Former Speaker of the House of Representatives, Yakubu Dogara, has lamented that the northern part of Nigeria is now operating under a curse.
Speaking on Tuesday during a panel session at the Nigeria Investment and Industrialisation Summit 2025, organised by the Northern Elders Forum in Abuja, Dogara warned that the insecurity situation in the North must be treated as a national emergency.
He fumed over the worsening bloodshed across the region, maintaining that the magnitude of killings in the North had spiritual implications.
Dogara lamented that the “curse” which he associated with the blood flow in the region has crippled development in the North.
He stated, “With the kind of bloodletting we are witnessing in the North, if you are a person of faith, you will know that we are operating under a curse because it is human blood.
“The effect of a curse is that you sweat without results. That is why we are sweating in this part of the country without any tangible outcome.”
Dogara insisted that security must be the top priority before any meaningful development could occur, urging governors in the 19 northern states to pool resources to combat the menace.
“If it will mean pulling all the 19 northern states’ resources together to tackle insecurity, we must do it. Otherwise, all our conversations here will amount to nothing,” he stressed.
Dogara also urged the region to stop depending on external solutions, saying northerners must take charge of their own destiny.
“We need to depart from doing business as usual and embrace radical, transformative action. Help is not coming from anywhere; we must take our destiny into our own hands,” he warned.
He argued that without the development of the region’s vast population, Nigeria’s overall progress would remain stalled.
He added, “The development of northern Nigeria is not a regional prerogative. It must be seen as a national emergency. If the vast number of people we have in the North are not developed, Nigeria is going nowhere.”
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