). Both incidents share common link in view of their capacities to resurrect heated discussions on interfaith relations in the country.

     So, what interest was the leak meant to serve: reinforce such claims given the agenda of ISWAP or underscore the pro-activeness of the security agencies to nip such potential treats in the bud?

     Whichever prism the matter is viewed, the development is bound to evoke sad feelings of the heinous crimes of the terrorists while pursuing their weird agenda. Such feelings will do no good to current efforts to correct narratives in the foreign media on alleged Christian persecution in the country. ISWAP as a brand name is bound to reinforce such claims.

    Though the insurgent group had in 2022 attacked St Francis Catholic Church, Owo in Ondo State leaving in its trail the death of 40 worshippers and injuring many others, that was perhaps, the first time it was extending its attacks to the southern part of the country. With the said credible intelligence unveiling their plans to attack Ondo and Kogi states which shares borders with about 10 other states, the fear is that the terrorist group may be spreading to other states in the south.

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    That is the foreboding signal from the exposed DSS memo. It depicts ISWAP as unrelenting in pursuing its weird ideology despite the efforts of the security agencies to contain their menace. The report is said to be based on actionable intelligence. Good! What was required in the circumstance was for the relevant security agencies including the DSS to have moved into quick action and apprehend the masterminds of the plan. That is the standard expectation in such sensitive security threats.

    But nothing of such is of public knowledge. Neither does the evidence in the public space give an inkling of that given the speed with which the leaked memo hit the pubic space with little time for the military to act. The memo was dated October 20 but barely two days after, it had already made media headlines. So, what time did the army have to act before the alert was leaked?

    Or was the memo deliberately leaked by to procure public confidence in the capacities of our security agencies to rise to the challenges posed by ISWAP? That objective is better served by the apprehension and possible public parading of those identified with the surveillance on soft targets. It takes humans to identify soft targets and mount surveillance on them. It also takes humans to detect those behind them.  Why no arrests were made is behind the suspicion that there may be more to the leak than ordinarily meets the eyes.

    Ironically, the leak only succeeded in creating panic among the public as evidenced by the confidence building meetings by the Ondo State Police Command and assurances from the governments of Ondo and Kogi states.

    Apparently worried by the impact of the leaked memo on its citizens, the Kogi State government had sought to rationalise the report “as a step towards victory noting that it demonstrates the proactive work of the DSS and other sister agencies in protecting Nigerians from criminal elements”. 

    Ondo State government said it is part of routine intelligence report shared regularly among security agencies and the government to identify and prevent potential threats. It touched on the propriety of the leak when it assured citizens that the report was already being acted upon by the relevant security agencies with adequate measures to ensure public safety and security in the state.

    The statements from Ondo and Kogi State governments contain obvious rationalizations for the leaked memo. The one commended it as evidence of the pro-activeness of the security agencies in identifying and eliminating potential threats. While the other said the memo was already being acted upon with adequate measures for safety and security taken.

    My reading of these interventions is that the memo may have been deliberately leaked to show that the security agencies are doing their work efficiently. That could as well be. But the leakage without evidence of arrested masterminds diminishes the credibility of the narrative.

    Even then, its timing is wrong. Coming at a time the government is contending with allegations of Christian persecution from the international community, the alert will only resurrect such feelings and throw spanners in the wheels of those efforts. That is perhaps, the dimension those who see the leaked memo as evidence of the pro-activeness of the security agencies may not have considered. The weight of this dimension diminishes whatever credit the security agencies may seek to take of the exposed plot.

    The overall interest of the country would have been better served had the memo been kept out of public view. But in seemingly seeking to take glory, we have succeeded in creating panic by drawing attention to the unrelenting weird desire by ISWAP to spread its terror agenda on the rest of the society.

    This also bears correlation with the avoidable altercation between Bwala and CAN on his interpretation of the outcome of their discussions when he visited their secretariat to get their view on alleged persecution and genocide against Christians in the country.  Things turned sour when CAN issued a statement describing the Presidency’s version of the meeting which gave the impression that the association dismissed claims of Christian genocide in Nigeria, as “completely untrue and unfair”.

    The clarification by CAN did not help whatever advantage Bwala sought to take of that visit. If that visit never held, CAN may have opted to maintain its silence and allow the authorities sort themselves out. Bwala’s apparent overzealousness dragged them into the fray with unpalatable outcomes.

  • Between Gumi and Sowore

    Between Gumi and Sowore

    Two separate events penultimate week, drew attention to the responses of Nigerian authorities to the festering multi-dimensional insecurity in the country. The first was the peace agreement brokered by the United States of America (USA) which ushered in a ceasefire and release of hostages in the two-year old war between Israel and Hamas.

    Though Nigeria had no role in the agreement leading to the cessation of hostilities, albeit temporarily, Islamic scholar, Sheikh Ahmad Gumi saw parallels between that event and possible solutions to the unabating banditry in the country. In a Facebook post, he had said, “Peace between Israel and Hamas they term as terrorist brokered by USA. Who said there is no peace with terrorists? Make peace with bandits and let us have peace”.

    The reading of that comparison is that, if Israel can enter into a peace accord with a known terrorist organisation like the Hamas, there is no reason the Nigerian authorities cannot work out a peace plan with the bandits and restore order in the country. There is some sense in it.

    It is also suggestive of Gumi’s frustrations with the current military campaign against banditry. He did not disclose the shape of the peace proposal. But the fiery Islamic scholar is known to have at different times called for amnesty for the bandits to lay down their arms.

