By SUNNY IKHIOYA

The pattern is clear and simple for all to see: anytime these elements and religious fundamentalists rear their ugly heads, insecurity follows. Take a look at Kwara State. Not long ago, a woman’s house was openly torched for practicing an alternative religion; the whole establishment kept quiet. People were threatening, also in the open, to cause mayhem if others practiced their traditional religion. Professor Wole Soyinka kicked against it, Gani Adams, the OPC chieftain, also added his voice; the establishment kept quiet. The result is what has befallen Kwara State today: kidnapping, banditry, terrorism and the likes. Nobody is looking at the source.

The Yoruba states used to be united as one in culture and shared lineage. Religious secularity was part of it, and everyone was allowed to practice his own religion without persecution. Not too long ago, some elements decided to bring the sharia form of administration into Yoruba land, and Ogbomosho became a haven for some of these religious retrogrades. Some threatened not to obey the instructions of the new Soun of Ogbomosho because he is a Christian. Look at Ogbomosho today: schools are being openly attacked and children kidnapped in broad daylight. The Onììre local government, Oyo State, where the abduction of schoolchildren just took place, is in that axis.

The press reported that the kidnappers were supported by locals in the community. Who are these locals? You will find out that they are the religious brethren of these kidnappers and bandits who are loyal to their cause. Insurgency, banditry and kidnapping do not happen suddenly; they have remote causes, but the perpetrators wait for ideal conditions to carry out their actions, giving reasons such as the hardship conditions in the country and politicians’ excesses. When you cut off the sources, which are the remote causes, you will eliminate these extreme crimes from our environment. The people must stand up for freedom of religion, kick against fundamentalism, and the government must be bold enough to support this course.

Much of the funds for these extreme doctrines come in the form of aid from abroad, to build worship centres and execute their one-religion agenda. Our security agencies are not critically examining the kind of messages religious leaders preach in this country. The other day a preacher was openly declaring a fatwa against a fellow citizen of this country, and no arrest was carried out nor caution given to this preacher. We are afraid to be called infidels by these agents of the devil masquerading as prophets of God, whereas they are just charlatans and puppets of foreign interests determined to impose their agenda on this nation.

The government of President Tinubu cannot claim any credit until they sort out the problem of insecurity; it has already gotten out of hand. Worst still are people who believe that these bandits are fighting for a cause. Speaking during an interview on AIT, Sheikh Gumi said the “herdsmen would not have a source of financing their war machine if they leave banditry.” He was speaking on “Ending Insecurity; Amnesty and Negotiation with Bandits” (Daily Post of May 18, 2026). Any critical mind reading this will conclude that this is a supporter of the bandits’ activities; this is not the type of statement you make in public because it encourages the villains to continue with the criminal activities.

When a people have been suppressed, brainwashed and misled for a long time, their suppressed style of living becomes the standard. It is like the Stockholm syndrome, where the victims show love to their oppressors. The elites of the North have been so selfish in the manner they have managed the affairs of the region that they have left the children in the hands of fundamentalist preachers. Indeed, it is mainly religion that can make a brainwashed people keep up with the misrule that is currently going on in the country, and it is what the carpetbaggers, gold and mineral merchants are using to exploit the resources of the land. They use religion to propagate hate, for the people to fight each other while they take away the spoils. Religion is used to suppress rational thinking, such that people cannot question entrenched anomalies and injustice.

The cattle herder turned bandit will kidnap people in the forests, while the ones to collect the ransom live in the cities; those ones collect the money from them and supply them with arms and peanuts. Until the North is freed from illiteracy and female suppression in the name of religion, we will continue to battle insecurity of this nature. When the people are well informed, they will know that “Nigeria is home to 371 officially recognized ethnic groups, with anthropological and linguistic records frequently estimating over 250 distinct ethnic communities nationwide. Together, these groups speak over 500 distinct languages across the country’s 36 states.” They will understand that for us to be one nation, all of these ethnic groups must agree to come together under one federated government without coercion. They will understand that Nigeria is a secular nation where each one is free to practice his own religion without persecution. They will understand that it is your fundamental right to travel and live anywhere at will, not occupy our forests and kill people. They will understand rational thinking and the new world of science, technology and progress in the form of love and humanity. That is what proper education brings to a people.

The North must start by removing the children from the streets and forests and channeling them to proper education; the girl child must also be supported in this direction. It is the least the leadership of the North can do to secure the future of the North and Nigeria generally. The government must begin to clamp down on religious fundamentalists and the sponsors; there lies the root cause of our unending insecurity. We have been dragged for too long by sentiments of ethnicity and religion. Unfortunately, these have permeated different sections of our security infrastructure. Imagine the telephone line of our national security adviser being bugged. People have become more loyal to their religious leaders instead of national patriotism. So, we experience different shades of sabotage.

If we must eliminate the kind of insecurity we have in this country, the government must be decisive. What Gumi is proposing will never work; you do not negotiate with terrorists and bandits that are clearly misguided and have no clear focus about their grievances. I have cited instances of the Tamil Tigers of Sri Lanka in the past; that is the only solution to their nuisance. There is no middle ground: you are either ready to compromise and leave them with their destructive conduct, or you eliminate them once and for all. I will suggest that we go for the latter solution.

•Ikhioya wrote via: www.southsouthecho.com