Over 30 explosions rocked Nigeria – More than 300 killed – Investigation
From the October 1st 2010 bomb blast at Eagle Square, the following fourteen months have been a trying period in Nigeria’s history. Although it had experience pockets of armed violence that keep it on its toes, the magnitude of explosions that rocked the country in the past 14 months is something policy-makers and the citizens […]
From the October 1st 2010 bomb blast at Eagle Square, the following fourteen months have been a trying period in Nigeria’s history. Although it had experience pockets of armed violence that keep it on its toes, the magnitude of explosions that rocked the country in the past 14 months is something policy-makers and the citizens never imagined. Within that period, more than 30 different explosions have been witnessed, with devastating consequences across the country. The blasts have so far killed over 300 hundred persons and injured more than 500 hundred, Weekly Trust checks reveal. The casualties cut across age, gender region and in some cases even the perpetrators themselves, with property worth trillions of naira destroyed.
Weekly Trust investigations indicate that about 50 percent of the overall incidents occurred in the North-Eastern part of the country, particularly in Borno and Yobe states, widely believed to be the two strongholds of the Boko Haram sect, which claims most of the bombings. The remaining 50 percent of the incidents occurred across some cities in the country, mainly the Northern parts, including Abuja, the Federal Capital Territory (FCT).
Weekly Trust discovered that methods applied include the most recent and dreaded of them all, suicide bombing, in which the perpetrator utilizes difficult-to-detect Improvised Explosive Devices (IEDs). Some of devices employed, according to experts, are alien to the nation’s security community and therefore difficult to crack. A retired police officer, Akin O. Fadipe noted that security agencies are not making any real attempt to stop bombings in the country.
Interestingly, some explosions are being revealed to be something other than terrorist attacks, the most recent being the Kaduna blast, which police bomb experts have investigated and discovered to be a chemical reaction, as opposed to the widely believed story. Also, recently in Azare, Bachi State, robberies disguised as terrorist attack have occurred.
Connecting the incessant bomb blasts in Nigeria with the economic and social reality on ground, Dr. Ameachi Nwokolo, a Nigerian security and counter-terrorism expert based in the U.K said: “An abhorrently corrupt political system exists, which increases the hunger and anger amongst the poor.” He added: “There are presently young Nigerians that can do anything to survive or for their siblings to survive.” To him, the capacity of security agencies is in doubt.
While the victims who were killed in the bomb attacks are gone without any compensation to their families, the injured ones alive as well as communities affected in the several bombs attacks across the country wallow in pain and lack without adequate compensation or any form of social welfare, the Federal Government has proposed the whopping sum of N922bn for the security sector in the 2012 budget, the highest in the history of the nation.
From an economic point of view, the volume of bomb blasts in Nigeria have also affected the investment potentials of the country. While the direct cost would include declining investor confidence and Foreign Direct Investment (FDI), the immediate effects are loss of man-hour of productivity to bureaucracy and security checks at both airports and offices across the country.
Ustaz Nura Dambo, Chief Imam of the Masjidul Manar, Tudun Jukun, Zaria, said suicide bombing is against the teachings of Islam. Another prominent Islamic Scholar in Nigeria, Sheikh Abubakar Giro Argungun shares this view of Ustaz Dambo. Dambo did add that those at the helm of the country’s affairs are not sincere about handling the spate bombings and other security problems in the country. “Unless the government sincerely addresses all these issues, the problem of insecurity would continue to be with us. And there is no sign that the government is ready to touch the lives of the common people if their activities, if removal of fuel subsidy and failure to address power problem, is anything to go by.”
Since the October, 2010 blast, the confidence of prospective investors to Nigeria has declined. The 2011 World Investment Report prepared by United Nations Conference on Trade and Development confirms the decline in FDI. According to the report, FDI capital to Nigeria declined to $6.1 billion in 2010 from $8.28 billion in 2009. It is a known trend that investors often seek advice of their missions in any country before investing in a foreign economy. Hence, with travel advisories by most of the foreign missions warning their citizenry of the risk of doing business in Nigeria, it remains to be seen how government can muster confidence.
Bishop of Sokoto Catholic Diocese, Mathew Hassan Kukah said the situation should not be viewed from the religious perspective, even though some of the unfortunate things are given religious coloration just to deceive people. He said: “I think we are missing the point here. We shouldn’t look at it from a Christian and Muslim perspective, but as a nation. When we analyse it from this angle, we take it away from the criminality involved in these actions. We are giving a wrong cure for a wrong diagnosis.” He added: “In my view this has nothing to do with religion and if it does, it is largely a function of mismanagement. With a leadership so blatantly inept, leading a society where abject poverty reigns supreme with massive corruption existing side by side, we need to be doing more than this.”
“We need to learn to focus on our citizenship a lot more. We cannot be speaking about one Nigeria but basing our judgments of issues on religion. Whatever you publish regarding this, as long as you take it as a religious issue you’ll have both sides (Christian and Muslim) complaining about one or the other being better favored.”