    Engaging in peaceful negotiations with the bandits would seem plausible especially if issues to the conflict are clearly known. But do the bandits have issues to resolve with the Nigerian state? If yes, what are those issues? I shall return to it.

    The second is the proposed peaceful protest march to Aso Rock Villa on October 20, by activist and publisher of Sahara Reporters, Omoyele Sowore for the unconditional release of Nnamdi Kanu, leader of the proscribed Indigenous People of Biafra (IPOB).

    Though Sowore had some weeks back, made public his intention to galvanise support for the campaign, he has been visibly mobilising for the protest march. Available reports indicate that he has been securing the buy-in of some notable Nigerians including students’ bodies against the continued incarceration of Kanu in the past four years.

    In a viral video in which he appeared with the special counsel to Kanu, Aloy Ejimakor, among other activists, Sowore was seen querying the rationale for Kanu’s continued detention in the face of the clemency granted some categories of convicts among the 172 Nigerians pardoned for various offences. He is contending that if the heinous crimes committed by some of the convicts could be pardoned under the president’s prerogative of mercy, there does not seem further justification for Kanu not to benefit from such reprieve.

    There is a convergence of views between Gumi and Sowore on the path to resolving the insecurity in the country. Gumi believes bandits could still be engaged to lay down their arms and embrace peace despite being termed a terrorist organisation. This to him promises a better approach to ending the scourge of banditry that has left sorrow and awe in parts of the northwest.

    Gumi may have been led to this position by his knowledge of the bandits, given that a few years ago, he visited their camps in Zamfara forests where he interfaced with some of their leaders. Some of the bandits’ leaders who spoke during that visit cited cattle rustling, attacks by the military and being beaten up by the indigenous people of the state while on the road as their grievances.

    Then also, Gumi had called on the federal government to grant amnesty to enable them lay down their arms and embrace peace. But that did not happen apparently because of the difficulty in deciphering their proper grouse with the government, except the military attacks to contain their menace.

    But banditry has since metastasized with the government unable to contain the monster. This has compelled communities in some of the affected states to enter into some form of peace accords with the bandits for peace to reign. The most recent was the accord in the Subuwa Local Government Area of Katsina State in which traditional rulers and communities engaged directly with some of the bandits to foster dialogue and peace. Before now, a traditional ruler in one of the states was suspended but later reinstated for entering into similar peace accord with the bandits to allow local farmers access to their farms. Nobody can give a vivid account of the efficacy of such ad hoc peace agreements.

    But their lure inexorably highlights the helplessness of the local people in the hands of the bandits. And in existential challenges like this, it is difficult to fault those entering into such agreements in the face of the inability of the governments to maintain law and order in the affected communities. When Gumi canvassed amnesty or peace accord with the bandits, he may have been guided by this reality.

    The case of the IPOB and Kanu is more straightforward in the sense that the leadership is identifiable and their cause known as well. But the grouse Sowore and all those rooting for the IPOB leaders’ release have is with his continued incarceration for over four year without conviction by the courts. Sowore argues that with some of the names that benefitted from presidential clemency, it has become difficult to find justification for Kanu’s continued detention.

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    Expectedly, issues have been raised from government quarters regarding the propriety of such demands with the current court case in which Kanu is standing trial for alleged terrorism. Some other private individuals have even gone to the length of holding Kanu allegedly responsible for the killings in the southeast following the insecurity that trailed the self-determination agitations. They would want the courts to sort out his case before the issue of pardon could arise. They are all entitled to their views.

    But such antagonistic views fail to state how his conviction and possible jail will resolve the insecurity in the region, especially when weighed against the non-kinetic strategies of the same government to Boko Haram insurgency. Kanu has been in the custody of the DSS for over four years now and arraigned in various courts without being convicted.

    There is nothing preventing the committee on the prerogative of mercy from recommending his release among the 172 persons granted presidential clemency. There is also nothing preventing the president releasing him in the overall national interest if he decides to do so. If four years of detention and trials could to resolve the insecurity in the southeast, it remains to be conjectured what a jail term can do.

    Besides, the demand for a political solution to the Kanu saga is not new. Nearly everybody that matters in the southeast had at various times lent their unequivocal voices for the release of Kanu to deny oxygen to the band of criminals hiding under IPOB to commit crimes.

    The Ohanaeze Ndigbo sent delegations to the immediate past president to give guarantees for his freedom. But the most touching was the delegation led by first republic minister and elder statesman, Mbazulike Amechi, to late President Buhari on the eve of his 94th birthday in 2022 pleading for the release of Kanu to him as a birthday gift.

    There is nothing wrong in Kanu benefitting from the presidential clemency as part of the solutions to the insecurity in the southeast. The parallels drawn by Gumi and Sowore should not be wished away. Not with subsisting challenges in containing the nation’s insecurity.

  • Jonathan: Buhari won Boko Haram ‘technically’

    Jonathan: Buhari won Boko Haram ‘technically’

    Was former president, Goodluck Jonathan wrong to expect his successor, late Muhammadu Buhari to have defeated Boko Haram insurgency soon after assuming office? That is the question brought to the fore by Jonathan’s reservations last week, on Buhari’s inability to expeditiously bring the war to an end, despite being once named by the insurgent group as their negotiator.

    This question still needs answers irrespective of the clarification by Jonathan that his statement should not be misconstrued as an indictment on Buhari or suggestive of his complicity in the Boko Haram saga. Perhaps, interrogating the observation, may well get the country closer to comprehending the complexities posed by the festering Boko Haram challenge.

