The perilousness of the present security situation in Plateau State is underscored by the night curfew the government there has put in three local government council areas and President Muhammadu Buhari’s strident condemnation of the massacre that happened Saturday in Jos, the state capital. Police spokesman Ubah Ogaba confirmed that 22 persons lost their lives that day.
He said in a statement, “On 14/08/2021 at about 0928hrs, the Plateau State Police Command received a distress call that a group of attackers and their sympathisers along Rukuba Road of Jos North Local Government Area attacked a convoy of five buses returning from the annual (Muslim) Zikr prayer in Bauchi State and heading for Ikare in Ondo State. Unfortunately, 22 persons were killed and 14 injured in the attack.”
Other reports said that the Irigwe youth that Saturday morning were conveying the remains of their members killed in a recent attack for burial in Bassa. They had set out in a convoy for the burial as announced when violence broke out along the way on Rukuba road. “As they were conveying the corpses, they met some vans conveying Muslims they suspected to be Fulani,” said one report. However, the Muslims said they were commuters from Bauchi. Yet the Irigwe youths attacked them, killing some and injuring others.
The state government reacted to the latest killings by putting a curfew in Jos North, Jos South and Bassa council areas, beginning that Saturday. It would run from 6pm to 6am “until further notice”, Governor Samuel Lalong’s director of press, Dr. Simon Macham, said in a statement. The governor called for calm and appealed to residents to avoid any action or utterances that would further inflame the situation. He assured security agencies “are conducting investigations into the attack.” According to him, “So far, 20 suspects have been arrested.”
President Buhari who returned to the country only a day before the attack condemned the massacre in the strongest of terms yet. In a statement issued Saturday night by his spokesman, Garba Shehu, the President declared that Plateau State has been one of the states affected by herder-farmer clashes “which have, in a significant way, been curtailed following the intense peace-building efforts of the administration of Governor Simon Lalong.”
He said, “However, to be clear, this is not an agriculturalist-on-pastoralist confrontation, but rather a direct, brazen and wickedly motivated attack on members of a community exercising their rights to travel freely and to follow the faith of their choosing. With the evident preparedness of their attackers, it is clear this was a well-conceived and pre-arranged assault on a known target, location and religious persuasion of the travellers, not an opportunist ambush. The Presidency offers condolences to the families of the victims and continues to liaise closely with the local authorities, including security, the police, and governmental agencies.”
According to Buhari, these kinds of attacks on Nigerians “are unacceptable, heinous, and stand in complete contradiction to the teachings of the great religions of the nation. “Make no mistake, in line with my commitment to protect all Nigerians, I have ordered our security agencies to fish out the perpetrators of this gruesome massacre of innocent travellers and bring them to justice.”
We salute Gov. Lalong and President Buhari for their unequivocal condemnation of the heinous crime committed against innocent fellow compatriots on Saturday. Their strong language matches the weight of the crime. The massacre threatens to unmake the long peace that Plateau had enjoyed after years of communal and sectarian killings. Those sad “years of locusts” must not return. This is why the security agencies should do what it will take to get the killers of last Saturday to come face to face with justice.
Meanwhile, we join the President in commending the ongoing efforts by the governors of Plateau, Bauchi, and Ondo states; the Sultan of Sokoto, Sa’ad Abubakar III; and Sheikh Dahiru Bauchi as well as a number of notable Christian and Muslim leaders at normalising the situation in Plateau.
