Insecurity: The Northern Leaders’ Incongruous Silence

By Kazeem Akintunde

My brother and colleague, Reuben Buhari, wrote an article on his Facebook page that left me traumatized and depressed for days. It was based on the testimony of a man living in a community that has entered into an agreement with Boko Haram terrorists.

Reuben and I worked together at Leadership Newspapers for several years. I was based in Lagos as Deputy Editor while he was a pair of strong hands in Kaduna State. When I was promoted as Editor of one of the titles and had to relocate to Abuja, Reuben became a veritable source of exclusive news for me and we became close. Both of us have since left the newspaper, but we remain friends on social media.

Last week, his article was a sad story of what has become of the community where he was born in Kaduna State. I have taken the liberty to reproduce the story below, with little or no editing. 

Be warned: Some issues in this post may be disturbing. 

This is the back of someone, (picture of a man with his back to the camera and face covered) who lives in a community that has entered into an agreement with Fulani kidnappers following repeated attacks. The community is now in its third year living alongside bandits.

I chose to show only his back to protect his identity. It took him a week to leave his community, which I will not name, but it’s in Kajuru LGA, Kaduna State.

The man you see is married with 5 children, but his wife doesn’t belong to him since the agreement was entered into. The kidnappers sleep with her whenever they feel the urge, sometimes while the children watch. If he protests, he will be shot. The same thing happened to all the women in the village. If a kidnapper leaves a blanket in front of your house or drops a stick, it’s a sign that he will sleep in your house with your wife or daughter that day, while you sleep outside. 

This man, like other families, can’t leave the village now, though some have managed to. If you are caught, you will be shot. If you are seen walking with a bag, you will be searched. They are allowed to farm, but one quarter of the harvest goes to the bandits. They aren’t allowed to own a phone, though a few have found a way around it. If you are caught, you will be shot.

You can’t wear any new clothes. A bandit will simply tell you he needs them. They aren’t allowed to own torchlights. Only bandits can own torchlights in the village. You can only own an old motorcycle. They take any new one they see. It’s the bandits who buy petrol and sell it to those with motorcycles in the village. 

They aren’t allowed to own a machete; only hoes and diggers are permitted for farming. 

They can visit villages that have also entered into an agreement with the bandits. If they want to buy anything from a village that hasn’t entered into an agreement, it’s their wives who are allowed to go. If the wives don’t return, the husbands and children will be shot. If the men want to go to an outside market to buy anything or sell grain, their wives and children stay behind. 

Youths in the community are forced to accompany the bandits to steal or kidnap. They are forced to ride the motorcycles while the bandits sit behind them with guns. If you refuse to go, you are shot. 

They can’t hold any church service on Sunday unless the bandits are not around.  

Schools in those communities do not function because teachers have abandoned them. Likewise, primary health centers (PHCs)s do not function. 

Everything is controlled by the terrorists. Sometimes, they pick people from the community and shoot them to show what will happen to anyone who disobeys them.  

This is just a summary of the chilling things this man said. 

There are more than 20 communities in Kajuru LGA, about 30 in Kachia LGA, and dozens in Chikun LGA that have entered into such agreements with these kidnappers and are living under similarly harsh conditions. Though the conditions vary, but most have no freedom at all.

I read the chilling accounts above and sleep deserted me for days. Are we in a society governed? Law and order seem to be foreign terms to most Nigerians now. Specifically, do we still have any semblance of governance in Kaduna in particular and in most northern states in general?! Are we going to continue like this and pretend that we have a nation? 

Reuben’s chilling post has attracted over 2,000 comments on Facebook, with revelations that many communities in the North have entered into such agreements with bandits and kidnappers so that they would not be ‘attacked’ by the criminals. My take is that the loss of their freedom, dignity, livelihoods and their families qualify as attacks nonetheless. Signing their freedoms to bandits that make sex slaves of their wives and children is the worst form of attack. 

In one of the comments, a woman who claimed to be a health worker said that women are now willingly coming to her facility for family planning interventions.  When questioned as to why when they are legally married, they confided in her that they are daily being raped by bandits and terrorists in their own homes and their husband remain helpless and powerless. They carry the shame around but are determined not to have children for the bandits, hence their resolve for family planning interventions.

The same author, Rueben Buhari, in another post titled: The Expanding Danger We Are Toying With, wrote: “A looming danger posed by these armed kidnappers, who are ravaging parts of northern Nigeria, is that they are consolidating their hold over large swaths of empty land. This is how they achieve it: they consistently attack a community, then later ask the community to enter into an agreement with them. Once they secure that, they move on to the next village. If you refuse the agreement, they intensify the attack until you agree, or you run and abandon your village, which fits their plan – they now have space. 