     Jonathan had during a book launch in Abuja said, “One of the committees we set up then, the Boko Haram nominated Buhari to lead their team to negotiate with the government. 

    “So, I was feeling that, oh, if they nominated Buhari to represent them and have a discussion with the government committee, then when Buhari took over, it could have been an easier way to negotiate with them and they would have handed over their guns. But it is still there till today”.

    The statement quickly drew the ire of Buhari’s former spokesman, Garba Shehu.  He described it as misleading since neither Boko Haram’s founding leader, Muhammed Yusuf, nor his successor, Abubakar Shekau, ever nominated Buhari for mediation. Shehu claimed that Shekau consistently denounced and threatened Buhari while recalling that Buhari escaped a Boko Haram bomb attack in Kaduna in 2014.

    Shehu however, claimed confusion over the nomination of Buhari arose after a Boko Haram faction, allegedly sponsored by his (Buhari’s) political opponents staged a press conference in Maiduguri, through one Abu Mohammed Ibn Abdulaziz claiming that the sect preferred Buhari and other northern elders.

    Even then, he said Buhari dismissed the report at the time as “just speculation” since nobody had contacted him directly.

    All that Shehu strove to prove is that Buhari was not nominated by the known leaders of the Boko Haram insurgency. But he admitted there was a nomination by Ibn Abdulaziz, a factional leader of the insurgency group who he claimed was a political agent. Shehu also sought to establish that Buhari has no known links with Boko Haram as they demonised and even attacked him in Kaduna. All that could as well be.

    Does Jonathan’s observation collapse just because Buhari’s nomination was not made by either Mohammed or Shekau presented by Shehu as the known leaders of the insurgent group? Or, how correct is it to presume that the nomination by Ibn Abdulaziz did not exist coming from the quarters it did, especially since the insurgency group demonised and attacked Buhari?

    Shehu’s answers to the two questions will likely be in the affirmative. In order words, having seemingly faulted the premise on which Jonathan based his expectation of Buhari to have won the war soon after assuming office, his statement should be seen as lacking in merit. That would however, amount to an oversimplification of the larger issues thrown up by Jonathan.

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    If Jonathan was wrong to expect Buhari to have won Boko Haram based on the factional leader that made the nomination and Buhari’s rejection of the same, what do we make of copious evidence where Buhari made claims of his uncommon capacities to tame the insurgency group?  Did Buhari leave anyone in doubt that he had the capacity to handle the raging insurgency in the country better? At any rate, was the fight against insecurity not one of the cardinal campaign programmes with which he sought the votes of the electorate?

    Buhari unarguably, was one of the greatest critics of the handling of the Boko Haram insurgency by the Jonathan administration. He not only accused Jonathan of “looking the other way” when the Chibok girls were abducted but was reported to have said in 2013 that the “military offensive against Boko Haram is anti-north”. Many northern leaders had at the budding stages of the insurgency faulted it and read political motives into it. Elite dissonance was one of the key reasons Boko Haram got entrenched.

    During his famous speech at Chatham House London, Buhari did not leave his audience in doubt that he had solutions to the Boko Haram insurgency. He did not only fault the prosecution of the war but promised to lead the war from the front.

    Hear him, “We will always act on time and not allow problems to irresponsibly fester, and I Muhammadu Buhari, will always lead from the front and return Nigeria to its leadership role in regional and international efforts to combat terrorism”.

    He also promised to pay special attention to the welfare of soldiers in and out of service: “we will give them adequate and modern arms and ammunitions to work with… to choke Boko Haram’s financial and equipment channels, we will be tough on terrorism and tough on its root causes”. Buhari received thunderous ovation from his audience for speaking so confidently on his plans to eliminate Boko Haram.

    Buhari was also reported to have assigned himself a timeline of six months to win the war against the insurgents after he won the 2015 general election.

    It is therefore not in doubt that Buhari’s statements and body language gave the impression that he had all it takes to tame the Boko Haram monster. So, Jonathan’s expectation of him to have won the war against insurgency soon after assuming office is based on solid foundation. In that also, he is with many.

    Irrespective of the quarters from which the mediation nomination came, Buhari left nobody in doubt that he had the magic wand to win the war against Boko Haram. Many believed him and he owes his electoral victory largely to that expectation. His profile as an Army General and former military head of state counted as added advantages.

    Jonathan may not have gone this length, but the issues were obviously at the back of his mind when he spoke the way he did at the book launch. It serves no useful purpose misconstruing his statement as suggestive of Buhari’s link with Boko Haram. Buhari made such claims and there is nothing wrong holding him accountable to his words.

     Buhari was conscious of the promises he made on the matter. It was in apparent bid to fulfil them, that he gleefully declared in December 2015, barely six months after assuming office that “Nigeria has technically won the war” against Islamist Boko Haram insurgents. He had predicated his claims on the grounds that the militant group could no longer mount “conventional attacks” against security forces or population centres.

    For him, Boko Haram had been reduced to fighting with Improvised Explosive Devices (IEDs) and remained a force only in its heartland of Borno State. His claims were seen as hasty and received with mixed feelings by those versed in asymmetrical warfare.

    But all these claims were soon to collapse like a pack of cards. The insurgents quickly to put a lie to them as they resumed onslaughts against military formations and population centres. These took enormous toll on the military both in human and material capital despite efforts to contain the insurgents.

