Cecilia James was kidnapped in April last year along with four other people while working on a farm in Kaduna State, northwest Nigeria. She complains that the police, in her opinion, did not take measures to find the whereabouts of the criminals and prevent their execution. The victims remained in the bush for almost two weeks until the family paid the ransom. “They sexually harassed us and threatened to kill us when we cried,” she says in a telephone conversation.
Aisha Anaba, 25, is haunted by the memory of the kidnapping and death of her little sister, Zainab Anaba. In July 2021, the 14-year-old teenager was kidnapped along with a group of students at the Birnin Yauri University School, in Kebbi State, in the northwest of the country. She lost her life in a shootout between the Army and the kidnappers shortly after, her sister explains. “There was a rumor that the kidnappers were going to go to school, but it was believed that it was a student's invention,” she recalls in a telephone interview, in which she accuses the Government of negligence. Maryam Anaba, another of the sisters, was also kidnapped the same day at school and taken to a forest, and although she was released days later, to date Nigerian security agencies have not been able to track down the criminals.
For years, Nigeria has been experiencing a crisis of kidnappings and violence considered by some experts to be the most serious in Africa. In the first week of this month, several armed groups kidnapped around 500 women and children in the north of the African country. Some 130 of them have already been released, according to official sources. A report from the consultancy SBM Intelligence reveals that since 2019 almost 15,400 people have been kidnapped in the country. Between 2011 and 2020, this firm estimates that the ransoms paid amounted to more than 18 million dollars (approximately 14.5 million euros). The event of this type that has made the most headlines so far occurred in April 2014, when 276 students were kidnapped by the jihadist group Boko Haram. Since then, the north of the country has been periodically shaken by this type of criminal acts, while numerous international organizations demand the adoption of measures to guarantee the safety of the citizens of the north of the country and in particular school children.
In some areas, the rise in religiously motivated kidnappings is beginning to gain ground, but experts say ransom payments are at the root of these crimes. “The reason is mainly economic,” says Frank Tietie, a lawyer and human rights activist in Abuja. “The kidnappers have so far proven to be ethnically and religiously blind, judging by the profiles of their victims.”
The State lacks the capacity to adequately police most of the country, which has given enormous freedom of movement to kidnappers and allowed them to enjoy impunity.
James Barnett, security expert at the Hudson Institute
“The State lacks the capacity to adequately police most of the country, which has given enormous freedom of movement to kidnappers and allowed them to enjoy impunity,” summarizes James Barnett, security expert and researcher at the Hudson Institute, with based in the United States. This produces “an imitation effect, especially in the midst of this economic crisis” that affects the African nation, he adds. In his opinion, criminals have achieved such a degree of
de facto
power and authority over some rural areas of Nigeria that they have become “veritable chieftains”.
For the experts consulted, the kidnapping crisis in Nigeria is proof that the country's technological and intelligence infrastructure is failing. Stephen Kefas, human rights activist and journalist, believes that mass kidnappings like those this March could have been avoided if the Nigerian intelligence services had been more effective. He, who has been arrested accused of defamation – in his opinion, due to his criticism of the authorities – affirms that the Government can “follow anyone to any part of the country if it wants, but it cannot track terrorists who are in the forest making calls,” he adds in reference to an attack perpetrated by armed men against Nigeria's elite military academy in August 2021, which resulted in the death of two officers and the kidnapping of another.
In 2022, the Nigerian government implemented a rule requiring the synchronization of mobile SIM cards with National Identification Numbers to improve security. However, some relatives of victims point out that the kidnappers continue to make untraceable calls. Former Nigerian Minister of Communications and Digital Economy, Isa Pantami, promoter of the initiative - which has been criticized for requesting funds to pay the ransom of some kidnapped victims earlier this year - blames security agencies for not effectively taking advantage of the standard for tracking criminals.
Stephen Kefas, human rights activist and journalist, believes that mass kidnappings like those this March could have been avoided if the Nigerian intelligence services had been more effective
In the opinion of Andrew Agbo-Madaki, professor of Cybersecurity and Intelligence Engineering at the Ontario University of Business Administration and Communications, Nigeria has the necessary technology to combat crime, but the political will to tackle the problem and cooperation and exchange Data exchanges between security agencies remain a big problem. “What we need is for law enforcement agencies to be able to collaborate with each other,” he says.
Emeka Okoro, senior security analyst at security firm SBM Intelligence, points out that Nigeria needs a comprehensive approach that includes both technology and community engagement to reduce kidnappings. “Technological solutions, such as surveillance cameras, GPS tracking, mobile applications and biometric systems, can effectively prevent kidnappings by deterring potential kidnappers, monitoring movements and enabling rapid response in the event of an emergency. Examples include the use of CCTV in the UK, GPS trackers in Nigeria, and emergency alert apps such as SafeCity and bSafe in Norway. Community engagement through platforms such as social media and neighborhood watch programs also plays a crucial role.”
Oludare Ogunlana, professor of National Security at Collin University in Texas, emphasizes that security problems cannot be solved solely with technology, since it is not infallible. And he mentions as an example the Nigerian presidential elections in 2023, in which members of the opposition protested an alleged manipulation of the Bimodal Voter Accreditation System, an electronic device to verify the identity of voters through fingerprints and facial recognition. As a practical solution to the problem of insecurity, Ogunlana advocates the creation of a regional police force – today it is a federal body.
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