THE incessant genocides in Plateau State, which started since 1999, led to loss of thousands of lives, and particularly  refugees (widows & orphans), inclusive. The major ones occurred in 2001 and 2004, respectively. We will not hurriedly forget when the Olusegun Obasanjo-led government  declared a state of emergency in the central Plateau State, after the massacre of innocent souls as a result of a crisis which ensued between two ethnic groups, spiralled  into a religious war.

Obasanjo feared the violence could spread across the country and as such, declared a state of emergency. He also announced on May 18, 2004,  the suspension of the then state governor, Joshua Dariye, whom he accused of being weak and incompetent and replaced him with a retired army general, Major General Chris Alli.

The emergency legislation gave the police and other security agencies the power to detain people indefinitely, conduct searches without warrants, impose curfews and ban public processions. Obasanjo said then that, the state of emergency was to be reviewed after six months.

Major-General Alli, who previously held power in the state when Nigeria was under military rule, warned, “in my 32 years in the military, I have been taught to use force and again I am the administrator. So, I have all the power to crush any attack.”

In November 2008, a group orchestrated ethno-religious cleansing. In the pogrom that followed, about a thousand people lost their lives. Again on 17 January, 2010, Jos was involved in another killing spree.

Now in March,  2010, Plateau State is at it again, with over 300 people, mostly women and children murdered in the early hours of  March 7, following attacks on Dogo-Na-Hawa, Ratsat and Jeji villages in Foron district, Jos South Local Government Area of Plateau State.

The attacks were visited on the Berom villages by men suspected to be Hausa-Fulani fighters, who had descended from the hills from where they launched into the villages at about 2a.m.

Going by the imposition of the  dusk-to-dawn curfew, in the aftermath of the January riots in which over 350 died, there ought to have been military presence in the area at that time.

Some of the fighters were said to have positioned themselves at strategic entrances to the villages, while others went in and began to set houses on fire. Those who tried to escape were butchered, while others were shot.

Former Deputy Senate President, Alhaji Ibrahim Mantu, had blamed the  crisis  in Plateau State on poor leadership, adding that there is no guarantee that there would be no further loss of lives and properties in the state.

Acting President should as a matter of urgency declare a state of emergency in Plateau State

Kenneth Uwadi,
Mmahu Egbema,
Imo State.

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