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Suicide bomb:
A Curious
Police Account
By Obed Awowede
Newsdiaryonline Sat June 18,2011
The report that a suicide bomber of the
Boko Haram extremist
sect was responsible for the June 16 bomb blast that rocked the
parking lot of the Police Force headquarters in Abuja must
surely rattle Nigerians. As expected, the imagery of the suicide
terrorist sneaking up just about anywhere in the country – a man
unafraid to die for his cause, a mobile bomb – is frightening
and may well be the undoing of even the most elaborate security
plan. That was the point President Goodluck Jonathan sought to
convey when he visited the Police Headquarters; everyone is
vulnerable. So, in a way, like the suicide bombers of the US’
9-11 attacks and the UK’s 7-7, the Nigerian Police Force has
found in the Louis Edet House bomb its own 9-11, where the
argument as it has been insinuated, is that a well-fortified,
security - conscious and competent establishment was only
penetrated by the doomed machinations of a suicide bomber. In
the September 2001 (9-11) attack by the militant group al-Qaeda,
the United States’ Defence headquarters, Pentagon, famed as an
impenetrable fortress was also a target in the suicide air
strikes but it was saved by the heroic acts of the passengers in
the doomed flight who chose to perish elsewhere than give the
suicide bombers the satisfaction of striking at the heart of the
US military establishment. That may well be the fate of the lone
policeman who chose to check out the suspicious car that bore
the suicide bomber at the Nigerian police headquarters.
It is the story told by the police about the June 16 bombing of
a section of the police headquarters. What this would suggest is
that the ‘pentagon’ of the Nigerian police was so impenetrable
that it took a suicide bomber to cause havoc. Perhaps. But if
you visit such militarized establishments in Nigeria or anywhere
you know that access is not as easy as the police made it look,
neither is the checkpoint moved from the gates to the car park
as they explained. Curiously too, the man who manned the gate
and possibly one of the dead people was a traffic policeman, who
also went to inspect the car housing the suicide bomber. That is
odd.
It is possible that the account given by the force spokesman
Sola Amore is indeed the way things went but his statements and
the photos of the damage do not bear him out, they raise more
questions than answers, they tell us plainly that we have more
reasons to be more circumspect about the Nigerian Police Force.
There are three reasons to query the account:
One is based on the psychological profile of the average
Nigerian establishment and their leaders. It is un-Nigerian,
very unlikely, for anyone that lives in Nigeria knows, that a
convoy of the IGP or any other egocentric public office holder
(and they are many) would be tailed and his armada of police
escort do not move to stop the car. In this case, the bomber not
only tailed the convoy to the police headquarters, the gates,
which are usually shut, were left open for this same car to go
right in after the IGP had been flagged in. Again, the car was
not stopped for check at the gates but was allowed to move to
the parking lot where the said unfortunate police officer made
to screen the occupant and was killed.
I am also bothered at the haste with which the police brass gave
out a casualty figure of two, only to turn around to tell us two
days later that eight persons died, and we may yet be told more.
What this tells me unfortunately, is that there was, as any
perceptive Nigerian has come to expect, no serious work done to
examine the crime scene and get to determine the cause and harm
done by the blast. It is the basics of crime management and
should tell us the impact.
Thirdly, I am suspicious of the account that there was a suicide
bomber, who having successfully gained entrance to the police
headquarters is satisfied to detonate his explosive in the
parking lot, taking with him only a few lives. I would have
thought that given the profile of the typical suicide bomber, he
would have been determined to make a dash for the IGP or the
main building and caused maximum damage. He may well have
executed his task on the way to the police headquarters by
perhaps ramming into the IGP’s car right in traffic, if indeed
Hafiz Ringim was his target, which I am in no position to
counter. I think the police should come clean on the real nature
of that attack or be more specific with the details, else
critical assessors of their statements thus far may well believe
that the police top brass is unable to come to terms with the
possibility that bomb was planted in a vehicle right in the
parking lot and remotely detonated.
Doubts aside, our fears must move us as a people to address the
issues that make security such an unsure enterprise. There is
little doubt that Intelligence has failed throughout the
country, yet if you experience the informal nature of
relationships in our communities you must wonder why
Intelligence fails. As a journalist, you wonder why it is so
easy to fish out criminal tendencies in our institutions and
that commonplace capacity cannot translate into the security
forces. Nigeria is porous both for and against the potential
terrorist or robber! So you get this impression that any
security force that applies itself diligently will deliver
results. Beyond the platitude that ‘the killers will be fished
out’ and ‘Nigeria is still safe’ dished out by our leaders
(remember IGP Ringim had said the same thing in Borno only two
days before the Boko Haram took the war to his doorsteps), we
need to address the issues of security and safety more
fundamentally. The starting point, I think, is for the police to
admit that it is incapable of policing the country as it is
structured. Then, we must now look to devolve security by
allowing for police forces run by states. This will take a bold
move on the part of the Jonathan administration working with the
legislature and the various state governments. Having had a good
run in the north and Abuja lately, the
Boko Haram may well
fancy making a statement in the commercial capital Lagos. The
impact for a country looking to get out of the woods will be too
much, even now. The platitude of Ringim does not give me hope.
Awowede is the publisher/editor-in-chief,
Moneymatteronline.com
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