Last month, tragedy struck, leaving sorrow and anger across Northern Nigeria after 16 men from the region were killed in Uromi, Edo State.
This incident left communities, states, and the nation in grief and mourning.
The victims, believed to be hunters, were reportedly lynched and set ablaze by a mob of community members and local vigilantes.
In response, Edo State Governor, Monday Okpebholo, suspended the Commander of the Edo State Security Corps, Friday Ibadin, and banned all unregistered vigilante groups in the state.
Furthermore, Okpebholo, alongside Abba Kabir Yusuf, visited Torankawa village in Bunkure Local Government Area of Kano State, the home of most of the murdered 16 hunters, where they paid a condolence visit to their village and families.
More so, the state government, alongside the federal government, set up a formation of a joint fact-finding committee to investigate the killing.
READ ALSO: Uromi Killings: FG, Edo govt establish fact-finding committee
Since then, there have been numerous calls for the perpetrators of this heinous act to be brought to justice.
Speaking in an interview with The New Daily Prime, Adams Abuh, Assistant Director of Internal Security (ADis/SSS) Retired, suggested a way forward to address the issue and prevent further occurrences.
Abuh, a Fellow of the International Institute of Professional Security (FIIPS), stated that opinion leaders within those societies must call their people to order.
He cautioned that if one group takes drastic action, the other group will react, and this could lead to a national calamity for the country.
He further emphasised that both stakeholders and opinion leaders in those communities need to interface with their people.
He also stressed that governments at various levels, need concerted efforts to ensure that these threats do not materialise.
The Managing Director/CEO of Otiyeke Universal Security noted, “But, be that as it may, our security agencies and various communities must be proactive to forestall any future revenge or retaliatory action by the threatening groups.
He added: “I think we should not just go to bed and sleep and have our eyes closed.”
“We should be operating both physically and by way of adequate management, counter-security to management strategy, we call it propaganda.
On how security agencies can distinguish between criminal activities and ethnic-based conflicts in their investigations, Abuh emphasised that security agencies, due to their training, should certainly be equipped to recognise the nature of various criminal activities and security threats.
“I’ll give you a typical example. Like these people, this unfortunate incident in Nurumi, where they claimed that they came from Botswako’s side, that they were hunters.”
He further stated that a competent investigator would certainly ascertain from that region whether they had been there, whether they had been hunting, they had been engaged in other activities, among other details.
“And then the only thing is that people should, in the course of investigation get the real facts in the case. Whether it has an ethnic or religious correlation is not what is important at this point.”
He added: “What is important to you, first and foremost, is for you to know the facts and know the truth and get to the bottom of the incident. If it is a threat to security, you will find out what is causing the threat and how can that threat be neutralized. If it is ethnic-based, whether you need to engage the leaders in that particular ethnic group and see how you can talk them out, or use a government agency, it depends.
“And that is why, you see, the intelligence organization, how they handle threats, is different from the police who directly investigate the criminal activity and persecute. In most cases, the intelligence organization tries to find out the cause and try to neutralize it so that the event does not take place. If the crime is committed, that does not mean they will not find out the truth and try to persecute their will.
“But the most important thing is to try to neutralize the threat to any security. So that there will be no breach of peace in that society.”
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He added that another key action the government should take is to reduce the volume of arms in circulation.
Furthermore, he stated that the Ministry of Livestock Development represents another step forward, noting that it is the first of its kind in the country.
“On the issue of ranching, and certainly, we have talked about it so much. We have not experimented with it anywhere yet to see how effective it can be. But all I know is that most of the herders themselves will not like this ranching, because they would want to be moving from one place to the other, which is not beneficial to the farmers.
“And because it’s this nomadism that creates the kind of crisis that they have all over the country. One thing I want to also make people understand is that the herders/ farmers’ crisis is not peculiar to the Southwest, South-south, Southeast, or North-central, it’s in every part of the country.
“Even in Sokoto, they have the same issue; in Borno, too, they have the same insecurity problem. So it is a nationwide crisis.
“But I think that the measure by the government in establishing the Livestock Development Agency, and that organization, certainly now is working out this strategy. I’m sure in the next year, they will have come out with their programmes, and it might lead us somewhere.”
