When Will the Blood on the Plateau Be Enough

We are being killed. I am tired of being told otherwise.

You remember Palm Sunday. A day meant for hosannas, for palm branches, and for the promise of peace. In Plateau State, that Sunday became a graveyard.

In villages around Bokkos and Barkin Ladi, in places like Aungwan Rukuba, residents were mowed down. Men, women, and children, and their blood soaked the ground. The same pattern persists, and the numbers continue to be ignored. Human beings have become numbers.

But the government calls it “farmers‑herders clash.”

I have been to Aungwan Rukuba. Tell me, is it a ranch? Is it a grazing reserve? I have passed through those winding roads. I have seen the homes, little shops, and churches. Those residents were not farmers carrying machetes into a pasture dispute. They were traders, teachers, and bakers. They were mothers hanging laundry, and children kicking footballs in the dust.

So why do we keep using language that hides the real cause and shields those responsible? It is critical that we name this violence for what it is, so we can demand true accountability.

When a community is surrounded, attacked with military precision, villages are razed, and people killed inside their homes and places of worship, that is not a “clash.” It is a massacre.

After the blood dried, Governor Caleb Mutfwang visited the affected communities. I watched the footage. He arrived in an Armored Personnel Carrier, an APC, and addressed the traumatized residents from inside that same APC.

Let that sink in.

The governor of a state, surrounded by security, standing inside an armored vehicle to speak to his own people, people who had just watched their families die. He could not step out and stand among them. He could not walk the streets where terrorists roamed freely until he struggled to engage with them and had to step out.

I am not mocking him. I understand the danger. But if the governor himself cannot leave his APC in those villages, what hope do ordinary men and women have?

I have been to the 3 Division in Jos more times than I can count. I have walked those barracks roads. I know the military is not idle, and I know soldiers have paid the ultimate price trying to hold the line.

But do you know how far 3 Division is from Aungwan Rukuba? I looked it up.

The 3 Division is roughly 55 kilometers from Aungwan Rukuba.

Fifty-five kilometers, less than an hour’s drive, even less in a speeding Hilux. And yet, the terrorists attacked and had their way as if there was no government, military, or law.

But wait, there is also the Nigerian Air Force 103 Strike Group in Jos. A fully equipped air base. So why were the terrorists not repelled? Why were the villagers left to die with soldiers just an hour away?

I have asked that question so many times my throat burns. But wait, the attack started right opposite a police station, and this is not the first time that location has been attacked.

I have heard stories, too many to ignore, of what happens in these attacks. The military arrives, sometimes before the attack, sometimes after. And instead of going after the terrorists, they go after the villagers.

They disarm the innocent. They confiscate local hunting rifles, Dane guns, and any other weapons villagers use to protect themselves. They tell them, “Leave security to us.”

Then the terrorists come. The villagers have no means left to defend themselves. The soldiers who disarmed them sometimes leave before the attack. Sometimes they remain, citing orders to stand down while the terrorists kill.

What do you call these patterns, if not complicity, a system that fails to protect and instead enables this violence? My main argument is that the language and actions of our leaders intentionally obscure the truth and prevent meaningful change.

How can people just go into a community and start shooting?

Why did the government not arrest the bastard who bragged about this attack before it even happened? We all saw the videos. We all read the posts. He told us what he would do. And then he did it. And the government sat on its hands.

If a man announces he will burn your house and you do nothing until the ashes are cold, do you really care about justice?

Sheik Gumi, love him or hate him, said something that should keep every Nigerian awake at night. He said the government knows these terrorists by name, locations and their sponsors.

Are you kidding me?

If you know the men who are slaughtering our people, why are they still moving freely? Why are they occupying villages, converting churches to mosques, and collecting taxes, while the government pretends to be surprised?

And then the Chief of Defense Staff called them “our prodigal sons” who need to be rehabilitated.

Prodigal sons.

I am a Christian. I know the story of the prodigal son: a young man welcomed back with love after repentance. But did the prodigal son commit violent crimes or displace communities?

An army general once said, and I still cannot believe this was said out loud, that Boko Haram could be the president of Nigeria. At the time, many dismissed it as a joke. But now I wonder. If our leaders see mass murderers as potential presidents, if they see terrorists as sons to be rehabilitated rather than criminals to be brought to justice, then what does that say about who we have become?

Rehabilitation? Can ideology really be changed?

I am curious. How do you assess that? Can a man with entrenched beliefs be rehabilitated in a six-month program? Or is this about contracts and funding, while those responsible go back to their ways?

I have seen this playbook: disarmament, demobilization, and reintegration, billions spent, yet the terrorists return stronger.

Let me be clear: this is not only about Christians. Moderate Muslims are being killed too. The same criminals who burn churches do not spare the Muslim who refuses to join their ideology. The same terrorists who raze villages do not ask for your denomination before they slit your throat.

This is an attack on stability and against every Nigerian who wants peace.

Let that number sink in. More than sixty communities in Plateau State have been emptied, displaced, and occupied. I have heard from people I trust, that terrorists now control those villages as landlords. They have set up shops, moved freely, and renamed the villages. In many places, churches once filled with hymns have become mosques. The cross has been replaced.

Yet some politicians, leaders who swore to protect the Constitution, stand before cameras and say with straight faces, “This is not genocide.”

What is it then, sir? When an entire people are driven from their ancestral land, when their places of worship are desecrated, when they are killed simply because of their identity, what word would you have us use?

I am tired. I am tired of too many funerals, of seeing displaced families, and of leaders debating words while places of worship change hands.

I want to know: when will the government treat this as the war it is? When will those who incite violence be arrested before the blood flows, not after? When will our military be given the full backing it needs to clear these terrorists out of our communities and hold the ground?

Evil men and women hold positions of authority. They collect salaries meant to protect us. They give press conferences where they lie to our faces. They call murderers “prodigal sons.” They disarm the innocent and arm the guilty.

I have asked God the same question so many times. I have not yet received an answer. But I know He sees every tear. He knows every name.

And I believe, I have to believe that the silence will break. That justice will come. That Plateau will rise again, and Nigeria will heal.

But it will take more than my prayers. It will take action and, crucially, it will take leaders who acknowledge the reality of targeted violence instead of disguising murder as “clashes.” It will require every Nigerian to stop looking away and confront the truth head-on.

Until then, I will keep writing and I will keep asking the hard questions as this should not be happening in Nigeria of 2026!

May the souls of our brothers and sisters rest in peace, Amen!