Assassinations - the Last Phase of Terror BY ANIEBO NWAMU

I've come to believe that the violent insurgency of
the past one year is one huge foreign plot to
dismember Nigeria. The plotters [for lack of an
appropriate name, some people call them Boko
Haram] must have understood Nigeria inside out
before launching the offensive.
They know that governance is not serious
business here. They know that few people work
for the country and that almost everyone is
interested in getting a share of the nation's
wealth. They know that nobody would willingly
die for Nigeria.
We have failed to forge a nation, so it's very easy
to break what has been cobbled together as
Nigeria in 1914. And I have bad news for fellow
Nigerians: the plotters may succeed! There is no
need pretending that "we are on top of the
situation" anymore, especially now that the
struggle seems to have entered the phase Wole
Soyinka once mentioned: targeted assassinations
of important Nigerians.
Senator Gyang Daylop Dantong has been killed.
Hon. Gyang Fulani has been felled. A retired
general, Sylvester Iruh, gave up the ghost after
he was attacked by "suspected Fulani herdsmen"
on the Lagos-Ibadan expressway. But for God's
intervention, a first-class monarch, Shehu of
Borno Abubakar Umar El-Kanemi, and the deputy
of Borno State, Alhaji Zanna Umar, would have
been history by now.
Nobody, no matter how highly placed, can claim
to be safe anymore. Since it's no longer ordinary
people alone that are dying, the rich and the
powerful in our midst should move quickly to stop
further deaths - in their own interest.
The insurgents have applied all manner of tricks
to provoke a religious war without success: post-
election violence, bombing of churches and killing
of Christians, reprisal attacks, making
inflammatory statements, using the media to
create confusion, attacks on mosques. What I
consider the last phase of this reign of terror is
assassination of influential Nigerians that has just
begun. Shall the powers that be continue to play
the ostrich?
Under this cloud of uncertainty, it will be
impossible for anyone to organise elections in
2015. Which suggests that the prophecy of
Nigeria breaking up by that year will come to
pass. Rather than consider running again for
president in 2015, President Jonathan should
quickly convene a national conference that will
write a new constitution for the country.
That conference should also quickly outlaw
corruption and waste in government. Clearly, this
presidential system of government is not
sustainable. The size of government at all levels
should be reduced by 75 per cent. We need a
unicameral legislature that works.
We need a judicial system that delivers justice.
And we need an economic system that creates
jobs, taxes the rich, protects the poor and
rewards hard work. The current civil service -
filled with deadwood, scammers and thieves -
ought to be replaced by a smaller ICT-compliant
service that works.
My guess is that those plotting Nigeria's
disintegration are mainly foreigners. I don't know
what the security agents interrogating suspects
have found, but I feel the number of mercenaries
is great. Desperate, brainwashed and barely
educated young people from places like Chad,
Niger, Somalia, Libya and Mali might have been
recruited for the job of breaking this African
"giant".
Of course, there are Nigerians among them -
those equally plagued by unemployment,
poverty, corruption, bad governance, injustice
and all other evils. I felt insulted when I read
accounts of "Fulani herdsmen" massacring people
in Plateau State and elsewhere. Imagine a
herdsman with an AK 47 rifle and dressed in army
uniform! How clever can the plotters be?
A fertile ground has been prepared for seekers of
the country's breakup by the bad deeds of
yesteryear. I have always known that a class war
is inevitable in Nigeria. No force can withstand all
the unemployed and underemployed young
people in the country today.
When people steal billions of naira, they forget
that they are surrounded by millions of other
people that have nothing to eat. A day of
reckoning must come - it has come. Are Nigerian
leaders awake? There's no time to waste.
Everywhere you go, you see faces of frustration
and desperation. Young people are angry.
A caller on a radio programme last week asked for
a contact to join Boko Haram because his home
had been marked for demolition in Abuja. He was
not kidding. The terrorists (erroneously called
Boko Haram) will always have a bank of suicide
bombers.
But those plotting Nigeria's disintegration are
taking the wrong route. They may succeed in
making a part of Nigeria ungovernable but the
final whistle cannot go until the string that holds
the country together is cut. Until crude oil dries
up or becomes unprofitable, all states, no matter
how bankrupt, will keep meeting in Abuja every
month to share oil funds.
So, what worked in the Soviet Union or Yugoslavia
or even Mali cannot work here. Nigeria has been
on the brink several times, but it has always come
out strong, thanks to oil. I can assure the
insurgents that not even one state in Nigeria can
be Islamised or Christianised even if they burn all
the churches, mosques and schools in the
country.
True Christians and Muslims will keep worshipping
God. And the more important people are
assassinated, the more important people will
emerge.