By Musa Ladan<\/p>\n
The occasional attempts by Boko Haram insurgents to make statements with
\npoorly thought out but nonetheless daring attacks for me is a thing of
\nconcern. I am concerned not because I think the group can resurge to the
\nsick height it got to in its depravity but because factors and persons
\noutside of the group would want it to and seem to be doing all they can to
\nreturn the country into the nightmare scenario.<\/p>\n
This concerns are neither misplaced nor exaggerated. For instance, I have
\nconstantly asked myself what it is that the people of the North-East,
\nparticularly Borno want.\u00a0 To the best of my knowledge and based on new
\nreports, Boko Haram has been largely degraded while several pledges have
\nbeen made toward rebuilding the area \u00e2\u20ac\u201c there is even a Northeast
\nDevelopment Commission in the offing with the enabling Act in the making
\nbefore the National Assembly. What is however missing is the buy-in and
\nsupport of those that parade as the leaders in Borno state.<\/p>\n
Their contributions, if they can be so called, have been mostly petty
\npolitics, bickering and self-interest that have only served to distract the
\nanti-terror fight. In some instances, these attitudes transcend the scope
\nof distraction to look like deliberate acts of sabotaging efforts at
\nbringing peace back to the place.<\/p>\n
I consider the case of the Senator representing Borno Central, Baba Kaka
\nGrabai, who as recently as February this year claimed that the terror group
\ncontrolled half of the state when the reverse was the case. He made this
\nallegation at a time when the insurgents barely controlled one local
\ngovernment or have been largely funnelled into Sambisa forest where troops
\nare still cleaning out remnants of the terror group. There other
\npoliticians in the state that are of the same bend. They act to boost the
\nmorale of insurgents and they cannot claim this was being done unwittingly.<\/p>\n
The Chibok Girl\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s Parents Association has been no less disruptive. Its
\nchairman, Mr. Yakubu Nkeki\u00e2\u20ac\u017d, was more interested in the place of ancestry
\nof a rescued girl than in the hope offered by another child escaping
\nslavery and deprivation. The throve of intelligence she could offer and
\nassist with the rescue of scores of the children still in the grips of
\nterrorists was insignificant so long as she was not abducted in Chibok or
\nnot on a list that the military had compiled of the stolen girls. The
\nassociation through its utterances after the rescues suggested Chibok is a
\ndistinct state of the federation or even an independent republic that had
\nno business with the rest of the country.<\/p>\n
I am equally challenging Borno Elders Forum to prove they have done enough
\nand that they have not been used or being used by embedded interests in
\ntheir ranks. They have taken positions in the past that left me wondering
\nwhether as elders they truly want the crisis to end and life returning to
\nnormal.
\nNo less deserving of my dissatisfaction is the National Security Adviser
\n(NSA), Brig-Gen. Babagana Munguno (rtd), who incidentally hails from that
\nstate. Layman thinking would project that he would pitch in his best to use
\nhis office to restore peace to the state but nothing \u00e2\u20ac\u201c body language,
\nutterances and actions, has shown that he has any interest in ending the
\ninsurgency even now that Boko Haram has been battered to its weakest.\u00a0 He
\nshould, in my expectations, be on the case of the Ministry of Defence and
\nmilitary services to deliver the last surviving Boko Haram terrorist to him
\nfor trial. Such request would follow only after properly empowering them of
\ncourse. I don\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t think any right thinking person would have accused him of
\nbeing partial or sectional because the northeast is deserving of all the
\nnational attention it can get now.<\/p>\n
And there are the other assorted collection of groups and caucuses that are
\nused as fronts by the vicious politicians from the state and at federal
\nlevel, who possibly want terrorism to be sustained because they have turned
\nit into an industry; there is money to be made from federal government
\nfunding and international organisations\u00e2\u20ac\u2122 intervention. If the group that
\nnecessitated the interventions gets wiped out, then the cash runs dry so
\nfor them this is not a desirable outcome. So they cook up the most
\noutrageous of stories to float so that troops can be distracted and the
\nfederal government left in confusion. Among their ranks are the
\ncollaborators that validate bogus claims of questionable NGOs that attempt
\nto cripple troop\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s ability to fight.<\/p>\n
Not to be outdone are the so called activists from other states and the FCT
\nthat have somehow discovered that there is money to be made from disasters.
\nThe continued existence of Boko Haram guarantees their meal tickets since
\neach atrocity the group commits provides another item to use for
\nblackmailing the government.<\/p>\n
I advise the Presidency that whatever progress is being made in the fight
\nagainst Boko Haram must be weighed against the true intention of the
\nleaders in Borno state. Do they want terrorism to be defeated or are they
\nkin on retaining it as an industry? How much has the collective attitude
\nand influence of the all the groups identified above contributed to our not
\nhaving finished the fight? Who else among the state\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s population are
\nworking to continue giving the incentives to terrorists? What roles have
\nthese various groups played at the various stages of the conflict?<\/p>\n
I strongly think it would be damaging if President Buhari in his May 2017
\nspeech has to again refer to the Boko Haram fight in the present continuous
\ntense simply because the very people of the state are frustrating the war
\nto end the insurgency. In case they have not noticed, the war is costing
\nanything in the region of a fourth of our (real) national expenditure in
\naddition to costing the lives of other Nigerians from other states. There
\nis another security concern brewing up in the South-south for which the
\nmilitary is needed. So we cannot be fixated on Borno state forever. Those
\nsustaining terrorism in the state \u00e2\u20ac\u201c actively, through inaction or just
\nsabotage \u00e2\u20ac\u201c should know that the fundamentals of the crisis are not
\ninelastic; something will give soon.<\/p>\n
Ladan, a lecturer contributed this piece from University of Maiduguri.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
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