Tag: bomb blast

SIR: The gory sights of hapless victims of the Nyanya bomb blast, including children, would make even a heart of steel melt. Such was the crude nature of the bomb blast of Monday April 14, that has shattered dreams, aborted hopes and forever murdered sleep. One thing that cannot, however, be disputed is that these are tough times for motherland. What obtains presently is akin to happenings in a state of war. No one knows when and where the next tragedy would happen. No one knows who the next victims would be. The bottom line is that no one, perhaps with the exception of the lucky few who have the luxury of military and police protection, is safe again in the country.

Sadly but typically, in the midst of the chaos and sorrow that characterized the Nyanya bomb blast, our leaders have continued in their usual style of trivializing serious national issues. While the American Ambassador to Nigeria James F. Entwistle and other concerned individuals were offering to donate blood for surviving victims of the blast, our leaders were busy making unguarded and infuriating statements that gave them away as opportunists and self-centred characters. It is amazing how our leaders have become so obsessed with power that human lives no longer mean anything to them. It is no longer news that we have become accustomed to politicizing sensitive national issues in this clime. But how does one rationalize the politicization of human lives?

In our customary penchant for cheap talks, everyone has been talking about nothing. The airwaves are being bombarded with all manners of talks. Our elders at the ongoing National Conference in Abuja are equally not left out in this national past time of unfruitful blabbing. Everyone wants to be seen to be saying something, no matter how insignificant.

Sadly, despite our penchant for idle talks, we can’t fix elementary challenges such as making our roads safer, making our hospitals work, safeguarding lives and property, ensuring regular power supply, protecting investments among others. Hypocrisy and deception have become a national past time. Can there really be any meaningful progress in a society where falsehood has relegated truth to the back seat?

We have become a people without conscience to whom all that now matters is power, wealth and fame. That is why we brazenly dance naked at the graveyards of our compatriots whose lives were cut off in avoidable manners and circumstances.

Irrespective of our predilection for superfluous talks, if we refuse to learn our lessons and act decisively, nothing will change. We need to stand up together and act decisively against terror. Those who are waging war against our nation have demonstrated that they care less about mundane dividing factors such as ethnicity, religion and politics. Religion, ethnic and political affiliations simply means nothing to these agents of death.

The various security agencies in the country need to do more than they are presently doing in the management of the country’s security situation. Inasmuch as it is true that terrorism is becoming a global challenge, our security bodies need to exhibit more decisiveness and professionalism in their handling of the situation. One primary duty of governments, all over the world, is the protection of the citizenry. The present trend that exposes Nigerians to unhindered horrid attacks and premature deaths, is, to say the least, intolerable

It is rather distasteful that a few days after the horrific Nyanya incident, about 100 girls at the Girls Senior Secondary School, Chibok, Borno State, were kidnapped by men of the Boko Haram sect. Without doubt, we need a new approach in our fight against terror. But, perhaps, more crucially, we need to unite as a people against terror. We need to rise above divisive selfish and parochial dynamics in order to confront terror as one strong united people.

• Tayo Ogunbiyi

Ministry of Information & Strategy, Alausa-Ikeja