    It is an irony of sorts that Buhari failed to win the war against the Boko Haram insurgency until he left office. What has rather been witnessed has been the emergence of more splinter groups with some attacking population centres in parts of the country they were not able to access when Jonathan held sway.

    Just a few weeks ago, Borno State governor, Babagana Zulum raised an alarm on the regrouping of the insurgents around the Tumbus areas of Lake Chad and Mandara Hills within the Sambisa Forest in the state. This is in addition to several attacks, killings and abductions by the insurgent group.

    But the more troubling arising from the book launch, is the seeming lack of clarity among leaders on what Boko Haram really stands for, its sponsors and the best strategy to eradicate the scourge.

    Jonathan believes the issue of Boko Haram is far more complex than it is often presented. He sees their motivation beyond the hunger-narrative even as he fingered external sponsorship given their sophistication in arms and ammunitions.

    The Chief of Defence Staff, Christopher Musa wants the underlying factors that incubate insecurity; poverty, lack of education and unemployment to be addressed. For former president, Olusegun Obasanjo, the country must ask itself hard questions about how it has handled the crisis over the past 15 years. If by now there is no consensus on some of these issues, is it surprising Boko Haram appears to be defying solutions?

  • Idris and foreign media claims

    Idris and foreign media claims

    Minister of Information and National Orientation, Mohammed Idris took time out last week to interrogate characterisations in sections of the foreign media of religion-induced attacks and violence in the country. He was piqued by claims from some international platforms and online commentators that terrorists in Nigeria were carrying out a systematic genocide against Christians.

    Though he named neither the offending social media platforms nor the commentators, the minister considered their claims so grave that he had to issue a statement to correct the wrong impressions created.

    “The federal government strongly condemns and categorically refutes recent allegations by certain international platforms and online influencers suggesting that terrorists operating in Nigeria are engaged in a systematic genocide against Christians. Such claims are false, baseless, despicable, and divisive”, he said.

    He sees as misrepresentation of reality, the portrayal of Nigeria’s security challenges as a targeted campaign against a single religious group and that though Nigeria is faced with security challenges, couching the situation as a deliberate, systematic attack on Christians is inaccurate and harmful. He is largely right.

    The minister’s position seems to find further support in subsisting incidences of such attacks across the country. So, when he said the criminals target all who reject their murderous ideology regardless of faith, he is backed by facts.

    But that is not all there is to the matter. Yes, the criminals target all those who reject their ‘murderous ideology’ without regard to faith. They attack Muslims who do not identify with their own brand of teaching. They also attack Christians because they belong to a different religious fate. If other people who do not belong to any of these two religions are attacked, they were caught in the course of the onslaught on the two dominant religious groups. But what is this murderous ideology? And who are its purveyors in our circumstance?

     Answers to these posers may chart the part to the misinterpretation and mischaracterisation of the security challenges in the country by the foreign media.  And they may well be located in the way religion-induced violence and attacks on worship places budded and escalated in the last couple of years.

    The first bomb attack on worship places surfaced around 2011 when the Boko Haram insurgents attacked St Theresa’s Catholic Church, Madalla near Abuja on a Christmas day leaving in its trail deaths, sorrow and awe. More than 30 worshippers were killed, many others injured and properties of inestimable value destroyed.

    This was followed very closely by bomb blasts at the Mountain of Fire and Miracles Church Jos, Plateau State and another at a Church in Gadaka, Yobe State. Those attacks were received with mixed feelings given their targets. But Boko Haram was later to begin attacks on Mosques following mounting suspicions on its motive.

    The situation became complex when the so-called bandits whose motivation has not proved different from that of Boko Haram joined the fray. In the last two months or so, bandits are known to have mounted attacks on Mosques in the northern parts of the country bringing in their wake the death of innocent Muslim worshippers.

    Bandits struck in August this year, during prayer time at Anguwar Montau Mosque in the Malumfashi Local Government Area of Katsina State. At least 32 worshippers were killed in reprisal for the killing of their commanders by villagers the previous weekend. Malumfashi youths were so aggrieved by the attack that they took to protests blocking the Malumfashi-Funtua highway.

    A couple of days ago, armed bandits stormed a Mosque in Yandoto community, Tsafe Local Government Area of Zamfara State killed at least five people and abducted several others. The attack came less than a week after gunmen abducted worshippers during morning prayers at a mosque in Gidan Turbe village also in Tsafe LGA of the same state.

    Before this time, a bomb attack and mass shooting during mass service at St, Francis Catholic church, Owo, Ondo State had left more than 50 people killed. The Nigerian security agencies then fingered ISWAP for the dastardly killings. Four of the masterminds have since been arrested and are facing prosecution.

    Yet, herdsmen attacked St Paul’s Catholic Church, Aye-Twar, Katsina Ala, Benue State last August. Chairman of the Nigerian Catholic Diocesan Priests Association (NCDPA) Katsina Ala, Rev. Fr. Samuel Fila gave a disturbing account of the attack. According to him, “the attack has finally shut down all pastoral activities since all the 26 outstations have been occupied by herdsmen long before now.

    The malevolent attach left in its wake the desecration and destruction of the parish church, destruction of the parish secretariat, the burning to ashes of the Father’s House, destruction of household items, pastoral logistic vehicles in addition to many other items” the NCDPA chairman recounted.

    All these seem to reinforce Idris’ argument that the terrorists operating in the country attacks Muslim and Christian places of worship and therefore puts a lie to the narrative of a systematic genocide against Christians. What could have then, led the foreign media outfits and commentators to their conclusion? Could it be a deliberate voyage on mischief or the general biases and ignorance that sometimes blur western media perception of events in Africa and the less developed nations?

