Boko Haram: Time For Action —Ben Nanagan

Hearing horror tales from a distance has a way of injecting a feeling of apathy and disconsolate nonchalance on the hearer. But for an observer and a victim, the impact is real, profound and traumatising.

The Boko Haram massacre of Friday, 4 November 2011 is another traumatic disaster for the victims and bereaved but for us the traditional sympathisers, it is business as usual. We have paid our condolence visits and made the usual diplomatic statements: “The perpetrators of this wicked act will soon be brought to book;” “The sacrifice of our martyrs shall not be in vain”. And so on and so forth. Such statements come so freely from those mourning the dead but for the bereaved, it is a tale of excruciating pain and eternal trauma. Losing a beloved one is a painful trauma nobody wants to live through.

But the satanically inspired Boko Haram sect has neither compunction nor any iota of moral conscience as they have come to “steal, kill and to destroy”.

I had thought that my last article on Boko Haram would be the one after the UN building bombing in August 2011 but alas, how wrong man could be. To be blunt and candid, Boko Haram has come to stay with us.

Boko Haram announced its nauseating presence in 2002 as a religious cult/sect without any orchestrated philosophy. Some of its resolves then were (1) To islamise all the Northern States (and of course, Nigeria later). (2) To eradicate secular education  and replace it with undiluted Islamic education (3) To jettison any trace of western education or civilization (4) and an unwritten determination to dip the Qur’an in the waters of Southern Nigeria.

Boko Haram’s determination to islamise the 19 states of the North will be an impossible feat as some states there have as much as 85% Christian population specially in Benue, Plateau and Nassarawa states. In Adamawa and Taraba States, Christian population is above 35%. In states like Kaduna, Kogi, Kwara, Katsina, Yobe, Niger and Jigawa, the situation is not too different. Even in predominantly Muslim states like Kano, Sokoto, Bauchi, Borno, total islamisation will be an unfair deal for Nigerians from other cultural and religious backgrounds living in those states.

To Islamise any part of Nigeria is to totally alienate non-Muslim Nigerians residing in such states. How can Nigerians obey Nigeria’s call when the nation is no longer bound in freedom? Nigerians must be free to practice their religions wherever they live. They must never be compelled by a violent religion that negates that cherished freedom which the constitution guarantees us.

Boko Haram, we are told, means a genetic hatred for books (Boko Haram) and the products there from. Hence, its hatred for Western Education and culture even though it’s founding leaders Yusuf Mohammed and Buji Foi were graduates not of Quranic School but from the education system which they abhor so much.

And last week, Boko Haram caused mayhem in a mainly Christian neighborhoods of Damaturu, Yobe state and bombed six churches and two police stations including the state Nigerian Police Force headquarters. In this carnage, at least 63 deaths were recorded while some foreign media with reporters on the ground confirmed that at least 100 people died in the 8 targets in Yobe state alone. In two other separate attacks, two women were killed in a Catholic church in the Zonkwa area of Kaduna state. Another life was also lost in an attack in Maiduguri, Borno state.

These pre-notified bombings are a result of complicity and partisanship on the part of the military, the police, government officials and especially politicians who give these agents of death a leeway to freedom. Most of these bombings are well advertised and the targets are well notified in advance. In fact, the police know these people very well and even hobnob with them as happened before the bombs exploded on the Louis Edet Nigeria Police Force Headquarters on June 17 2011.

The federal government must muster the political will to tackle this breeding monster once and for all. The government has the means and military might to wipe out this dreaded dragon in the making.

Nigerians will recall that the Niger Delta Joint Task Force (JTF) under the command of Brigadier Sarkin Bello discomfited the Niger Delta militants and disorganised and destroyed their bases without, mercy killing over 100 militants in a federal government undeclared reprisal attacks against the militants who were accused of killing 11 soldiers in May 2009. General Sarkin Bello was brutal and merciless and brought the Niger Delta militants to their knees. Nigerians still remember very vividly how the Maitatsine crisis was brought to an abrupt end when the then Federal Government gave the order to flush out and crush the Maitatsine sect. And it took only two days for the then military to crush Maitatsine and his followers and till date, Maitatsine has not resurrected.

When it comes to such orders and operations, the military has no friends. The Boko Haram crisis has been lingering since 2002 and after 9 years of uninterrupted operation, it has grown bolder, more daring and won local and international Islamic sympathy. This has also expanded the sophistication of its network and weaponry. Boko Haram has also grown bigger and stronger in outlook and organisation with affiliations and support from Al Qaeda and other militant groups all over Africa.

If the Federal Government does not nip this cancerous growth in the stem, as it has passed the bud stage, Boko Haram will become more problematic than Al-Shabaab in Somalia which today is causing mayhem not only in Somalia but also in Kenya, Uganda and other neighbouring countries. Today, Al-Shabaab has grown so big that the United Nations, American and an African combined forces code named “Africom” are all fighting to contain it.

Most of the strong rebel groups of the world today became so powerful because the government of their countries did not adopt the right approach at containing them ab initio. The Aceh rebels of Indonesia, the FARC rebels of Colombia, the Yemeni Al-Qaeda, the Mungiki of Kenya, the Janjaweed of Sudan- and the almighty Taliban of Afghanistan.

The origin of the term Taliban is as controversial as it was in 1994 as it is today. Some Asian watchers believe that the young militants who rescued the first Pakistani trade convoy from the Afghan warlords in Kandahar in October 1994 are the progenitors of today’s Taliban.

But Hafiz Abdul Rasheed, a Taliban activist in Quetta disagrees with this story as some others have traced its origin to 1985-6. Today the Taliban is a parallel government in Afghanistan and they have killed many provincial governors, legislators and even a former President and many high profile dignitaries.

Nigeria will be exposed to global ridicule and shame if the Taliban situation is replicated in Nigeria. Nigeria is too elastic to absorb such a shock and the inevitable result is for the now threadbare bond that holds us together, to snap.

The Federal Government has to act fast to avoid the international community placing the “no-go-area” tag on Nigeria. If this happens, our already fragile economy will collapse as foreign investors will shun Nigeria and seek investment opportunities elsewhere.

Perhaps the easiest way out of this impasse is to adopt the solution of Alhaji Bala Nallah, a member of the last Federal House of Representatives who suggested that the 20 million people who inhabit the restive areas of the Niger Delta be wiped off with a big bomb so that the Federal Government could have access to the region’s crude oil.

Even though Gen. Sarkin Bello did not drop the big bomb in the Niger Delta, he responded to Rep. Bala Nallah’s prompting and routed the militants of the Niger Delta.

The Federal Government needs to give the order as the Nigerian Army does not lack able officers to wipe out Boko Haram. Yes it is possible.

•Nanaghan writes from Lagos