PLATEAU PEOPLE: ACCEPT PLURALITY, LET PEACE REIGN — DON’T ALLOW SELF-SERVING VOICES TO DIVIDE YOU
By The Analyst Editorial Desk
There comes a time when a society must pause and ask a difficult question: who truly benefits when its people are constantly pushed against one another?
For the people of Plateau State, that question has become increasingly important.
Plateau is not a community of one voice, one interest, one political persuasion or one ethnic identity. It is a plural society, built by different peoples, cultures, faiths, political tendencies and communities. That plurality is not a weakness. It is one of the defining realities of the state.
The danger begins when legitimate differences are deliberately transformed into permanent hostility.
Political disagreements are normal. Competition for public office is normal. Criticism of government is necessary. Communities have every right to demand justice, accountability, development and equal treatment.
But disagreement becomes dangerous when politicians, activists, commentators or other influential voices deliberately reduce every issue to “us versus them.”
That is where Plateau must draw the line.
Who benefits from division?
An investigative approach to any prolonged crisis should go beyond the loudest speeches and ask a more fundamental question:
Who gains politically, economically or socially when ordinary citizens remain divided?
When citizens are busy fighting over ethnicity, religion, political affiliation or regional identity, attention can easily be diverted from questions that matter more directly to their welfare.
Where are the jobs?
Where are the functioning schools?
Where are the hospitals?
Where is agricultural productivity?
Where are the roads?
Where is security?
Where are the investments capable of keeping young people productively engaged?
Where is the accountability for public resources?
These questions should not disappear simply because political actors have succeeded in creating another argument for citizens to fight about.
The people of Plateau should therefore be suspicious of any narrative that requires them to hate one another before they can support a political cause.
Plurality is not betrayal
There is a dangerous tendency in public discourse to treat disagreement as disloyalty.
A Plateau citizen can love Plateau and still disagree with another Plateau citizen.
A Christian can disagree with another Christian.
A Muslim can disagree with another Muslim.
A member of one ethnic group can disagree with another member of the same group.
A supporter of one political party can engage another supporter without turning political disagreement into personal warfare.
That is democracy.
The alternative is not unity. It is enforced conformity.
And a society that cannot tolerate legitimate disagreement eventually becomes vulnerable to manipulation by the loudest and most organised voices.
Plateau must reject the politics of permanent suspicion
The people must also be careful about narratives that portray every political disagreement as an existential battle.
Not every disagreement is an attack on Plateau.
Not every criticism is hatred.
Not every political opponent is an enemy.
And not every person who speaks loudly in the name of the people necessarily speaks for the people.
This is where citizens must become more demanding.
Ask for evidence. Demand facts. Examine records. Follow the money. Question claims. Compare promises with performance.
That is how a politically conscious population protects itself.
The real enemy of democratic development is not disagreement. It is a society in which citizens stop asking questions because they have been emotionally mobilised against one another.
Peace is not surrender
There should also be no misunderstanding about peace.
Calling for peace does not mean asking victims of injustice to remain silent.
Peace without justice can be fragile.
But justice itself must be pursued through lawful, democratic and peaceful means.
Where there are allegations of wrongdoing, the appropriate response is investigation, evidence, due process and accountability — not collective punishment, ethnic hostility or political vendettas.
Where government fails, citizens should demand answers.
Where public officials abuse power, institutions should investigate.
Where criminality is established, the law should take its course.
But citizens should not be encouraged to become enemies merely because they belong to different political camps.
The dangerous business of speaking for everyone
One of the most important questions Plateau citizens should ask is:
Who gave any individual the authority to define the position of an entire people?
Plateau has millions of citizens.
No politician, activist, traditional leader, religious figure, commentator or pressure group can reasonably claim that his or her personal position automatically represents every Plateau citizen.
The people are diverse.
Their interests are diverse.
Their political choices are diverse.
Their experiences are diverse.
Their conclusions will therefore naturally differ.
That is not a crisis.
That is plurality.
The crisis comes when somebody attempts to convert personal ambition, political frustration or sectional interest into a supposed collective mandate without allowing other citizens to speak.
Do not surrender Plateau to political entrepreneurs
Every society has individuals who discover that division can be politically profitable.
They may not always announce their intentions openly. Sometimes the language is wrapped in patriotism. Sometimes it comes disguised as defence of the people. Sometimes it is presented as an uncompromising struggle for justice.
But citizens must look beyond the rhetoric.
What exactly is being proposed?
What evidence supports the accusation?
Who benefits from the mobilisation?
What happens after the anger has been generated?
Does the campaign produce solutions or merely permanent enemies?
Those questions matter.
Patriotism should never become a licence to silence fellow citizens.
And nobody should be allowed to monopolise the definition of what it means to love Plateau.
Plateau belongs to all its people
The future of Plateau cannot be built by one ethnic group against another.
It cannot be built by one religion against another.
It cannot be built by one political party against the rest.
And it certainly cannot be built by permanently converting political opponents into enemies.
The state needs citizens who can disagree without destroying one another.
It needs journalists who investigate rather than inflame.
It needs politicians who compete without poisoning society.
It needs civil society organisations that demand accountability without becoming instruments of factional warfare.
It needs citizens who can distinguish patriotism from propaganda and accountability from political vendetta.
Most importantly, it needs a generation that refuses to inherit yesterday's hatred as tomorrow's political strategy.
The choice before Plateau
The people of Plateau have a choice.
They can allow every political disagreement to become an ethnic confrontation, every criticism to become an accusation of betrayal and every election to become another excuse for division.
Or they can mature politically.
They can disagree.
They can investigate.
They can challenge government.
They can support different candidates.
They can expose wrongdoing.
They can demand justice.
And after all of that, they can still sit at the same table as Plateau citizens.
That is the maturity democracy demands.
The state does not need uniformity.
It needs responsible plurality.
It does not need silence.
It needs evidence-based debate.
It does not need manufactured enemies.
It needs accountability.
And it does not need citizens who are permanently suspicious of one another.
It needs peace strong enough to accommodate disagreement.
Plateau belongs to its people — all of them.
No political ambition, sectional interest or personal agenda should be allowed to become more important than the peace and future of the state.
Let Plateau disagree without destroying itself. Let justice be pursued without hatred. Let plurality exist without fear. And let the people refuse to be divided by anyone whose politics depends on keeping them apart.
The Analyst — Strenthening Investigative Journalism.