    Even as the motivations of western media platforms remain a matter of conjecture, it would appear they were deceived by the profile of the terrorists. Who are these terrorists operating in Nigeria and what is their mission?

    Top on the list is the Boko Haram insurgents. They are opposed to western education and propelled by the weird desire to institute an Islamic state. Islamic State for West Africa Province ISWAP is another. It broke away from Islamic State    (IS) another radical religious group linked to Al-Qaida. Its name gives out its doctrinaire.

    There are also the bandits whose motivations are yet to be clearly decoded. At one time, they share the same characteristics with the killer herdsmen. And at another, it is difficult to draw a line between them and the Boko Haram insurgents or other terrorist groups masquerading around. They are largely responsible for the attacks in Katsina and Zamfara among other states in the north.

    Attacks on worship places also come from the insurgency of the herdsmen ranked by Global Terrorism Index as the fourth most deadly terrorist group in the world. The case of Katsina Ala is just a tip of the iceberg of such attacks and despoliations. Of course, there are other less effective ones like the Lukarawa. The proliferation of these terror groups propelled by strange religious ideological leanings could obviously send wrong signals.

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    There are other forms criminalities in and around the country. But their purveyors are not engaged in mounting attacks on places of religious worship.  So, it is not unlikely that the profile of these insurgents, doctrines and their preoccupation with attacks on places of worship may have influenced the foreign media platforms.

    They may not have captured the real situation on ground. But the fact that such attacks could lend themselves to misinterpretation outside our shores, illustrates most poignantly the danger in the activities of insurgency groups propagating religious beliefs that run at cross purposes with the secularity of the country. That is the issue to contend with.

    Admittedly, the government has been waging a relentless war against the insurgency of these extremists. In recent times, arrests of key leaders of the insurgent groups have been made. There are also copious reports of their being neutralised in huge numbers by the security agencies.

    But the resurgence of the attacks as the tempo of the 2027 general elections draw nearer raises suspicions of political colouration. Data collected by the Armed Conflict Location and Event Data Project shows there have been 43 separate attacks on Church premises this year.

    This should instruct a re-assessment of the current strategy in prosecuting the war against terrorism to secure total defeat. As long as the terror groups pursue their weird religious doctrines, so long will their motivations lend themselves to misinterpretation.

  • Gombe’s out-of-school children

    Gombe’s out-of-school children

    Though eighth in the list of states in the country with the highest number of out-of-school children, Gombe State government appears sufficiently worried by its standing. This is evident from the measures it is undertaking to reverse the sliding trend.

    Kebbi, Sokoto and Yobe states respectively top the list of states with the highest number of out-of-school children while Imo and Anambra states occupy the 36th and 37th positions according to data provided by the Cable Index. The Federal Capital Territory, Abuja was counted as one of the states and listed in the24th position.

    Apparently dissatisfied with its ranking, Gombe State government last week inaugurated an elaborate School Enrolment Campaign for the 2025/2026 session with a threat to prosecute parents and guardians who fail to send their children to school.  The state government drew attention to Section 19(2) of the State Universal Basic Education Board (SUBEB) Amendment Law 2021 which prescribes punishment for defaulting parents and urged them to ensure their children or wards attend and complete primary, junior and senior secondary school education.

    “Any parent who contravenes section 19(2) of the law commits an offence and is liable upon conviction, to pay a fine or serve a one-month prison sentence. Subsequent convictions also attract substantial fine or imprisonment for a term of two months”, chairman of the state’s SUBEB, Babaji Babadidi warned.

    He said the state government adopted the measure to ensure that every child has access to quality basic education. That is not all. The state government also invested heavily in the sector, offering free education through which it targets enrolling 400,000 pupils into primary schools this session.

    This will entail supplying the children with free exercise books, school bags and other school materials as incentives for massive enrolment. The target is to give quality education to the children in addition to skills that will make them self-employed.

    If these investments and incentives fail to achieve the desired result, prosecution of defaulting parents and guardians will be the next line of action to ensure compliance.

    It is heart-refreshing Gombe State is so challenged by the rising number of out-of-school children that it decided to confront the scourge head on. Though the state ranked eighth in the scale of out-of-school children, figures furnished by its commissioner for education, Prof. Aishatu Maigari, put the number at over 700,000.

    This no doubt, is staggering given estimates by the United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF) which put the total number of out-of-school children in Nigeria at 18.3 million. This figure confers on Nigeria, the unpleasant tag of harbouring the greatest number of out-of-school children in the world. In practical terms, it translates to one, out of three school children in the country not enrolled in school.

    The northwest and the northeast account for the largest chunk of the figure. It is little surprising that Gombe which harbour over 700,000 of these out-of-school children has taken measures to halt the drift. It did not only develop models to reduce the numbers but state-specific strategies to arrive at the same objective.

    The school enrolment campaigns which coincided with the new school calendar year are meant to sensitise the rural communities and boost the enrolment of children in schools as they resume the current session.  It also enabled them to sensitise and explain government’s investments in the field of education and the need for pupils to take full advantage of them.

    But the government also intends to wield the big stick if parents fail to enrol their children in schools. Though prosecution will throw up its own challenges, the essence is to draw the attention of possible defaulters to its consequences. One striking feature of the state’s-specific strategy by Gombe is the setting of benchmarks and targets on the number of school children it seeks to enrol in the current academic year.

