The outcome of a public opinion survey strenuously conducted through the support of Ibrahim Mo Foundation in selected remote villages across 27 states of Nigeria, majority of those we interviewed opined that Nigerian political class since independence have been shortchanging the masses consciously and on whose back they rode to power, prominence and influence that has now become a stumbling block to development.
Most of the elderly amongst them opined that the only time ordinary Nigerians featured in the calculation of the political class was the brief period between 1952 and 1959, when the fear of the colonial power kept the then new inheritors on their toes.
If anyone is in doubt, all needs to be done, is to take a look at the 1963 Republican Constitution midwife by first generation politicians. There was nothing in that superstructure about the masses of Nigeria. It was all about acquisition of additional powers by the ruling coalition Northern Peoples’ Congress (NPC) and the National Council for Nigerian Citizens (NCNC).
When they finally pulled down the whole edifice over sharing of political offices after the 1962/63 Census crisis and the 1964 disputed election, the military that surfaced at the political scene in 1966 only followed their footsteps. Instead of the new self-proclaiming messiahs fighting their claimed ‘ten percenters,’ they institutionalized corruption through self-serving government policy thrusts including the 1978 Land Use Decree which allowed the sharing of priceless land at will by governors and the Babangida commercialization policy which allowed military men and their fronts to share the nation’s public enterprises among themselves.
The emergence of military-appointed ‘new breed politicians’ that brought only corruption in 1999, increased the nightmare of ordinary Nigerians. In the name of privatization, the political class sold Nigeria’s total investment of over $100bn for a little over $1bn to themselves, leading to the collapse of our bubbling manufacturing sector and turning the country to importer of even labor from other societies while our younger ones roam the streets in search of non-existing jobs.
Following their fathers’ footsteps, children of serving and retired military officers, according to a House of Representatives probe, forged papers to steal N1.6trillion from the government under the fuel subsidy scam, with some now posted to jail.
That the political class often unleashes heavily-drugged armed thugs on the people during electioneering campaigns and elections, which has gone beyond the realm of speculation. We have it on the authority of the late National Security Adviser, Gen. Andrew Azazi that Boko Haram was a creation of North-eastern politicians (Ecomog in Borno, Kalare in Gombe and Sara suka in Bauchi). We also have it on the authority of Abubakar Kawu Baraje, former chairman of the rebel New Peoples Democratic Party (nPDP) that Fulani from Mali, Sierra Leone, Senegal and other neighboring countries were imported into the country to facilitate the victory of All Progressives Congress (APC) at the 2015 presidential election just as we have it on the authority of Dr. Abubakar Gumi that most of the bandits terrorizing Nigerians presently are the aggrieved Fulani intruders seeking vengeance over APC led federal government’s unfulfilled promises to them for the roles they played during the 2015 presidential electioneering campaign and the election.
Unarguably, the Nigerian political class is tarred with the same brush. But in terms of greed for power and impoverishment of the masses of Nigerians, the typical Northern Nigerian political class has no rival. Unfortunately, the preoccupation of most northern leaders since the end of the civil war has been to impoverish their people and inflict psychological injuries on their psyche for perpetual slavery and ease of control for manipulation and other dirty jobs.
Today, the nonchalant attitudes towards security and sustainable economy by most Northern Governors and the political class of the region, has thrown the region into a battle field and insecure for investment in trade, agriculture, thriving economy and education. The result is fast encouraging the criminally-minded to export the self-inflicted social problems bedeviling the region to other climes.
Government has today become a science. Intensive surveillance by local vigilant groups is the only reliable solution providing temporal succor to the persistent insecurity within their areas of operation.
Unfortunately, apart from few state governors, for fear of losing grip on the impoverished masses, are opposed to local vigilant groups. In Borno, there is the Civilian Joint Task Force (Civilian-JTF), in Bauchi, there is Danga, Spider Web and Zabgai local security outfits operating with the support of the state government so as in other states.
For instance, a 2017 study titled ‘Conflict and Insecurity in Northern Nigeria’ by Mike Shand of the International Crisis Group revealed the following facts.
That in 2016, over 2,000 people were murdered and tens of thousands displaced in Benue and Kaduna States alone. Incidents involving herders and ethno-religious jingoists accounted for 44 percent of all the fatalities in the country in 2016. Herders were dragged to the battlefield as a result of persistent rustling of their animals and murder of their cowboys by natives under the claim of land grabbing. Herders had no government protection and till date are left at the mercy of their courage, resources and fighting skills. Based on that, they always opt for self defence which has worsened the situation beyond any control.
While most governors and politicians of substance opposed support to local vigilant groups, the study also pointed out that “large banditry groups operate with mounting audacity through most Nigerian States with the main theatres at the Kamuku forest in Kaduna, Felgore forest in Kano, Dansadau forest in Zamfara, Dajin Madam in Wase of Plateau State, Yankari in Bauchi and Dajin Rugu forest stretching through Kaduna, Katsina and Zamfara States”.
The study quoted another report which estimated that in 2013, more than 64,750 cattle were rustled and at least 2,991 herders killed in states across the North-central zone which is now facing severe reprisal. From 2011 to 2015, bandits, cattle rustlers and other criminal elements killed 1,135 people in Zamfara State alone, according to the Nigerian Security and Civil Defence Corps (NSCDC) quoted by the study.
