Nigerians, violence must not become routine

Nigerians awoke this week to yet another series of grim reports from Plateau, Kebbi and Kogi states. At least 20 people were killed in an attack on Kawel community in Plateau State, while separate incidents in Kebbi and Kogi left more people dead and others abducted. Although the locations differ, the underlying story remains the same: a country struggling to protect its citizens from recurring violence.

The most troubling aspect of these incidents lies beyond their frequency. Equally alarming is the growing danger that Nigerians may gradually begin to regard such tragedies as a routine feature of national life.

The pattern has become painfully familiar and disturbingly predictable. News breaks of another community under attack. Casualties are counted and survivors recount their ordeal. Public officials issue statements of sympathy and condemnation, while security agencies pledge investigations and intensified operations. Public anger follows, although it often fades as attention shifts elsewhere. Before long, another attack occurs and another community joins the expanding list of victims. No nation should become comfortable with such a cycle.

Every casualty figure represents a human story. Behind the statistics is a father who will never return home, a mother whose children must now face an uncertain future, a farmer whose years of labour ended in violence, or a young person whose aspirations were extinguished in an instant. These are not mere entries in a security report. They are citizens whose most basic right, the right to life, has been brutally violated.

The attacks in Plateau, Kebbi and Kogi also expose a deeply troubling reality about the country’s security challenges. Violence is no longer confined to a particular region or linked to a single form of conflict. Banditry, communal clashes, kidnapping, farmer-herder disputes and organised criminal activity continue to intersect, creating an intricate web of insecurity across large parts of the country. Consequently, many communities now live in a state of constant uncertainty, never knowing whether the next attack will strike a neighbouring village, a farming settlement or a major roadway.

The consequences extend far beyond the immediate loss of life. Agricultural productivity suffers when farmers abandon their land for fear of attack, while businesses become reluctant to invest in areas where security cannot be guaranteed. Young people, meanwhile, begin to lose faith in public institutions when repeated assurances fail to translate into meaningful protection. The economic and social costs of insecurity therefore reach well beyond the communities directly affected.

Government at every level must acknowledge that public confidence is increasingly linked to its ability to protect lives and property. Citizens may endure economic hardship and navigate political disagreements, yet they cannot reasonably be expected to accept a reality in which killings and abductions become ordinary features of everyday existence.

Security personnel deserve recognition for the sacrifices many of them make under difficult and often dangerous circumstances. Nevertheless, bravery alone cannot replace an effective security strategy. Intelligence gathering must improve, operational responses must become more rapid and coordinated, and those responsible for these crimes must be identified, apprehended and brought before the courts. Above all, communities need evidence that the state possesses both the capacity and the determination to prevent attacks rather than simply respond after the damage has been done.

The attacks in Plateau, Kebbi and Kogi should serve as a stark national warning. A country that becomes accustomed to recurring violence risks losing more than lives and property. It risks surrendering its collective sense of outrage, a development that would carry grave implications for the nation’s future. That outcome must be resisted.

A nation’s conscience is measured by its willingness to mourn every needless death, demand accountability for every act of violence and insist that every citizen, regardless of geography or circumstance, deserves equal protection under the law.

Nigeria cannot allow mass killings and abductions to become just another set of headlines. The day such tragedies cease to shock the public is the day the country begins to accept the unacceptable, and that is a price no nation can afford to pay.