    If the state is able to register 400,000 pupils, then it would have substantially reduced its share of out-of-school children to 300,000. That will be a remarkable feat. If that trend is replicated next session, Gombe should be on the path to eliminating the scourge from the state’s education system. That is barring other extenuating factors that incubate, propel and sustain the phenomenon especially in that part of the country.

    The example by Gombe State is noteworthy. Yet, there is little evidence of other infrastructural investments in technical education that gives some modicum of assurance that products of its 6-3-3-4 education will be able to use their heads and hands to create jobs instead of depending on elusive government employment.

    Free education and such incentives as free exercise books, school bags etc. are essential in addressing the challenge of low school enrolment. But that is not all there is to it. Whereas such incentives will enable the poor to have access to schools, they cannot address the root of the debilitating material conditions and dire privations in which a majority of our people live.

    Tackling out-of-school children challenge cannot make reasonable progress without evolving adequate therapeutic responses to the multi-facetted systemic dysfunctions that propel and sustain the malaise. Poor budget allocations to education at all levels of the government is a serious factor even as the little funds allocated suffer from the large scale corruption that hallmark public offices in this country.

    This reflects in the poor infrastructural facilities that have become the face of our public schools. In many states, children study in ramshackle buildings, some without roofs even as others sit on bare floors for their daily lessons. Such negligence acts as serious disincentive to school enrolment.

    So, governments must upgrade the level of facilities in their schools’ system to make them attractive and conducive for teaching and learning. That also brings in the importance of addressing issues relating to the welfare of teachers and other ancillary staff.

    Child labour, certain cultural and religious practices are other inhibitors which state governments must work to address. But by far, the greatest challenge to a quick reduction in out-of-school children is the multi-facetted insecurity tilting the country to the precipice.

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    This is especially so for the northeast and north-western parts of the country. That is where the Boko Haram insurgency that professes weird religious ideology holds sway. Boko Haram which literally translates to ‘education is evil’ speaks eloquently of the incalculable harm strange religious doctrines could wrought on school enrolment.

    Boko Haram and its splinter insurgent groups had severally demonstrated their strong aversion to western education in serial abduction and ferrying into the thin air of hundreds of school children. Schools in Chibok, Borno State, Kuriga in Kaduna State and Jangebe in Zamfara State were some of the key victims.

    The wider repercussions of these abductions propelled by strong aversion to western education are felt in the high number of out-of-school in those two regions. There are also other regular abductions in rural communities by the so-called bandits whose motivations are yet to prove different from those of the insurgent groups. These have resulted in mass dislocation of families with children of school age at the receiving end.

     Faced with cascading insecurity, many of the states with high out-of-school children have increasingly found it difficult to decisively tackle the monster. That is why the current war against all forms of insecurity in the country must be waged to its conclusive end. It will amount to grand illusion to expect drastic reduction in out-of-school children in states where the insurgent groups campaign against western education, abducting and killing those they find in schools.

    Besides, the various governments must work to reduce the debilitating poverty in the land through huge investments that will guarantee decent life to the greatest number of the citizenry. This will entail husbanding and harnessing the collective wealth which Mother Nature bountifully endowed this country to uplift the citizens from scorching poverty, misery and privation due to mismanagement by self-serving rulers.

     It is not a coincidence that Nigeria which had earned the unenviable rating of the world’s poverty capital, is also home to the highest number of out-of-school children in the world. Does that say something?

  • Niger and allegory of two cities

    Niger and allegory of two cities

    Many must have been taken aback penultimate week, when the news filtered that the Niger State government placed a ban on all forms of religious preaching in the state. The secularity of the country and the prospects of the new regulations infringing on the rights of citizens to freedom of religious worship and expression, resonated as issues of concern.

    Thus, the motive of the government was bound to come under suspicion as the Director General of Niger State Religious Affairs, Umar Farooq, confirmed the ban in addition to the requirement that preachers must obtain licences before they can be allowed to preach in the state.

    “It is true the state government has banned preaching. Any preacher who wants to preach must secure a licence between now and two months”, he said. Farooq further explained that what all prospective preachers are required to do is to visit their office and fill out a form. Thereafter, they will face a panel that will screen them before they are allowed to preach.

    But when the state governor, Mohammed Bago appeared on a television interview last week, he said the measure was not a ban on evangelism but a way of checking inciting messages that could threaten peace and security. Hear him, “I didn’t ban evangelism. For anybody going to sermon on Friday, he should bring his scriptures for review, and it is normal”.

    Bago drew parallels with Saudi Arabia where such rules exist and contended that you cannot say because you have been given the opportunity to be “a cleric, you will go out and preach the gospel that is anti-people and anti-government”.

    What seems to emerge from the above is that the state government did not ban religious preaching in the state. Rather, its new regulations on religion require preachers to get the authorisation of the government before they can preach. In other words, the new regulation vests the right to determine and approve qualified preachers on the shoulders of the state government. That immediately raises questions on the propriety of government officials delving into matters that impinge on the ecclesiastical realm. How qualified are they for the self-assigned role?

    The above question is further reinforced by another strand of the directive which mandates all preachers to submit their sermons for the approval of the government. 

    Ostensibly, the measures are designed to prevent indoctrination and public incitement thereby enhancing the maintenance of law and order. The state government could also seek to justify the directive on the serial exploitation of religion by unscrupulous people to cause trouble. Ours is a country that is not strange to weird religious doctrines and beliefs.

