Presidential monologue ( 17)
“A curse shall light upon the limbs of men; / Domestic fury and fierce civil strife shall cumber all the parts of Italy;/ Blood and destruction shall be so in use/ And dreadful objects so familiar/ That mothers shall but smile when they behold / Their infants quarter’d with the hands of war;/ All pity choked with custom of fell deeds…” – Mark Antony
THE above is from the play titled, ‘ Julius Caesar’ by William Shakespeare. Through the character of Mark Anthony, he predicted a civil war and bloodbath in Italy, following the assassination of Julius Caesar to the effect that mothers would smile when they behold their infants quartered.
Today, killings are so common in Nigeria, reaching levels that are debasing of our common humanity. We are now inured from news of death. We carry on as though nothing matters. This is not the way of humans, and of civilisation; we are simply receding to the pedestal of prehistory.
I recall that growing up in the village of Emaudo, Ekpoma, death in a street would send cold shivers down one’s spine, and if one knew, per chance, the site of burial of the dead, each time one passed by the location, one often developed goose pimples. Such was the value placed on human life that death was so terrifying, and not to be wished for anyone, except for those who willfully take another’s life. In contemporary times, the whole discourse around the abolition of capital punishment is mainly because a high premium is placed on life to avoid the contradictions of the criminal justice system where an innocent could be wrongly condemned.
Mr President, you might ask what I am up to. Or put in another way, what is the kernel of this piece? It is about the killings on the Plateau, the ongoing ethnic cleansing there. According to reports from multiple sources, on Thursday April 18, Dading James Jordan, a 200- level student was allegedly killed along with a mother and a child in Chikam, a town that habours some of the students of the Plateau State University by Fulani herdsmen.
As an aftermath, the students of the varsity took the body of their colleague to campus to express their displeasure at the cold murder of Jordan, and were halted by the security unit on campus manned by the military. The students resisted, and the military fired warning shots that went to the extent of aiming at students. The management of the university shut the school to calm frayed nerves and prevent breakdown of law and order, while commending efforts of the military towards the maintenance of peace in the area.
However, the video clip of the stampede that followed the shooting at the varsity students was chilly. Young men and women were running helter- skelter, stumbling, and other without the benefit of paramilitary training, were pinning down while shouting, “They are shooting students, the soldiers are shooting students”. Worried, I could not sleep. The spectacle sent a twinge down in me. I saw those students as my children. Imagine how their biological parents would feel, especially those who have lost a son or daughter. Loss of life is eternal, the hand of the clock, cannot be turned back.
Mr. President, this is not the country of our dream over which we were ready to die in the struggle against military rule. We envisaged peace, rule of law, and life abundance. These are the lack dominant in our country today.
The ethnic cleansing in Plateau by aliens who claimed that Nigeria and Africa are their unique possession is about land grab. To realise this reprehensible objective, humans are expendable to the misanthropes. Their resilience despite the presence of Operation Safe Haven is because their collaborators are embedded in the Nigerian security forces. Two solutions might help. One is the reorganisation of the Third Amoured Division based in Jos. This is the short term prescription. It requires the actions of the Chief of Defence Staff and the Chief of Army Staff.
Two is the formation of Plateau State Police. This issue is currently on the front burner of the restructuring debate and amendment agenda of the Tenth National Assembly. This is the long term approach because of the constitutional content and procedures. It is high time we stopped the bleeding of the people of Plateau State.
Mr President, shooting at students, our children, is bestial and smacks of the Glover Syndrome, a socialisation in which the security forces see the people they are meant to protect as the enemy. That is the mould of the colonial state. If this development has not gotten to your table, please request information from appropriate government agencies that should know. I wish you a very happy new week.