Gunshots crackled at the premises of a High Court in Owerri, the Imo State capital, when six men of the underworld invaded it recently in a bid to rescue one of their own, Henry Chibueze (alias Vampire). He is an alleged notorious kidnapper standing trial for serial felonies. The commando-like operation was successful with his escape, along with two others. Five prison officials received gunshot wounds. The incident marked a new low for our fragile security system.
But the dare-devilry might become another national epidemic if the appropriate authorities do not get the message. Media reports have it that gunmen who had laid in ambush freed Vampire as prison officials were taking him and 49 other suspects to court. As the kingpin was scurried to freedom, he was reportedly handed a gun by his fellow confederates to join in the shooting spree that eventually overwhelmed the prison officials. Thereafter, they fled in a waiting vehicle. The Imo State Governor, Rochas Okorocha, has placed a N5 million bounty on the escapee.
The security breach is one that raises a lot of eyebrows, given the strategic location of the High Court. It is enveloped by Imo Government House, State Police Command and the official residence of the Commander of the Nigerian Army’s 34 Artillery Brigade. Such an area, therefore, should enjoy the highest security surveillance in the state. In particular, Vampire’s brazen escape raises a big and troubling question. Why did the security agencies treat such a dangerous and highly valued suspect with laxity? Before his first arrest by the SSS, he had reportedly travelled to Lagos to shoot his girlfriend dead in her father’s house for allegedly stealing his N15 million. The criminal kingpin was elusive for five years until 2015 when State Security Service operatives nabbed him and handed him over to the police. The shocking discovery of 264 mobile phones with inmates of Owerri Prisons during a raid by security operatives in the wake of Vampire’s bizarre escape, bares it all. By organising his criminal syndicate in the prison, using his phones, he was able to plan his escape. Certainly, this is a case of gross incompetence of our security institutions, their outright corruption, or a toxic combination of both.It is a security puzzle the police should decode quickly by re-arresting the fugitive for him to face justice.
Owerri Prisons, just like others across the country, are in dire need of a security sweep. All officials implicated in this racket should be punished. Such betrayal of trust explains why kidnapping, armed robbery and assassination cases have become rampant. The Imo fugitive, being a trans-state bandit, should compel the state police command to look beyond its domain in the manhunt. It is just as well that the Comptroller-General of Prisons, Ahmed Ja’afrau, went to Owerri, shortly after this embarrassing blunder to investigate the shame. He does not need to go far. It is simply prison racketeering; and it is not new. In 2016, a warden at the same Owerri Prisons was discovered to have aided kidnappers in running their nefarious trade while in custody, by allowing them access to phones and other unapproved privileges.
Kidnapping, erroneously viewed as a petty crime by government at all levels, has assumed a horrific dimension as the hoodlums see the illegal endeavour as very lucrative. They kill, maim, lend themselves to assassinations, rape women and fleece their victims of millions of cash. Little wonder, therefore, that Nigeria accounted for “a quarter of globally reported cases,” according to Africa Re-Insurance Organisation in its 2011 report.
Some states like Anambra, Imo, Abia, Edo have been bulldozing the houses of kidnappers as a punitive measure. Lagos State joined the league of states that have approved death penalty for the crime last month. But merely imposing capital punishment is far from being the solution. This is evident in the fact that about 1,000 convicts have been on death row since 2006, according to Amnesty International in its 2013 report. Lack of political will, religious sentiments and growing global disapproval of such sentences appear to tie governors’ hands from signing death warrants.
Ultimately, keeping the criminals in check lies in security agencies retooling their intelligence gathering and exhibiting the highest level of professional integrity. At every level, the might of the state should be made to count. When the Federal Government bared its fangs in 2013, by deploying soldiers in Aba and its environs, kidnappers who had shut down the city took to their heels.
However, soldiers cannot be drafted to areas under siege all the time. This is why it has become expedient for Nigerian authorities to adopt security strategies in Colombia and Mexico, which have far more kidnapping challenges, aggravated by their drug war. Colombia, once the global capital of kidnapping in 2000, created special anti-kidnapping squads. With this, the crime has been reduced sharply from 3,572 reported cases in 2000 to just 190 in 2014. Security forces also complement the effort of the squads by seizing control of areas previously held by guerrilla groups that mastermind the felony. Mexico too, set up similar interventionist platforms in 2014, when the number of victims spiked from 1407 in 2012 to 1695 in 2013.
Government should respond effectively to the scourge of kidnapping. The Interior Minister, Abdulrahman Dambazau, cannot dodge this humiliation of our security system. Across the country, violence has risen in a way that cannot be ignored and that imperils all of us. Whether in the South-East, Niger Delta, South-West or northern part of the country, kidnapping has seriously undermined the economy and scared away not a few foreign investors. The stain of lawlessness has indeed run deep.
But the equation has to change. Governors have committed resources to ensure that police commands are ahead of the criminals. They should be hard on police commissioners in demanding results. It is from the massive illegal arms and ammunition in circulation that the hoodlums get the impulsion to dare security operatives. These weapons should be mopped up. Otherwise, it will be sheer chimera for anybody to think the criminality will just fade away.
