Ceding Kaduna-Abuja road to bandits

On Thursday, April 11, the acting Inspector General of Police, Mr. Mohammed Adamu, claimed that the Abuja-Kaduna highway had been made safe for all travellers. Briefing State House correspondents on the outcome of a security meeting between President Muhammadu Buhari, service chiefs and the heads of other security agencies at the Presidential Villa, Abuja, Adamu said: “I want to assure Nigerians that the Kaduna-Abuja road is now safe. We have cleared the road, we have arrested a lot of kidnappers and some of them were fatally injured during the confrontation we had with them.” But in a statement released on Sunday, April 14, the police indicated that it had just engaged in a shootout with kidnappers, gunning down nine of the suspects operating on the highway. The suspects, the statement said, were killed during an exchange of gunfire between them and police operatives at a forest, adding that two members of the gang escaped with gunshot wounds. Recovered from the suspects were six AK-47 rifles, one pump-action gun, 1,206 rounds of AK-47 ammunition, seven magazines, 28 cartridges and 158 expended shells. While reiterating his call for public support for the police and other agencies, the IGP assured that the war against armed bandits would soon be won.

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Two weeks ago, over 30 commuters were allegedly kidnapped by gunmen on the highway. The Police Public Relations Officer for the Kaduna State Command, DSP Yakubu Sabo, confirmed the incident but could not confirm the number of victims involved. The police spokesman said a Toyota Hilux van was recovered with a bank cheque and a lady’s shoes at a village called Gidan Busa, about 40 kilometres from Kaduna, the Kaduna State capital. It will be recalled that in 2017, reports indicated that most affluent Nigerians, including former top military officers and the political and economic elite, had abandoned the Abuja-Kaduna highway, opting for rail transport because of the incidences of kidnapping and banditry. Two years on, it is saddening that the situation has not been noticeably bettered. In spite of the assurances by IGP Adamu, the road is still far from safe for travellers and given the fact that most Nigerians cannot afford air transport while rail transport remains unattractive, the situation calls for concern. Without doubt, the police had indeed adopted various measures to restore order on the highway. This explains the killing on nine bandits last week. But it is nevertheless a fact that bandits have continued to lay a siege on the highway, creating mayhem and causing panic among travellers. Many innocent Nigerians have lost their lives on the highway and many more have been maimed for life. The police may be trying their best, but as a Nigerian proverb puts it, the boiling water in the pot is too excessive for the yam powder at hand to make a fine meal.

Instructively, the Nigerian Railway Corporation recently deployed two coaches to complement the ones already being used as the rail sector takes advantage of the predicament of motorists on the Kaduna-Abuja highway. When people abandon a road like the Kaduna-Abuja highway for security reasons, it needs no fortune telling to realise that the Nigerian state has effectively yielded that route to criminals. Indeed, if retired Generals have decided to avoid that road, what would be the fate of ordinary Nigerians? Truth be told, the Kaduna-Abuja road is a metaphor for a failed state. It speaks to the emptiness and incompetence of both the Muhammadu Buhari-led Federal Government and the Nasir el-Rufai-led Kaduna State government. For a nation increasingly divided along ethnic and religious lines, the situation portends danger, particularly in the possibility of disenchanted citizens resorting to self-help and thereby blurring the lines of civility and legality. If the conduct of the Federal Government is anything to go by, it is almost as if the situation is nothing to bother about, as it has everything perfectly worked out. But it does not, and there is a real question whether it even intends to take the situation seriously enough to address it with novel strategies.

To be sure, rail transport, particularly where modernised, is desirable. As a matter of fact, the country cannot make meaningful progress until the rails are working, and very efficiently too. But a situation whereby people resort to rail transport only to save their lives is both worrisome and foreboding, not least because those who made the roads impassable can equally make the rails undesirable. We urge the government to cease its impertinence in pontificating about foreign direct investment while toying with security issues. It should face the issue of security squarely. Governance is problem-solving. Enough of grandstanding on the challenges of security on the Kaduna-Abuja highway and other parts of the country.