Nigeria’s Fallen Heroes -By Kene Obiezu

As Nigeria continues to battle the extreme evil that terrorism is under its many guises, Nigerians have been spared the worst by those who defend the country.

In North-east Nigeria, soldiers, some scarcely in their twenties, leave family and friends behind to confront terrorists, recover sacked communities and reassure terrorized populations. Many of them have paid the supreme price in defense of their country.

It would be lazy to cite the militarys rigorous discipline which most times jars civilian sensibilities to advocate that no sympathy should be felt for the soldiers at the battlefront; it would even be lazier to simply say that whatever befalls them is their lot as they signed up for the work in the first place. However, the path of reason would be to recognize that someone has to do it as a step to recognizing the impossible conditions under which they battle formidable enemies thanks to Nigerias grotesque embrace of corruption and the corrupt.

The Nigerian police has so many shortcomings. Perhaps, more than any other institution in Nigeria, it is the Police that best captures every angle of Nigerias struggle with impunity, corruption and bad leadership like a master photographer. The events of October 2020 which culminated in the Lekki toll gate massacre continue to haunt a battered country and hound the police.

However, away from their incompetence, there is no doubt that whenever the Police is able to put itself together, Nigerian criminals feel a juddering disruption of their activities.

It is against this background that Nigerians must be collectively horrified at the gruesome murder of two policemen in the Southeast Nigeria by men suspected to belong to the Eastern Security Network ESN), the militant wing of the proscribed group, the Indigenous People of Biafra. Those who carried out the dastardly act even had the stomach to make a video of it which has since circulated online.

It is now beyond argument that perfection cannot be painted into Nigerias wrinkled canvas of national life. Thus, when different institutions and players comingle in Nigerias public space, it is usually a feast of faults and fraud with many coated with the thick tar of corruption.

So, like many other institutions, the police is like a hen sitting on many eggs. Some are utterly rotten, but many are not. Together with other security personnel in the country, they form Nigerias last line of defense against the malevolent force that terrorism is.

It is why there can be no justification whatsoever for killing any of them. It is in the interest of the most vulnerable Nigerians that those who protect them are safe themselves. At each death which befalls a security personnel at the hands of terrorists, national outrage must swirl like dust in a cyclone.

With every officer killed in any of Nigeria`s security agencies, death at the hands of terrorists takes a step closer to an innocent Nigerian; a community draws closer to its day of sack, and many hearts close upon irreparable heartbreak.
But lest those who do these things labour under any misapprehension or illusion whatsoever: they are neither freedom fighters nor heroes. They know nothing about piety. They are savage criminals – bloodthirsty wolves who derive the greatest pleasure from rendering women widows and their children fatherless.

Those who do these things mock the pain and sensibilities of Nigerians who have borne painful witness as a once peaceful and prosperous country has been reduced to a killing field.

They do not speak for and to any right-thinking Nigerian; Nigerians know who their real enemies are; and never again in Nigeria will foe be described as friend no matter the fraud or duress.

Kene Obiezu,
keneobiezu@gmail.com