ZUL-HAJJ 14 1430 A.H.
TUESDAY DECEMBER 1 2009.
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Nigeria as kidnappers’ den! (II)
By L.Chinedu Arizona-Ogwu
A recent study by the participants of”nigeria4betterrule “demonstrated that Nigeria is becoming one of the unresolved nations of the world. Their findings showed that in the past two decades murder rates in Nigeria have more than tripled, from 13,877 homicides in 1980 to 49,587 in 2002. There is no simple explanation for these escalating crime rates. Instead, it is a combination of several causes in a “perfect storm” of mutual causation. Poverty — but mostly the huge gap existing between the rich and the poor, which is amongst the worst in the world — creates a fertile environment where drug dealers operate with ease and criminals can establish substantial areas of influence.
Nigeria’s seemingly intractable inequality has been a case study for economists and social scientists for decades. According to the World Bank, Nigeria’s inequality pattern is only better than Sierra Leone’s and Central Africa Republic’s. Nigeria’s richest 20 percent earns 62 percent of the nation’s income, while Nigeria’s lowest 20 percent earns just 2.6 percent of the income. And Nigeria’s inequality is even more relevant because of the size of Nigerian population and because Nigeria’s GDP ranks amongst the ten growing GDPs in the world.
The causes for this incredible income gap are varied. Historically Nigerian elites were able to influence the government policy for their advantage. The model of Nigeria’s insertion into the world economy by exporting products of low value, produced at low wages because of the labor surplus, worked to widen the gap. Finally, decades of hyper-inflation — from the 1970s to early 1990s — affected mostly the poor who had no financial artifices to protect their assets.
Under these circumstances, during the last half of the 20th century, millions of Nigerians moved from the poorest Northeastern region to urban centers in the South looking for jobs and better living conditions. The resulting population boom in the Southern urban centers contributed to the proliferation of slums. An erratic urbanization pattern developed in many of the major cities in the South, particularly in Abuja, Lagos, and Port Harcourt, where eventually rich mansions share the same neighborhood with miserable housing.
From the perspective of the perpetrator, the act of kidnapping is a relatively easy and safe way to make a bundle of money quick (compared to robbing banks, for example). The tricky part lies in the kidnapper’s need to work with a crew that has the skills to effectively hold the victim in captivity and oversee the negotiation that follows. The team needs to be capable of careful planning and considerable organization. They also need access to a number of non-identifiable cars, as well as a number of safe houses to hide the hostages. Sometimes several hideouts are used in order to evade the police. These unique requirements help explain why kidnappings are usually conducted by specialized gangs.
The Niger Delta also offers a number of tempting soft targets in the figure of multinationals’ executives, prosperous entrepreneurs, and other VIPs and their families. Feeling unsafe, many have adopted preventive measures, such as hiring bodyguards for personal security, acquiring armored vehicles, bullet-proofing their cars, and buying special insurance policies. Executives frequently use helicopters, not only to escape from The Niger Delta’s chaotic traffic, but also for security reasons. The Niger Delta has currently registered the sixth largest helicopter fleet in the world — it jumped quickly from less than 300 helicopters in 2002 to about 500 in 2005. Because children are especially attractive targets for kidnappers — since they offer little resistance and are emotionally appealing as hostages — some wealthy families have concluded that the best protection they can buy for their children is to send them to live abroad, mostly in London.
Due to the growing occurrence of kidnappings and increased terror among the population, the police in the Niger Delta have stepped up efforts to address the situation. In 2004, recognizing the specificity of kidnapping as a crime, the government of various states created, within the civilian police force, a special Anti-Kidnapping Division (DAS). This division has a specific intelligence unit, SWAT-type training and abilities, and expertise in negotiation. Other efforts to curb crime include the establishment of a toll-free police hotline, for tips on cases and to report criminals. The State has also developed a campaign to promote safety, which is aimed at educating the public about measures they can take to prevent becoming a victim. The recommended tactics include avoiding the identification of family members in the media, frequentchanges in traffic and time patterns between office and home, use of shadowed and bullet-proofed car windows, careful scrutiny of employee references, as well as the use of trained drivers and bodyguards. The rationale here is that many kidnappers will choose a different target if they perceive that stakes are high and the potential victim is alert.
