Violence is being democratised in the city of all Nigerians, writes Paul Nwabuikwu
Depending on your source, last month’s jail break at the Kuje prisons in the vicinity of the Abuja International Airport unleashed between 400 and 900 detained and convicted felons, including high profile terrorists, into the federal capital and its environs. Since then, the headlines have been full of reports of worsening insecurity in Abuja, along with reports of car jackings, kidnappings and a few robberies in Wuse 2 and other expensive neighbourhoods.
It is therefore not surprising that those of us who live in the city and therefore close to “the seat of power” have been receiving the kind of attention usually reserved for residents of Kaduna, Zamfara, Borno and lately, Owo – parts of the country that have been repeatedly traumatized by terrorists, bandits and kidnappers.
On second thoughts, scratch that. Actually, the whole country is currently traumatized by the exploits of criminals of various stripes. You don’t have to be a direct victim to be affected by the tales of wickedness and gore in the headlines. Even Nigerians in the diaspora cannot resist being drawn into the horrors captured in videos and audios on social media and frantic calls from home. Murder and mayhem have become Nigerian signifiers along with Afrobeats, garri and galloping inflation.
So it is no surprise that for several days now I’ve been fielding anxious calls from worried family and friends within and outside the country. They all want to know if I am alright and “keeping safe” – an expression which has assumed the fervency of anxious advice and passionate prayer. There are many enquiries about my movement, when I leave the office and I am urged to avoid nocturnal movements and lie low in order to escape the arrows of the evil ones.
But not all the reactions to the security issues currently afflicting the federal capital are sympathetic. Some Nigerians are not sad that “you people in Abuja are experiencing what we have been experiencing”. In fact, many are quite happy that the burgeoning democratization of violence has reached us, that we are all now suffering together. You can hear the gleeful tone in voices and tweets, and that distinctive Nigerian “God don catch una” tone in which derision and fake sympathy are communicated. It’s unsettling but quite understandable.
Abuja is not just another place in Nigeria, it is not just a collection of houses and offices and factories and homes and other socio-cultural fillers that make up Nigerian urban centres. Beyond its official status as the capital of the country, it has over the years acquired a reputation for both political intrigue and grand corruption.
It is the city of Transcorp Hilton, where political big wigs hold caucus meetings surrounded by fixers, errand boys, praise singers and some buxom female talent to add some colour; the city of expensive empty mansions owned by billionaire civil servants, military generals and politicians who are too rich to care about losing rent money; the city of rich young people whose only claim to fame is that they are related to the powerful by blood, profit or bodily fluids. Abuja is the headquarters of grand political scheming and targeted influence where the ideals of nationhood go to die and healthy policies get hollowed out, becoming skeletal monuments to fraud. For many Nigerians, Abuja is a five-letter word which inspires angry four-letter reactions (and their equivalents in local languages) by Nigerians to the many things wrong with the country.
But of course there’s the other Abuja – the slums which exist in close proximity to the expensive neighbourhoods where the powerful hold court. They are scattered all over the city, a testament to failed anti-poverty and urban planning policies. Outside the city, there are the vibrant and rowdy outskirts where some quite comfortable and many not so comfortable people call home. This is the Abuja of Mararaba, Nyanya, One Man Village, Zuba, Karimajiji and parts of Bwari, Pape, Dutse and other places where the majority, like their counterparts in Ajegunle and Maroko on the outskirts of Lagos survive in far less opulence. In these places, life is an obstacle course of poverty, poor infrastructure and that desperate dash to escape nightmarish traffic before bedlam ensues.
The current anxiety over security unites the two Abujas in an unlikely solidarity that defies class and money. The areas on the outskirts and other areas farther from the city centre started feeling the pinch of insecurity much earlier than the better resourced zones. Which is not surprising considering that a disproportionate percentage of criminals come from poor neighbourhoods and it’s only natural that they are more comfortable operating in familiar and less protected precincts. But as the capacity of Nigerian security forces becomes more degraded and the number of personnel remains abysmally few compared to the population (Less than 300,000 soldiers and less than 400,000 policemen to a population of about 200m), they are becoming more ambitious.
Of course, the most exclusive parts of Abuja have never been perfectly safe. The United Nations building, the popular Banex complex of stores in the heart of the city and other places were bombed during the Jonathan administration. I recall an early morning operation by some formidable looking fellows at the popular Sahad junction that scattered the traffic that my wife and I were part of to the four winds. The next day’s papers reported that the robbers had traced a large consignment of cash from a bank to the junction where they forced the vehicle carrying the money to a screeching halt with blazing guns. It was an awful experience.
But while violence in Abuja is not exactly a new phenomenon, what makes the latest spate more ominous is that previous attacks gave the sense that the military is too weak and compromised to cope. The audacity of violent criminals, whether inspired by religion or profit, is increasing even as the Nigerian state, represented by significantly less effective security forces, seems to be in retreat.
For instance, there were widespread reports that soldiers on guard within the vicinity left before the Kuje attacks. Like similar ones in the past, there has been no strong official response to the reports. Government and the military high command need to take these reports more seriously. The spectacle of criminals in widely shared videos threatening to kidnap the president or flogging kidnapped victims is not good for the image of the country or for the peace of mind of citizens whether in privileged Abuja or less powerful parts of the country.
Nwabuikwu is a member of THISDAY Editorial Board
