Christian faithful at the St. Ignatius Quasi Parish of the Catholic Church, Ayar Mbalom village, in Gwer East Local Government Area of Benue State, certainly did not have any premonition that the gathering of Tuesday, April 24, was going to be their last act of worship.
The parishioners had gathered as early as 5.30am for the early morning Mass as is the practice in the Catholic circles. But all of a sudden, gunmen suspected to be bellicose Fulani herdsmen invaded the church and started pumping hot lead on the worshippers.
At the last count, 17 church members and two priests lay dead, as the hallowed sanctuary of the church was violated and desecrated with men, women, boys and girls drenched in a pool of their blood.
No doubt, the latest Benue incident has vindicated the controversial expressions of elder statesman and former Army Defence Chief, Gen. Theophilus Danjuma (retd.) that the average Nigerian would do well to give vent to self-defence, as the government is no longer there to defend them
Soon after the killings, the suspected herders disappeared into the thin air, leaving no trace till date as neither the police nor other security outfits have yet to come up with any cheery clue as to who the killers at dawn were, much less make any arrest.
Outraged, the Catholic community issued a statement to express its disappointment with Nigeria’s security outfits, and by inference, the Federal Government, condemning the authorities’ lack-lustre approach or even, utter inaction in the face of reckless killings of defenceless citizens by a combination of Boko Haram insurgents and gun-totting herdsmen.
It was worrisome poring through an emotive statement by the Catholic Diocese of Makurdi, signed by its Director of Communications, Fr. Moses Iorapuu, who gave the names of the slain Reverend Fathers as Joseph Gor and Felix Tyolaha. The church demanded justice and sought for government protection, noting that things were already getting out of hands in Benue State.
Touching still, is the fact that it was the slain Fr. Gor who, through what he had posted on his Facebook on January 3, this year, had actually reinforced common suspicion that those who exterminated the early morning worshippers were Fulani herdsmen, grazing in the Ayar Mbalom neighbourhood.
The deceased cleric had then posted, “Living in fear. The Fulanis are still around us here in Mbalom. They refused to go. They still graze along. No weapon to defend ourselves.”
This is to recall, however, that Gor raised the alarm on the social media, in the wake of the gruesome killings of Benue locals by Fulani herdsmen, in which no fewer than 85 persons were mowed down. The streak of killings in Benue between December 2017 and the New Year season of 2018 was so gory and benumbing that it attracted international outrage, with the United Nations tasking the home government here to rise up to the occasion of protecting the lives of its citizens.
In neigbouring Taraba and Adamawa too, where, like Benue, the herders have had a long history of territorial hostilities with the native farmers, killings of harmless natives are now a recurring decimal, and on each occasion such bloodshed was perpetrated, the police were quick to issue their trite and perfunctory statement of ‘we will do all within our powers to track down the perpetrators and bring them to book.’ In reality, however, the hapless, bereaved persons would bury their dead and return home, mourning and bearing the attendant pains, alone. The road to justice in this clime, it would seem, is closed.
No doubt, the latest Benue incident has vindicated the controversial expressions of elder statesman and former Army Defence Chief, Gen. Theophilus Danjuma (retd.) that the average Nigerian would do well to give vent to self-defence, as the government was no longer there to defend them.
But should that be the case in a country that appropriates the lion’s share of its annual budget to defence? In 2017, for instance, defence was one of the four sectors that got the highest allocation in the year’s budget, with a total sum of N465.87 billion allocated to it. In the same vein, the Ministry of Interior got the highest recurrent allocation of N482.37 billion and N63 billion capital vote, respectively. So how come the security outfits were always outsmarted and outgunned by ethno-religious militias, insurgents and other hoodlums?
It is equally disappointing that long after the nation had reached a consensus in public discourse that the solution to the irascible conducts of the killer herdsmen was to establish cattle ranches for them, the Council of State body in its meeting last weekend, finally helped the Muhammadu Buhari administration to endorse the move, apparently to douse rising tension over the Benue disaster.
Sad still is the fact that the Buhari administration has undisguisedly demonstrated cold feet in dealing decisively with the herdsmen malaise, as the government only waits for attacks to occur and then issue lame official statements in condemnation. This is despicable.
Above all, the nation is inching to the reality of the need for a state police format, as it is clear that the localities are under-policed and are often doomed under frequent invasions by nihilists and all manners of modern-day Goths. The response system under the present police structure is factored mainly for the urban areas.
As such, considering, and early too, the idea of having state police looks like the prosaic stitch in time, that saves nine.
