It is amazing that Plateau State could go on a boil when, for much of the years under Governor Simon Lalong, a template existed to keep the communities together. Governor Caleb Mutfwang took over and has to do two things. One, he should recognise the APC lawmakers. Two, he should return to the security template his predecessor left. Reports say, he dissolved the inter-religious council and pooh-poohed local arrangements that brought representatives of communities to share, vent and resolve grievances before they boiled over into bleeding machetes, butchery and limp babies. The state has been reporting a series of burials and weeping families, and it is obvious they can be avoided.
Governor Mutfwang should not let what his predecessor left behind become in the words of Shakespeare like “insubstantial pageant faded.” Peace is about human beings, not systems. But we have to make systems for human beings to leverage. That was what the governor met. The area known as Miango, for instance, was one of the most violent in the state. It is tranquil today. For irony, it was in the neighbourhood of the 3rd Armoured Division. Yet, the hordes defied the army and made a parade of death and plunder. The state inaugurated what it called a Day of Forgiveness to mark peace because peace efforts at Miango yielded fruits. A predecessor is not a foe but a forerunner, a link in the chain to the future. Even in Lalong’s system, the state witnessed some spasm of bloodletting, but they were often few.
On the legislature, the nation focused on Rivers State but what is going on in Plateau is worse, it is an endorsement of anarchy. The state is running a democracy without lawmakers. The governor has allowed this to go on because of the Supreme Court judgment that affirmed the governor on the same ground that the appeal court threw out the lawmakers. This is not acceptable. The PDP folks are throwing the constitution out of the window. We cannot cherry-pick the law. We cannot accept one and toss another and pledge fidelity to the constitution. We cannot be believers in part. It is a dangerous precedent. The media, the Nigeria Bar Association and the NGOs have been silent about this travesty.
Sam Omatseye-The Nation
