Wednesday 01 April, 2026

Nigeria spent N5.41 trillion on defence in 2026. Thirteen people were killed at a wedding in Kaduna.

Bandits arrived at a wedding in Kahir village in Kagarko Local Government Area, Kaduna State on the night of 30 March. They were armed with AK-47s. They killed 13 people and abducted others. Hours earlier, gunmen had attacked the Angwan Rukuba community in Jos, Plateau State, killing residents in their homes.

By the following morning, the President had condemned both attacks. He described the perpetrators as "heartless cowards." He directed security agencies to "act on early warning intelligence." He announced the government is "acquiring more sophisticated equipment." Operation Enduring Peace deployed troops. The Plateau governor visited the community and vowed justice.

This is the full response. This is what it looks like every time.

Last December, Tinubu presented the 2026 federal budget of N58.18 trillion, with N5.41 trillion allocated to defence and security. That figure is not nothing. Nigeria has active military operations across the northeast, the northwest, and the Middle Belt. Troops are deployed. Equipment is being procured. The government is not pretending the security situation doesn't exist.

What the government is not doing is changing the conditions that produce it.

The UN's top humanitarian official in Nigeria said earlier this year that Nigeria's violence extends far beyond any single religious community or conflict. It is driven by climate pressure, land competition, governance failure in rural areas, and criminal networks that have operated in the northwest for long enough to have their own supply chains. Nigeria has roughly 3.5 million internally displaced people. The humanitarian response plan that raised close to $1 billion annually a few years ago raised barely $262 million last year.

The attacks in Kaduna and Plateau are not surprises. They are the continuation of a pattern that condemnations and operation names have not broken. The Middle Belt has been burying its dead between presidential statements for years. Operation Safe Haven, Operation Cat Race, Operation Whirl Stroke. The operations are named, the troops are deployed, the statements are issued. The funerals continue.

Kahir village had a wedding. They had families gathering the way families do. What they didn't have was the thing a N5.41 trillion defence budget is supposed to provide.

The remaining abductees from Kahir haven't come home yet. The statement from Aso Rock has been filed. The operation is named. The wedding is over.