The forest rangers in Kwara State led lives filled with meaning, pursuing a mission often disregarded, but they perished because the country they protected was afraid of the wrong issues. We shudder at the expense of gear, the price of change, and the hassle of rural progress, while overlooking the much higher cost of neglect.
The murders from last week were not caused by a minor theft that spiraled out of control. Instead, they represented the outbreak of a more profound issue, a clear sign of a nation in decline that is unable to safeguard its citizens, its assets, or its territory. We constantly talk about highway bandits and terrorists in the North-East, but we turn a blind eye to the growing conflict within our forests. In those quiet green spaces, which mark the real edge of Nigeria's economy and security, our most courageous individuals are losing their lives, equipped only with light uniforms and fragile bravery.
Envision the widow in Patigi, gazing at the attire her husband will never don again. Or consider a farmer at the forest's border, now compelled to cultivate his land beneath the weight of fear. These are not mere numbers. They represent lives shattered by gunfire and obliterated by apathy. By reducing them to minor details, we become complicit in their disappearance.
Nigeria's forests are not vacant areas. They are lively centers of illegal logging, uncontrolled mining, arms trade, and rural conflicts. The very reserves that ought to act as lungs for our environment and drivers for our rural economy have turned into bases for criminal activities.
Studies suggest that Nigeria suffers a loss of N440bn each year due to illegal logging. This is more than just a shocking number; it's a deep wound. The numbers hide organized crime groups, heavily armed and financially supported, who view our forests not as a common treasure but as a resource to be exploited. When poorly compensated guards try to stop them, it's not a balanced confrontation. It's a massacre.
Robert Kaplan once stated in "The Coming Anarchy": "The environment is not merely a concern of beauty or conservation, but one of survival and confrontation." The Kwara killings validate his statement as accurate.
However, the Forest Guards did not perish solely due to gunfire. They were victims of the structure of Nigerian security itself. Their duty, safeguarding natural resources, places them directly in the way of multi-billion-naira criminal networks. Nevertheless, their legal authority is divided, their salaries are disgraceful, and they lack proper equipment.
The contradiction is obvious: state governments manage land and forest resources but allocate less than 0.5 percent of their security budgets to safeguard them. Guards monitor large reserves without armored vehicles, encrypted radios, or even insurance. When they catch high-level offenders, they have to transfer them to the police, only for the perpetrators to be released by nightfall.
We have essentially instructed them to engage in a conflict using sticks while their adversaries possess advanced weaponry. They are Tier-1 risk takers equipped with Tier-4 resources. Their fatalities are not random occurrences. They stem from a lack of policy attention.
There is an additional aspect to consider. These forests are more than just economic assets. They serve as critical battlegrounds. In the North-West, bandits operate; in the South-West, kidnappers thrive; and in the Middle Belt, insurgents find refuge within forest reserves. Leaving these regions unprotected is equivalent to granting criminals a strategic advantage. Each forest ranger who dies is not merely a loss of life, but a concession of territory.
Each hectare given up bolsters the power of those who intimidate farmers, disturb rural trade, and weaken the delicate food security for millions.
In recent months, Kwara State has witnessed tragic evidence of this situation. In the Patigi Local Government Area, armed Fulani attackers raided Matogu village early in the morning, resulting in the deaths of 10 individuals, including a pregnant woman, and the kidnapping of seven others for ransom. In Isin, another assault led to the death of two people, one of whom was a vigilante, while several villagers were taken hostage and motorcycles were set on fire, demonstrating unchecked aggression.
Not far from Motogun in Patigi, seven villagers who had been taken hostage were freed when security forces and local watch groups launched an attack on the bandits' hideout in the forest. Some members of the vigilante group were injured with gunshots during the operation. The audacity of these attacks is alarming. Criminals have not only attacked communities but also targeted police stations and killed community leaders, including the commander of the vigilante group in Kakafu village. These events show that bandits now move freely through the forest areas of Kwara with little consequence, increasing the fear among locals and highlighting the critical need for a new security system.
