Before The Bullet, There Was History: Why Nigeria Needs Historians To Contain Insecurity
The Oasis Reporters
September 29, 2026
By Kenneth Azaigba
For over a decade, Nigeria’s response to insecurity has been dominated by two groups: security operatives and politicians. We deploy troops, we hold security summits, we negotiate amnesty, yet the conflict persists and often mutates. The missing chair at the security meeting is often that of the professional historian.
But no bullet fires without history. Before the trigger is pulled, there is often a claim. Bullet is the final chapter. History is the first chapter. If you want to stop a bullet, you must begin from the trigger, security personnel are reactive. They react to threats, not why it happened.
Obviously, the absence of historians at security roundtables is not accidental; it is a product of our institutional amnesia. In doing so, we ignore that insecurity has a genealogy. This is why professional historians need to be involved in conflict containment. Professional historians are not storytellers of the past; we are analysts of process. Conflict resolution without historical analysis is medicine without diagnosis. Three examples suffice:
a) Historical Root = Cause Analysis: What the media calls “farmer-herder conflict” is a century-long contestation over land tenure, colonial grazing reserves, and post-independence agricultural policies. Without understanding how the Burtali system collapsed or how the 1978 Land Use Act altered communal ownership, any peace accord is temporary. Every conflict has a biography. You cannot treat fever without knowing the medical history of the patient. Thus, when only soldiers and politicians are involved, it ends at treating symptoms. But when historians are involved, the causes of conflict are unearthed.
b)Deconstruction of Conflict Myths: Every conflict group weaponizes history — selective memories, invented grievances, distorted narratives of who owns Jos, Southern Kaduna, Yelwata, or Katsina.
The professional historian, trained in source criticism and archival method, is the only actor equipped to interrogate these claims and dismantle the ideological justification for violence.
As Marc Bloch submits; Historian is a judge who interrogates witnesses – oral, written, archaeological and delivers verdict based on evidence, not sentiment. Y. B. Usman adds; The manipulation of history is central to the manipulation of power in Nigeria. Without professional historians, communities will kill each other over manipulated history.
C) Institutional Memory for Sustainable Peace: Military operations end battles; institutional memory ends wars. When the army withdraws, who keeps the record of peace agreements, boundary adjustments, and transitional justice promises? Without documentation and preservation by historians, societies repeat their conflicts because they have forgotten how the previous one ended.
According to William Zartman, African conflicts persist because peace agreements ignore historical agreements.
History is not decoration in negotiation; it is foundation.
In my study on rural conflict, I found that precolonial Tiv had ityo system and Fulani had Pulaaku code that regulated coexistence for 100 years.
Colonialism broke it.The Post colonial state did not rebuild. Security personnel and politicians don’t remember this, a historian does.
Security agencies provide security; historians provide context for security. Until we integrate professional historical expertise into State Peacebuilding Agencies, Ministry of Internal Security, and the National Counter-Terrorism Centre, we will continue to fight the symptoms while ignoring the structure.
Before the bullet was fired, there was a history that made it inevitable. It is time we listened to those trained to read it. For as Azaigba argues; “…you cannot secure what you do not understand historically. Security without history is temporary occupation, not peace.”
Kenneth Azaigba is a Professor in the department of History and Strategic Studies, Federal University Dutsin-Ma, Katsina State.
