Conservatively, Abuja-Kaduna highwayis the busiest road in the entire northern part ofNigeria and one of the busiest in the country. It provides access to nearly allthe 19 northern statesand links them up through other federal and several state roads in the region.All classes of citizens in this part of the country including governors, legislators, ministers, judges, businessmen, traders, artisans and the unemployedall ply the road to access not only Abuja but other towns and cities in other parts of Nigeria. Unfortunately, the road became something else in recent years; something not less tormenting than Hell.
Although Hell is one of the themes that belong to the metaphysical, it is believed in many religious traditions to be a place or state of torment and punishment experienced only after death. In many religions including Islam and Christianity, Hell is described as painful, harsh just as it inflicts suffering on the guilty. This is why no one likes discussing it because, even listening to stories about it alone, is considered by many as nightmarish as being a condemned person in it. This is even as no individual has ever seen Hell.
Regrettably, some wicked and hardhearted miscreants have, through their heinous crime of kidnapping, ‘dragged’ Hell from the metaphysical world to our mundane planet of empirical experiences; unleashing what should be the exclusive share of the guilty among the dead on innocent lives that use Abuja-Kaduna highway(and by extension the Kaduna-Kano and Abuja-Okeno roads). For example, the wife of a brother (whom we fondly call Umar Afro) fatefully experienced what Allah mentions about Judgment Dayin Qur’an 80:34-36saying ‘That Day shall a man flee from his own brother; and from his mother and father; and from his wife and children’. Out of intense fear, sheabandoned her little children on the highway to escape the hands of blood-thirsty kidnappers.Inna lillahiWa Inna IlayhiRaj’un!My brother’s sister-in-law was however abducted but was lucky to be spared from being used for rituals when her captors discovered that she was about 7 months pregnant.
Indeed, many innocent lives and colossal wealth have been lost to kidnapping activities.
One of the worst experiences an individual can go through in life is kidnapping. The tragedy of strange or even familiar persons abducting you and locking you up in an uncomfortable place; restricting your movement and blocking you from communicating with your family members and sometimes treating you brutality; and yet demanding for a ransom to be paid within a defined period; is worth describing as ‘Hell on earth’. Family members, friends and close associatesof a kidnapped individual also have their share of the latter’s trauma as they are subjected to pains and open-ended moments ofnervousness.Anyone who survived kidnapping would never wish even his worst enemy to passthrough the hands of these condemnable criminals who have become bizarre admirers ofCheung Tze-Keung, the infamous Chines gangster that was nick-named ‘Big Spender’.
The anxiety which the mere intent to travel on this road subjects an intending traveler to is sometimes more frighteningthan the panic that fills the mind of a patient wanting to undergo a major cardiovascular surgery. A colleague who is a regular user of this roadmentioned in a recent discussion we had that the intractable incidence of kidnapping on this road has though brought several of its users closer to God throughtheir constant prayers for protection and forgiveness of sins. Truly, Allah (SWT) declaresin Quran 29:2 saying ‘Do men think they will be left alone on saying “we believe” and that they will not be tested?’ Of course, trials have their spiritual gains but if man would have the privileged to make a choice, trialsother than kidnapping would be most preferred. Allah knows best!
In the past 6 months, several batches of suspected kidnappers were arrested on this highway but the crime has refused to die down. For instance, the Nigerian Police Force in July this year paraded 32 suspects over alleged violent crimes and kidnapping along the Abuja-Kaduna highway. Barely a month later, the Police Special Forces under Operation Absolute Sanity arrested 40 kidnappers and rescued 3 victims along this road. In spite of these seriesof arrest and in spite of the perpetual presence of police patrol vehicles with armed personnel stationed at several tens of strategic spots throughout the length of the Abuja-Kaduna highway, kidnappers yetremain as active as quicksilver on this busy highway. This only suggests that the task of checkingkidnapping on the road is, presumably,beyond the professional strength of the police, which possiblyexplains why the police could not do much when on Wednesday June 7, 2017, about 30 kidnappers struck on this highway and abducted 20 passengers.
On Sunday November 12, 2017, hundreds of villagers blocked the Kaduna axis of the Abuja-Kaduna highway to protest the killing of their community’s Civilian JTF commander, HarunaHalilu. The villagers who hailed from SabuwarGayan, a village along the highway, blocked the road at about 2pm; lamenting the failure of government to tackle kidnapping on the road. Halilu was reportedly at his farm when the kidnappers attackedand killed him.
Some insinuations that could account for the survival of kidnapping become obvious from a critical interrogation of this phenomenon. Police perceived complicity evidenced by the release of suspects soon after their arrest could be a factor. Such suspects return only to kill those they believeacted as informants to the police .The failure by judges who preside over kidnap cases to apply existing laws on suspects found culpable is another plausiblehypothesis. While we urge the signinginto lawof the bill on death penalty for kidnappers which was recently passed by the Senate, we call on judges to courageously apply the law.
The fact that kidnapping was not recorded when military troops and some special police units were deployed to the Abuja-Kaduna highway while maintenance work on the runway of the NnamdiAzikiwe International Airport Abuja lasted, is a strong indication that government has the capacity to tackle this violent crime. The safety of travelers on this road is critical to the political economy of the entire northern part of Nigeria. This column, therefore, passionately appeals to President MuhammaduBuhari to deploy military troops to the Abuja-Kaduna highway and other roads infiltrated by kidnappersbecase soldiers have the training and the equipment to rid the highways of kidnappers.May Allah (SWT) guide all the authorities concerned with this request the will to grant it, amin.