The financial injustice adds to the pain. We allocate trillions for military equipment in Abuja, yet only minimal funds for those who protect our rural borders. This is a myopic approach. The World Bank cautions that environmental crime costs developing economies up to 10 percent of GDP each year. In Nigeria, this issue is worsened by rising food prices and joblessness.
As Nobel Prize winner Elinor Ostrom emphasized, communities flourish when they have the power and motivation to manage their shared resources. Our system has taken the opposite approach: concentrating authority in Abuja, ignoring the states, and leaving the communities whose forests are being exploited without support. In Abuja, they purchase jets. In Ilorin, they discuss budgets. In the forest, a guard suffers. This is the sad balance of Nigerian administration.
The mirror shows the shortcomings. We have neglected, poorly trained, and undervalued those individuals who are crucial to preventing Nigeria from descending into environmental chaos. However, the lamp should illuminate the path ahead.
There are solutions available. The Federal Government, via the Office of the National Security Adviser, should require state governors to establish and professionalize their Forest Guards. These groups need to undergo verification, wear uniforms, have insurance, and receive adequate training. They should be entitled to hazard pay similar to those fighting terrorism.
State legislative assemblies are required to enact laws that reserve a minimum of five percent of annual security funding for forest conservation. This financial allocation should support modern communication devices, patrol vehicles, and wages that reflect the dangers faced by personnel. Without assured financial support, the pattern of neglect will persist. Officers should be granted restricted authority to make arrests and detain individuals committing environmental violations. This measure helps break the existing cycle of impunity, allowing influential loggers to go unpunished.
Community volunteers should be officially integrated into the system, under strict supervision. They are familiar with the area. They can offer valuable information. When combined with official structures, they act as enhancing forces instead of isolated individuals who struggle to deal with bandits threatening their neighborhoods.
Protecting forests cannot depend only on military force. It needs to be economically beneficial to preserve them. State governments should encourage investment in sustainable logging, charcoal production, and non-wood forest products. Young people lured by crime should have more attractive opportunities in legal, profitable forest-based economies.
Nigeria should ultimately adopt the carbon credit market. Through reforestation initiatives, private companies and cooperatives can obtain global financial support while revitalizing our environmental equilibrium. Opportunities for young people, income for states, and security for communities—this is the market-driven solution to disorder.
In a deeply moving way, behind these policies lie human faces. Picture once more the widow of one of the Kwara guards, now looking at the children she has to raise by herself. Envision the smallholder farmer whose land is next to that forest, who now has to work with fear. These are not just abstract numbers in an official record. They represent lives lost due to our shared apathy.
The killing of the Kwara guards serves as a national condemnation. It shows that Nigeria has lost sight of its boundaries. We have given up millions of hectares to lawbreakers while supporting oversized government offices in Abuja. We have neglected the forests, the vital organs of our country, and by doing so, put our security, food supply, and economy at risk.
If we keep on this path, the forests will be lost, employment will disappear, and lawbreakers will take over the land. The next victim won't only be a uniformed officer. It will be the rural farmer, the market vendor (all of which are currently happening in Kwara), and ultimately, the weak nation as a whole.
President Bola Tinubu and the governors are faced with a decision: maintain a flawed, centralized security approach that overlooks rural conflict areas, or adopt a decentralized, community-based system that protects the forests and fosters an eco-friendly economy.
The legacy of our actions, not financial allocations, will shape history. The forests will recall our deeds or inaction. It's time to move past empty rhetoric about security votes. We need to support not only those with weapons in Abuja, but also those with machetes and radios in the remote areas. Their safety is crucial for our own. The protectors are no more. Their blood calls out. If the forests vanish, Nigeria will suffer. And history will not overlook our silence. Neither will the forests.
Provided by SyndiGate Media Inc. (Syndigate.info).
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