By Rotimi Fasan
THE last hasn’t been heard yet about the Independence Day terrorist attack that took the lives of many Nigerians some hundreds of metres away from the Eagles Square, venue of the celebrations.

Although millions of Nigerians have wondered if there was indeed anything to celebrate about Nigeria hitting the 50 years mark.

Yes, millions of Nigerians have for months questioned the huge amount of money set aside for the celebration of what amounted to them as a non-event against the backdrop of mounting external debt, infrastructural decay and sundry failures in the system- Nigerians had expressed their reservations about the entire celebration.

But they couldn’t have imagined anyone expressing their opposition to the celebration in the very violent manner that we all witnessed on October 1. Nigeria was suddenly cast in the light of an unsafe territory, one of those countries in Asia or the Middle East in the firm hold of terrorists.

That the bombs went off so close to Eagles Square says something of the daring confidence of those who planted the bombs. There couldn’t have been any doubt they wanted to make a statement, made it and very loudly too.

They could well have detonated their lethal devices in the very heart of the elaborate parades going on at the time of the attacks, they would appear to be saying.

Or, if they so wished, they could have walked right into the parade venue and launched an attack right in the presence of the foreign guests invited to the Golden Jubilee celebrations.

Then would we have had a playback back or replication of the sort of attack that ended the life of Anwar Sadat, the Egyptian president that was assassinated in 1981 in the wake of the 1978 agreement he signed with Israel. Sadat was killed by a soldier right on the parade ground.

But planners of the Eagles Square attack mercifully spared us the scandal, to say nothing of the tragic enormity, of such attack. But nevertheless, their coming so close to the venue of the celebrations to launch the attack must have been enough to scare the wits out of the foreigners who, unlike some Nigerian politicians, knew they had not been declared persona non grata in their different countries and could well go back home.

And so home many of them returned not minding the ECOWAS regional meeting that was to have held in Abuja and at which many of them had been expected.

President Goodluck Jonathan was abandoned to handle that part of the matter alone. But the curious thing about the whole attack was the announcement of it and how that announcement was received.

I first heard it as breaking news on African Independent Television (AIT), the television arm of the media ‘behemoth’, owned by Raymond Dokpesi, Director General of Ibrahim Babangida’s campaign team.

AIT had broken into its transmission of the Golden Jubilee celebrations to make the announcement. Initial report said that five people died, among many more that were injured. Current reports put the number of dead at between 10 and 18, including civilians and security personnel.

What appeared like normal news report would take a curious twist several days later when Raymond Dokpesi would be detained by the State Security in connection with the Eagles Square attack.

But before then what had initially appeared as routine statement by a leader wanting to reassure his people had been made by President Jonathan. He had said government knew those who were behind the attack in Abuja.

He would go ahead in a separate statement to contradict the claim by MEND that it was responsible for the attack. Jonathan anchored his claim on his being from the Niger-Delta and his wide knowledge of the area. What’s more, he from the Niger-Delta, was now president? What more could MEND want?

He vowed the real culprits would be exposed. Again what appeared quite ordinary and without any importance would assume some importance in the few days that followed the attack in Abuja. This was the absence of Babangida from the celebrations.

Babangida, now an aspirant for president in next year’s election, was the only one of Nigeria’s former heads of state still living that was not part of the Eagle’s Square celebrations.

He was conspicuously absent. In the light of what has since played out, I guess it’s clear that Babangida’s absence was not just fortuitous. Certain things had been playing underground, unknown to the rest of Nigerians.

And those things are beginning to come up now. Which leads one to ask the following questions: Was MEND truly behind the attack in Abuja or not? If it was not, as some of its members have come out to say, who was responsible for the statement claiming responsibility for the attack on behalf of MEND?

And what would be the motive for MEND’s claim of responsibility? Did AIT have foreknowledge of the attack through its proprietor? What’s the connection between this attack, Dokpesi’s arrest and his alarm, some weeks ago, that his life was in danger?

Was it in recognition that the life of his campaign manager was not safe, and by extension that his own life too was not safe that Babangida elected to stay away from Eagles Square?

Remember that only weeks before Babangida had talked of the cordial relations between him, Jonathan and their respective families? At what point did things begin to fall apart between them? Don’t forget too that Babangida supported Dokpesi’s alarm that his life was endangered?

And when President Jonathan said, rather confidently, that he/his government knew the perpetrators of the Abuja attack, did he have in mind opponents of his ambition to return to office? Was he of the impression that Henry Okah might be working with these opponents of his?

What should Nigerians make of the Okah claim that he was approached, by somebody in Nigeria he is yet to name, to implicate some opponents of President Jonathan’s presidential ambition in the Abuja attack? Where does the truth lie in all this?

With the belligerency coming from Adamu Ciroma and other persons from the North demanding Jonathan’s resignation following his handling of the Abuja attack, are we witnessing a gradual slide into anarchy?

Are we to understand some people as wanting to put their knowledge of the use and management of arms into violent use against Nigerians?

The trading of insults, accusations and retailing of rumours and all sorts of conspiracy theories along regional lines can’t be in the interest of the rest of Nigerians with no greater ambition than to live decently and in peace on the part of earth it has pleased God to place them.

Will the politicians allow them just this little without bringing the entire house down on everybody?