by Mohammed Bello Doka
23 June, 2026.
The death of Major General Rabe Abubakar in the captivity of bandits is not merely a tragedy; it is a national indictment. The circumstances surrounding his abduction, the subsequent negotiations, the stated cause of his death, and the military operation that followed present a collection of contradictions that demand scrutiny. In asking if Nigeria is losing the war, we must first confront a more unsettling question: has the state become so ineffective that its citizens now instinctively turn to non-state actors for their security and survival? The absurdity of the situation reveals a government either unwilling or incapable of protecting its own, and a security architecture that appears more interested in closing a case file than in pursuing justice.
The official narrative from the Katsina State Government, which declared that the General died from complications of diabetes and hypertension, is a perplexing attempt at closure that raises more questions than it answers . The government asserted this conclusion, seemingly without an autopsy, before any serious medical examination could have been conducted . The speed with which this cause of death was announced and the immediate burial of the body have created a void of trust. If a former military spokesman, a man who once spoke for the armed forces, can be buried without a proper autopsy to determine the cause of his death in captivity, what hope is there for an ordinary citizen seeking justice? This was not a natural death. It was a death that occurred in a forest, at the hands of criminals, under conditions of extreme duress that would exacerbate any pre-existing health condition . The state’s eagerness to label this tragedy as "natural" is a reckless attempt to sanitize a national failure and shut down public discourse. Who was responsible for this medical determination, and why was there no interest in investigating the exact cause of death of a Major General?
Furthermore, the operation to rescue the General and his wife exposes a baffling tactical failure. The military stated it knew the location of the bandits, and the Katsina State Government was reportedly in direct contact with the abductors, establishing that their whereabouts were known via phone calls . If the state knew where the General was being held, the most rational military approach would have been to deploy a cordon and seal off all possible escape routes to ensure the kidnappers could not flee. This is a basic principle of military tactics, known as a containment operation, intended to isolate and neutralize a hostile force. Instead, we are told that the General died, and only hours after his death was his corpse recovered, confirming that the location was known to the military. A day later, the military successfully extracted his wife but, according to reports, the bandits had escaped . This sequence of events is a stark contradiction.
This leads to an uncomfortable inquiry into the nature of the military engagement. Did the military truly engage the bandits in a firefight, or was the operation simply a retrieval mission for the body and the wounded wife? After rescuing his wife, who had suffered gunshot wounds, the military's mission appears to have ended. This raises a critical tactical question: how many troops are required to evacuate one wounded woman? The Nigerian Army has a defined casualty evacuation procedure, which begins with collecting a casualty and moving them to a Medical Reception Station . It is unfathomable that the entire contingent of troops involved in the rescue operation would be required solely to evacuate a single person. In any professional force, a designated team would be responsible for the casualty evacuation while the rest of the unit maintained the operation and pursued the fleeing enemy. This was a failure of command, operation, and will. The government is complicit in this outcome, not necessarily by direct action, but by a system that allows for such profound operational incompetence and an overwhelming sense of impunity among criminals.
The most disturbing consequence of this crisis is the breakdown of the social contract between the state and its citizens. The government explicitly advises citizens not to pay ransoms, a policy that is legally sound but practically untenable. When a person’s loved one is held captive, the logic of the state—which has proven incapable of ensuring their safe return—is overridden by the immediate and desperate logic of the family. The bandits demand ransom, and the state offers only a policy of non-negotiation that has repeatedly failed. For a rational, able, and capable person, the choice is not a moral one; it is a rational one. They will pay the ransom. It is a matter of simple probability: the family sees a higher chance of survival by complying with the abductors than by trusting the state's rescue efforts. The fact that a General of the Nigerian Army was treated as a bargaining chip for livestock, as was reportedly demanded by his abductors, highlights the profound disrespect for the state's power . If the state's most revered citizens are reduced to such levels, then the state itself has been profoundly diminished.
The implication is damning: citizens are now more likely to listen to armed non-state actors than to their own government. The state has effectively lost its monopoly on violence and the legitimacy to demand compliance. In such an environment, the government is not seen as a protector but as an obstacle. Citizens will fund their own security, negotiate with criminals, and take matters into their own hands, as they feel the state has abandoned them. The conclusion is both troubling and disturbing. If 99% of Nigerians in such a situation would pay a ransom, then the state has already lost. The war against banditry is being lost, not on the battlefield, but in the hearts and minds of a citizenry that has learned to trust criminals over the state. It is a loss of faith, and it is the most devastating defeat of all.
Mohammed Bello Doka can be reached via [email protected]
Abuja Network News
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