THESE days Nigerians fight over anything. A disputed bus fare, a misunderstood word  at a community gathering or the better known incidents of cult rivalries or the more celebrated cases of land disputes are reasons for Nigerians to go at each other.

Casualties could be high. In some instances, combat is postponed to another day and could last for months. No part of the country is spared the scourge of unrest. The causes could be as ridiculous as the killing of a hunter’s dog in Ilorin, Kwara State.

A police corporal, Mr. Agboola Joachim, who was among policemen sent to quell the commotion, died from bullet wounds. Angry youths of Abayawo and Dada communities were engaged in the fatal confrontation after a dog of a hunter in one of the communities was killed.

What is the worth of a dog compared to the life of the policeman? What was the value of the dog that its killing could enrage the communities? How could the fight escalate to one where firearms were used? Were the police surprised that the warring groups were armed?

Little about this incident is surprising. Communities in many parts of the country are armed. They go to war at the slightest provocation. Sometimes they do not require a reason, other than to test the firing power of their acquisitions.

Any incident is enough to re-ignite unsettled quarrels among these communities. The confrontations are also occasions to frighten opponents with exhibitions of arsenals that could scare security agencies.

In rural communities, where poverty is a daily companion, a hunter’s dog is a major asset in the economics of hunting. Its death is a setback without immediate remedy. The hunter is not worth much without his dog.

Yet, this could not be a good reason for the confrontation, during which 50 motorcycles, again the riders’ source of sustenance, were destroyed. The anger that resulted in this extent of destruction and the killing of a policeman could not all have been over a dog’s death.

It is becoming more important by the day that security agencies have a presence that warring communities respect. The killing of security agents has gone unpunished for too long.

Last May, the Ombatse group in Nasarawa State killed 100 security agents. The chief priest Ala Agu defended Ombatse thus, “The governor asked the police officers to arrest me, cut my head and take my head to him. When they came, because they were themselves drunk, my god did not allow them to come to me and they died on the way.”

Agu and his men are still free. Others who act like them expect similar treatment.