Online Opinion piece

What do you believe is the number one element preventing peace, either locally, nationally, or internationally?

By Chimekwene Grace O

05/03/2011

 Discrimination among northerners and southerners in Nigerian

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 “Someone please help Kaduna, the home state of the Vice-President Namadi Sambo. About 150 youth croppers have had their hands and limbs hacked off by people protesting the outcome of the 2011 presidential elections in Kaduna State. A youth croppers who managed to escape the brutal attacks, narrated how they were rounded up by some youths. Their attackers appeared to be organized and they were told to line up and in turn had their hands amputated. Those who tried to escape had their limbs chopped off. But some of them managed to escape and have alerted the authorities.

The victims are in separate hospitals undergoing treatment. Many terrified youth croppers’ are now migrating away from Kaduna State to their respective states of origins. So far the authorities, in order to prevent the risk of revenge attacks, have refused to disclose the number of dead victims. Thousands of youth coppers were slaughtered with about 35,000 receiving treatment or displaced.      

The Nigeria Police Force and the military have made their presence felt and effecting arrests. President Jonathan has promised to set up a judicial inquiry to look into the post presidential elections crisis. On his part, the CPC Presidential candidate, General Muhamadu Buhari has condemned the attacks on churches and the violence in general in a brief comment to BBC Hausa Service. But observers noted that he has stopped short of reproving the mindless killings of the youth croppers.

There have only been a few times in my life where I experienced discrimination. I traveled to Kano a state in Nigeria for track meet and we were from the south it was so obvious the kind of reception we were given. Action they say speaks louder than voice. Throughout our stay we were treated different from the way they treat the northerners. They give them the best treatment.

Yes, the situation is indeed very serious. To varying degrees, massive bands of the far north, especially within lower class neighborhoods and the abundant slums are shaken in violence. In Kaduna, political capital of the old northern region, there have been reports of very violent goings-on: corpses with machete cuts stacked along the highways, mobs of armed urchins from Muslim-dominated neighborhoods at makeshift checkpoints ready to kill southern Christians, payback attacks by angry Christians, fearful residents abandoned in their homes or, if they are lucky, packed like sardines inside police and army barracks where they had fled to for refuge. Not surprisingly, a 24-hour curfew has been imposed by the authorities. In all, about 10 northern states have witnessed violence since incumbent President Goodluck Jonathan was announced by the Independent National Elections Commission (INEC) as the winner of the last Saturday's elections. He won the elections. But because he is from the south, the northerners are fighting against it. The Muslims are burning churches, and killing innocent people because the winner of the 2011 presidential election is a southerner.

In cases as this, for peace to reign I think the best way to stop discrimination and violence is to separate the northerners from the southerners, easterners, and westerners that way there will be peace and everybody will leave happily.