Funke Egbemode: Is this the end?

I have a number of friends who have decided to be blind to everything that is going wrong in this country because the country's president is a Niger Deltan and these people are eager to show that the insecurity is an attempt at sabotaging his government,  and not an indication of its ineptitude. Well, they may be right. Or not.

In what follows, seasoned writer Funke Egbemode shares her thoughts regarding the siege that we are undergoing from the insecurity and from government's campaign of disinformation.
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I am scared, very scared. Of all my friends, I am (or was) the most optimistic about Nigeria. I was the one who thought Nigeria is the best country on God’s own earth, a country though moving at snail’s speed but one on its way to greatness nonetheless. I am the one who always rushed back home from every trip abroad. I simply couldn’t feel at home anywhere else after 10 days. But today, right now, I am scared for my country. I think we have lost it. We are in trouble and it does not matter how long and how vehemently we deny it, this country is about to slip down the slope.

There is blood everywhere, death every day. Terror has taken over our sleep. Terrorists have taken over our hallowed places. When these dreaded men first invaded our space, they bombed markets and viewing centres. They graduated into mosques and churches. They made an evil tragic move on the UN Building and the Force Headquarters as if daring us to come out and fight. They thumbed their noses at us. Then they punched us in the chest and while we were trying to stagger back to our feet, they kicked us hard in the groin.

Since that first kick in the groin, terrorists in Nigeria have hit us repeatedly in the most life-threatening spots: double punches to the temple, calculated ones to the throat and the stomach. Yeah, we kicked back a few times and the terror boys retreated. We foolishly brought out champagne, toasted to a victory that was uncertain and gave incomplete testimonies in churches. We are winning the terror war, we sang. It soon became a refrain. All the time we were chanting ‘we don win’ like drunken princes, the terror boys were honing their bloody skills and oiling their guns. They perfected their evil act and developed new strategies. While we bandied political press statements and spoke ‘big big grammar’ on television, the terror boys bought up motorcycles from states where their use had been banned and recruited more men to show us who is in charge. They made more police and army uniforms while we traded blames and passed bucks.

While we were busy waving the constitution in one another’s faces and trying to outdo the next person on who had a longer list of adjectives, the terror boys built bunkers, located all entry and exit routes at our borders. They took over our forests, found chinks in our armours and told themselves, they would finish us.

In the kingdom of these terrorists, there is no APC or PDP. They are not preparing for an election. They speak with one voice and work in one accord. Nobody wants to take over from anybody. They just want to kills us in our sleep, behead our children in their hostels. They are determined to win. And we are still speaking English, dogon turenchi, fighting new wars with old weapons and tactics. I am close to tears as I write this because all I can see is a cul de sac. All I can hear are political scientists analysing what they think they understand. All I can see are human rights human beings and pro-democracy people reciting figures and quoting philosophers who never lived in the kind of hell we have found ourselves. Watch out for them on AIT, Channels, Silverbird and TVC from Monday morning. I have stopped watching them. I now watch African Magic in the mornings. The movies help me escape into another world and prevent me from smashing my own television screen. It is so sad that we think we can win this terror war by not doing something different.

Since the dawn of 2014, the terror attacks had become a daily thing, spreading like wild fire. This war we are supposed to be winning is the reason we are weeping every day. We now have a factory assembly line churning out widows, widowers, orphans and the handicapped daily. And the media aides of our political office holders have a ready template for press statements ‘condemning the evil attack, dastardly acts and bombing of innocent Nigerians.’ They just change a few lines to reflect the venue and casualty figures. Then the politicians carpet one another. Hasn’t anybody told them we no longer find their comic performances funny? Do they know the implication of not fixing this problem? Do they know there are Nigerians who think their leaders can’t do anything about this evil ravaging our land? And they may be right, you know. Maybe our leaders have run out of ideas. I dare them to do something. These terror boys have us by the jugular. We are gasping. Our eyes are popping out of their sockets.

If these terrorists have moved from weekly attacks to daily attacks, successful ones too, does that not mean they have changed strategy? If they have become daring enough to attack a military base twice in 24 hours, what does that say about us, our leaders? I am not worried about whether we are at war or winning the war. I am not impressed by the terms and terminologies deployed by both the military and articulate lawyers. I am just tired of the heap of corpses.

Very many times, this nation has danced back from the edge of the precipice but right now, this minute, I feel totally hopeless. But I am just a frightened mother, a distressed Nigerian. Maybe the governors know something I do not know. Maybe the President has an ace up his sleeves.  Maybe the National Assembly will dig in its creative bag and fish out the cousin of ‘doctrine of necessity’. Maybe not. Maybe they can’t do anything and that is why I’m so scared. What if nobody can do anything? Is this the end?

We are counting bodies as I write this in Kaduna. The peaceful Katsina where I spent Valentine last month is still counting corpses. And now there is a new set of terrorists we are stupidly nauseatingly calling Fulani herdsmen. Have we all gone bunkers? Fulani herdsmen wearing army uniform and handling AK 47? Where is our sense of shame? How can security operatives, government officials, leaders who were born and bred in Nigeria actually believe that those murderers moving from village to village are herdsmen? How? We have called and treated them like cattle rearers for three years or so now and capitalising on our security naivety or foolishness, they have moved from Plateau to Benue to Nassarawa. And that is too close for comfort.

Think back to the Fulani families in your village and community when you were growing up. They were peaceful, almost docile as long as you do not tamper or trifle with their cattle. They were friendly. My mum bought (still buys) cocks and hens from the ones who live in a neighbouring village. Their chicks which we call ‘adie gaa’ are a different breed. They are taller, bigger and grow fast. Herdsmen wear long flowing robes, turbans, rubber sandals , not camouflage. Their wives sell ‘wara’ (cheese). They have lived everywhere with us, across the country in peace. If demons have sneaked through our borders in the night and we are all thumbs about what to do to exterminate them, can we try not to insult our collective intelligence by calling them Fulani herdsmen?

Now that we are no longer safe anywhere and our governors can’t count on their security details to protect them, can we do something because this is all so scary. Or am I the only scared one?

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Funke Egbemode is a backpage columnist for The Sunday Sun Nigeria. This article appeared in the March 16, 2014 edition of the paper.