These appear to be strange times in Nigeria, when everything seems to work against the country. With high unemployment rate currently around 23 percent, according to data from the National Bureau of Statistics, many Nigerian youths have become easy preys to people who recruit them for unwholesome activities. Lamenting the worsening unemployment rate in the country, a member of the Faculty at the Lagos Business School, who spoke with BDSUNDAY on condition of anonymity, said: “Anybody doubting about negative things happening in the country may be making a serious mistake. If Nigeria has 28 to 30 million unemployed youths and every year about 700,000 (seven hundred thousand) others are added to that number, it is getting to a tipping point.”
Nigerians have also expressed shock at the level of lawlessness and seeming hijack of the country by hoodlums who operate with reckless abandon. These illegally armed men have taken over the entire country, abducting and killing at will. They carry out their nefarious acts without hindrance, and it appears they have no regard for constituted authorities.
Speaking with our correspondent, Anthony Imoh, a senior manager with a commercial bank in Lagos, expressed sadness that it appears the present administration may have failed in its major reason for being in office, which is protection of lives and property.
“We used to hear about all the negative things that are happening now in the days of the military. Talk about human rights abuses, oppressions, and extra-judicial killings. It was for these ills that the then civil society organisations fought the military jackboots to a standstill. These struggles helped to establish democracy in Nigeria. But with what is happening today, Nigeria has lost it. Even though we pretend that we are in a democracy; we are in the worst form of military dictatorship. I do not need to mention such indices; they are there for everybody to see,” Imoh said.
Imoh further explained that a situation where the security agents forcefully deny citizens their rights to show their displeasure over what they think is absence of good governance or oppressive government signposts a dangerous time and an eloquent testimony that Nigeria is yet to be free.
“I can tell you that the fight for freedom is still on. If at this stage of Nigeria, 59 years after independence, we are still experiencing this level of impunity by government and their agents, it then means that the fight for freedom is not yet over,” Imoh further said.
He also blamed what he described as excruciating suffering in the country for the violent reactions by some citizens.
“The principle of cause and effect is at work in Nigeria. There is failure of governance, leading to hunger, poverty, unemployment, under-employment, depression and deaths. The Nigerian people are reacting to these, and I had expected the government to take pro-active decisions to ameliorate the suffering, but I am not seeing something positive.”
He also noted that the rate at which war songs are being sung, and war drums being beaten by various ethnic nationalities are a pointer that all is not well with Nigeria.
“Many groups in the country are not happy with government and they are not hiding it. They are reacting to the negative behaviours of government. There seems to be no synergy between government and the people. At best, I can say there is that peace of the graveyard in Nigeria at the moment,” Imoh said.
Speaking with BDSUNDAY on the negative developments in the country and the need for government to convince Nigerians that it has come to serve and not to kill, a cleric, who craved anonymity, said he never imagined things would be such bad in Nigeria and for the masses.
“Before the 2015 general election, I never imagined that Nigeria would return to this sorry state. When I look back to the pre-civil war days; I still see a replay of those things that led to the avoidable civil war in Nigeria. With what I am seeing, the country is inching, every day, closer to that unfortunate episode. I hear people say, ‘nothing can make us fight again’. But I laugh. I laugh because; we are very close to that point. All is needed is a trigger. It could be a minor provocation. If we sing ‘let there be no war’ song with our mouth; we must also work and pray towards that; because, mere wishing, may not help us,” he said.
The cleric pointed out that, “a country where hundreds of people are being killed and the corpses decapitated by the killers; a country where many people are being kidnapped on a daily basis; a country where ethnic and religious consciousness, and hate speech have become a national anthem; a country where government is so opaque that the people do not know what is going on; a country where government prides itself in nepotism and citizens appear to have lost confidence in their government that live in denial of everything; there is no trust anywhere; then, there is danger. I hope we survive it.”
Expressing fear over the strange happenings in society, Cheta Nwanze, lead partner, SBM Intelligence, said: “Every society serious about progress aims towards equity. Arresting those that point out the rots in the society, while negotiating with those that carry out violence, sends a message.”
Calling on the Federal Government to restore peace and tranquility in the country, and win back the confidence of citizens, Ariyo Badmus, a member of the civil society group, said: “I am of the opinion that government has not applied itself well in the area of governance. Things have continued to move from bad to worse. Government must show capacity to arrest the ugly situations of killers overrunning the country to the point that there is no part of the country that is safe.”
Recall that soldiers had last week killed three policemen (one inspector; two sergeants) and a civilian). The policemen, who were murdered along Ibi-Jalingo Road, Taraba State, were conveying a kidnap kingpin, Alhaji Hamisu, to the command headquarters in Jalingo. The soldiers were said to have also released the suspect, who is now on the run.
Last week also, an Okada rider, Chimaobi Nwogu of Umuokereke Ngwa in Abia State, was shot dead by a military officer.
It is the belief of analysts that something has gone wrong with governance and the current government must as a matter of urgency stem the tide of bestiality in the country.
By Our Reporters
