37 Deaths In One Room: Niger State And The Questions We Must Not Bury With Them

37 DEATHS IN ONE ROOM: NIGER STATE AND THE QUESTIONS WE MUST NOT BURY WITH THEM

37 Nigerians died in one room.

Not in a war. Not in an accident on the highway. But in a detention cell in Minna, Niger State.

For over 48 hours, Nigerians have been left to speculate, to argue on WhatsApp groups and Facebook comments about how 37 young men - some of them CHILDREN below 18 - died at once. Some say suffocation. Some say chemical poisoning from mining sites. Some say disease outbreak.

But 48 hours after, where is the official press release?

Where is the science? Where is the truth?

If 37 people died in detention, Nigerians deserve more than rumours. We deserve a FORENSIC TRUTH.

WHO SHOULD BE SPEAKING BY NOW?

This is not a village matter. These are the authorities that must speak NOW:

1. Nigeria Security and Civil Defence Corps (NSCDC) - In whose custody they died. The Commandant has been suspended, but suspension is not an answer.
2. Nigeria Police Force - Criminal Investigation Department (FCID), Niger State Command - The lead agency for criminal investigation of unnatural death.
3. Department of State Services (DSS) - Already part of the investigation committee set up by Governor Bago.
4. Forensic Pathologists & Medical Examiners at General Hospital Minna and Federal Ministry of Health - Only an AUTOPSY, toxicology and histology can tell us if they died of suffocation, lead poisoning, mercury, cyanide or disease. Not a press statement.
5. Federal Ministry of Solid Minerals Development & Federal Ministry of Labour and Employment - Because what took them to that mine in the first place?
6. National Orientation Agency (NOA) and National Environmental Standards and Regulations Enforcement Agency (NESREA)- Where is the awareness?

Governor Bago confirmed 67 boys were crammed into ONE cell, and 37 died. Survivors said they were banging the door, begging for water, drinking their own urine to survive. They were left to gasp for air while officers watched.

If that survivor testimony is true, then we are not just talking about illegal mining. We are talking about negligent homicide and a violation of Section 34 of our Constitution - Right to Dignity.

NOW LET'S TALK ABOUT THE REAL DISEASE: ILLEGAL MINING

For years, we have pretended not to know that illegal mining is the engine of insecurity in Niger, Zamfara, Kebbi and Nasarawa.

Who owns these illegal sites? Who are the sponsors with excavators, who pay peanuts to our sons to dig gold with bare hands? The boys you see are just labourers. The real owners are big men in cities - some with political protection.

Illegal mining in Nigeria is not hustle. It is a CRIME.

Under the Nigerian Minerals and Mining Act 2007, Section 131, unlawful mining without a licence is punishable by imprisonment, fines running into millions, and forfeiture of the minerals and equipment. When it leads to death, it can attract manslaughter and even murder charges under the Criminal Code, and charges of child labour and human trafficking.

But how many owners have been jailed? We arrest the small boys and leave the cartel.

And that gold does not stay here. Reports show it is smuggled out and trafficked through global supply chains while our children die in pits and our communities are taken over by bandits who protect the mines.

We ignored it, until the pit swallowed 37 lives at once.

AND WHAT ABOUT THE CHILDREN?

Some of those bodies on that green tarpaulin were children. Under 18.

Child labour. Cheap labour.

Someone recruited a 16-year-old to go and inhale mercury and lead for N3,000 a day. Who is that person? That is the question we must ask, not just "what killed them?"

The Child Rights Act and the Trafficking in Persons Act is clear. Using children in hazardous labour like mining is a crime. NAPTIP should be on this case too.

PARENTS, LET US ALSO LOOK IN THE MIRROR

I sympathize deeply with the parents. No mother should bury her son like this. May Allah comfort you.

But as parents, let us ask ourselves with a heavy heart - when our 15-year-old son brings home N10,000, N20,000 from a mining site, do we ask him where he got it from? Do we know illegal mining is a crime, or we just don't care because there is hunger in the house?

Poverty is real. I know. But a little accountability can save a life. If we do not question that money, we are silently sending them to death.

AND WHERE IS THE PUBLIC HEALTH CAMPAIGN?

The NOA, Ministry of Health, and State Environmental Agencies have failed these children.

Do our children know that illegal gold mining exposes them to lead poisoning, silicosis, mercury, cyanide that can damage their brain, lungs and kidneys forever? Do they know one night in a chemical-contaminated body inside an airless cell can kill them?

We have not taught them. We have not warned them. We only wait for tragedy to post RIP.

MY CALL TODAY

1. I call on President Bola Tinubu, the Minister of Interior Olubunmi Tunji-Ojo, the IGP and the DSS to ensure a transparent, independent autopsy is published. No cover-up.
2. I call on the Federal Government to NAME and PROSECUTE the owners of the Wushishi and Lukoto illegal mining sites, not just the boys they used.
3. I call on NAFDAC, NOSDRA and Ministry of Solid Minerals to shut down all illegal sites in Niger State and create a register of legal artisanal miners with safety gear.
4. I call on NAPTIP and Ministry of Women Affairs to rescue children from mining pits in Niger and Zamfara.
5. And I call on YOU reading this - Stop celebrating "quick money" from illegal mining. It is blood money.

37 boys went out to look for daily bread. They came back as corpses. If we bury them without answers, we have buried our conscience with them.

May their souls rest in peace. May their families find justice.

We need peace. We need security. And it starts with telling the truth

C O P I E D