Police in the Niger Delta have also scored a few moderate victories, including the dismantling of some criminal bands. Also, so far, they have been able to preserve the lives of all abductees. Neither the police, nor private security firms have reported killings related to kidnappings. Notwithstanding these few successes, the overwhelming crime culture in Nigeria increasingly works to undermine the population’s confidence in the state to protect them. Nigeria’s judicial system is slow and antiquated, allowing cases to pile up and creating a huge backlog. In addition, smart attorneys have exposed the system’s vulnerabilities and they frequently exploit loopholes to delay cases indefinitely. In addition, the penal system (under the responsibility of the Ministry of Justice, which controls over 5,000 penal institutions) has proved ineffective. In the year 2000, 212,000 inmates were incarcerated in Nigeria. Prisons are overcrowded, riots are frequent, and drug kingpins keep control over their gangs even from inside prison. Escapes — either by spectacular breakouts or simply by bribing prison guards — are not uncommon.
Given the inability of the Yar’Adua administration to resolve the Niger Delta problem including the problem of extreme crime, why has the federal government not adopted a comprehensive plan to tackle the problem? Well, plans – impressive ones – have been presented, both in response to particularly dramatic crimes and during political campaigns. The central theme that emerges from these plans is that the state’s action must involve social programs and judicial reform, in addition to improving enforcement capability. Nevertheless, effectiveness has only been observed, and modestly, at the state level. For example, Imo state was able to map regions of crime occurrence and use this information to coordinate social and educational programs. The also strengthened the police effectiveness by retraining the force, including on human rights, and improving intelligence gathering and analysis. This government as well, beginning in 2008, has been revamping and reorganizing its enforcement apparatus and has been constructing new prisons.
This government should enact and issued National Plan for Public Safety, a comprehensive project aimed at preventing crime, reducing impunity, and “increasing the overall safety for all citizens.” The plan should assign a budget of approximately N75b and included 124 strategies to fight extrajudicial imprisonment, abduction and organized crime. The NPPS should advocate for total disarmament and gun control laws, provide for professional training and police re-equipping, ordered an end to police violence, and promise to update legislation related to public safety.
I hope we are going to be a little more forward thinking. The added complication now is that it is difficult to know who the hostage takers are. Among them were insinuation about militants, but since they have embraced amnesty, could the criminals and armed gangs be on this row? There are those who genuinely believe that the tactic will sap the morale of the nations who are Nigerians either directly or in support roles. Their hope is to sow anguish and confusion by seizing innocent people, making phones negotiation, pricing and bargaining ransom and of their fear and humiliation in captivity and in a final cruel refinement, threatening and executing their murder. It does not seem to matter to them that these crimes do not lead to the fulfillment of their demands or that the tactic has been condemned by all those who sympathize with their cause. Their resistance to occupation has support across the world, but their method of slaughtering defenseless men and women has turned the environment into public enemies.
There are other rogues in the partisan. A great number of criminals and jobless crooks have got into the act, with profit as their only motive. The mystery surrounding the kidnapping of the citizenry is a case in point. I do not think they kill them because the material gain from holding them is big; I have my doubts about the whole operation from the start because the style and method all indicate that the kidnappers are an organized gang with no connection to the resistance. The motive behind the militant-induced kidnapping was inconsistent with the goals of the present criminality, whose purposes remain to usurp and maltreat the security and well-being of Nigerians.No easy-going!, no free movement!!
And finally, the government should take effective steps to rein in the kidnappers, especially members of the militants who refused to embrace amnesty and other such criminals who have shown an alarming inclination to disturb the peace of Nigerians. There have been so many incidents where people, including elderly persons and juveniles, were abduct and subsequently concealed for ransom in either ‘crossfire’ or ‘shoot-out’ or ‘encounter’. In a significant number of these cases, those detained and killed were claimed to be innocent Nigerians. Even if they were not innocent, they did not deserve to be killed just like that. The government must put an end to extra-judicial abduction, once and for all; it should realize that civilization and extra-judicial kidnapping do not go hand in hand.
Source: Nigerians In America
