Nigeria has a habit of treating sparks as though they are harmless fireflies—until the whole roof is on fire.
The tragedy of the Nigerian Civil War was supposed to be a permanent lesson etched into our national conscience. The scars are so deep that decades later, many families, especially in the Southeast, still carry the weight of memories they would rather forget. The pain did not end when the guns fell silent; it merely changed clothes and settled into the hearts of generations.
Yet, it appears that as a nation, we have mastered the art of forgetting yesterday’s wounds while walking blindly into today’s sorrows and tomorrow’s dangers.
When the Chibok girls were abducted in April 2014, the nation stood still in shock. It was one of those moments that made people ask, “How did we get here?” The incident was treated as extraordinary, a terrible exception to the norm. Sadly, it was not the last chapter. It was only the opening paragraph.
Today, kidnapping has become a travelling salesman, knocking on doors across states and regions. What began in the Northeast has packed its bags and spread across the country like a stubborn weed in an untended farm. Communities that once watched the crisis from a distance now find themselves sitting in the front row of the same nightmare. Again, how did we get here?
The frightening part is not just the spread of terror; it is the dangerous normalisation of it. In my country, abnormality has been normalised. We hear reports of abductions so frequently that some people barely pause before moving on to the next news item. That should worry us all. A nation is in trouble when tragedy becomes routine and outrage begins to expire quickly.
For the first time, a pressure group is not just calling out the government for negligence over the abduction in Oyo, it is also embarking on protests to drive home the point and call the government to action.
The government cannot continue to chase shadows while the monster grows muscles. This is not the time for half-measures, committee jargon, or press statements dressed in fine grammar. The house is leaking, and officials are debating the colour of the paint.
Security challenges do not disappear because they are ignored. A snake that is allowed to grow in the backyard will eventually find its way into the living room. What started as isolated incidents has evolved into a national emergency with tentacles reaching into schools, highways, farms, villages, and even urban centres.
The truth is uncomfortable but necessary: a soft approach to a hard problem only produces harder problems. Terrorists, bandits, and criminal networks interpret hesitation as weakness. While government agencies are often busy reacting to yesterday’s attack, criminal elements are already planning tomorrow’s headline.
Nigeria is standing at a crossroads. One path leads to decisive action, intelligence-driven security operations, stronger community policing, better border control, improved surveillance, and the political will to confront insecurity without compromise. The other path leads to more tears, more displaced families, more abandoned farms, more frightened schoolchildren, and more communities living at the mercy of criminals.
History is already tapping us on the shoulder. The warning signs are not hidden. They are flashing like hazard lights on a broken-down vehicle in the middle of the highway.
Government must stop playing catch-up with disaster. It must move from reacting to preventing, from promises to performance, from speeches to strategy. The cost of prevention may seem high today, but it is nothing compared to the price of national regret tomorrow.
The nation cannot afford to sleep with one eye open while danger sharpens its teeth at the doorstep. If urgent and proactive measures are not taken now, Nigeria risks waking up to a crisis far bigger than the one it currently struggles to contain.
And when that day comes, history will ask a simple question: the warning signs were everywhere, so why did those entrusted with leadership wait for the storm to arrive before seeking shelter?