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    In the last couple of years, the country has been embroiled in Boko Haram insurgency with about four affiliate insurgency groups propelled by strange religious doctrines, joining the fray. That should say something about the danger in allowing unfettered access to the public, of inciting religious ideas.

    It is not in doubt that religion has been serially exploited and manipulated by unscrupulous and self-serving persons to foment trouble of unimaginable proportions with dire consequences for co-habitation, peace and progress.

    If that is Bago’s concern in insisting that preachers must be licensed before they can preach in the state, one can understand. But the regulation veered off tangent when it sought to arrogate to government functionaries, the powers to licence preachers and determine sermons good for public consumption through vetting.

    This is as dangerous as it is practically impossible given the multiplicity of such sermons (written and unwritten) that regularly emanate from the numerous religious organisations. It remains to be seen how the government intends to access sermons from the nooks and crannies of the state, some of which are hundreds of kilometres away from the state capital. It presents huge logistic challenges.

     Even if the government drastically prunes down the number of preachers (which is clearly outside its mandate), it will still have to contend with the right to regulate sermons meant for the pulpit in a plural society of diverse religious persuasions.

    The state government gave away its motive when it asserted that the measure will act as a check against anti-people and anti-government sermons. By extrapolation, the government’s goal is to ensure that preachers do not author sermons that criticise its actions and policies. That would rather sound strange. If religious leaders cannot offer constructive criticisms to government’s policies and actions taking advantage of the fundamental freedoms guaranteed by the constitution, then the human society is in big trouble.

    Freedom to criticise government policies and offer direction to the people is different from public incitement. And the churches should have the right to determine that. At any rate, the laws are there to check possible abuse. Niger State government is also flawed when it seeks to capitalise on what it called anti-government sermons to seek to gag preachers.

    Such assessments can be subjective as we have seen in the constant arrest of journalists on the orders of some governors. Clerics have a duty to call the attention of and redirect the government and the society when things are drifting. And they have been doing that.

    Besides, politicians are not immune to religious exploitation to serve their selfish predilections. For in verity, much of the religion-induced crises this country has encountered, were in the main, instigated, sponsored and promoted by politicians in their inordinate ambition to win elections by hook and crook. Politicians are notorious for deploying religion and ethnicity to whip up sentiments when their influences significantly diminish. The cascading insecurity in the country has its roots in the inordinate desires by politicians to achieve their political objectives through devious means.

    It remains to be conjectured how the same politicians can be the new face of credible religious sermons. The new regulation depicts the Niger State government as one afraid of criticisms. That is the uncanny contradiction in assigning the powers to vet religious sermons in the hands of politicians in Niger State or any other part of this country. Politicians cannot be trusted with the role of moral compass on religious matters.  

    Events in Niger State again, elevate to the fore, the distinction by medieval philosophers between the corporeal and the ecclesiastical realms. The measures strike at the heart of the division between the purviews of the state and religion.

    St Thomas Aquinas believes that the state (temporary authority) and the Church (spiritual authority) are distinct but complementary. The state focuses on worldly matters while the church presides over the spiritual realm. For him, the state and the church are distinct governments that should work harmoniously with each respecting the other’s domain.

     Aquinas captured the nature of that relationship when he contended that if a state’s action conflicts with moral law or spiritual wellbeing of its citizens, the church has the right to speak out and provide guidance. That is the red line Niger State is bound to cross as it seeks to prevent clerics from sermons it considers anti-government.

    St Augustine captured the thrust of this division in his allegory of two cities-the city of man and the city of God. He described two cities built on contrasting loves-the earthly city built on love of self to the point of despising God and the city of God built on the love of God to the point of despising self.

    These are not literal cities but spiritual societies with members of the earthly city pursuing temporal power and glory while members of the city of God seeking God’s glory and eternal life. The two philosophers captured all that is required to be said of the relationship that should exist between the state and religion.

    They are two separate spheres of authority guided by different motivations. Though their roles can find complementarity in some instances, they largely exist to pursue and serve different goals. Niger State government is definitely going beyond its boundaries by not only seeking to ‘ordain’ preachers but in vetting and approving their sermons before they can go public.

    Such a policy amounts to combining the powers of the state and religion in the hands of politicians. Bago’s parallels with Saudi Arabia where preachers submit their sermon for vetting every Friday says little given the secularity of Nigeria. His government will also have to contend with Sunday sermons from an assortment of religious denominations.

    Let Niger State government contend with the challenges of the CITY of man and leave the CITY of God in the hands of the religions.

  • The ‘gospel’ by FCT Police

    The ‘gospel’ by FCT Police

    Federal Capital Territory (FCT) police command, is seriously worried that offering its officers bribe or other forms of inducement will compromise their duties, taint the integrity and credibility of that institution. It therefore cautioned the public last week, to desist from such acts as they are not only unlawful but could impede the performance of the responsibilities of the officers.

    “It is unlawful to give our officers money or any form of inducement while they are performing their duty. Let them discharge their responsibilities diligently without interference”, the FCT Police command stated. This is the second time in three months that the police command has come out with this admonition.

    Last June, its Commissioner of Police (CP), Ajao Adewale similarly cautioned residents against offering bribe to police officers as it is a criminal offence under section 118 of the Penal Code Act. He had then warned officers to stop illegal detentions, extortions and unlawful interference in civil disputes particularly land-related cases.

