Post-Election Violence in Nigeria - My take and suggestive prevention
So the papers carried it. Election violence in the north. This got me asking a simple question. What is the role of our numerous security outfit? Does any Nigerian remember the good old days when people were scared to hear the phrase C.I.D (Crime Investigation Department). Its been a long time I heard that phrase been used. In the good old days once you threaten to report a person to the C.I.D,you get instant apology from whoever that person is. But these days,not the same anymore. We even have people beating their chest on how much trouble they gave the police, how they beat up a police officer like that is some trophy. Before I derail from the above topic, I think its best I stick to my initial intention for writing this post.
I woke up this morning and decided to do a sweep of my Gmail messages for the morning. Checking my mail is suddenly a routine to my waking up ever since I got my android phone. As one of the new services Google added to it’s superb email service is the Google Buzz service. Talking about Buzz later. I happen to have a follower who posted the following question :
As a private citizen, how would you end the post-election violence in the north and prevent reprisals in the south? Any ideas?
I noticed a few views as regards pleading with the south not to retaliate. Good intentions but its easy to think this way when you are not directly involved with a loss. I mean will you not be thinking of reprisal when your dear loved one was cut down because some illiterate northerner who probably isn’t aware of election rules thinks his candidate was suppose to win.I mean youth corpers where been slaughtered like bush meat. How can a person round up 50 corpers put them in a house and set the house on fire? Tell me there is more to this than just pure anger with the election result. I would love to express my full anger on the mentality of the people in the north but in reality its not really their fault. I also blame our government and duplicate security outfits and agencies for the post election violence.So what are the suggestive prevention tactics :
- The North needs to be aware that they too have loved ones living in the south. And that as they attack other southerners who are there in the north for the sake of business, that they have their relatives living in the south as well. I mean would you attack a neighbor if you knew that he could return the same gesture possibly in a greater magnitude. Maybe ones or twice the south should go mad just like the north does at times. I feel that way the north would be aware that there are also mad people in the south as well. Am I a supporter of violence? No am not. Don’t get me wrong but I belief and have experience that people take you for granted if you remain quiet. People will continue to poke you in painful places as long as you don’t respond. A response or two should be enough to create the expected awareness.
- 90% of my blame goes to the security outfit. Every Nigerian knows how inefficient our police force is. Statistics I heard over the radio, suggest that we have 1 policeman to 400 persons and in total we have about 100 thousand policemen. The police system to begin with doesn’t not provide a good educational environment for police officer recruited from the lower ranks. This ranks are those who have no university degree or just OND or something like that. There was a time when people were scared of joining the police force because of the fear of getting shot by armed robbers.But today the case is different. People join the police force with the hope of escaping unemployment. Our police force is ill equipped and so I really don’t blame the officers for the inefficiency in providing that protection for the tax payers. I as a private citizen expected this post election violence and am sure the security outfit were aware of potential trouble spots. So the question is why wasn’t this prevented. Why weren’t the security bodies mobilized to ensure this doesn’t happen. But yeah they were deployed right after the violence erupted and the destruction had escalated. Now they are on the street to prevent reprisal. How grand. My solution equip security unit,provide a good and continuous education program for them. I guess they will begin to see themselves with a lot more self esteem than they do now. Am sure a policeman who entered with nothing and finally attains the equivalent of a university degree will have pride in been a police officer. There should be a minimum means to defend themselves. We are constantly in a situation where you have 6 officers and on 2 have the means to protect themselves. The rest have road side sticks..like they are policing scape goats.
- Education for the north. Most northerners are not aware of the other parts of the country. They are not aware of how the rest of the country thinks.So in my opinion they are myopic about the Nigeria they belong to. How will education improve this.First the few Northerners who happen to go to school end up going to some religious based school. I for one thought that religion from the start condemns violence. So my take is to help them mix better with the south may be, I repeat may be that will ease things a little.
I warn again that this is my own view of things which could be affected by my mood as I was writing this article. Ask me questions on this later, I may not even remember what I wrote. So don’t take this words of mine as a means to judge my personality.
