By Charles Kumolu, Deputy Editor

If 2021 was the most harrowing year in Nigeria, 2022 may be too dicey.

Never in recent history had so much uncertainty hung over the nation’s future.

But for hope and faith, none would have welcomed the New Year with smiles.

Reasons lie in the distressing experience last year was and the doubts over the unlikeliness of a different year.

In the last 366 days, in key areas, especially security and economy, it was stumbling and falling for Africa’s most populous nation.

The aftermath saw over 2,287 persons murdered as of the third quarter last year by non-state actors.

It was a year that left the populace at the mercy of violent non-state elements, who now share certain monopolies with government.

Even for newsmen who tallied the number of daily deaths and observed the speed with which the society moved on with each set of killings, it wasn’t an easy call.

At the same time, millions sank deeper into poverty.

President Muhammadu Buhari had claimed to have lifted 10.5 million people out of poverty, but the claim was a stark contrast with what is on the ground.

The truth is that persistent inflationary pressure driven largely by accelerating food prices made more Nigerians increasingly poor.

Institutions like the World Bank, International Monetary Fund and Nigeria’s National Bureau of Statistics, NBS, had all warned that citizens were becoming increasingly poorer.

With no corresponding response from government at fixing the challenges, there are worries over the 2022 outlook.

More Nigerians may die, just as living may become the survival of the fittest.

Irrespective of pledges of a turnaround, the average Nigerian appears non-expectant of anything different this year.

Just as Arthur Golden, best-selling author of Memoirs of Geisha, declared, “nothing is as bleak as the future except the past,” only Nigeria’s past isn’t opaque as things stand.

For political correctness, a minority may unsurprisingly feign hopefulness amid hopelessness.

But sycophancy aside, there is little to inspire hope in security, economy and politics, especially the 2023 race.

Events of the last seven days are even enough to diminish any optimism of a happy new year where lives and property are safe.

Specifically, between December 25-and today, no fewer than 14 people have been killed while 40 were taken hostage in separate incidents.

Apart from leaving you transfixed, the breakdown makes one wonder if the new year would ever be a happy one.

On Christmas day, armed persons attacked 15 communities in Gusau, the Zamfara State capital, killing seven people and abducting 33.

Between 25 and 27, Gunmen kidnapped seven people in Plateau, Kaduna and Ekiti states.

A union leader Damilare Oladipupo aka No Story was on Christmas Day, stabbed to death at a hotel in Agbado area of Ogun State.

On December 28, bandits invaded Gada village in Zamfara State where they killed the District Head and five others.

The terrorists were said to have gone from house to house in the community, unleashing mayhem on the peasants.

In Anambra State, on December 31, gunmen killed a policeman and injured another in an attack on Eziama-Uli Health Centre.

As you are reading this, bandits may be on a killing spree in some northern communities while other killer non-state actors might be pouncing on their targets in different parts of the country.

No pretenses, that’s just the Nigeria of today where people are murdered daily for no crime of theirs.

Importantly, if the same security responses employed last year are retained, then insecurity would definitely outlast this administration.

Should that be the case, Nigerians may become as vulnerable as ever.–even more vulnerable than the characters in Raleigh Sadler’s Vulnerable: Rethinking Human Trafficking.

This is no doomsday prophecy, but what possibly awaits citizens this year except government sees the crisis as more existential than political.

Therefore, the ability to tackle the security challenges headlong, rather than employing political rhetoric, will determine the country’s stability in 2022.

But it can only happen when authorities see security as a holy grail.-just the manner peace in the Middle East is viewed by prime ministers, diplomats and presidents.

That said, the prevailing political climate also smacks of uncertainty ahead of 2023 election.

The scene would be so charged considering the North/South debate over power shift and other unfolding factors.

Instructively, how well the rotation issue is handled will determine the level of calmness in the race.

By extension, the politics of who emerges as the presidential candidate of Peoples Democratic Party, PDP, and All Progressives Congress,APC, may likely result in an anti-climax that would overheat the polity.

Such a situation could throw up an opportunity for a third force, but Nigerians might waste the chance as they always do.

To paraphrase Noam Chomsky, author of Failed States: The Abuse of Power and the Assault on Democracy, they would march on, following their leaders, toward an armageddon of their own making.

Chances are that such a situation is likely to play out ahead of the general election.

However, only the application of firm political will to prevailing security, economic and political challenges, can prevent the year from being yet another unsettling one.

Security, economic and political experts, expatiated these likely scenarios in separate interviews with Sunday Vanguard.

Drawing on the experience of 2021, minefields were identified in the sectors, just as workable ways of demining were suggested.