    Re-emphasising that bail is free, he warned that any officer found demanding money for bail or documentation will face severe disciplinary action. Before now, the Inspector General of Police (IGP), Kayode Egbetokun, had also issued copious warnings on police zero-tolerance for extortion, corruption and impunity.

    He ordered the specialised units including the IGP X squad, the monitoring unit and the Complaint Response Unit to intensify their oversight functions in tacking these unethical practices.

    The warnings came amidst mounting complaints by residents of unlawful detention of individuals over bail-able offences, demand for money before commencement of investigations and police involvement in matters clearly outside their jurisdiction.

    The sermon from the FCT police command amplifies the concerns by the IGP. But there is a substantial difference in the approach of the FCT command to the matter.

    It is not just confronting the cankerworm from the angle of police officers who compromise their duties by asking for and receiving bribe or other forms of inducement. No! It recognises that in this fight, there are two sides to the coin-the giver and the receiver. It works from the prism that if there are no givers of bribe, there will be no receivers. That goes without saying.

    The sermon is justifiably propelled by the logic that a comprehensive and realistic fight against corruption cannot make any headway without tackling the two sides in the game. If those who offer bribe refrain from such acts, police officers will not have any choice than to carry out their duties in accordance with the demands of their offices.

    The sermon goes beyond the police institution to touch on the key role of the public in the fight against corruption in public places. It seeks to make the case that, corruption within the police institution and in our national life, will continue to suffer reverses as long as the public continues to aid and abet it.

    That is not to whittle down the overarching pressure rogue police officers could exert in exacerbating the malfeasance. Rather, it is an admission of the efficacy of a two-pronged approach in addressing the harm wrought on the nation’s institutions by suffocating corruption.

    That seems the essence of the gospel by the FCT police command. But the issue is not just about the conduct of FCT residents or police officers in that command. It mirrors the larger moral decay in the society and the constraints it poses in the quest for economic, social and political development.

    Good a thing, the FCT police recognises that for the fight against corruption to gain traction, the attitudinal disposition of the public towards the matter must change. It strikes as a clarion call on the public to resist the temptation to offer bribe even when pressured by some unscrupulous officers.

    It remains to be seen how much impact moral suasion will make on FCT residents on the subject matter. Even if it succeeds in dissuading residents from offering bribe to police officers, that would still amount to scratching the surface of the pervasive corruption that inundate all facets of our public life.

    As valuable as the gospel from the FCT police command is, it cannot go far in addressing the complex issues that have overtime rendered the war against corruption a nagging illusion. This is in spite of proclamations by governments after government to tame the monster.

    Police appeal for public cooperation highlights other potent dimensions to the fight against the scourge. It should re-direct the minds of this country’s leadership to the complexities presented by the current strategies in the fight against the social malaise. The leadership of the police has been issuing constant warnings to officers on what awaits those caught receiving bribe and other forms of gratification.

    How far such preachments can go in bringing about rapid attitudinal change in a society characterised by weak institutions and processes is anybody’s guess. Weak institutions create an environment where corruption thrives due to lack of accountability, transparency and effective enforcement mechanisms. That is the dilemma in Nigeria’s situation and the reason the fight against corruption has not recorded reasonable progress.

    The National Bureau of Statistics (NBS) and the United Nation’s Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC) in a report published in August 2017 rated police officers and judges as the most corrupt in Nigeria. The report was based on a survey conducted in April and May, 2016 across 36 states and the FCT.

    Though the police authorities cited empirical and survey instrument defects as well as inability of the report to factor in their achievements during the period to fault the survey, that rating does not appear to have significantly altered.

    In May last year, an Inspector attached to the Imo State police command was demoted after he was caught on camera collecting bribe from motorists on the Owerri-Onitsha expressway. That is just a tip of the iceberg in the mindless extortions that take place at various police formations and checkpoints across the country.

    And in April this year, some police officers were caught on viral video receiving money from a Chinese national. It was such a huge national embarrassment. Police authorities described the incident as “unprofessional and unethical”, with a promise to discipline those involved.

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    The FCT police command must have been so frustrated in fighting corruption given extant realities that it had to resort to sermonizing to arouse the consciousness and seek the cooperation of the public. They have good reasons for it.

    So, it is not just all about placing the blame at the doorstep of police officers. The public also shares in it. They are culpable when they show scant regard for law and order. And when they run against the law in many civil matters, they seek quick escape by compromising the law enforcement agents.

    But that cannot explain the mindless open extortions by unscrupulous police officers across the country. Neither can it rationalise the demands for money for bail or touted documentation processes. Pervasive corruption bears positive correlation with the material conditions of a people. Especially so, where national wealth is not deployed for public good but rather appropriated by a self-serving, privileged few.

    Fighting corruption is a huge national challenge. It is not just a matter for police authorities alone. Corruption trickles down from the leadership at the highest levels to the grassroots. Corruption is officially instituted when elections are rigged by hook and crook; it manifests in vote buying and sundry electoral infractions that subvert the collective will of the electorate. It demands drastic and holistic national therapy.

    Corruption is at the root of the inability of this country to record meaningful progress in economic, social and political spheres. Empirical evidence has consistently shown that the higher the level of corruption, the lower the level of economic growth and development and the vice versa. That is the stark reality facing the country as it continues to rank low globally on most development metrics.

    The choice is ours. It is either we confront corruption headlong and quicken the pace of national progress and development or stagnate. Something more fundamental and far-reaching, including value change and re-orientation in the mould of the sermon from the FCT police command will make the difference.

    It will entail leadership by example rather than precept.