BRIGANDAGE AT IKEDC OFFICE
The culprits should be made to account
We condemn the invasion of the Ikeja Electric Distribution Company (IKEDC) headquarters in Alausa, Lagos, by armed personnel of the Nigeria Airforce (NAF) last week. And we ask that all the people involved should be apprehended and brought to justice. Nothing should warrant military personnel to take laws into their hands or engage in such a disgraceful act of violence against innocent civilians who were only doing their lawful duties. Although the Chairman of IKEDC, Kola Adesina, has adopted a conciliatory note with the NAF, the Association of Nigerian Electricity Distribution Companies has called on the federal government to identify all the military personnel involved in the show of shame and hold them accountable. Since orderly conduct of troops is a command responsibility, the commander of the base that keep the errant troops must also be held to account.
The whole episode speaks to sheer lawlessness. Following the impasse between the Sam Ethnan Airforce Base and Ikeja Electric over unpaid bills running into billions of Naira, and the 13-day disconnected electricity supply to the base, some armed soldiers, numbering about 64, stormed the premises of Ikeja Electric to demand that their light be turned on. Apparently to demonstrate their power, the NAF personnel reportedly overpowered the IKEDC Staff, injured about 15 of them, and vandalised property worth almost a billion Naira. “What happened this morning was quite unfortunate, and certainly it will not happen again,” was all that the Air Officer Commanding (AOC) Logistics Command, Air Vice Marshal Adeniran Ademuwagun, who visited the IKEDC headquarters with his team could offer. But that is not good enough.
With staff beaten up, vehicles taken away, equipment damaged, individuals and families traumatised, this kind of recklessness is a disservice to the ethos of “officers and gentlemen”. And there must be consequences. Even more condemnable is that the action was taken against legitimate business outfit in the power sector that is challenged on several fronts. This culture of military personnel brutally taking the law into their hands is a travesty in a democracy.
Regrettably, this recourse to violence by personnel of our armed forces is not new. Perhaps, it is the nonchalant attitude towards investigating and punishing deviants that has allowed a culture of impunity to persist. Because these serial violations hardly attract serious consequences for their perpetrators, they are being normalised. But nothing can justify the whimsical resort to lawlessness by those whose primary responsibility is to uphold the law. As we have argued repeatedly on this page, no matter the extent of provocation, a person in uniform must not resort to taking the law into their own hands. Heads of our armed forces therefore have the primary responsibility of re-educating their men regarding basic decency.
Over the years, several reasons have been adduced to explain the violent disposition of some of our men and women in uniform who have scant regards for the rights of the citizens. Such reasons include their conditions of service especially the meagre remunerations, poor living condition in their barracks and low self-esteem. But the attack on a business concern is quite worrisome in several respects. While we hope that the culprits will be fished out and brought to justice, the heads of other critical institutions of state which bear arms should learn from the ugly episode. They must begin to instill discipline in their personnel.
When those who carry arms on behalf of the state begin to behave like licensed thugs, anarchy is not too far away.
