Human rights activist Omoyele Sowore has warned that Nigeria has lost a significant portion of its territory to insurgents and other non-state actors.
Sowore made the statement on Wednesday in Abuja while standing in solidarity with members of the Nigeria Labour Congress, NLC, ahead of a planned nationwide protest over worsening insecurity.
“The country is bleeding, and it has to be urgently stopped. The leadership of Nigeria has failed to protect the citizens of the country,” he said.
He lamented the rising wave of kidnappings across religious centres, noting that both Muslims and Christians have been affected.
“You are all in the country, where people are getting kidnapped from places of worship, whether it’s a Muslim or Christian,” Sowore stated.
He further expressed concern over the continued captivity of schoolchildren and the silence surrounding attacks on security personnel.
“We have over 250 kids still in captivity, and everybody is behaving as if everything is normal. Nobody’s even talking about our soldiers; Nigerian Air Force personnel are being captured by the small Republic of Burkina Faso,” he said.
According to him, the nation’s security situation has deteriorated beyond any previous experience.
“It looks like everything has broken down, and we have a duty to keep. Enough is enough, and that is why we are here to march peacefully with the NLC,” he added.
Rejecting claims that insecurity has always been part of Nigeria’s reality, Sowore said the current situation is unprecedented.
“There’s no reason for us to be giving excuses that insecurity has always been an issue. It has not always been an issue. The level of insecurity we have in Nigeria now has never been like this,” he said.
He compared the present crisis with the period of the Nigerian Civil War, noting that normal life continued in many areas at the time.
“But today, if you go to the Southeast, it’s unsafe. You go to the Southwest, it’s unsafe. You go to the Northwest, and it’s completely under siege. You go to the Northeast, it’s completely taken over,” Sowore said.
He concluded by alleging that a substantial part of the country is no longer under government control.
“In terms of even territory, Nigeria has lost almost 30 per cent of the territory to non-state actors who designate themselves as terrorists. They call themselves bandits, kidnappers and so on. But the truth is that it seems as if the leadership of Nigeria has lost complete control of the country,” he said.
