Is Life In Southern Kaduna Worth A Kobo To Murderers? -By Isaac Asabor

Any close watcher of the sanguinary activities of murderers in Southern Kaduna in the last few days would know that Kaduna State and Nigeria are passing through a very trying period. Never in the history of Nigeria has it faced this kind of reckless killings of fellow human beings in manners that are reminiscent of the slaughtering of helpless chickens. Not even during the civil war!

If there is any evil in our contemporary society that has taken a worrisome trajectory, it is irrefutably the unprecedented and callous manner in which innocent lives are being cut short by rampaging killers in Southern Kaduna. With the news of the gruesome killings perpetrated in that part of the country recently as the news was agog some few days ago that gunmen suspected to be Fulani militia on Thursday, precisely on the night of July 25, 2020 invaded Agwala Magayaki of Doka Avong in Kajuru Local Government Area of Kaduna State, killing seven persons, including an 85-year-old man there is no denying the fact that the sanguinary notoriety Kaduna is known for has once again surfaced. It was reported that some locals have been declared missing with several houses razed during the attack. Unarguably not helping matter was the unfounded statement attributed to the Kaduna State Governor, Mallam Nasir el-Rufai that banditry attacks were occurring everywhere in the North-West States of the country, adding that incessant attacks in Southern Kaduna were laced with ethnic and religious colourations. With the unguarded statement, not a few groups and individuals have berated the governor for making the unsubstantiated statement about the massacre in the state. To put it in pidgin parlance, the governor was like saying “Make una leave us alone. Nor be today. Dem dey also kill for other places. Nor be only Kaduna”.

It is not an exaggeration to say that while millions of people find it difficult slaughtering chickens, goats and other domestic animals, killers in Southern Kaduna ironically, have seemingly been deriving pleasure in exterminating the lives of others without even blinking their eyelids. In fact, the life of any man in the estimation of these wicked killers is just what can be called a “KoboWorth” in this context.

It is germane to say that screaming and gruesome news headlines in newspapers cast in the similitude of “Again, gunmen kill seven in Southern Kaduna”, Southern Kaduna Killings: You Have Failed, Group Tells El-Rufai” and dozens of other screaming headlines; both offline and online no longer holds anyone spellbound nor stir their emotions anymore as they are becoming the new normal.

In a state of lamentation over how reckless human life is being terminated by each passing day in the hands conscienceless killers in Southern Kaduna, I overheard a colleague jokingly opined that “Killers in Kaduna may not resist the predilection to kill their fellow Nigerians as they see the lives of fellow Nigerians to worth not more than a kobo.” He may not be wrong because it seems Killers in that part of the country see human lives as worthless. Succinctly put, it appears they no longer see the lives of others as priceless. The callous manner people are being killed these days in Southern Kaduna, no doubt, indicates that human life has totally lost its value. One may not be wrong to insist that life is “KoboWorth” in the estimation of rampaging Killers in Kaduna and the elites that are ostensibly maintaining what can in this context be called conspiracy of silence, and making unfounded statements.

In reality, this writer, and other sane Nigerians will not evaluate the lives of others, and conclude that it is “KoboWorth”. Unfortunately, the value, which killers in Kaduna have ostensibly placed on human life, suggests it is valueless, even if conclusion will continue to defy logical reasoning.

Permit me to say that contrary to what many people think concerning Islam as a religion, that murder is strictly forbidden in the Qur’an. Qur’an 6:151 says, “And do not kill a soul that God has made sacrosanct, save lawfully.” (I.e. murder is forbidden but the death penalty imposed by the state for a crime is permitted). 5:53 says, “… whoso kills a soul, unless it be for murder or for wreaking corruption in the land, it shall be as if he had killed all mankind; and he who saves a life, it shall be as if he had given life to all mankind.”

A similitude of the foregoing spiritual injunction in the Christendom explains that right from the womb, the life of man has been valuable in the eyes of God. For example, in Psalm 22 verse 10, David said “From birth I was cast upon you; from my mother’s womb you have been my God.”

Though, this piece is not a sermon, suffice it to say that David also in Psalm 139 verse 14 said, “I praise you because I am fearfully and wonderfully made; your works are wonderful, I know that full well.” Life is so precious and valuable that a hackneyed aphorism aptly says “Life has no duplicate”.

From moral perspective, does it mean that killers that are presently giving fellow Nigerians in Southern Kaduna sleepless nights are so trigger-happy that they enjoy killing others? Does it mean that their collective conscience has been sired by the devil? They are supposed to have it since conscience is physiologically inherent in any living human being.

The inspiration to write this piece emanated from the fact that human life cannot continue to be taken by each passing day through the sanguinary activities of rampaging killers across the country; not just in Kaduna but in every part of the country. Also, the inspiration to write this piece is to sensitize fellow Nigerians that we cannot continue to live in this Hobbesian state of nature that is short, brutish, and nasty. The society we are presently living in is not too different from the proverbial dog-eat-dog society. In fact, leaders in the three tiers of government should try as much as they could to ensure that the killings across the country are nip in the bud. After all, Thomas Jefferson of blessed memory was quoted to have said that “The care of human life and happiness, and not their destruction, is the first and only object of good government.”