End Insecurity Now! Stop Mass Kidnapping And Killings
Statement of the Revolutionary Socialist Movement (RSM) on insecurity in Nigeria.
By Damilola Owot
Insecurity has taken a new dimension since the Tinubu government came into power in May 2023. As we have predicted, the rate of kidnapping, banditry and robbery has increased geometrically while the working people have been bearing the menaces.
Kidnapping and abduction have become the order of the day in Nigeria. In fact, this new pandemic, which started sometime in the early 2000s is now widespread as it now affects every part of the country. According to the report published by The Punch Newspaper on Tuesday, 30/01/2024, over 17,000 Nigerians have been kidnapped during both the Buhari and Tinubu regimes, including University students, School children, policemen and other security agents, a political party chairperson, deputy vice-chancellor of an institution and a host of others.
Earlier, we heard how the Minster of Digital Economy, Issa Pantami (Ph.D) facilitated the release of Nabeeha and five of her sisters by raising a whooping N50m for the payment of ransom to the kidnappers. We have also heard in local news how several youth Corp members were kidnapped on their way to their different call-up states in which they intend to serve their mandatory one-year youth service.
All of these events point to the failure of the past and present Tinubu-led Federal Government to critically and systematically resolve the fundamental crisis in the Nigerian security system. It also exposes all of the press releases and media romance that Nigeria is now more secure under the new administration. The root cause of all these social vices is the wide gap between the poor and the rich. The new policies of Tinubu – particularly the removal of fuel subsidies and the floating of naira – have further worsened the situation. In a bid to survive, different groups of kidnappers have emerged across the country with different warlords. The kidnappers now target prominent persons, school children, and university students so that they can claim hundreds of millions of naira in ransom.
Sequence of Kidnapping Cases Across Nigeria
On Friday 26th of January, 2024, 3 Mobile Policemen attached to PMF 51, Oghara, drafted to the Ohoror axis of the East-West Road in Ughelli North Local Government Area of Delta State were reportedly abducted by gunmen. These policemen were kidnapped with their AK47 riffles and other ammunitions while trying to intervene in a robbery case along the axis. According to the report, 3 of the 6 Mobile Police Officers were abducted by suspected Fulani herdsmen.
Three students of Al-Qalam University in Katsina State, Habiba Shatali, a 200-level of Political Science student, Mariam Musa, a 400-level Microbiology student and Yusuf Abdulazeez, a 400-level Mathematics student were abducted around Kurfi, Dutsinma on January 14, 2024, while heading back to school from Minna, the Niger State capital. They all spent one month in the custody of a notorious bandit called Usman Modi-Modi. They were released after the payment of five million Naira for each of the students.
Abduction of children from places of learning including Baptist Boys High School Kaduna, Kankara Boys School Katsina, and School of Health Kaduna, amongst others were also recorded. It is distressing that children attending schools now face issues around their safety even within the school environment where they are ordinarily supposed to play and learn in an atmosphere devoid of fear or encumbrances. Seeing that this is fast becoming a pandemic in the country is not only distressing but saddening.
We are aware of the threats of the Minster of the Federal Capital Territory- FCT, Nyesome WIke, who, during one of his press briefings, warned kidnappers, armed robbers and those operating one chance to either repent from their crime or die at the hands of security agents in the territory. He was also quoted to have claimed his administration has started a clampdown on insecurity in the territory. However, this is just another media romance without any concrete efforts to solve the lingering crisis of kidnapping, army robbery and so on.
How to Resolve Security Challenges in Nigeria
Given the background of all of these events, it is critical to conclude that the reason why abduction and kidnapping are now a profitable business is the midst of mass poverty, hunger and segregation that exists in the country. Bandits and kidnappers now stay on the highways to kidnap and attack houses and schools to forcefully whisker people away from their schools and homes. While this could also be political, we believe that the monetary benefits attached to it made it an irresistible offer for the perpetrators. We cannot also overrule the proliferation of arms and weapons as one of the ingredients for the widespread of these acts.
Hence, we believe that a serious movement to end insecurity must start with bringing an end to abject poverty, marginalization, and unemployment in the country. We hold that the sustainable way to end kidnapping, abduction, and insecurity is to make such acts unattractive and delicate. This would start by ensuring free, quality education at all levels, provision of employment opportunities, and equity in the allocation of social amenities and so on. Similarly, communities should be allowed to organize and establish community policing to defend themselves in the face of any security threat.
We must also make it clear that with the present excess power that is vested in state governors, state police will not be able to solve this menace, it will be a tool in the hand of state governors to oppress oppositions and also victimise dissents in the state.
Workers and ordinary people are victims of insecurity, so the two Labour centres must come together to provide leadership for the anti-kidnapping movement to compel the government to step up activities to end insecurity. So that life and property of everyone in Nigeria can protected.
By putting all of these steps into action, we can start to bring insecurity to an end and ensure a more stabilized economy. However, all of these projects are not sustainable under the greedy capitalist system of the Tinubu/APC-led government. As we saw during the Buhari regime, capitalism cannot resolve the fundamental problems facing humanity. This is why we are calling for a mass-based political movement of the workers that will wrestle power from the bourgeoisie elements and establish a socialist government under which the commanding heights of the economy will be placed under democratic control and managed by the workers, artisans, peasants and ordinary people.