By Ezeh Jude Ogechi
Three weeks ago in this space, we mused on the topic: "Abba Kyari: Why are Nigerians acting surprised?" And we asked, "who investigates the investigator."? It was informed by the twist that having seen the endemic corrupt practices within the rank and file of our police force, Nigerians still expressed surprise at the allegations by U.S intelligence police that DCP Abba Kyari was an accessory to Hushpuppi's crimes.
A similar incident played out last week as a terrorist group nicknamed "armed bandits" invaded the Nigeria Defence Academy (NDA) located in Afara, Kaduna state, killing some officers, injuring many, and abducted some. The incident happened in the dead of the night of Monday 23rd August.
Everyone was taken aback! How could it have happened? A Military Defence Academy overpowered probably by armed "bloody civilians"? Those who were startled by the reprehensible incident and ask these questions, I reckon, were being dishonest with the realities of our territorial antecedents. One of our problems is that we often stick our guts to the present, neglecting the counsel of J.F Kennedy that: "History is a relentless master. It has no present, only the past rushing into the future. To try to hold fast is to be swept aside." We must learn to allow the past to guide our transient present, towards carving the ideal future we crave. Consequently, let's take few steps away to tap from the archive, so we will appreciate why our anxiety over the current attack is slightly out of place.
There is nothing new to it!
Was it not here, on the night of April 14, 2014, that 276 schoolgirls in Chibok were hounded, and driven for more than 20kilometers to Sambisa (a forest location in Borno State) without interception from any law enforcement agent? Was it not here that the similar dreadful incident took place in Dapchi, on February 19, 2018, with the victims numbering about 110, one of whom, Leah Sharibu, is still in captivity till this moment? Was it not here that retired Air Chief, Alex Badeh, was assassinated in cold blood, one week to the Christmas of 2018, and nothing came out of the case? Was it not here that Hon. Ahmed Gulak was assassinated in broad daylight on May 30, 2021, with no definite trace of the perpetrators?
Was it not here that INEC Resident Electoral Commissioner in Kano, Alhaji Mukaila Abdullahi, and his family were burnt to death and the cause shrouded in mystery? What about the murders of Funsho Williams (July 27, 2006) and Bola Ige (December 23, 2001)? Same with Dr. Marshal Harry who was assassinated on March 3, 2003, in his house and in the heart of Garki, Abuja, just a few meters away from the Abuja Police Command Headquarters? What about Chief AK Dikibo, the former PDP Chieftain from the South like Harry, who was assassinated on the highway in Delta states in 2003?
Do we also talk about the case of a frontline Journalist and former Editor-in-Chief of Newswatch Magazine, Dele Giwa, who was brutally cut down, his flesh mutilated into pieces, in a cloud of a parcel bomb explosion and right in his living room on a Sunday morning, October 19, 1986? What did we make out of the invasion of security formations in the Southeast in the recent past? I can go on and on to mention numerous cases.
In all these and many more incidents in the past, Nigeria moved on as if nothing happened. So, why did we all of a sudden became horror-stricken at the news that men with the same trademark broke into NDA?
Maybe because people felt that being the echelon of military formation which doubles as a training school for all cadres of military officers, no dare-devil gunmen could ever dare it. Ironically, it has proved to fool some to think that way. In Nigeria, anything can happen. Have we forgotten too soon that on Sunday, May 9, 2021, burglars broke into the Aso Rock villa residence of a top official in the presidency? The villa (arguably the most secure zone in the country)? Have we also forgotten that on Wednesday, April 18, 2018, a mob of miscreants invaded the National Assembly, forcefully snatched the Senate Mace, and made away with it unscathed?
Or are our memories so short-lived that we couldn't recollect the tragedy of ten years ago, that took place on the Friday morning of August 26, 2011, when a car bomb blew up some parts of the UN office in Abuja, with 18 fatalities and countless injuries? How about the invasion of the Louis Edet Police Force Headquarters in Abuja by terrorists? How about the first in the series of armed invasions that occurred in October 1, 2011, when the Eagle Square Abuja was attacked in a bomb blast that rattled the entire nation and consequently halted the Independence anniversary parade ceremony ongoing at the Eagle Square, during the administration of former President Goodluck Jonathan? So, if hoodlums can have a field day in guarded zones like Presidential Villa, National Assembly, and the UN headquarters in Abuja, then what is remaining?
On Wednesday, July 23, 2014, I was returning from Katsina. We had barely entered Kaduna when Buhari's entourage passed us by. Few minutes later, a bomb blast which Buhari claimed was targeted at him, blew so close to his fleets at Kawo Market; and that was after a prior blast two hours before, near Murtala Mohammed square. Estimated 40 souls were instantly lost to that horror. All vehicles into Kaduna, ours inclusive, were blocked and asked to re-route as immediate curfew was imposed by then Gov. Ramalan Yero. That was also during the tenure of former President Goodluck Jonathan.
If we are to go further into the recess of history, we would discover on July 10, 2003, when a sitting governor, the courageous Dr. Chris Ngige, was abducted in broad daylight in his office at the Government House, Awka, Anambra state. That was when former President Olusegun Obasanjo was in power.
Please accept my apologies for dragging your memory back to the ugly past in our national diary. It was an inadvertent effort to buttress the point that Nigerians ought not to be stupefied by the trepidation NDA incident as if it was the first time a crime of such magnitude was perpetrated. But still, one can pardon them on the ground that no matter how often evil occurs, man can never get used to it. The culture of evil indoctrination has never found a home in any society, not even during the barbarian's days.
And this brings us to the point of addressing the unanswered questions about that bloody night. How did the security architecture of the institution get compromised so easily that night at the Defence Academy? What about the Academy's Sentry and Quarter Guards? Were they all caught off-guard while their CCTV camera control room monitors coincidentally and simultaneously slumbered? Whatever happened to the officers on patrol in the barracks that night.
I had my NYSC scheme in an Army barracks back in the day. I have faint knowledge of how regimented life in military barracks operates. It is virtually impossible to crack the watch night arrangement of a typical Nigerian defense barracks. How then, did this permissiveness arise in NDA at Afara, that unholy night?
Some school of thoughts, posing as conspiracy theorists, suggests that for every security breach as enlisted above in the plot of our discourse, there is a security personnel collusion. And to validate this hypothesis, Senator Ali Ndume (the senate committee chairman on Army) a few days ago, publicly opined that the military should fish out the moles in their ranks. Whether this is truly the case, only the future will tell. But the indisputable fact remains that the loss and collateral damage thereof, is to Nigeria's corporate entity as a whole, which continues to throw up the rhetorical question: Who defends the Defender?
May daylight spare us!
...Eze Jude Ogechi is a Medical Laboratory Scientist, Columnist, and public affairs Commentator.
