The terrorists who attacked Nigerian Railways Abuja -Kaduna train (AK9) on the night of March 28, 2022, were not just as callous as murderers can be, they were very unkind to the All Progressives Congress (APC). The terrorists were also spiteful of Lai Mohammed, Minister of Information and Culture. The latter was self-inflicted, though.
The APC had successfully concluded its national convention on March 27, 2022. The eventual holding of the meeting was an achievement of sorts. It had appeared for long that intense clique manoeuvres and jostling for control among the party lords would never allow the convention to hold. It eventually did.
Monday, March 28, was the first working day after the convention. It was to be a day dedicated to some celebratory laps and revelry into the night by the new party leaders and their victorious camps. Then, bang came the bomb from terrorists!
The disaster took joy away from APC’s successful convention and in place of high spirits and back slapping, imposed grief and indictment. The incident added to the party’s burdened profile in managing national security.
Had the train attack not brought death and grief, but only truncated the celebration of the APC, chances are that the ruling party would have blamed PDP (Peoples Democratic Party) for being the spoilsport. That is how prominent a succubus the main opposition party has become to the ruling party.
But then the terrorist attack was major and the country was so shaken by the incident that the import of the audacious attack could not be trivialized. As is now obvious, the terrorists clearly have contempt for Nigeria, her government, her security apparatus and indeed the will of the state. The terrorists now pick their target and proceed to bring the fight to the country. Then they walk away.
The terrorist strike on the Abuja-Kaduna train on March 28, 2022, also came a few hours after Lai Mohammed, the Minister of Information and Culture, out of nowhere and with statistics only available in his pouch, made a widely reported statement that “Nigeria is becoming safer every day.”
The terrorists promptly put a lie to Lai’s melting claims.
Terrorists have no souls. They have no attachment to humanity. They live, not even on the fringe of modern civilization, but totally out of its loop, against all that logic and plural dynamics of modern civilization represent. Even at that, terrorists are often known for pursuing certain goals, often unrealistic. Not so with the case in Nigeria.
The terrorists currently stalking and killing Nigerians have no grievances against Nigerians that are known. There is nothing of theirs that Nigeria is holding. They are simply archetypical of the Bible’s summation of the devil and his essence. He is just out “to kill and to maim.” Those who, by God’s grace, manage to survive a brush with the rampaging terrorists confirm that they are predominantly non-Nigerians. Somehow, curiously, they are never killed or apprehended.
For all the death and grief they inflicted on Nigerians on March 28, 2022, the terrorists were not the only evil entities at work on that fateful night. Of no less repugnance and surely, condemned to the pit of hell by dint of their acts on that tragic night were a set of bloodsuckers on Twitter. The terrorists with guns and bombs were said to be non-Nigerians. The ones on Twitter, mocking a victim of the train attack, are said to be Nigerians. By their acts, they will forever live in infamy.
It remains most unfathomable how and why any human being will take to mocking a young innocent compatriot in the throes of death, for doing no other wrong than alerting the world that terrorists had struck the train she was travelling in and that she had been shot.
Dr. Chinelo Megafu’s tweet was probably the very first alert to the world about the terrorist attack on AK9 train on March 28, 2022. Her message was clear and straight, “I’m in the train. I have been shot. Please pray for me.” It was an alert and a plea from the heart. Chinelo must have been in pains from the bullet wound. Being a doctor, she must have known the mortal implications of her gunshot wound, hence her plea for prayer.
But what did the poor girl receive in response? One Abolore, in @ysone2 twitted back to Chinelo immediately with a snide query, “Are you dead now?” Then in tow, certainly in a league of evil, one Yewande @SupaWande descended on the traumatized girl battling for her life, with a reply; “Liar. Clout chaser. You will be shot in reality in Jesus name (amen). Jesus? Then Prince ‘boye Adetu @Abiwapele replied Chinelo, “What is an IPOBian doing in a dead Buhari train, except you are on a different mission.” But they have not finished. Mansherry of Ode_Remo replied the poor, innocent girl that must be dying at that point, “It’s ONLY the people the Rising Sun (SIC) that lie unprovoked because of hatred for the government in power & the country! Snap your wound and let’s see it!”
Can vileness and hate be expressed any deeper than was spat by Abolore, Yewande, Mansherry at Ode Remo and ‘boye Adetu at Chinelo in her moment of need? To imagine that she never met them anywhere. Chinelo lived in Kaduna and served her country diligently, but the four demented elements, apparently making a living from touting, had to call her names at her most vulnerable moment. What could be the root of such deep-seated hate? Bigotry. She was Igbo. She was going to her base in Kaduna. They could not understand what she was doing in Kaduna. They had to profile her, even at the point of death. They had to profile her race too, because that is how they make their living. Chinelo was Igbo. They are Yoruba. They are said to be party goons sprouting from holes away from home, as defenders of the ruling party. So sad!
The irony cannot be missed; Chinelo had been serving her country and adding value through her professional work as a doctor in Kaduna. Her traducers, Abolore, Yewande, Mansherry of Ode Remo and ‘boye Adetu are out there somewhere, spreading hate and hurling insults at people at will, as their own contribution to nation-building.
How does a plea for prayer by an innocent young girl shot by terrorists in a train attack amount to diminishing government’s railway services? Here, once more, is a clear example of the damage idiots can do to a society, in the name of loyalty to a political group or individual?
Eventually, Chinelo died. Abolore and company must he fulfilled that the young doctor was truly shot. The reward for evil deed is given.
By the time the smoke cleared from the terrorist attack on AK9, Chinelo was not the only casualty. She may have sent out the first alert on the attack, but no less than eight passengers died. The victims, sadly, were mostly young professionals, doctors, lawyers, bankers, etc. The wounded are many, while the terrorists are still keeping the ones they kidnapped. May God secure and return them alive to their families.
A plausible interpretation of the unnatural behaviour of Abolore, Yewande, Mansherry of Ode Remo and Prince ‘boye Adetu on the night of the train attack is that they were part and parcel of the terrorist plot. Their gratuitous insult on Dr. Chinelo for her alert on the attack seemed to be a desperate drive to divert public attention while the terrorists on the ground gained access into the train to finish the operation. That eventually happened. These, indeed, are evil times.