Since 2001, the serene nature of Jos, Plateau State and surrounding areas, a place renowned for its beautiful weather and scenic beauty has been punctuated by incessant ethno-religious crises that have claimed thousands of lives. It has ended up creating a city that is divided along religious lines, with worship days of Friday and Sunday fraught with tension.
Although the city has enjoyed about two years of break from sectarian riots and insecurity mainly from bombing attacks on churches from the usual suspects, Boko Haram, which cut across Northern Nigeria, there is another festering security issue underneath: it is that of random attacks on villages and families on the outskirts of Jos and in the adjoining local government areas, such as the one yesterday on two communities in Riyom Local Government Area of the state which killed 28 people, including a police corporal.
The attackers, always described as unknown gunmen, swoop in on lone villages or households at night, burn property and kill people, sometimes wiping out entire families, and then disappear back into the darkness. They leave behind in their wake tears and destruction, and the smell of death and sorrow hanging in the air.
This has been going on for months, and a solution to it has yet to be found. Ironically, this is despite the presence of a Special Task Force of military personnel whose sole duty is to maintain peace on the Plateau. Yet, they have not been able to apprehend these gunmen. With the entire intelligence network in the state, no one has an idea of who these people are, or where they come from. Meanwhile, the people of Plateau State are being killed on a regular basis.
These killings do not make as much news as riots in the city of Jos itself. Hence, there is little reaction to it, even sometimes, among the people in Jos, which in turn does not exert pressure on the government and her security agencies to rise to action and end this bloodshed.
But the fact of the matter is that people are being killed: men, women and children; sometimes, whole families. Peace on the Plateau should go way beyond just having peace in Jos City.
Even worse is the fact that the incessant attacks might make some restive youths to exact their idea of justice, which would be taking out their anger on likely innocents, and then, causing the outbreak of another major crisis.
The government and her security agencies must make the apprehending of the gunmen and the securing of the lives and property of the people in the rural areas of Plateau State top priority.
Failure to do so would be putting the fragile peace in the state on a tinderbox.