Will Ogbomoso Be the Turning Point?

The nationwide protest organised by the National Union of Teachers (NUT) over the Ogbomoso school abductions is a welcome development. And for many reasons. For one, newspapers are giving the abductions more front-page treatment. In a country perpetually consumed by politics, where electioneering is what we live for, the diversion of media focus to the burning issue is timely and necessary. It is expedient to put the issue of school kidnappings — and insecurity in general — on the front burner. Kidnappings happen regularly in the north such that they get scant media attention, maybe because many think “it is their problem”. Ogbomoso is closer to home for some people.

I am quietly hoping that the Ogbomoso abductions will, at last, get everybody on the same page. By “everybody”, I refer to leaders, commentators and ordinary Nigerians. By “same page”, I mean recognising that we are faced with a threat that affects everybody, regardless of religion and region. We love to politicise things in Nigeria. The APC weaponised the Chibok abductions of 2014 against President Goodluck Jonathan ahead of the 2015 elections. And now, the Ogbomoso incident is an opportunity for the opposition ahead of 2027. We have been politicising insecurity since the days of President Olusegun Obasanjo but what is our gain? Maybe we now need to cast politics aside.

Alhaji Atiku Abubakar and Mr Peter Obi, two key opposition figures, have been talking a good game about insecurity under President Bola Tinubu and the APC, but they are yet to show us what they will do differently to make Nigerians safe. The APC leaders talked more than this ahead of the 2015 elections. They called Jonathan all sorts of names and promised to end Boko Haram in the twinkling of an eye. Eleven years later, are we safer than we were in 2015? Talk is cheap. Political talk is even cheaper. I would love Atiku and Obi to articulate their security plans beyond campaign talk. Something like “The Atiku Plan to End Insecurity” and “The Obi Doctrine to Keep Nigeria Safe”.

If we really know what is best for Nigeria, we will never play politics with insecurity. That is why I am hoping the Ogbomoso abductions will become a turning point in the way we tackle the security challenges. From all indications, the abductors are not mere bandits. They are terrorists. People often confuse the two, especially as both groups terrorise their victims. Bandits come to steal, kidnap and kill, but they are mostly robbers operating out of the bush. Terrorists also adopt the same method but, on the other hand, they have a political demand/goal. The terror groups in Nigeria, Mali, Niger and Burkina Faso, for instance, want to establish an Islamic caliphate. That is political.

The beheading of the Ogbomoso teacher is an indication that this is a terror group, not just some random bandits doing kidnapping. And they have leverage: the schoolkids and the teachers. Any attempt to use force to rescue the captives can lead to collateral damage. Some Nigerians are saying it doesn’t matter — just level the whole place. I notice that those saying this do not have children or relatives among the captives. The traumatised parents, families and communities want the captives safely back home. The terrorists have shown that southern schools are just as vulnerable as those in the north. That is why the Ogbomoso abductions appear to be generating more than a mere interest.

Someone said the terrorists are only “testing the mic” with Ogbomoso. If they get away with it, they may have found a new market, what with the heat the Nigeria-US military operation is putting on them in the north. The terrorists may start moving southwards. Sadly, as you solve one problem somewhere, another surfaces elsewhere. But we can use the Ogbomoso case as a catalyst, a turning point. We have missed similar opportunities in the past. It is time for Tinubu to press the hard reset button. As I have said before, something is not working well in our war strategy. The bandits and terrorists regularly raise their capacity and change tactics, and we must be a step ahead of them.

But, first, Tinubu and his security chiefs must ask themselves the hard and inconvenient questions. A starting question, I suggest, is very simple: are these criminals ghosts? The answer is no. They are human beings like the rest of us. That means they are visible, like you and me, to the naked eye. In that case, how do they settle down at a location, build camps, purchase and transport supplied, carry out surveillance, and launch attacks on communities without detection or prevention by the Nigerian security agencies? To the best of my knowledge, there is no village in this country that does not have the presence of a security operative. Are these operatives really doing their job or sleeping on duty?

The Ogbomoso abductions did not happen suddenly, from all indications. Those guys did not fly into the community. They went there by land. There were reports that they killed one or two people in some of those villages recently. What did the police do about it? What did the other security agencies do? What kind of analysis did they do? From what we are reading in the media, some criminal elements have been living in the bush for a very long time. If the security agencies are not aware, why? Who failed in their duties? If they were aware, what did they do about it? Who failed in their duties? We need to ask these questions if we are really interested in diagnosing the challenges.

Another hard question Tinubu and his security chiefs must ask themselves and provide us with a cogent answer is the fate of the trillions of naira being poured into security expenditure. From experience, these security guys do not believe in transparency and accountability. Many feed fat on the security budgets while hapless Nigerians continue to be at the mercy of the well-equipped and more committed terrorists and bandits. After the death of Major General Iyanda Muraina, army chief of accounts and budget, in 2022, we got to know, following family feuds, that he left behind dozens of choice mansions and a bevy of elite bulletproof cars. He was just the accountant. Do the math.

