JOS: CITY OF DEATH?

I remember in 2004, when a crisis erupted in Jos. The statistics of death was alarming, and the pictures from the carnage seemed like something taken from a Steven Spielberg horror movie.
Hundreds of people were killed, and the situation eventually led to a state of emergency been declared in that state. The governor of Jos then, Joshua Dariye, was suspended for six months, and a military administrator took over.
What dominated the news for a period of time after that mindless carnage, was the politics surrounding governor Dariye’s suspension from office.
Yes, people talked about how it was unfortunate for the victims to die needlessly, but our leaders focused more on whether a state of emergency should have been declared or not. God!
Fast-forward to 2008, and yet another crisis erupted in that once serene city. A friend of mine lost his dad, and my school, Olabbisi Onabanjo University (OOU), also lost some of her alumni that were in Jos for their national service. In all, over five hundred Nigerian lives were lost in that tragedy!
Then, the situation got me thinking of the casualties more as individuals than just numbers.
Death is inevitable, but it is a very bad thing when it is evitable. Someone once likened human beings to strings of a guitar: if you tweak one string, the reverberation would be felt by all the other strings. That means that when one person dies, it has a ripple effect.
The average human being has a father, mother, siblings, nephews, nieces, cousins, friends, neighbours, school mates, church members, mosque members………………….the list is endless. When one person dies, the effect is felt by everybody that had come in contact with that person.
Nigeria is a blessed country, and our citizens’ lives are priceless, but what does it say about us, when we shed each other’s lives like skin off a snake’s back?
Once, a United States war ship was hijacked off the coast of Somalia. There were about ten people on that ship. The US government refused to pay any ransom, but rather, raised an elite force to rescue their citizens. At the end of that scenario, all but one of the Somalian pirates was killed. The lone survivor was taken to New York for trial, but no American life was lost.
There have been lots of cases where journalists were kidnapped in hostile situations all over the world, more recently in places like Iraq, Afghanistan e.t.c.
When such a situation occurs, the country that is affected, will not rest on its oars, until its citizen is returned hale and hearty.
Those are people who place premium on human lives. Can Nigeria do the same? One of the reasons why the Jos crisis keeps recurring is because there is very little regard for human lives. That is why hundreds of people can be wiped out inside their country in peace time.
We can never progress as a country, if we do not respect the sanctity of human lives.
Jos has turned into a city of death. Stories of Jos’ scenic beauty and hospitality have now become history. Jos is on a path to self destruction.
Something drastic needs to be done, and it needs to be done fast. There is no need for probes, inquiries, committees, or all such frivolities.
The root causes of these carnages are known, but what needs to be done is for the government to summon the political will to deal with this gory malady decisively.
A lot of committees have sat, but their reports have never seen the light of day. The time is long overdue for the government of Nigeria to put a permanent end to this wanton destruction of Nigerian lives.
A government ceases to be a government if it cannot perform its basic responsibilities, and one of the basic responsibilities of a government is to protect the lives of its citizens.
Good people from a great nation don’t kill each other over cattle, or such nonsense.
Jos must be rescued from the merchants of death who are hell bent on turning that beautiful city into a ghost town.
All of us must rise up to collectively condemn this, and to demand actions from our leaders. Our countrymen are not goats and chickens, so they shouldn’t die like that. Remember that whatever happens to your fellow man today, could easily happen to you. This is an issue of national importance. Jos must be sanitized!

NB: R. I. P to the people who lost their lives in the Jos crisis. May God ease the pain of their families.