–By Austen Akhagbeme:
It is most disturbing and disheartening that nothing moves anyone anymore in this country; not even the government of the day.
Just a few weeks ago, the advance convoy of the nation’s number one citizen was attacked by bandits on the same day that Kuje prison was attacked and about a thousand inmates were freed. Up until now, no decisive step is known to have been taken yet to address this novelty of a taboo in the history of our security system.
As I write this, cyberspace is awash with the video of the ISWAP terrorists unleashing violence on the remaining abducted victims of the Kaduna-bound train attack while threatening to abduct the nation’s President and another top government official in no distant time.
How did we get to this appalling stage of our national life where bandits and terrorists can so threaten the state, her instrumentality and her people with such audacity, bravado and a reckless braggadocio?
Why are these terrorists becoming more and more audacious, vicious and daring in their actions and utterances by the day? What do they know that the rest of the Nigerian security apparachik are oblivious about?
It is so nauseating to think that we can now all be enclosed within the fiercely and fearful fiefdom of these agents of darkness without an assuring respite of their imminent extermination from the side of the state and her representatives.
This is worrisome, especially now that the threat is being directed to the very unusual quarters, like the President and his tributary of power.
Let us all join our voices in the collective condemnation of this seemingly innocuous but deadly threat to our nation and her people. Perhaps, by so doing, the government may wake up to her onerous responsibility of providing safety and security for us all, especially in these days when most Nigerians sleep with their eyes wide open.
- Austen Akhagbeme is a Columnist with Blank NEWS Online
