They certainly did not see it coming; it was like every other day, and the business of the day was to set out on a day-long journey from Port Harcourt to Kano. Enrapt by the wave of nostalgia and the excitement of festivity beckoning back home, the 22 hunters who were ambushed and 16 of them gruesomely murdered by a mob in Uromi, Edo State, never foresaw the piteous fate that was lurking on their path.
But why should the thought about being stopped, attacked, and some of them killed even cross their minds when they were not within enemy lines in a war zone? Alas, right before them were the cold hands of death. Sixteen souls were needlessly wasted in an unprovoked attack, and their only offence was that they belonged to a tribe and region of the country, travelling with licensed dane guns.
In a split second, children were turned orphans, wives widowed, families deprived of their breadwinners and dreams shattered. Nothing underscores the enormity of the attackers’ callousness like the barbaric act of burning their victims with tyres. But this is what you get when a nation behaves in ways that suggest clearly that it condones mob violence.
Long history
In a 2024 report, Amnesty International said Nigeria recorded at least 555 victims of mob violence from 363 documented incidents in the last ten years, with policing failure exacerbating the violence.
“The failure of the Nigerian authorities to protect lives has led to a growing escalation of mob violence over the last decade, as people increasingly take the law into their hands and carry out so-called ‘jungle justice,” Amnesty International noted in the report.
How can peace be guaranteed in a nation where persons accused of theft, blasphemy and witchcraft, among other crimes, are beaten, tortured and killed with impunity, and perpetrators are never arrested to face justice?
“The menace of mob violence is perhaps one of the biggest threats to the right to life in Nigeria. The fact that these killings have been happening for a long time, with few cases investigated and prosecuted, highlights the authorities’ shocking failure to uphold and fulfil their obligation to protect people from harm and violence,” Amnesty International Nigeria enthused.
Section 36(5) of the 1999 Constitution (as amended) is without ambiguity. Every person who is charged with a criminal offence shall be presumed to be innocent until he is proven guilty. Unfortunately, those who perpetuate jungle justice rarely read the Constitution, or if they do, they oftentimes rarely believe in or abide by its tenets. If not, why jungle justice?
How did we condescend to a level where people take the law into their own hands and punish alleged offenders for perceived crimes without granting them the basic right to fair hearing which everyone is entitled under the rule of law?
The reason is simple: Police and other security agencies, including the judiciary, have failed to protect human rights by denying access to justice. How else can one explain the fact that a series of such incidents of jungle justice have been reported without perpetrators made to face the wrath of the law?
Sad reminder
The Edo incident is a sad reminder of the fact that the much-talked-about national cohesion is a ruse. Unfortunately, there is a precedence. In different parts of the country, people take the law into their own hands, kill innocent persons extrajudicially and get away with it, and we wonder why mob violence has remained intractable.
Before the Edo incident, there had been many of such cases. For instance, in August 2021, a mob in Jos, Plateau State, attacked 26 travellers returning from Islamic preaching in Bauchi. Those killed were merely passing through Jos. There were claims that their killing was a reprisal for earlier attacks on farmers in Miango District believed to have been carried out by armed herders.
Three years after the incident, little or nothing is heard about justice for the victims. And we wonder why Edo happened. People will always commit crimes as long as they know they can effortlessly get away with it.
But like I said earlier, there are many such incidences in different parts of the country, most of which go unreported. And we wonder why Edo happened. Unless authorities hold those responsible for mob violence accountable, the country will continue to witness escalating cases of mob violence.
Beyond the outrage
The outrage that greeted the Edo killings is commendable. But beyond the widespread condemnation, the government must ensure prompt, thorough, impartial, independent and transparent investigation, and, most importantly, ensure the perpetrators face the full wrath of the law, with the victims adequately compensated
Successive Nigerian governments have failed to ensure a country where people can live freely from fear and violence. Not only did they fail to build effective, accountable, strong and inclusive institutions, they failed to guarantee equal access to justice for all. In most of our societies, especially the rural areas, people live in constant fear of violence, kidnapping and other organised crimes.
This disconnect has helped greatly in exacerbating incidences of mob violence, among other security challenges. It is clear. This mob violence, which is not peculiar to any part of the country, is fueled by deep-seated religious and ethnic mistrust, fear, and misinformation.
As for the Edo killings, we all must rise in unison to condemn it as we have done for killings generally in the country. Not only is it heinous, it poses a threat to national unity. Authorities’ efforts to ensure perpetrators are brought to book are commendable.
Since everything was recorded in a video, identifying and arresting the killers should not be difficult. Justice must be served to deter those wishing to do the same. The day the nation can no longer guarantee the safety of travellers on its road is the day it ceases to exist. One thing is obvious. Edo killings, a clear example of animalistic act of recklessness from a misguided mob, are indicative of deep-seated distrust in the midst of a deplorable security situation.
Recalling Natasha
Will Senator Natasha Akpoti-Uduaghan (PDP, Kogi Central) escape this planned recall, or will she go down as the first lawmaker to be recalled since 1999? Those seeking her recall accused the lawmaker of gross misconduct, ‘abuse of office, evasion of due process and a pattern of deceitful behaviour that has not only embarrassed the people of Kogi Central senatorial district but has also tarnished the integrity of the Nigerian Senate and our nation’s democratic institutions’.
The fact that the move to recall Natasha is coming shortly after her tiff with Senate President Godswill Akpabio, whom she accused of sexual harassment, makes it extremely difficult to disabuse the minds of most Nigerians from the notion that the recall is engineered from without. Should those seeking to recall Natasha have their way, the number of women in the national assembly would have been reduced by one. Representation in Nigeria’s national assembly, as it is with election into executive offices, has been skewed in favour of the men. From 1999 to date, the number of women elected into the national assembly has been a fraction of their male counterparts, making the clamour for more opportunities for women to ascend elective offices a necessity.
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