Rather than shifting the blames of the tragedies on the organisers of the food camps, the government should own up and admit that it has failed the people. Security and welfare of the citizens, remain the major responsibility of the government. Any administration that fails to live up to these basic duties, has failed.
By Emeka Alex Duru
You may notice the subtle attempts by the political leadership to push the blame of the recent mishaps at the food distribution centres on the organisers of the events. The agenda seems to be working. Thus, the organisers are being painted as careless or even reckless. They have become scapegoats or fall guys, as we say in popular lingo.
Over the weekend, a Court in Iyaganku, Ibadan, had ordered the remand of the estranged wife of Oba Enitan Adeyeye Ogunwusi, the Ooni of Ile Ife, Naomi Silekunola and two others, over the event at Bashorun Islamic High School, that ended up in stampede. Others remanded are the school’s principal, Abdullahi Fasasi and the proprietor of Agidigbo FM, Alhaji Oriyomi Hamzat. They were kept at the Agodi Correctional facility pending an advice for the Director of Public Prosecution of the State Ministry of Justice. They are facing trial on a four-count charge that borders on conspiracy, acceleration of death, negligent acts causing harm and omitting to provide adequate security and medical facilities.
Reports also claimed that the Police had picked a Reverend Father in Abuja, over similar incident in a catholic Church in Maitama district of the city. Key officials of the Okija food centre organisation were also said to have been taken in. I could not verify the reports. But all the suspects are being haunted over the tragedies that befell the nation between December 18 and 21 in Ibadan, Okija and Abuja. Official reports claimed that the incidents left over 67 Nigerians dead and many injured. Breakdown of the mishaps showed that about 35 children died in a stampede during a Christmas funfair event in Ibadan. Six other children who suffered various degrees of injuries were hospitalized.
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On Saturday, December 21, three days after, 10 persons were confirmed dead at the Holy Trinity Catholic Church, Maitama, Abuja. The accident occurred during an annual charity event organised by parishes of the Catholic Church to distribute foodstuffs to the poor and the vulnerable in the community.
Same day, another stampede happened in Okija, Anambra state. Police confirmed 22 dead and scores injured. The palliatives were donated by a notable member of the community, Chief Ernest Obiejesi (Obijackson), on behalf of the Obijackson Foundation as an annual exercise to celebrate Christmas with the people.
All the mishaps took similar pattern. In the struggle to get ahead and obtain the free food items distributed by organisers, the participants trampled upon one another, leading to the deaths. Many Nigerians have expressed their sympathies to the victims and their families. President Bola Tinubu, in mourning the victims, blamed the organisers of the events for the mishaps. “I see this as a very grave error on the part of the organisers”, the President said on Monday during his first Presidential Media Chat. Senior officials of the government have toed same line.
That is where we are missing the point and losing the relevant lessons from the unfortunate incidents. This is not the first time Nigerians would be killed in food distribution centres. In April, nine people were reportedly trampled to death and 30 others injured while scrambling for Sallah palliatives at Senator Aliyu Wamakko’s home in Sokoto State.
On March 20, two students of the Nasarawa State University died while scrambling for 7.5 kg bags of rice distributed by the state government. Seventeen others, mostly females, were injured. Four days later on Friday, March 24, at least seven females, with ages ranging from eight to 53, were trampled to death, while others sustained injuries in a stampede at the annual Zakat distribution of N10,000 organised by AYM Shafa Foundation in Bauchi. Earlier in February, seven people were killed in Lagos while struggling to buy confiscated rice being sold by the Nigeria Customs Service (NCS) to the public as an intervention in the face of hardship and hunger.
Of course, there could be elements of inadequacies in logistics and crowd control on the part of the event organisers. But what cannot be taken away from them is the good heart and fellow-feeling behind their actions. Whether we accept it or not, the tragic incidents in Ibadan, Okija and Abuja, point to sheer failure of leadership in the country. We cannot divorce the avoidable deaths in the food camps from the prevailing extreme hunger and hardship in the land. Palliatives had been shared to the needy in the past without issues. And the number of recipients had been manageable. But since the removal of subsidies on petroleum products, floating of the naira on the foreign exchange market and other economic policies of the Tinubu administration, prices of goods and services have been on the rise. A bag of rice that was bought at N30,000 before now, rose to N100,000 or more, depending on location and quality. A measure of Garri that was sold at N1, 200, rose to N2, 500, and in some places, higher. Most Nigerians have been on the edge, hence their resort to food distribution centres for respite.
My article on Friday, July 12, 2024, titled “Inside Tinubu’s Republic of Hunger”, was not intended to mock the government but to draw attention to the rate at which Nigerians were pummeled by poverty and hunger. Part of the observations was how almost all the failed portions of internal roads in major cities, had been taken over by able bodied men and women, begging for money or food. That can only show the extent Nigerians have been debased by poverty and want.
It can only take one experiencing huger to understand how desperate these Nigerians can be. I passed through such terrible path of queueing for food during the dying days of the 1967-1970 Nigerian Civil War, when as kids of less than seven years, we were forced to line up at relief centres for rations that might not come or when they did, were in patches and morsels. But that was a war situation. Biafra, our homeland, was under economic blockade orchestrated by the federal government and its callous foreign collaborators. So, we needed the handouts to survive.
Nigeria’s case is different. The country is not at war and not passing through any pronounced disaster. There is therefore no reason for Nigerians to file out for the so-called palliatives or whatever they represent. It is simply a case of the wickedness of the leaders at various levels. In those hapless and vulnerable souls crushed in Ibadan, Okija and Abuja, Nigeria, as an entity dies.
So, rather than shifting the blames of the recent tragedies on the organisers of the food camps, the government should own up and admit that it has failed the people. Security and welfare of the citizens, remain the major responsibility of the government. Any administration that fails to live up to these basic duties, has failed.