‘Also, if you refuse to enter into an agreement, members of your community are kidnapped and held for a long time, subjected to constant beatings and food deprivation. Some are killed. Under pressure, your community could be forced to enter into this agreement and effectively become their slaves.

‘They set up their camps around those abandoned communities. That’s where kidnapped victims are brought and held. The kidnappers also settle there with their families. As they kidnap, they earn money to buy more arms, motorcycles, and to keep growing, so they can take over more communities.  

‘Through these, the kidnappers now control a large swath of previously inhabited territory across Chikun, Kajuru, and Kachia LGAs. The most prominent is the one around Rijana. I have spoken to several kidnapping victims, who say that they were held in a camp about a day’s trek from Rijana village. One man said the camp holds about 80 victims brought from different communities.

‘According to several victims’ testimonies, that’s the camp where both the Ariko and Awon victims are currently being held. Victims are brought in, ransom is paid, and they are freed. As they are freed, more are kidnapped and brought in. The camp is constantly refilled and constantly generating millions of Naira and motorcycles. That’s why most villages in the area have been attacked until they were abandoned. The survivors are now taking refuge in Rijana, Katari, Jere, and even in Kachia towns, amongst others.’’

For his advocacy on social media, Buhari has been invited by the Department of State Services (DSS) in Kaduna. His community members are angry and they are presently mobilising themselves to go with him whenever he is ready. Several lawyers are also pledging free legal aid for him.

In one of his previous posts, he alluded to the fact that a local government Chairman in Kaduna State has been complaining about his advocacy on Facebook and that he has been severally warned to keep quiet.

It is the culture of keeping quiet that has pushed the North to where it is today. Many of their leaders kept quiet when the Boko Haram crisis started almost two decades ago. Some were even in bed with the late Boko Haram leader and founder, Mohammed Yusuf, before he was eventually killed by the military. At present, large portions of land are in the effective control of Boko Haram fighters across several states in the North.

In Katsina State, up to 17 or more out of the states’ 34 local government areas are designated as severe frontline security flashpoints heavily impacted by armed banditry. The local councils most severely troubled by bandit activity, often bordering the Rugu Forest and other vulnerable corridors include Batsari, Jibia, Safana, Danmusa, Kankara, Faskari, Kurfi, Sabuwa, and Dandume. Many of these communities have, in the past, entered into agreements with the bandits, negotiated by community leaders and traditional councils.

In Kwara State, certain remote or border communities experience security breaches, occasional bandits raids, and kidnapping attempts rather than territorial occupation. Heavily impacted districts within local governments such as Ifelodun, Ekiti, Patigi, Edu, Irepodun, Isin and Oke-Ero have also faced sporadic criminal activity and localized security interventions. It is the same scenario in several states up North.

Many northern youths who fear being kidnapped and disinterested in joining the bandits have found their ways southward, where they have taken up menial jobs to survive. In Lagos State alone, there are over 50,000 Northen youths, majority of them without any formal education, who have taken to riding Okada to eke out a living. Those that are not riding Okada are into other menial jobs. They wake up and sleep anywhere they find themselves, with most of them becoming security risks in Lagos. It is the same scenario in almost all the states in the southern region of the country.

It is the culture of NOT keeping quiet in the South west that made the difference when kidnappers struck in Oriire Local government area of Oyo State, where school children and their teachers were abducted from their classrooms. Many Yoruba leaders joined the vanguard to get the victims released and the media also made the story front-page news. After persistent pressure, the kidnappers were forced to release their victims while the terrorists have been arrested and are now having their day in court.

Northern leaders should emulate their counterparts in the South west and rise in unison to condemn banditry and kidnapping. It is abnormal for Northern leaders to want to turn banditry and kidnapping into a normal day-to-day occurrence in their jurisdictions. Even the Qur’an, the holy book of the most practiced religion in the region is against deliberately hurting a fellow human being, and they should all rise to condemn it instead of tagging miscreants as their ‘’brothers.’’

Security agents should go after these elements that have turned most parts of the North to no-go areas. Rueben Buhari is not their problem. No right-thinking person should expect silence in the face of these atrocities against humanity, whether the victims are from their communities or not.  We owe it a moral duty to be our brother’s keeper.  The North is bleeding, and until their leaders choose to take the bull by the horns and tackle this highly disturbing menace, the region may eventually drag the entire country down the precipice.

See you next week.