Monday May 28th was declared as the National Day of Mourning and people from all walks of life converged on the Unity Fountain, Abuja, to mourn victims of killings across the country. The mourners were clad in black shirts with the inscription #OneDeathTooMany. Civil society groups, human rights activists, and family members of some victims were in attendance. Chidi Odinkalu, convener of the programme, said the event was organised to acknowledge the departed. He lamented that killer herders were controlling territories in the middle belt while kidnappers and cultists had taken over the south-east and south-south.

“The government is losing territory to armed bandits who are killing Nigerians and the same government who should lead us against this things are now the one dividing Nigerians. We are now in a country where human life is meaningless and in which Nigerians are being divided across ethnic and sectarian boundaries when people die. And we want to call attention to the need to return our country to what matters; a sheer humanity and citizenship and that is the only way you can run a united democratic republic. If you don’t have citizens and you don’t honour human life, you cannot have a country,” he said.

Innocent ‘2Baba’ Idibia, an activist and musician, Oby Ezekwesili, a former minister of education, were among those present at the mourning event.