Martyrs of our savage clime
Two untimely deaths within the last one week tugged at my innards and jolted me back to the reality of the dangerous times we are living through in Nigeria. Coming at a time when we were recording a spate of successes against Boko Haram terrorists in the Northeastern part of the country, these deaths were […]
Two untimely deaths within the last one week tugged at my innards and jolted me back to the reality of the dangerous times we are living through in Nigeria. Coming at a time when we were recording a spate of successes against Boko Haram terrorists in the Northeastern part of the country, these deaths were a real dampener capable of discouraging those who wish the country well and ordinarily would have contributed to its development.
Take the gut-wrenching case of 57-year-old optician, Ian Squire, from Shepperton, Surrey. Fourteen years ago, in 2003, Squire founded a Christian charity organisation, Mission for Vision UK, dedicated to free optical healthcare delivery in partnership with local churches, missionaries and communities in various African countries. Once a year teams of opticians and volunteers are assembled to carry out comprehensive eye care programs in rural areas of the underdeveloped world, predominantly in Africa.
The organisation has carried its mission to the following countries: Uganda – 2003; Uganda – 2005/2009/2012; Ghana – 2006; Burundi – 2010; Nigeria – 2013/2015/2016/2017; Kenya – 2016, among others.
Mission for Vision collected used frames and other materials from the publics through his surgery in Surrey to be donated freely to the poor people in Africa and other poor regions who otherwise would never have been able to pay for the services.
The organisation’s free service included sight testing, dispensing of glasses, provision of protective sunglasses, administering medication, organising and funding cataract operations and funding other local projects which benefit the community. Squire also invented a portable solar-powered frame-and-lens-cutting-machine to enable prescription glasses to be made in remote regions of the world. It was in the process of bringing light to the darkness of the poorest of our poor compatriots that darkness descended on him and his charity in the form of ransom-seeking kidnappers.
Squire and three other members of his group were kidnapped in mid-October from their accommodation in Ekameta, Delta State, in the restive oil-producing south of the country where kidnapping for ransom has become a huge industry. Following negotiations by the British High commission and Nigerian authorities, the three other Britons – David Donovan, his wife Shirley and Alanna Carson were released.
Perhaps the most apt of the many tributes to the life of the great man was the one released by the family: “He was a man constantly pushing the boundaries of generosity with his charity work, the scope of which knew no borders, taking him all the way to developing countries that needed it the most.”
Thankfully, this time the police have swiftly announced the arrest of two of the kidnappers and the shooting to death of a third. Our hearts go out to the Squire family and to all those who have lost loved ones in similar circumstances. The irony of losing one’s life while trying to improve the quality of the lives of total strangers cannot be lost on those of us who live daily under the yoke of sundry social inequities which render our people’s lives miserable, brutish and short. May the reward reserved for those who devote their lives to the service of others not pass Ian Squire by.
The other death that set our teeth on edge was that of 44-year-old Dr. Ibrahim Mailafiya, a computer expert who was killed by armed robbers even after handing over all his belongings to them. Mailafiya had only just returned to Nigeria a few days earlier after his PhD at Leeds. He was all set to resume as head of the computer science department at Nasarawa State University, Keffi.
Dr. B. Bennett, one of his shocked lecturers at Leeds, celebrated the academic whose sun was forced to set at the dawn of a new appointment: “His research was a very practical piece of work about whether artificial intelligence and machine learning could be used to find mineral deposits in Nigeria. He was good company, a respectful and good natured person, as well as being very persistent in his research; he really believed in what he was doing. My thoughts are with his family.”
Mailafiya could have stayed back in the UK or any other part of the world to continue contributing to the body of knowledge in his field. He chose to return home to help train the future generation of leaders. But the armed robbers that waylaid him on the Kaduna-Kano road were not satisfied with taking only his earthly belongings. They shot him to boot.
Within the same period, the social media was active with the story of some British visitors who were attacked on their way from the Murtala Mohammed International Airport to the Eko Hotels Lagos. They had arrived Lagos safely at about 5pm. Traffic was so bad that they spent about three hours in Oshodi. At about 8.20pm four armed robbers struck. They collected foreign and local currency, laptops, bags, phones, international passports , etc. When the foreigners reported the case at the Ilupeju Police Station, they discovered that many other visitors had been similarly attacked around the same axis.
Mercifully, unlike Squire and Mailafiya, they survived to relate their savage experiences.
The dark spots on Nigerian highways are known. Is it too much for the police to mount permanent quick response units around those areas? May the Ultimate Consoler grant succour to the Squires and Mailafiyas in these dark hours. Those untimely deaths further diminish us.