ACF Says Northern Nigeria In State Of Despair, Hopelessness

“The killing of innocent people through bomb blasts and gun attacks is not a solution to the grievances of the perpetrators. The government should equally use its intelligence network to smoke out the kingpins of insurgency and terrorism in order to restore the confidence of the citizenry. ACF finds it agonizing and traumatic the frequency of such barbaric acts by insurgents and gunmen as [they have] become a daily affair."

The Arewa Consultative Forum (ACF), which is the leading socio-cultural group in Northern Nigeria, today stated that their region of the country was in a monumental crisis owing to the Boko Haram insurgency and incessant killings. In a statement distributed to the media by its national publicity secretary, Muhammad Ibrahim, the organization described last Tuesday’s bombings in Maiduguri and other parts of the North as troubling, adding that the insurgency led by Islamist group, Boko Haram, had undermined economic activities in the North and disrupted social life.

The statement said the “bomb blast that occurred on Tuesday morning at the Maiduguri Monday market in Borno State was wicked, gruesome and condemnable considering the huge number of children and old women that were killed in the blast and also the destruction of property it caused. In the last ten days, over one hundred people were killed in various bomb blasts in Borno, Abuja, Kano, Bauchi and Kaduna.”

The group further stated, “Many states in the northern region including Abuja have witnessed and experienced too many bomb blasts in the last five years which have killed many innocent lives, displaced many people, brought untold hardship on the citizens and distorted the economic life of the region thereby undermining its socio-economic development. In fact the insecurity situation has placed the region in a state of despair and hopelessness despite the effort of the military and other security agencies in combating the insurgency.”

ACF argued that the activities of Boko Haram insurgents, unknown gunmen and other criminals in the North were deplorable, adding that innocent people had continued to suffer unjustly for perceived grievances that they knew nothing about.

ACF appealed to the perpetrators of the pervasive crimes to embrace the civilized way of addressing grievances through dialogue with the government.

“The killing of innocent people through bomb blasts and gun attacks is not a solution to the grievances of the perpetrators. The government should equally use its intelligence network to smoke out the kingpins of insurgency and terrorism in order to restore the confidence of the citizenry. ACF finds it agonizing and traumatic the frequency of such barbaric acts by insurgents and gunmen as [they have] become a daily affair.

“The Forum quite appreciates the combined efforts of the Federal and states governments in their coordinated fight against insurgency in the northeast zone and calls on [the] government to take more proactive measures that will halt the re-occurrence of these dastardly acts. It should equally use its intelligence network to smoke out the kingpins of insurgency and terrorism in order to restore peace in the zone and other affected areas.”

The group urged the federal government to fulfill its promise of adequate funding and provision of equipment for the frontline troops to enable them to crush the insurgency.

The statement asked the federal government to “fast track investigation into the various bomb blasts and [begin] the immediate prosecution of the arrested suspects rather than keeping them in perpetual detention without trial.” It offered its “heartfelt sympathy to the families of those killed and injured in this unfortunate incident of Monday Market bomb blast, the people and [the] Borno State government.”