The Killing in Katsina: Our Dear President Buhari -By Yusuf Hassan

Dear President Muhammadu Buhari, I hope this meets you well.

Your Excellency, after the initial euphoria that greeted us of your victory as the President of Nigeria to power, we were also for once-proud that one of our own is there to help us overcome our problem. Security is one of your areas of core competence from your training and orientation. You said in many instances that what Nigeria lacked was leadership. You promised to provide that leadership. Our expectations were that leadership as you promised was to provide swift and decisive action which entails emotional presence and motivation.

Your Excellency, you may know well that your homeland, Katsina State is gradually becoming another major regional theatre of violence and has been a hotbed of killings by bandits and kidnappings. Life of citizens in most regions simply means misery and pain with high-level of poverty, hunger, trauma, and long-suffering accompanied but you have only chosen to maintain a studied silence which is not golden but hurting and heart-rending.

The rate at which the killing rise in the state is on the ascendency, and will soon reach an alarming height if radical measures are not put in place to check the major that contribute to the unpleasant development. Every day, rampaging gangs of armed bandits have engaged in violent acts, attacking, abducting, killing, raping and robbing villagers and travelers, and engaging in cattle rustling.   In Batsari, Safana, Jibia, Sabuwa, Dandume, Danmusa, Kankara, Faskari; Control is so weak that bandits can storm into rural towns, typically three-up on a motorbike wielding machetes and guns, invade communities, killing, maiming and abducting for long hours unchecked and unchallenged have become a daily routine.

These atrocities are unending. Bandits and kidnappers communicate with community and families of victims for weeks, using GSM phones, yet, security agents are unable to track and smoke them out. The peace accorded to them by the state government has collapsed with renewed attacks across the local governments of the state.

In those local governments, one often wakes up without his pillow soaked in tears, many being displaced, and most having to deal with post-traumatic stress disorders at various places with many killed and several others abducted.

Your Excellency, that this is your government. Long after you have gone, you’ll be remembered for what you have done and how many interventions you have made. Many past successive regimes have in different ways made efforts, mostly futile or counter-productive.   In street parlance, it is said that whenever and wherever there is a crisis, any onlooker is either a villain or a conspirator. We cannot agree more.

The life of every Nigerian should be precious to the government and should be treated as such. What we need now is an emergency response and a holistic review of the security framework with actions. You must take the necessary steps to ensure that those found culpable of involvement in these crimes are punished to serve as a deterrent to others.

Your silence is not golden. What we expect less is the government to protect the lives and property of all Nigerians irrespective of class or creed.

It is now left to you, Mr. President to act and act now!   Whatever it takes, Katsina people’s lives must matter.

Yusuf Hassan writes from Katsina.