For more than a decade, civilians in Nigeria have faced multiple security threats and risk of atrocities as result of attacks, kidnappings and extortion by various non-state armed groups.
Bella Ifasola
A clinic owner, Emeka Nwachukwu, was, on Wednesday evening, kidnapped at his medical facility in Kwara State, South-West Nigeria, police said.
Kwara State Police Command’s spokeswoman Toun Ejire-Adeyemi, said efforts were on to ensure the rescue of the victim, who was abducted around 8:30 p.m.
“It was reported that Mr Emeka C. Nwachukwu was kidnapped in a Clinic owned by him on the outskirts of Kosubosu town in Baruten LGA, Ejire-Adeyemi said in a statement on X. “He was taken to an unknown location. The police, alongside the vigilante in the community, have intensified efforts to rescue the victim unharmed.”
She noted that further development on the rescue operation will be made public as it progresses.
– Insecurity and violence in Nigeria –
For more than a decade, civilians in Nigeria have faced multiple security threats and risk of atrocities as result of attacks, kidnappings and extortion by various non-state armed groups.
Since the start of 2024 civilians have faced intensified violence across Nigeria, and near-daily attacks by armed groups resulting in kidnappings and other abuses against civilians.
Armed groups and gangs, including so-called “bandits,” have – for many years – perpetrated widespread atrocities, including murder, rape, kidnapping, organized cattle-rustling and plunder. Armed herdsmen are also destroying vast swaths of farmland, prompting many farmers to abandon their land out of fear of attack.
In August, the Director General of the World Trade Organisation (WTO), Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala, said insecurity in Nigeria is weaponised by politicians for political and selfish reasons.
A Nigerian soldier, Suleiman S., also alleged that the government’s practice of paying ransoms to terrorists – dubbed as bandits in the country was hindering the military’s ability to effectively combat them.
He urged the public to redirect their blame from the Nigerian Army to the government, emphasising that soldiers are constrained by orders and cannot take independent action.
The soldier said the military has the capability to eradicate bandits, particularly in hotspots like Zamfara State forest within a week if given the necessary orders.
He expressed frustration that the military’s potential is being wasted due to a lack of direction from leadership, whom he accused of profiting from the ongoing crisis.
He cited the assassination of a Sokoto State monarch, Alhaji Isa Muhammad Bawa as an example of a coordinated plan by certain individuals or groups to perpetuate insecurity.