The North rips through the moral landscape of Nigeria like a lawn mower. And this is not about whether big men in the North remember to write critical exams, have traceable certificates or have none. This is about the atrocious orgy of physical violence that has forever been the very definition of northern Nigeria.
As the Shiite crisis was on last week, a certain Mohammed Sani Katsina was on Facebook lamenting that “Northern Nigeria is the centre of bloodshed, intolerance, poverty, illiteracy and backwardness.” He said he loved his region but had “to tell this bitter truth” and that “it is the only region where you can find someone celebrating the death of his neighbour because of sectarian differences.”
Torrents of reactions followed that comment. He was attacked by some of his brothers from the north; one called him a “Wahhabi idiot.” We know the meaning of ‘idiot’ but can you check what ‘Wahhabi’ means so that the ideological import of the North’s tragedy can be properly brought home? Some of Sani Katsina’s southern Facebook compatriots hailed him – and then abused the North for being “the problem of Nigeria.”
History says that the Facebook poster was probably right. Eternal godfather of Northern Nigeria, Sir Lord Lugard, in 1902 lamented in writing that every year, there was always an eschatological troublemaker in the North wearing the garb of a Mahdi (messiah) and making a killing field of the arid region. That was 120 years ago. And nothing has changed since.
Killings and mayhem historically define our North. The 1953 Kano riots officially claimed 46 lives. What caused it? The North was opposed to the South’s demand for Nigeria’s independence from Britain, and so there were riots. A British army officer, Dennis William Lyndon, who commanded some of the troops that quelled the riots, never forgot his galling experience seeing “women and children … their arms lopped off with machetes and fuel thrown over them before they were set alight.” He said it was one of the worst of his experiences as an officer of the British army.
Life does not appear to have any meaning up North. There is no evidence that it does. Can you recall how precious children of southerners who were doing the national youth service were killed in some northern states after the 2011 elections? A friend recounted similar killings in 2010 (as reported by the Nigerian Compass newspaper then) and it was horrible: “They have entered our neighbour’s house… I can hear screams of people being shot… Ah! They have broken down the door to our house…They are climbing the stairs… We are all upstairs… Yes, mummy, we are six corps members… We are all here. Mummy! Mummy!… They have entered our room…” The phone went dead. It rang again.
“Hello? Hello? Tunde, speak up. Is that you?”
A husky voice spoke from the other end: “We have killed him. We killed all of them.”
The phone went dead. Permanently. No one was apprehended for these and all other killings. The dead were just another set of blood sacrifice the South had to place at the ever thirsty shrine of the North.
The same Kasuwan Magani where the latest Kaduna mayhem started witnessed a similar harvest of deaths in 1980. It was a riot that started almost as the last one. The moment Northern Nigeria’s train of blood and death decides to move, nothing stands in its way. Not the police; not the army. It was in Zango Kataf and Gure-Kahugu in 1987, and, later that year, it operated in Kafanchan. It then roared round the North spreading to Katsina, Funtua, Zaria, Kankia and Daura — hundreds of lives were lost. There were also the Jerein riots of 1989 and the Tafawa Balewa riots of 1991 which claimed thousands of lives. The latter was caused by what? A trade misunderstanding between a Christian butcher and some Hausa/Fulani people. In the same Tafawa Balewa in 2001, three weeks of violence and arson claimed 100 lives with several others wounded.
The killers of these eras would be in their 50s and 60s now. I shudder to think that some of them who managed to get education could be among our decision makers and takers today. They could be lawmakers and even governors. They could be in the army, the police and other security forces. I wonder how well they are serving Nigeria and its laws now.
The North has no answer to these killings. What it has is an army of disinherited, uneducated, uneducable or ill-educated youths who vent their anger on the society, killing with glee. On December 26, 1994 while millions around the world were in end of the year celebration mood, a certain Gideon Akaluka was being beheaded in Kano. His killers were his accusers. They said he blasphemed and must die. He was arrested by the police, remanded in prison. But those who would commit that murder had no trust in (and respect for) the Nigerian law. They invaded the prison, overpowered the warders, seized their suspect and cut off his head. With the head on a stake, they danced round the city. The Nigerian Tribune correspondent who got the photograph of that bizarre celebratory procession had to flee Kano forever – because he was to be the next victim. It has always been that bad.
In 2015, out of 17,031 violent deaths recorded in Nigeria, religious extremism took 9,464 — and all in Northern Nigeria. Indeed, according to The Nigeria Watch Project (2016), religious extremism in Northern Nigeria took 32,842 lives from June 1, 2006 to May 31, 2016. Two weeks ago, scores died in Kaduna. Last week, Amnesty International said 45 Shiites were killed by security forces in Abuja. The next figure can just be imagined. It is in the belly of time.
The street war of last week in Abuja and the violent response of the state would shock a normal people. But Nigeria is an abnormal entity; nothing shocks it and its people. So, we have moved on to new possibilities in disaster mining. And the North is very adept at birthing mayhem. You do not have to be told that the stone-throwing Shiites who got shot last week were essentially northerners. It was apparent.
The cost of blood and death in the North is enormous to all of us. And it is not just in terms of corpses counted and uncounted. In naira and kobo, can you guess how much has been lost to the Boko Haram war, the herdsmen killings, the Zamfara banditry and the North’s several other inter-ethnic mayhem? Money that would be used to cure Nigeria of its debilitating ailments are spent yearly on the North’s cancerous afflictions. And northern leaders, where are they in all these? You hardly hear them speak on how to stop the Almajiri system. Why? It is serving their politics. Or, I may be wrong. And as the North misbehaves, the gasp down South is: Why these people all the time? Se awon nikan ni?
So, what then is the solution or the river of blood will continue its unceasing flow? It has been convenient for successive governments to do what Muhammadu Buhari has been doing on these crises- fighting fire with fire. Confronting violence in northern Nigeria with state violence has served to kill insurgents. But there is always a resurgence which suggests that something fundamental is required. The easiest way is not always the best way. In fact, that way may lead to failure and greater disaster. Using soldiers to quell disturbances, as we are addicted to, can be inhuman, illegal, even criminal. It can only serve temporary official purposes – buying time for disaster to flay peace. What is needed is what is missing in the life of the ordinary Northerner. He needs good education — right education. Ignorance breeds stupidity and vulnerability.
In the 1980s, the North harboured a sect which forbade its adherents from wearing wristwatches and having buttons on their shirts. And that sect was very popular on the streets of the North. It has always been that bad. It is lack of education that would make a sane person believe that soldiers on duty were holding “toy guns”! Soldiers! But I heard it in one of the Shiite videos of the Abuja violence of last week. The voice running the commentary in the background was heard responding to sounds of AK47 in pidgin with Hausa accent: “Na lie, toy gun ne.” And stone-throwing young men believed him, surged forward and replied guns with stones…May the souls of the dead rest In peace.