The economic toll was also said to be huge with a 2015 study, indicating the federal government was losing $13.7billion in revenue annually because of herder-farmer conflicts in Benue, Nasarawa, Kaduna and Plateau States with the four states also losing 47 percent of their internally-generated revenues. In fact, in March 2017, former Governor Samuel Ortom of Benue State claimed that attacks by herders coming possibly from the Republics of Cameroun and Niger, had cost his State N95billion between 2012 and 2014. That quoted amount was not believed by discerning minds compared to the internally generated revenue of Benue State over the stated period. It was a statement probably concocted to suit a purpose but lacked substance.
Ortom had lied to cover ineptitude and cluelessness and his glaring incapacitation to handle the worrisome situation. In fact, allegedly, his biased and unworkable policies added value to the escalation of violence in Benue State when he held sway. He foolishly ordered Fulani herders out of Benue State thinking it was the best solution to the precarious situation. That can never be a solution.
Herders may vacate the state with their cattle but can they also be denied the freedom of movement within the state? That is where the problem lies. They know the terrain better than the natives and can crawl into the state for attacks at will. What again?
The report called attention to creeping desert which is fast turning 50-75 percent of the land area of Bauchi, Borno, Gombe, Jigawa, Kano, Katsina, Kebbi, Sokoto, Yobe and Zamfara States, to a desert. Most of the youths roaming aimlessly on motorcycles and unleashed on major Nigerian cities could have been deployed by their respective state governments to embark on the process of deforestation of the affected areas. While a former Defence Minister defended the killing of subsistence farmers on the excuse that grazing routes were taken over by farmers in the Middle-Belt and in Southern States, causing herders/farmers conflict, another former Minister, Bashir Salihu Magashi, ordered federating states to abrogate their anti-grazing laws to forestall further herdsmen violence. Ironically, he was silent on the 415 grazing reserves established by the Northern Regional Government of Sir Ahmadu Bello in the 1960s “which have succumbed to pressure from rapid population growth and the associated demand for farmland, overrun by urban and other infrastructure, or appropriated by private commercial interests”.
In an objective analysis of the appalling situation at hand, for the restoration of sanity, there is an urgent need for the 415 grazing reserves established in the 1960s to be revisited instead of apportioning blame where they don’t exist. Herders have over time used those grazing reserves and cattle routes exclusively established for their benefit, but now denied by respective governments for pecuniary interests. To say the obvious, most Northern Nigerian Governors have failed their people. The federal government has failed in its core responsibility of protecting lives and properties of Nigerians. Federating States instead of understanding the situation objectively resort to adopting self-help strategies in form of anti-grazing laws and a baseless and useless claim of land grabbing while ignoring to rid their reserved forests of ‘illegal’ intruders and suspected criminal herdsmen in order to fill the gap created by the federal government. Despite all the stated, has the situation improved for the better or has worsened to a more disastrous dimension beyond control?
Sleepy villages in parts of Plateau State hitherto living in peace and safe from security challenges are now targets of persistent attacks as reprisal by herders, bandits and other criminal elements that crawl into the localities from their neighboring hideouts to destroy houses, loot, maim, kill and celebrate.
Villages in Duguri of Bauchi State were under serial attacks by bandits while Kukawa in Kanam local government, Nyalum, Ginyir, Kamfani, Zak, Zurak, Bunyun, Bangalala, Paikanti, Ashale, Kilibobo, Aduwa, Safiyo, Gaji, Pinau and Gimbi of Wase local government, Plateau State were brutally attacked simultaneously and several souls posted to the great beyond by the bandits without any serious action from Plateau State Government or even a visit by government officials to commiserate with the bereaved and the aggrieved or support from NEMA or SEMA as if those areas are not part of Nigeria that do not deserve an attention.
Where then is safe in Plateau State? Where then, should the people go for safety as most of the people have lost confidence and trust in the Plateau State Government-owned security outfit, Operation Rainbow and in all other states sponsored security organs for suspicion of bias in operation? Is our country not a failed state under Bola Ahmed Tinubu? I wonder!
In the evening of Christmas day, 2023, over 300 hundred souls were posted to the great beyond in Bokkos of Plateau State by suspected bandits as retaliation for early attack by native militia group in their desperation to chase herders out of the land, under a claim of land grabbing.
In Yelwata village of Benue State, in early June 2025, over 200 souls were murdered that necessitated a visit by President Tinubu to commiserate with the people. As the dust was trying to settle, ethno-religious native bandits in Mangun district of Mangu local government, Plateau State, on June 20, 2025, deemed it necessary to murder eight innocent passersby on transit for a wedding at Qu’an Pan in same Plateau State without a reason other than being Muslims passing through a heavily dominated Christian/Pagans domain. These were few reported cases for public knowledge. Who knows the figure in other areas not announced and not visited in the far north and south-east?
Today in Nigeria, if Fulani herders are attacked and gruesomely murdered by native militia groups and their cattle rustled, there is always silence from government not even support with food items or visit to commiserate with the bereaved until the herders retaliate, it becomes news headline to warrant a visit by government officials. Should we expect any light at the end of the tunnel with such lopsided attitude? Your guess is as good as mine!
Finally, despite the challenges, the most peaceful states are; Adamawa, Akwa Ibom, Bayelsa, Bauchi, Cross River, Rivers, Gombe, Jigawa, Kano, Lagos, Ogun, Osun and probably Ekiti. IPOB and ESN are there in the south-east on killing spree. The people are forced to obey obnoxious laws of Sit-At-Home as conquered slaves by agitators of a mirage called Republic of Biafra. In God We Trust!
Muhammad is a commentator on national issues.