One more question Tinubu and his security chiefs should ask themselves is: can we go on like this and expect a better result? Can we continue with this ineffective approach to tackling insecurity and expect God’s grace to abound? Is it fair to all concerned? Will it be beneficial to all concerned? How long shall these criminals pillage our villages, kidnap our women and children, and waste human lives while we stand aside and look? Shall we continue to attribute it to God and say it is our destiny to be at the mercy of kidnappers, bandits and terrorists? While we pray, some prey on the resources of the commonwealth, heartlessly feeling secure in their air-conditioned offices. Something has to change.

I have read suggestions by many well-meaning Nigerians on how to improve security. Some say an emergency security fund should be set up, an assumption that money is the problem. But is it? I don’t know. Some want state police — as if the police can tackle a problem the entire military has been battling since 2009. Good luck with that. Pastor EA Adeboye said service chiefs should resign if they don’t end terrorism in 90 days, but we have been firing service chiefs since the days of Jonathan. Tinubu changed service chiefs just recently. Nigerians are not short of suggestions, but my concern is that we typically make prescriptions based on assumptions, not insightful diagnosis.

May I confess here that I myself do not know the solution. However, my own diagnosis is that the political and military authorities need to be more committed to this war. They must first admit that whatever they have been doing — and they have been doing a lot — is not enough to quench this fire. It is not about doing more of the same but having a rethink and doing things differently after undertaking a sincere appraisal of their strategy. The US-Nigeria military partnership is, so far, yielding tangible results despite initial opposition by some Nigerians. We should get help from anywhere and make Nigeria too hot for these criminals. Nigeria must not become another Mali.

It goes without saying that we cannot begin to think of finding an enduring solution if there is no single-mindedness and tenacity of purpose on the part of the political and military authorities. Tinubu, of course, must lead the way. He is the commander-in-chief of the armed forces. He is the chief security officer of the Federal Republic of Nigeria. The buck stops with him. Those politicising insecurity by blaming it on his political enemies are not helping matters. It will only serve the agenda of the terrorists when we leave the real issues and begin to politicise our collective trauma. Tinubu and his security chiefs must have a total rethink of their war strategy and press the reset button.

AND FOUR OTHER THINGS…

FAKE NEWS FIESTA

As we go deeper into the 2027 elections, we must tighten our seatbelts for a deluge of fake news, especially in the age of AI. One Ifechukwu Dennis, a social media content provider, has just been arrested by the police on suspicion of using AI to generate an audio purportedly of President Tinubu saying: “I’ve begged Peter Obi to step down for me. He refused. Now I will make sure the insecurity affects only south-east.” I worry about those who generate this sort of content just to spread disaffection. But I worry more about those who share such without caution. It is now of epidemic proportions and it may get worse. People are free to play politics but are there no boundaries? Evil.

DATTI TALK

Dr Yusuf Datti Baba-Ahmed has said he only agreed to be Mr Peter Obi’s running mate in 2023 out of sympathy. “People don’t understand that between me and Obi, there is a great deal of sympathy. I have sympathy for him. And this sympathy was at the core of our relationship,” he told Symfoni TV. “When he approached three other major politicians in 2022, I would have been glad if one of them had gone with Peter Obi in 2022. But they all avoided him. I took it upon myself because naturally I have always been a volunteer. For the sake of Nigeria, I extended that sympathy to him.” Pray, is this statement absolutely necessary? Politically, he benefitted more from the pairing than Obi did. Fact.

POLITICIAN PASTORS

On Thursday, handlers of Pastor EA Adeboye went on a long “shalaye” after he was falsely accused of protesting against President Jonathan in 2014. A short clarification is not out of place, but he should not allow himself to be dragged into partisan politics by the gods of social media. They have an agenda. Jesus Christ, our example, focused on the gospel, refusing to be lured into political talk. He made the famous “render unto Caesar” statement to ward off those trying to trick him into making political statements. Many Nigerian pastors have totally missed the road with their neck-deep involvement in politics, even campaigning for candidates. Adeboye must not join the fad. Wisdom.

NO COMMENT

Gunmen abducted a woman and her twin sons in Ibadan, Oyo state, on Wednesday. If the criminals were in doubt about the value of their captives, they were helped in no little way by a statement by the media aide to Chief Adebayo Adelabu, former minister of power, announcing to the world that she was his sister. That automatically shot up whatever ransom the abductors were planning to collect. To make matters worse, the statement gave extensive details on her, listing the places she had worked (including the CBN, where Adelabu was deputy governor) and her plans to relocate to the US. The only thing they didn’t tell us was the balance in her bank accounts. Wonderful.