By Aliyu Nuhu
While congratulating the families of train victims for the safe return of their relatives, something very sad came to mind about the whole tragedy.
1- The ultimate winners are the terrorists. They achieved all their objectives without retribution. They have all their inmates released, collected hefty amounts of money in billions of Naira and foreign currencies and went away without losing a soul. Meanwhile they inflicted damages on Nigeria. They killed passengers, destroyed a train and stopped it from operation for seven months and instilled fear in the minds of Nigerians.
2- The biggest tragedy is that all the captives were released through payment of ransoms which impoverished family economies, some might never recover. The last victims were released by military committee which means more money were paid and the military might have also cornered part of the ransom money. In the whole saga there was no shooting, no arrest, not even declaring some people wanted. What kind of country do we have for God’s sake? Time will tell the kind of arrangement reached for the release of the victims.
3- We just have a paper military. What is there in a military that cannot use force on terrorists. There is nothing impressive about military that abandoned its trade and go to terrorists and pay ransoms. It is really a shame on NIGERIAN government.
4- As long as people benefit from train attacks and kidnapping there will be no end to this kind of tragedy. The terrorists have made a good, safe and profitable venture and have probably gone to plan another attack. Security agencies that benefit from it will be too willing to be part of the next attack. The Mamus that made billions from ransom negotiation will be waiting to make ransom harvest. A kidnapping Industry has been created by government’s inability to deal ruthlessly with criminals.
