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News | Africa | West Africa

Who's protecting the people of Jos?

CAMERON DUODU - Mar 10 2010 07:16
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It has happened again. Is anyone surprised any longer when a "religious riot" occurs in Nigeria?

The latest one took place -- once again -- in the city of Jos, and the death toll is given as anything between 300 and 500 people.

Harrowing pictures of the dead have appeared in the media. Dogo Nahawa, a mainly Christian village about 5km south of Jos, was one of the settlements attacked by Islamist fanatics, apparently as a reprisal for killings earlier in the year. One resident said the Islamists, mainly pastoralists "from the surrounding hills", attacked at dawn.

"They came around three o'clock in the morning and started shooting into the air," he said. "The shooting was meant to draw people from their houses and then, when people came out, they started cutting them with machetes."

Many Nigerians have greeted the new massacre in Jos with disbelief. They are wondering how a city in which hundreds of people have been slaughtered like lambs in various outbreaks of violence over the past 18 months could have been left defenceless to fall into the hands of marauding fanatics once more.

Everyone knows that these clashes have become a fact of life in the north of the country. Yet, the police are caught by surprise again and again.

Police service a 'failure'
The pictures of carnage, coming hard on the heels of the exposure of extra-judicial killings by the police, have demoralised the population beyond measure.

This has led the minister for police affairs, Ibrahim Lame, to call his own police service "a failure". He said: "The current rate of crime across the nation, rising cases of extra-judicial killings, human rights violations, robberies, high-profile assassination and deliberate failure to comply with government directives, are testimony to the sheer incapacity or wilful defiance of [the] police high command ..."

The 'Jonathan faction'
The Nigerian people are fed up with excuses and verbal parrying by law enforcement agencies. Unfortunately however, their demands are not about to be met.

CONTINUES BELOW


This is because Nigeria has only yet to fully emerge from a paralysis of government caused by the illness of President Umaru Yar'Adua. He has just "returned home" after nearly three months in a Saudi hospital. Hardly any of the top people in the administration have seen him since his return.

He left Nigeria without any of the formalities that would have allowed the vice-president, Goodluck Jonathan, to rule in his absence. In exasperation, the senate voted to make Jonathan acting president.

Even though Yar'Adua is now back, he is still too ill to govern. He has endorsed the declaration of Jonathan as acting president by the senate, but there is too much distrust between the "Jonathan faction" in the government and Yar'Adua's "kitchen Cabinet" for the government to be able to act firmly in the face of a crisis such as that caused by the religious riots. - guardian.co.uk © Guardian News and Media 2010
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Who's protecting the people of Jos? It suppose to be Jonathan and Jang
Mzungu WaAfrica on March 10, 2010, 8:13 am
TIA. Failed states, failed leadership, EPIC FAIL where you look.
Donovan Jackson on March 10, 2010, 9:38 am
The wave of Islamic fundamentalism in Nigeria, Sudan etc should be cause for great concern. It's very oppoertunist in nature particularly in this instance in Nigeria. I don't hear the UN protesting too much over this? Why? Instead they prefer to attack an Israeli democracy. There will be nothing Democratic in the imposition of Islamic states(Sharia Law)in Africa.
Leon van Greunen on March 10, 2010, 9:44 am
Tibes. Religion. Capitalism. Exploitation. My fellow South Africans: are we going to join hands, unite and hold the upper class and their political and religious lackeys accountable?
Carl Wille on March 10, 2010, 9:57 am
Tribes. Religion. Capitalism. Exploitation. My fellow South Africans: are we going to join hands, unite and hold the upper class and their political and religious lackeys accountable?
Carl Wille on March 10, 2010, 10:06 am
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/africa/8558246.stm

"Many people come into Nigeria under the pretext of [being] pastoralists, they are mercenaries. They follow pastoralist routes to gain entrance, carry out their activities and then leave," he said.
Earlier, the Plateau State Christian Elders Consultative Forum complained that it had taken the army two hours to react after receiving a distress call, the AFP news agency reported.
By that time, "the attackers had finished their job and left", they said.

****************************************

Sound familiar ??
Andy Campbell on March 10, 2010, 10:33 am
What the heck is wrong with Africa. Why is it when the big boss is away nothing can get done? I work in Angola and when the Minister or Director is way (quite often) nothing can happen. Departments are stymied. Though, I must admit, since Peace in Angola, things are getting better. A lot better.

However, here we have a Minister who is stymied, because the President is sick. Good grief man, you have a Portfolio, act on it. This is people lives and livelihoods at risk. Get a grip.
Ken O'Connell on March 10, 2010, 11:31 am
Who is Protecting the people of JOS???? Genocide is Genocide whether millions, hundreds or a few human beings slaughtered.Week in and week out one reads/hears about what Hitler did and genocide will not ever happen in the world again but yet it carries on. One also wonders why we do not hear the outcries when it happens in Africa. Where is the UN Troops?? Can these kind of middle of the night slaughters ever stop?? I say never!! It is like the bombs going off in Iraq, Afganistan etc. Just slaughter in another way. Religious wars will go on until the end of time. Attempts of dominance by one religious fanatical sector on others. All that can happen is those perpetrators need to be brought to book and the death sentence imposed.
Eric Martinsich on March 10, 2010, 11:32 am
@ Camero; Everyone knows that these clashes have become a fact of life in the north of the country.Yes you are right. The then Biafra/Nigeria war came as a result of similar genocide though larger than the very recent ones. People, these are no religious conflicts. These and many more to come are all Nigerian State managed genocides. Do we know that of the many millions of innocent citizens killed in Nigeria, not even a person have been prosecuted? The Nigerian government and their agents which includes you that does business with Nigeria even when it is very obvious that that country is a devil's workshop, should be held responsible for the lives of the dead. Support the dissolution of that forced amalgamation and you will see some positive changes coming from that part of Africa.
Coleman Emejuru on March 10, 2010, 2:36 pm
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Reprisal killings A television frame grab shows a mass grave in the town of Dogo Nahawa, Nigeria, about 5km south of the city of Jos, on March 8. (AP)




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