ON Tuesday last week, while returning to Abuja from Kano, a member of the House of Representatives, Honourable Garba Durbunde, was kidnapped by gunmen. As soon as his colleagues got to know of this, they pulled all the strings they knew and secured his release less than 24 hours after his abduction. Durbunde stayed the night of Tuesday with his abductors, but was in the warm embrace of his family by Wednesday night.
In September last year, Mrs Margaret Emefiele, wife of the governor of Central Bank of Nigeria, Godwin Emefiele, was abducted along the Benin-Agbor Road. Immediately this got to the hearing of the authorities, the Inspector-General of Police Special Monitoring and Intelligence Team was dispatched to the area and in record time, the release of the CBN governor’s wife was secured.
But unfortunately the same spirited sprint with which the ruling class rescues its members who got caught in the net of kidnappers has not been replicated in the cases of those considered to be outside the circle of the powerful. For about 11 days now, two principals and six students of Lagos State Model College, Igbo Nla in Epe, Lagos State, have been in the custody of kidnappers, yet only promises have been made by the police and government, nothing concrete has been achieved. No Inspector-General of Police Special Monitoring and Intelligence Team has been dispatched; no air surveillance has been carried out to rescue these people. The type of swiftness witnessed in the cases of both Mrs Emefiele and Honourable Durbunde is patently lacking in this particular situation. If there was any doubt about the non-importance of the average Nigerian, this case has completely erased it. While the thought of an honourable member of the National Assembly or the wife of the apex bank governor spending nights in the custody of kidnappers is repugnant to the authorities, they believe that having school children and their teachers kept perpetually by abductors will not cause much damage to the system. Therefore, while the whole machinery of the state was deployed to ensure the rescue of the important ones who fell prey to kidnappers, the concerned authorities are not as keen to ensure early release of the less important Nigerians.
Now, parents of the abducted kids are at a loss on what to do to save their children, family members of the abducted principal are confused about what steps to take to get their people released from their abductors. None of them is sure if those in custody will ever regain freedom. If they believe that their relations will eventually be released, they are not sure when, how or where it will happen. The only thing they have to hold on to is hope. But delayed hope gives birth to frustration and frustration results in desperation. If the family members believe that the state is not as interested in their situation as it ought to be, they are likely to result to self help in desperation and begin to negotiate with the kidnappers. But should that really be the case? In sane climes, the life of the peasant is as important as that of the president. But unfortunately that is not the situation in Nigeria.
In Nigeria, it is a sin to be poor. In Nigeria, it is a sin to be insignificant. In Nigeria, it is a sin not to belong to the ruling class. In Nigeria, the state protects the rich, the significant and the ruling class but leaves the rest to suffer. Those who do not belong to the ruling class are expendable; their lives are not worth a piece of paper. The majority of the policemen in the country are deployed to protect the rich and members of the ruling class but the masses are left without police protection. The estates occupied by the high and mighty are well taken care of, but the areas where the hoi polloi live are bereft of life-enhancing facilities. The teeming masses of civil servants may not be paid their salaries for a whole year and the stipend paid retirees may be allowed to accumulate for 56 months, but the salaries and allowances of the ruling class, including the security vote of the governors must be paid promptly. The thousands of internally displaced people in various camps may go without food for days, but countless number of cows must be slaughtered on a daily basis in various state houses to feed the few tens that occupy those mansions. The rich and the powerful sure know how to take care of their ilk.
Though the poor claim to own this country, but in reality, Nigeria belongs to the rich, the poor merely exist as statistics. This is why the rich and the mighty ride roughshod over the poor and make living in the country hellish for the masses. In Nigeria, being poor is worse than being condemned to eternal damnation.
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