Which Way Nigeria?

Boko Haram, Niger Delta Avengers, Joint Niger Delta Liberation Force, Indigenous People of Biafra (IPOB), Fulani Herdsmen; the organisations are legion and more are emerging. Is Nigeria on the brink of a war, break-up or what? Nigerians watch in amazement as pockets of armed organisations tackle the federal government. AMEH EJEKWONYILO spoke with some top lawyers.

A new militant group, Joint Ni­ger Delta Liberation Force has threatened to blow six oil flow stations in Bayelsa State over the refusal of the President Muhammadu Buhari’s to address issues of development affecting the region. Despite overtures from the Federal Government to dialogue with the Niger Delta Avengers in the region, there are still violent activities by the armed group. Meanwhile the Federal Government has expressed its commitment to dialogue with militants in the Niger Delta. Secretary to the Government of the Federation, Ba­bachir Lawal, has insisted that the presence of soldiers in the region does not mean the government was opposed to dialogue.

 

Speaking explicitly about the Niger Del­ta Avengers, whose recent activities have caused a decline in the counrty’s oil and power output, Lawal said the group needed to identify its representatives for a dialogue. “Government is not averse to discussing with them (militants) but we need to know who is in charge and who we can discuss with meaningfully; that’s the dilemma of the government at the moment”, he said. But the question is - Is the Federal Govern­ment helpless? Why has it been unable to tackle the problems in that region? Why has government allowed the problems to fester? Mr. Olisa Agbakoba, a former President of the Nigerian Bar Association (NBA) shared some ideas.

 

“No, the Nigerian state is not helpless. These measures to dialogue with Boko Haram, the Niger Delta Avengers are wel­come because we need peace and stability to grow, which is not a bad is idea. But the underline solution is to restructure Nigeria or to decentralize. People criticize President Buhari that he has jettisoned the National Conference report; I don’t think I will waste my breath on that. What I am inter­ested in is how the Federal Government can present a bill for an enactment for the transfer of certain powers from the federal to the state governments. That I think is the central question; this is Nigeria’s underlying challenge.

 

“If it is not done, then negotiations with whatever groups that are in contention at the time will continue because the groups would feel that they have a grievance and they would present it by forceful nego­tiation. If you deal with one, another one would crop up. But if you deal with the structural deficits that Nigeria suffers, then that is a more long lasting solution than anything that I have seen today. So, that calls for courage, determined leadership; the type of leadership you see US President Barack Obama in the face of great odds. He understands what the issues are and he pur­sues them like he pursued Obamacare.

 

“We need to see the Federal Govern­ment pursue this issue of resolving Nigeria’s constitutional fracture. If that is started (it may not be resolved by just one act) but if it seriously started and people buy into it, then we are well on the way. America was in this process when Abraham Lincoln de­clared his proclamation, freeing slaves. The impact of that reverberated up till the time of Martin Luther King; it took a number of major Supreme Court decisions to deal with the problem; the first Supreme Court decision tried to reverse the proclamation while the second one in the 50s trying to implement it. You can see that Nigeria is not alone in this challenge, but it starts with somebody that was why Lincoln was assas­sinated in the theatre. Somebody starts it and then keeps it on. So, by the time of John Kennedy and Johnson, they were serious and then passed the voters’ right act, then that led to what we can now say that President Obama is a beneficiary of the long struggle to redress the constitutional fracture of America.

 

“So, what we are looking for is a leader that can start the process. It may take 50 or 60 years, but it has to start. We have been saying it for the last 60 years; from the time of Awolowo, Zik and Sardauna. We need somebody who will start it today to take seriously, and then people can rally around him and say, ‘this guy is serious.’ And then going forward will be that momentum; at each point a new amendment will come; strengthening the process. America has had over sixty amendments in more than one century. We can’t have all our amendments in one day; our amendments will be taken as a result of whatever defects we find in the constitution. So, it may take 300 years for the Nigerian constitution to achieve its real developmental peak, but let us start.”

 

Meanwhile, Mr. Anthony Agbonlahor an Abuja based legal practitioner has lent a voice to the persistent Fulani herdsmen issue in Nigeria.

“Until a few years ago herdsmen were never violent. When I was growing up in Benin, they used to bring their cows around for grazing and they have always lived with us; simple, easy-going people. They live in the forest because of their cattle. If they were going to stay in a place for long, they would obtain permission to build their huts. But for the past four years or so, people we call herdsmen are no lon­ger the herdsmen we use to know; these ones are armed robbers. I have had friends who had fallen into their hands along Be­nin-Okpila, Auchi-Iyeve road; they don’t ask for anything other than money as they wield their machetes. A man is walking along the road with an Ak-47 and you say he is a cattle rearer; what is he doing with an Ak-47?

 

“Until you punish offenders for crimes they have committed in order to serve as deterrence to others, very soon people will resort to self help. It is gradually getting to a stage where people are gradually losing confidence in government to provide se­curity and even in the judiciary to expedi­tiously determine cases.

“For instance, if the victim of a crime survives and discovers that the govern­ment is pampering the offender, it is in the nature of man to seek for revenge. It is in­herent in man to avenge wrong. It is only the law that keeps man in check, but when the law and security agencies as well as the administration of criminal justice fail, then anarchy is let loose.

 

“Recently, Ekiti State governor, Mr. Ayo Fayose was quoted as saying that he would ban herdsmen from entering the state. Though he does not possess such powers to ban a Nigerian from entering the state, but in doing that is to prevent retaliation. It is to prevent call to arms even when no offence has been committed. What is im­portant under the Land Use Act is that the Federal Government does not own any land unless lands that have been designat­ed as federal lands. The power to approve lands rests with state governors as custodi­ans on behalf of the people. It is only in the FCT that the land belongs to the Federal Government, with the powers delegated to the FCT Minister to assign and administer lands on behalf of the President. You can­not go to Enugu State and ask the gover­nor to approve land for grazing in his state where a lot people were recently killed.

 

“So, it is an issue the Federal Govern­ment should look at and punish offenders, but because the President is their patron not one Fulani herdsman or rearer has been punished. For some of the suspects in the Enugu massacre who were recently paraded in Abuja, that might be the end of that charade. The court in Abuja does not have the jurisdiction to try them; take the suspects to Enugu where the crime was committed. If they are left in Abuja, they will be charged under the anti-terrorism act. Are they terrorists? They are murder­ers. If you charge them to the Federal High Court, the highest punishment the court can give to them is life imprisonment. Is one person’s life more important than the other? What about the community that they have wiped out? Take them (the sus­pects) back to Enugu State and try them because no offence was committed here. They should be tried under the criminal codes of that state.”