what is a nigerian life worth?

By CAMERON DUODU

It has happened again. Is anyone surprised any longer when a “religious riot” occurs in Nigeria?

The latest one occurred -- once again -- in the city of Jos, and the death toll is given as anything between 300 and 500 people. Attackers wielding machetes killed hundreds of people in pre-dawn clashes between Islamist pastoralists and Christian villagers. Bodies were piled in streets.

Harrowing pictures of the dead have appeared in the media. http://www.nigeriannewsservice.com/index.php/Breaking-News/jos-boils-again.html

Many Nigerians, in sheer disbelief, are wondering how Jos, a city in which hundreds of people were slaughtered like lambs as recently as November and December 2008, and where killings continued sporadically into January and February 2009,could have been left to fall into the mercy of marauding religious fanatics again.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/africa/7758098.stm

　

Everyone knows that these clashes are periodic, and yet, the police appear to have been taken by surprise by them. Again.

In sheer frustration, Nigerians are asking: “Is there such a thing as a state of emergency that could be declared to protect life in Nigeria? What about a properly enforced curfew?” They are receiving no answers.

The most recent pictures of carnage, coming hard on the heels of the exposure of extra-judicial killings by the police by Al Jazeera television -- which I reported on 4 March 2010 -- have demoralised the population beyond measure.

Indeed, the headline to this story was printed above a story by a Nigerian, Mr Solana Olunhemse, who wrote in the Lagos Guardian newspaper on 7 March 2010, describing in despairing terms, how a horrible picture had been sent to him about another alleged atrocity against bus passengers in Nigeria. Nineteen people died in that tragedy and pictures of their badly mutilated bodies have been making the rounds. The police say that the incident occurred last year, not as recently as the disseminators of the pictures had sought to imply.

http://www.nigeriannewsservice.com/index.php/Breaking-News/jos-boils-again.html

Irrespective of the date of the incident, the pictures caused a great deal of consternation. The Nigerian Senate summoned the Inspector General of Police on 3 March 2010 to explain the action taken by the police against the perpetrators of the crime. The Senate’s anger was aroused after a member, Mr Ayogu Eze, had circulated the photo clips of the scene of the incident.

http://www.nigeriannewsservice.com/index.php/Breaking-News/jos-boils-again.html

In turn, the Minister summoned the Inspector-General of Police, Mr. Ogbonnaya Onovo, and gave him what was described as “an unprecedented tongue-lashing.”

The minister called his own police service “a failure.” He continued: "The current rate of crime across the nation, rising cases of extra-judicial killings, human rights violations, robberies, high-profile assassination and deliberate failure to comply with government directives, are a testimony to the sheer incapacity, or the wilful defiance of [the] police high command of the efforts of the government”.

Reports say Inspector-General Onovo appeared surprised that he and his most senior officials had been called to receive such a dressing-down from the Minister. But the Nigerian populace are fed up with excuses and verbal parrying both by Ministers and the law enforcement agencies. Unfortunately however, the people‘s fears are not about to end some time soon.

This is because Nigeria has only just partially emerged from a paralysis of government caused by the illness of President Umaru Yar’Adua. He has just “returned home” after nearly three months in a Saudi hospital. Hardly any of the top people in the administration have seen him since his return.

He left Nigeria without fulfilling the formalities that would have allowed his Vice-President, Mr Goodluck Jonathan, to rule in his absence. In exasperation, the Senate voted to make Jonathan Acting President.

Even though Yar’Adua is now back, he is still too ill to govern. He is reported to have "endorsed" the declaration of Mr Jonathan as Acting President by the Senate. But there is too much distrust between the “Jonathan faction” in the Government and “Yar’Adua‘s “kitchen cabinet” for the Government to be able to act firmly in the face of a crisis such as that caused by the religious riots.

The distrust has already produced one high-level casualty: Yar'Adua's National Security Adviser, Major-Genera (rtd) Sarki Mukhtar, has been fired. His replacement is Lt.-Gen (rtd) Aliyu Gusau,who held the same post under Yar'Adua's predecessor, General Olusegun Obasanjo. This bold action by Acting President Goodluck Jonathan signifies that the power struggle at Aso Rock, Abuja -- headquarters of the Nigerian fderal Government -- may not be quite over yet.

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