Peace Deals With Bandits?

MaTaZ ArIsInG
Dallas, Texas

Some of the videos trending online, arising from the current attempts to negotiate with bandits by some local government areas of Katsina State, have justified the position of most Nigerians, including this newspaper, who have kicked against negotiation with the bandits.

As at the last count, eleven local government areas comprising Jibia, Batsari, Safana, Ɗanmusa, Kurfi, Musawa, Matazu, Faskari, Kankara, Ɗandume and Sabuwa have signed what the authorities called a peace deal with bandits. These deals were monitored by government officials, traditional rulers and even security operatives.

The latest council area to enter such a clearly futile entente cordiale with these criminals and rogue elements is the Sabuwa local government area. However, the sort of weapons displayed by these bandits and the fact that they were not taken away from them show how fragile the so-called negotiation and peace deals are.

These terror elements came to what was supposed to be a peace talk armed with AK-47 rifles,

Rocket-Propelled Grenade and GMG, among other deadly weapons, and returned to the forest with these weapons.

If the fact that they came heavily armed and left with their weapons intact is not worrisome, then the audacity with which some of the bandits’ representatives spoke at the so-called peace suggests that we have lost it.

With a boldness that we find difficult to comprehend, one of the bandits’ leaders, in a video that has been trending online, told government and security officials gathered at one of the peace deals that if the government kills ten bandits, twenty others will come up to replace them. What impudence. Like most Nigerians, we are tempted to conclude that the nation appears to be at the mercy of these renegades.

One thing is certain: Officials of the local government areas in Katsina state negotiating with these bandits are apparently doing so from a position of weakness. Therein lies the danger. And we find it difficult to understand how we descended so low.

We have said repeatedly that negotiation with these criminals is not the way to go. And there are precedents to support our position. Even in Katsina state, former Governor Aminu Bello Masari negotiated with them, visited these renegades in their hideouts in the forest, offered them monetary incentives and had a photo session with them. What happened afterwards? More killings.

In Zamfara, former Governor Mohammed Matawalle and now  minister of state for Defence, offered amnesty to bandits who have killed, maimed, raped, displaced and abducted hundreds of citizens, believing that would end the menace, but nothing changed. Zamfara is still the hotbed of banditry.

Perhaps that was why Governors Dikko Umar Radda and Lawal Dauda Dare, who succeeded Masari and Matawalle respectively, repeatedly said they wouldn’t negotiate with bandits. It appears Governor Radda has changed his stand, which is why 11 council areas in Katsina state have entered what authorities claimed are peace deals with these terror elements.

Regardless of how we view it, these negotiations with bandits who have killed scores, received hundreds of millions in ransom after abducting many, displaced communities and made life brutish for millions of residents in the council areas of states across the northwest, showed a weakness on the part of the state. No amount of gaslighting can change this fact.

There are so many unanswered questions about the so-called peace deal. Does this not clearly show that the state has failed to protect lives and property? Will it deliver the peace that we all have been yearning for? In view of the fact that previous peace deals did not end this criminality, what assurance does the nation have that the latest attempt will be any different?

Our position on negotiation with bandits has not changed and will not. We are against it because we believe that it is an incentive to further crimes. How can the nation pacify persons who kill, maim, rape, abduct for ransom and commit all sorts of crimes against the citizens and expect to end crimes?

Assuming without conceding that negotiations with bandits is the solution to the current challenges and will ultimately guarantee lasting peace, what measures are being taken to placate the victims of their crimes? Justice demands that victims of crimes have restitution, and until that is done, the nation cannot be on its way to enduring peace.

Even worse, in our opinion, is the fact that what is going on indicates a duplicity on the part of the security apparatus of state- running with the hare while at same time hunting with the hound.

Similarly, it goes to prove right the speculation  that insecurity has become a lucrative franchise when considered that its budget is hardly available for auditing. We are concerned that Nigeria is exposing itself to ridicule  as officialdom loses grip of one its fundamental constitutional  duties- protecting the lives and properties of the citizens all because it wants to look politically correct as another election cycle looms in the horizon.

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